This list is a list of affiliate marketing hacks that you can use to increase your affiliate sales.
By “hacks” I don’t mean some magic software that will generate thousands of commissions.
That doesn’t exist…
What I mean by “hacks” is real tips that can make a big impact on your affiliate sales, if followed correctly.
These tips will also help you realize what part of your affiliate marketing business you need to spend more time on.
Affiliate Marketing Hacks – About This List
This is list is made up of tips that have helped me as an affiliate.
They all have a lot of benefits and that’s why they are on this list.
However, it doesn’t mean that all successful affiliates follow these tips.
There are thousands of ways of earning commissions and there are thousands of people who are successful with each method.
This list is in no particular order because it depends on you which ones you find helpful.
If you enjoy this list feel free to leave a comment at the bottom of this page!
1. Treat Affiliate Marketing Like A Business
Affiliate Marketing is a real business model.
It is not a way to earn a quick buck.
That means you need to treat it like a business…
Now, what do I mean by that?
I mean that you have to invest time and money upfront before seeing a return, just like in any other business.
Well, I say that but you can also just invest time or money. However, you will need more of whichever one you have (If you only choose to use one).
You need to be prepared to invest time and/or money to gain real experience, knowledge & a positive ROI.
Think long term!
2. Offer Value
This one is also really important.
Your goal is to help people have the solution to their problem and that’s how to get conversions.
You don’t make a purchase from somebody who annoys you, you make a purchase from someone who has the solution to your problem.
Otherwise, it will get a bit too boring for my regular readers!
3. Build Affiliate Marketing Assets
Your Assets are this tree. The tree produces traffic.
Learning to build assets is one of my favorite affiliate marketing hacks.
Here’s why…
Everyone always talks about affiliate marketing passive income but doesn’t go in-depth about how to create it.
Well, let me explain to you, you need to create traffic producing assets.
Assets that will produce traffic (and therefore money) to your affiliate links where purchases are made.
Don’t focus on messaging people trying to sell a product, that is worse than a job.
You are just trading your time for nothing because the chances they will make a purchase are extremely low and is not guaranteed at all.
If you are working a job, at least you are guaranteed some payment.
Now, you might say that you aren’t guaranteed of making sales anyway, but you are if:
You never give up
Focus on building traffic producing assets and keep building them
You are productive
Examples of Affiliate marketing assets include:
Your blog
Your email list
Your social media
4. Promote A Variety Of Products
This one is important so that you aren’t too reliant on one product/ payment.
It is also important so that you have different price tiers of products.
A variety of low ticket, medium ticket, and high ticket products is always beneficial.
This is because it is very likely that some people will only buy low or mid ticket items and some people will buy all.
It’s simply so that you generate as many affiliate commissions as possible.
5. Drive Different Types Of Traffic
Driving different types of traffic can be great because you get the chance to tap into a way bigger market.
Personally, I like using a variety of paid and free methods to build up my email list which I then also use to drive more traffic.
You also have a higher chance of finding an insane ROI traffic method that works for you. Driving different types of traffic will also lead to faster growth.
So, again if you are only driving one type of traffic, you should rethink that.
Now, this is more of a general business hack, but when you 10x your goals, your entire mindset changes in such a positive way.
You start putting more work in, you start cutting down on liabilities and investing it into your business.
In affiliate marketing, depending on what methods you use, you can always put in more of everything.
You can double the number of articles you write, double the amount of money you put into ads etc.
The quicker you do that, is the quicker you will succeed.
7. Promote Products With Recurring Commissions
This hack is actually pretty basic.
If you are promoting products with recurring commissions, each sale will give you multiple commissions.
That means you will get more commissions…
While this one is pretty basic, it is works wonders.
Recurring commissions will help you build up a sustainable affiliate marketing income a lot easier.
If a product costs $40 per month and you get 50% commission, you only need to refer 100 people to earn an extra $2000 a month.
Now, imagine the commissions you would be getting when after 5 years, you have a blog with 50,000 visitors per month and an email list of 100,000 people.
That goes back to building assets as well, both of these are so important.
