Affiliate marketing is a very popular way to make money online. You get paid a commission for the sales or traffic a particular product gets through your referrals. So are you thinking of starting affiliate marketing, but don’t know how to get started? Well, you’ve come to the right place!

Affiliate Marketing Make Money Online

From what you have probably heard, affiliate marketing is something that makes you rich within months with no effort whatsoever. This couldn’t be any farther away from reality. Although you can make money while sleeping (passive income), you will have to put a lot of work in first. If you are an expert it will take you less time. What’s the most time-consuming as a beginner is learning all the online marketing tactics.

Now there are a lot of ways how to drive traffic to affiliate offers. Where many people rave about social media marketing, email marketing is reportedly more powerful specifically for affiliate marketing. Other ways would be by creating a website and driving organic traffic from Google. If you are a beginner you are probably interested in the fastest way, so here it is (but remember, if you want to do this long term, please take it seriously and put the effort into creating a website and great content).

generating traffic with email marketing

Here is a complete affiliate email marketing guide to help you ace your affiliate journey.

So sit back bud, you have got a long journey ahead!

What Is An Email Marketing Funnel?

Before we delve into specifics, let’s get our fundamentals right and see why email is one of the most effective ways to market affiliate products.

An email funnel is a representation of how your subscribers turn from prospective leads to an actual customers through the engine and educational email communications. Here’s a diagram to help you grasp the idea properly.

email sales funnel diagram

Once you have understood the concept, that’ when you’ll find out how to understand and anticipate customer needs and the right time to shoot the pitch.

Why You Should Use Email Marketing for Affiliate Marketing

Now that was it for email marketing, but what makes us say emailing marketing is better for expanding your affiliate circle better than any other platform out there? Glad you asked that.

Social media also allows you to advertise and get referrals, you won’t be able to put everything under control if the platform has temporary shutdowns or perhaps not everyone will be using that specific social media platform. Whereas, an email is a place where you can expect an audience of everyone who is using the internet today. Social media works, but is very active and very dependent on the platform itself. Collecting emails and building an email list is something no one can take away from you, and when starting it might be easier than building an entire website with a lot of content.

Besides that, unlike pay-per-click (PPC) ads, your emails won’t wholly be cold leads. They will be people who are interested in your content and are actively engaging with your activities, which gives email an upper hand to influence people better than any other advertising method out there.

Here are the top 3 best ways you can leverage each minute you spend on affiliate email marketing to get the maximum output.

1. Choose the Right Products to Sell

Where email marketing can yield numerous benefits, there are few things that you need to keep in mind. Since your subscribers are interested in what you do, you need to respect their choices and offer them something that is not only profitable for you but will stay in your niche as well.

Before opting to affiliate with a product, ask yourself whether:

  • There is a demand for the product
  • Is the product related to your niche?
  • Does this product allow me to upsell (spoiler alert: we’re going to talk about it in a few seconds)

Once you find a product that perfectly suits these three questions, you can rest assured that your marketing products are going to make you a fortune.

What are Upsells?

Since we have already touched upon getting the products that you can upsell, but do you even know why and how you’re going to do that? Well, as promised, I’ve got your back again!

Upselling is one of the greatest opportunities to make money by offering additional related products once you notice your customer is hooked on the product. After all, it’s never a bad idea to entice a customer to buy 2 or maybe 3 products when he/she initially came to buy 1.

To be entirely correct, actually this would be called cross-selling. Up-selling would be if you allow them to buy a even better version of the product.

cross selling and upselling

For example, you are currently marketing a hoodie right now. Once you send an affiliate link to that hoodie, also include pictures of celebrities or other people pairing that hoodie with different styles and accessories; perhaps jeans, watches, or bags.

Along with the pictures, you can link to the products they are wearing. As a result, your customer is more likely to buy more than just that hoodie. So, where you were about to make $10 from that specific person, you are making $15.

Create an Affiliate Emailing Sequence

When I talk about sequence here, I mean it in two ways: a sequence of products and sequence of approach.

The sequence of products:

Now, as this is clear that you should stay in your niche, you need to start strategizing your affiliate links, which will directly improve the chances of landing a sale. How? Let me give you an example.