That is why I definitely wanted to put it on this list of affiliate marketing hacks despite it being basic and obvious.
In this affiliate marketing explained article, I am going to cover everything you need to know about affiliate marketing.
This includes what it actually is, the most popular affiliate programs and how you can get started today.
I am also going to cover 5 common misconceptions, that I often see around the Internet.
Another thing that I am going to cover is frequently asked questions because I often see the same questions.
By the end of this article, you will not only have a good understanding of affiliate marketing, but you will also be able to start building your affiliate marketing business today.
Affiliate Marketing Explained: What Is It?
The concept of affiliate marketing is actually pretty simple.
Affiliate marketing is when you (the affiliate), sell someone else’s product through your tracking link, and you get a commission. Pretty simple huh?
Affiliate Marketing is a real way of making money online and anyone can do it. There are no limits to how much you can sell because you can sell products while you are sleeping.
Well, while the concept of it is pretty simple most people fail. This is often because they are just trying to make a quick buck and they don’t treat it as a business.
Affiliate marketing is a real business model, and like any other business model, it takes time, effort and consistency.
Another reason why a lot of people fail is that they simply do it wrong.
The selling is the hard part of any business and there are some tricks that you need to use in order to be successful.
Why Affiliate Marketing Is The Easiest Online Business
Affiliate Marketing is by far the easiest online business that anyone can start.
You do not need your own product, customer support and you don’t need to handle all the problems that come with having your own product.
All you need to do is handle the selling.
However, just like with any online business it still isn’t the easiest thing in the world.
That means you need to test, follow working strategies and stay consistent.
Otherwise, you will probably fail.
Affiliate Marketing is by far the easiest online business though, as I explained above. Most people start with affiliate marketing before they go into other online businesses.
That is also proof that it is the easiest online business.
Common Misconceptions About Affiliate Marketing
Below you will see the Top 5 Misconceptions that I have seen about affiliate marketing.
All 5 Of these are not true.
For sure, there will be more out there, but these are the Top 5 Misconceptions that I have seen around the Internet.
1. Is Affiliate Marketing A Scam?
Personally, I always find this one quite funny because I do not understand how it could be a scam.
As I mentioned above, affiliate marketing is a real business and it is when you sell someone else’s link for a commission.
Affiliate Marketing is used by some of the biggest companies in the world such as Amazon and GoDaddy.
They also have affiliates and I can tell you they did not get to where they are by scamming people.
An Example that will help you understand
Below is an example to help you understand why affiliate marketing is real and isn’t a scam.
Someone has an online course on social media marketing that they sell for $300.
They have created this course once & there is no additional cost to creating the product. So if someone would sell the product for him, he would not mind giving them half the money, 50% commission.
Well, that person is you, so he creates a tracking link for you so when someone purchases through that link, the sale gets tracked to you.
Then you get the commission. The owner of the course is happy because he is selling more of his courses with less effort and you are happy because you are earning commissions.
The customer will also be happy, assuming it is a good product that offers value.
You can switch this model with anything, even physical products. However, if used with physical products the commission will probably be a lot lower because there is the cost of the production of the product.
Why Do People Think Affiliate Marketing Is A Scam?
I am not sure if I am completely honest.
However, I have some ideas about why some people might think it is a scam.
Gurus displaying aggressive earning claims, and promising you to be rich overnight.
Gurus selling useless courses, with affiliates for that course.
Other than that, I do not have an explanation unless the people who say that it is a scam simply don’t understand the business model.
2. Is Affiliate Marketing MLM?
In case, you don’t know what MLM is, it is multi-level marketing.
Wikipedia definition: Multi-level marketing (MLM), also called pyramid selling,network marketing, and referral marketing, is a marketing strategy for the sale of products or services where the revenue of the MLM company is derived from a non-salaried workforce selling the company’s products/services, while the earnings of the participants are derived from a pyramid-shaped or binary compensation commission system.
So, MLM is when a company is selling a product and at the same time tries to recruit a non-workforce to work for them on a commission basis, while anyone working in the pyramid-shaped system also gets paid for the commissions of the users below them.