For instance, you’re a fitness trainer who strategizes the order in which you need to sell your products. You start by sending out links to beginner programs, then perhaps a few emails of pure content where you help them achieve their goals by giving tips, blog posts, and building relationships.

The next one could be about an advanced fitness program with athletic wear clothing. Then, the tools and gadgets that they would need to match up to the advanced level. From there you can shift to complementary products like healthy food guide books, products, and everything that revolves around the fitness world to change at least one customer’s fitness life.

Thus, everything boils down to picturing an ideal customer in your mind, understanding their problems, and helping them from the scratch with your affiliate products to improve their life. Yes, it’s that simple to be successful.

The sequence of Approach:

Remember affiliate marketing is not the same as door-to-sales, where all you do is brag about your products and not acknowledge the position of your customers. Rather affiliate marketing is more like referring a product to someone. Like a friend who came over for a coffee and told you about their weight issues, and, you, the typical you, have just the right solution to help your friend with the right products. except here your friend isn’t the only one benefiting from it, you’re also making some really awesome bucks here.

Therefore, before you distance yourself from potential customers by being uptight with your approach and products, start by building a connection first.

Once a subscriber has opted for your email, start with a welcome email. Then about how you understand their problem and who are you to help them; blog posts could be a great asset here. Once you think you’ve enough engagement, bam! You’re all set to shoot the link to your first affiliate product.

2. Get Affiliate Email Marketing Started

Now that you have an idea of what to do with the products and how to get your perspective straight, it’s time we get practical.

When you opt for an email service provider, make sure it allows you to carry out Affiliate marketing. This is imperative, since many email service providers either restrict your account for doing this or, worse, block access to your entire email list.

I tried out many email marketing service providers. The one I cannot recommend is Mailchimp. I used it for a few weeks, and because I promoted products in the “make money online” niche, they blocked my account. So, not ideal for affiliate marketers.

The 2 services I can recommend are:

After the incident with MailChimp, I switched to Moosend. They have a cool UI and very friendly support. After a while, I switched to GetResponse though, because they also have the functionality to do Webinars. So, instead of paying for 2 email marketing software, I chose to move to GetResponse.

How to Write a Captivating Email Content

So it’s clear what you’re doing to do and how you’re going to start the email journey. But what if after all this hard work, you lack the right techniques of marketing that are actually the key to make sales?

Well, don’t overthink this too much, I’ve done all the research from your end. Here’s a step-by-step guide to writing a compelling affiliate email.

  • Keep your subject line concise and punchy: do a thorough research of the type of sentences that will make it irresistible for any subscriber to not open your email. Make sure your subject lines aren’t spammy.
  • Copy: while writing content, make sure your copy talks about exactly what the product’s website stands for. Along with that, pay close attention to the responsiveness of your email templates so mobile users can also access the information.
  • Strategize the content: bullet points and short sentences are more likely to grab sentences, so break down your large chunks of information into infographics, templates, bullet points, and pictures; all while taking care of alt text in each.

3. Automate your Email Campaigns

You automate your email campaigns using autoresponders. It works by creating a series of emails that are automatically sent to anyone who subscribes to your email. This, in return, saves you time in abundance so you take full advantage of being an affiliate marketer.

Email Automation for Affiliate Marketing

You can do this by, as mentioned earlier, strategizing your content and creating a sequence of the product from the bottom to the top in order to get the utmost engagement and sales. Along with your affiliate links, these could also be related to surveys, daily tips, weekly blog posts, or perhaps newsletters.

Conclusion

To wrap up the guide, in these few minutes the only thing you need to take away is how can you find the right products to market, how can you empathize with your subscribers, and a solid way you can put your affiliate program to action.

Now, this was just a small proportion from your part to be a successful affiliate marketer. To dig in deeper and further enhance your Affiliate Email Marketing skills, you can go to the following page and sign up for a free 3-day course: FREE 3 Day Email Marketing Course

Should you be interested in building a website and earn money as an affiliate marketer, I can recommend joining Wealthy Affiliate, that’s where I started my journey in 2015. -> Join Wealthy Affiliate for free <-