So, for example, if you and me would work in an MLM company and I have referred you, you make the purchase I get the commission. Up until now, everything’s fine. However, now I will recruit you and you go out and make a sale. Now, you get a commission but I make a commission as well because I referred you. If they make a sale, you get the commission and I also get a commission and it goes on and on so you can have thousands of people working under you. It is basically a pyramid scheme.
While this may interest some of you, it really shouldn’t.
Personally, I have never tried any sort of MLM myself, however, I have heard from tons of people that it can get you into some real trouble such as debt.
And btw, statistics show that only 3 out of 1000 are profitable with MLM. 0.3%! Less Than 1%
It is also very looked down on in most communities and it can also be very addicting apparently, in a sense that you do not stop bothering your friends & family and trying to get them to join.
Affiliate Marketing is completely different, you & the vendor are the only people getting paid for the sales you make.
It’s like digital sales closing, or a digital salesperson, with the advantage of being able to do it in so many different ways because you can use your link in so many different ways.
Emails
Blogs
Social Media
Funnels
If you would like more information on why MLM is something that you should stay away from, watch the video below.
3. Is Affiliate Marketing Dead?
This is also one of the questions that simply does not make any sense.
As long as there will be products online that are selling, affiliate marketing will be there too. Why?
Because it is beneficial to everyone. Businesses will always want affiliates to sell their products.
Also, the easiest way to earn a full-time income through affiliate marketing is definitely the knowledge industry, which is a $369 Billion dollar Industry.
And it’s only getting bigger. So no, Affiliate marketing is not dead and is not predicted to slow down for a long time.
4. Is Affiliate marketing a “Get Rich Quick Scheme”?
No, it really isn’t. Affiliate marketing is a real way of making money online. However, it is also a real business. That means that you have to invest time and/or money upfront, in order to see returns later.
So, you will not see profits very quickly, but it is possible to see quick profits with the right knowledge, money and time.
In affiliate marketing, it is all about building your affiliate marketing assets which could be:
Your email list
Your blog
Your social media profile
Your youtube channel
All these are assets that can produce traffic, and you want to produce targeted traffic, in order to get people to your affiliate offer who are interested in it.
All of the assets that are listed above have their own & unique benefits. However, as I said earlier unless you have the right kind of knowledge, money & time these will all take time to build up.
5. Is Affiliate Marketing Legit?
Another question that you should know the answer to by now.
Of course, it is!
As I have explained throughout this article, yes, affiliate marketing is a real business model!
There are tons, and I mean tons of people who are earning a full-time income online through affiliate marketing. That alone proves that it is legit.
It is a career opportunity of a lifetime and there are already so many successful affiliates out there promoting products for commissions.
Personally, what I find so great about affiliate marketing is the passive income that it brings.
Yeah, you will have to put some work in upfront, however, you can:
Have people visit your blog while you are sleeping if they purchase you get commissions
Have your emails sent out automatically while you are sleeping with your affiliate link and get commissions
Have people watch your YouTube review while you are sleeping which has your affiliate link, again you make commissions.
The opportunities are truly endless.
And just to put this into perspective for you there is an example below.
The average conversion rate of first-time viewers is 1%. While the average email follow-up conversions are 5%. (Note: With Low-Ticket Items, you often see a lot higher, and you make even more money with upsells and downsells)
That makes a total of 6%. Have a look at the example below.
Imagine you have a $100 affiliate product that you get 50% Commission for.
You send 2000 visitors to your landing page. 50% Convert to leads. and give you their email. They are then redirected to your affiliate offer. 1% of the 1000 purchases that equals 10 Purchases.
That’s $500.
Now, 5% convert in the follow-up emails, that’s another $2500. So $3000 in total. Now, you also have your upsells & downsells + an email list which you can promote different affiliate products to whenever you want
Your advertising cost for this would be anywhere between $800 and $2000. So your total profit would be anywhere from $1000-$2200.
Note:In order to have a campaign like this, you will first have needed to test your emails & funnels to be sure that they convert.
Now, you don’t only have some profits which you can reinvest, you also have an email list which you can use to get affiliate commissions forever.
You can just keep building this list, and as time goes past, you will reach financial freedom. It’s pretty simple really.
The Best Affiliate Programs
Next, I am going to cover the best affiliate marketing programs.
In this guide, I am only going to cover affiliate marketing programs that anyone can join so that anyone reading this can join them.
For sure, there are some other top affiliate programs out there, but these are the best ones that are open to anybody.
1. ClickBank
ClickBank is the most popular affiliate marketplace on the Internet.
It is completely free for affiliates, and you can promote any product from the marketplace that you want to promote and bag yourself commissions.
What’s great about ClickBank is, is that all the products are digital. That means that the commissions are way higher usually between 50% – 75%!
This is because the products are digital. That means there is no additional cost to the vendor of the product because they aren’t physical products, so there is no cost of producing more products.
ClickBank also has tons of products with recurring Commissions, which makes it easier to make a sustainable income off ClickBank.
They also have loads of products in almost any niche, so they really do have something for everyone.
Personally, I have only used WarriorPlus to promote products in the E-Business & E-Marketing Niche. However, I am pretty sure there are other Products in different niches such as health as well, but I am not sure.
The only notable differences between WarriorPlus & ClickBank are:
WarriorPlus has fewer payment methods
ClickBank is way more popular, which means really popular products are products that literally everyone is promoting. They also often have fake bad reviews, so that other affiliates can suggest their products at the end.
ClickBank has a lot more products and probably a lot more niches, due to its popularity.
WarriorPlus sometimes (not always) has more detailed information about the sales funnel & product prices.
ClickBank Products usually have better promotional material.
On WarriorPlus you have to get approved by the vendors. This is usually pretty easy, but sometimes they do decline.
You can sign up to both affiliate marketplaces and see which one is the best for you, or use both.
3. Amazon Associates
Amazon Associates is Amazons affiliate program.
Personally, I never used it because I like to promote knowledge products because of the higher commissions.
When you are promoting Amazon products, you are promoting physical products.
That means there is the cost of producing the product, which means commissions will be way lower.
Also, I believe Amazon takes a small % as well. However, as I have never sold on Amazon, I do not know.
Apart from that, Amazon works like any other affiliate platforms. You get your links, you promote, and get paid commission for sales.
The Best Pieces Of Software For Affiliate Marketing [+ Free Trials]
Before I go into what the best pieces of software are for affiliate marketing, I would just like to make clear that it really depends on what methods you are using i.e paid traffic, free traffic, etc.
I would also like to say that whichever methods you use, you probably will want some sort of email marketing campaign.
Email Marketing Software For Affiliate Marketing
As I said above, email marketing is essential for any affiliate marketing business. In fact, it is probably essential for any online business.
The main reason why it is so essential for affiliate marketing is that you have the ability to email your leads your affiliate offers forever and whenever you want.
And it is a list of leads that you own, whereas on social media you don’t own your followers.
Email marketing is also really useful for being able to keep in contact with your leads by offering them value etc.
The Email marketing software that I use is called GetResponse, they offer a 30 Day Free Trial (No Credit Card Required) which you can get by clicking here.
If you are looking to start a blog, the best provider for beginners is BlueHost.
They are the leading Hosting provider on the market and it is really easy to integrate their application with WordPress.
BlueHost is also incredibly cheap and it only cost around $60 a year. They have everything you will need and a great support team, in case you ever need a helping hand.
100% Recommend if you are looking to start a blog.
In this section, I am just going to cover some frequently asked questions that I see around about affiliate marketing.
These are questions that I have seen around the internet which have pretty simple and straight forward answers.
I am going to aim to explain each one so that you never need to ask any of these questions.
How Long Will Affiliate Marketing Last?
While I can’t give you a definite time frame, I can tell you it is not going any time soon.
It is a simple & straight forward business model that benefits people & businesses that cannot be replaced.
So, if I would have to give you a time frame I would say the bare minimum is 100 years, if not forever.
However, I can assure you it will not go during our lifetime.
Where To Begin Affiliate Marketing?
In order to answer this question, I would have to know what method you want to use to promote affiliate products.
If you are looking to do so through YouTube, pick a niche and start creating videos with content around that niche.
It really depends on which method you want to use if you want to be blogging and promoting affiliate products that way then just go & start a blog and uploading content.
If you are looking to go into paid traffic & promoting affiliate products through your email list then I recommend that you get a 14 Day Kartra Trial, and start building a funnel.
Then once you have your funnel connect your autoresponder, drive traffic and start collecting emails. I really can’t explain how you can start because I do not know which affiliate marketing strategy you want to use.
However, the key is to know where you want to go and focus on getting there.
Who Is Affiliate Marketing For?
Affiliate Marketing is for businesses that are trying to sell more of whatever they are selling and people (affiliates) who are trying to build an extra income stream.
Affiliate Marketing has made businesses millions and average people millionaires.
It is such a great model and if you are trying to build an additional income stream or maybe even more, affiliate marketing is for you.
Affiliate marketing is also for most online marketing beginners. Most big marketing “gurus” start by selling other people’s products.
Who Offers Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate Marketing is used by a large proportion of online businesses.
This question is usually asked by people who want to become affiliates.
The answer to this question is that there are so businesses that offer affiliate marketing it would probably be impossible to name 1% of them.
However, here are some affiliate marketplaces who you could sign up to for free today:
Amazon Associates
ClickBank
WarriorPlus
JVZoo
Why Does Affiliate Marketing Work?
The reason affiliate marketing works is simply because it benefits everyone.
It is beneficial to the customer assuming the product offers a lot of value, it benefits the affiliate who wants to earn an extra income and it also benefits the business who wants to make more sales.
Why Start An Affiliate Marketing Business?
That really depends on you. However, if you are looking to build a (passive) income online, affiliate marketing will always be the easiest option.
As I mentioned earlier, you will never have to worry about customer support, shipping or any other struggles that come with having your own product.
You only need to sell, sell and sell. That’s it and that is the reason affiliate marketing will always be the easiest online business to start with huge potential.
Welcome to this article about affiliate marketing on YouTube in which you will learn about;
How affiliate marketing on YouTube works
Affiliate programs that YouTubers can join
Strategies & Types of YouTube channels
Keyword research for YouTube
Growing Your YouTube channel
Content that converts
Keeping Existing viewers
As you see, this article will be pretty in-depth. So, you should be able to get some sort of value out of it, especially if you are just starting out with affiliate marketing on YouTube.
Let’s get started!
How Affiliate Marketing On YouTube Works
So, how does affiliate marketing on YouTube work? Affiliate marketing on YouTube is pretty simple, you create content around products and link to them with affiliate links. You will get free traffic, leads, and customers from YouTube which is what makes it so great.
We can make content such as reviews, how-to guides or even just include our affiliate links in regular content. When somebody goes and makes a purchase through our link, we earn a commission.
Don’t get me wrong, it sounds great, but it doesn’t happen over-night. You will need to be very consistent with your uploads before you start to gain traction unless you do something like launch jacking.
Affiliate Programs For YouTubers
In this article, I am not going to go too in-depth about affiliate programs. However, I will give you three marketplaces on which you should be able to find at least a couple of products in your niche. For a more in-depth guide, read this list of best affiliate programs.
ClickBank
First on our list is ClickBank. ClickBank is one of the biggest (if not the biggest) affiliate marketplaces for digital products. You can sign up for a free account and find products in your niche. However, you should be careful and research products before promoting them, as some are not very good quality.
With that being said, you can find a lot of high-quality products too.
Amazon Associates
Amazon Associates is the affiliate program for the amazon marketplace. There isn’t really too much more to be said, apart from that I recommend checking out the table of commission levels as you don’t want to spend your time promoting products with very low commissions.
ShareASale
Lastly, we also have ShareASale. ShareASale offers a wide variety of products that you could promote ranging from fashion to garden products. So, if you are looking to promote physical products, then you could definitely go and check them out.
Strategies For YouTube Affiliate Marketing
Before you jump into starting your YouTube channel, you will want to pick a strategy.
To help you with this I have broken it down into three different types of channels that you could grow. The three examples below are just examples. I’m sure there are other types too, but I think most people will fit into one of these three categories.
Of course, you could also make a mixture of two different channel types.
1. Growing a Niche Channel
The first type of channel is a niche channel.
This is a channel where you really focus on one specific niche and aim to create content around that niche. So, maybe it’s around a fashion-related niche, maybe it’s around computers or maybe even around books.
With a niche channel, you usually target as many keywords related to that niche with different videos and try to rank them. Also, there is often a little less work involved than in an “authority channel” which we will talk about later.
2. Launch Jacking
Our second type of channel is around launch jacking.
In case, you don’t know what launch jacking is, it’s when you create content around products that have just launched and then you profit off the buzz (through your affiliate link). In case this sounds like something that you are interested in, I recommend checking out my launch jacking guide.
The benefit of this type of channel is, that it’s usually speaking one of the quickest ways to earn money with YouTube videos. With that being said, you will need to put in a lot of work and it also requires a lot of frequency.
3. “Authority” Channel
The third channel type is an “authority channel”.
When you grow an authority channel, you grow a following that sees you as an “authority” in that niche. It’s a little bit different from growing a regular niche channel, but it’s not too different.
Some YouTube channels are a mixture of both. What I notice with a lot of “Authority” channels is that they are usually there to educate their audience in their field of expertise.
With an authority channel, you also want to focus on creating the highest quality content. I would also say that you should upload at least once a week. If you were to create a niche channel about vacuum cleaners or something like that, you could probably only upload once a month.
With that being said, as I always say the more you upload the better.
Other Types Of Channels
Of course, there are also other channel types that are not listed above.
For example, music or entertainment. With those sorts of channels, it can be a little bit trickier to create content around affiliate links, but it’s not impossible. You can still upload reviews of products that your audience would be interested in, or your favourite products, something along those lines.
It’s a little harder, but it’s definitely not impossible. There might also be some other channel types that don’t fall into any of these examples, which is fine also.
Keyword Research For YouTube
Now, let’s talk about keyword research.
If you are a relatively new channel, you will want to go for low competition keywords. Otherwise, you will have a hard time ranking.
You can find these keywords either by just typing in keywords into the YouTube search bar and looking for ones where not a lot of others have created content, or you can use tools such as:
Tubebuddy
Keyword Everywhere
Or even Google trends to determine search volume. You can use a combination of these to find keywords that you would have a good chance of ranking for. When you spot opportunities, create content!
Growing Your YouTube Channel
So, let’s talk about growing your channel because it’s not going to grow itself.
As we said earlier, you need to be spotting those low-competition keywords that will allow you to rank, this will help you grow your channel. But there are more things that you can do in order to grow your channel.
1. Title & Thumbnail For CTR
The first little tip that I have is to optimize your thumbnails and titles for CTR (Click-through-rate). This is one of the most important metrics on YouTube and if lot’s of people are clicking on your video, your video will go and get suggested to more users afterwards.
So, having a great thumbnail and a nice title can actually help you get a lot more views. With that being said, watch time is also very important and if everybody is clicking on your videos, but then leaving straight afterwards, YouTube will probably stop recommending it.
2. Well-optimized YouTube SEO
You’re probably not going to rank if you don’t optimize your video well. So, add some tags and maybe even some keywords in the description. Although, if you are going to add keywords into description, make sure to make them look NATURAL.
So, for example: “In this video, I will show you how to start a website.” That had the keyword “how to start a website”.
Don’t just spam the description full with keywords and say stuff like “ignore” or “tags”. Although a very limited amount of people actually get penalized or even banned for this, you don’t really want to be taking that risk.
It’s better to just build them in naturally.
3. Self-promote for engagement
Another ranking factor is engagement. This means you could just wait until users naturally find your video and engage with it, or you could be clever and speed the process up. Promote your YouTube videos on:
Your blog
Your social media platform (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Pinterest, etc.)
Quora
Medium
And just try to get some early engagement, as well as some subscribers who will watch your future videos. This can help you get the snowball rolling faster. Otherwise, you could spend a long time waiting for organic traffic, unless you have found some really good keywords to go after.
Keeping Existing Viewers
Part of growing your channel is also keeping existing viewers. This is important, otherwise, it will be harder to get more views on your future videos.
The first way, the obvious way is to ask your viewers to subscribe. This can easily be forgotten, but it will make you more money in the long term. So, do it! Another way is actually by collecting emails. This is really important too, as you can not only send out your newest content, but also make sales inside of the emails.
It’s really easy to do this, you set up a GetResponse account and you create a landing page and an email sequence. If you want to do this, but you are a little unsure how to do it, I have a guide on setting it all up here that will take you through it step-by-step.
Content That Converts
That’s all great, but what kind of content converts best?
From my blogging experience, I can tell you the following pieces of content convert well:
reviews
Product a vs Product B
How To’s
Best… For…
With this kind of content, the user is already presold. Most of these are self-explanatory but I will just give you an example anyway. If a user searches for “how to make a website” they already want to make a website.
If they land on your video where you explain how to make a website and you explain why they will need hosting, you will get quite a lot of conversions on your hosting as an affiliate (assuming that your content is well-explained).
Should you only create this kind of content?
You can, but other content is great too, especially if you spot keyword opportunities. Whatever content you produce, I would always recommend focusing on giving value, whether that be this sort of content or other content.
How To Add Affiliate Links & Disclaimers (Ethically)
So, lastly, we need to talk about adding affiliate links and disclaimers. This is pretty simple, but it’s important too.
Affiliate Links
First of all, when you add affiliate links you need to make sure to cloak them. For YouTube, you can use a free service such as Bit.ly or Pretty links if you use WordPress. Although, you should not be using bit.ly in emails due to deliverability issues.
The reason you will want to cloak your links is that affiliate links look disgusting. Some of them (for example ClickBank links) look so bad, your viewer may not even feel safe clicking on them. Cloaking affiliate links should be a pretty standard procedure.
You can do it for free, so just do it!
Affiliate Disclaimers
Affiliate disclaimers… something that all affiliates hate. After new guidelines, you need these in every single video description. You can google and find a standard affiliate disclosure.
However, my personal recommendation is to put some personality inside of them. Maybe something like: “The products mentioned in this video are honest recommendations, so all those links are probably big scary affiliate links and if you make a purchase through them, I probably earn a commission”
Something along those lines. Usually, this doesn’t hurt conversions at all. How you do it is really up to you, but the important thing is that you do it.
Final Words
I hope that you have enjoyed this guide on using YouTube for affiliate marketing and found some value in it.
If you did make sure to leave a comment and/or share the article. Just remember to stay consistent and eventually it should work out for you.
So, Why Is my Clickfunnels API Key not working? There are a number of reasons why your Clickfunnels API Key might not be working. However, the most common problem is not mentioned anywhere. Which is why I am writing this article. If you cannot find an answer online, and you are simply copying and pasting the API key correctly, then there is a huge chance that the problem that I mention is the problem with your API key.
What Is An API Key?
An API Key is a key that is used to integrate two pieces of software with each other. It is simply a key that is used to provide access from one software to another.
Why You May Need An API Key
There are many different reasons, why you may need an API key, as an API key is used to integrate any piece of software with another. Another reason why you might need an API key is to provide access to a piece of software. So, it is used as an access code for some pieces of software or some applications. These are the basic reasons why you may need an API key.
The Problem with your API Key
The problem itself is quite a technical problem so I am going to explain the problem as simple as possible. Just like any technology API Keys develop and update over time. And if the API key of your application or Integration provider is not on the same update as Clickfunnels they will not work, and you will not be able to integrate whatever you are trying to integrate.
Clickfunnels uses an older version of API keys, which is why it will not work with your newer API key. I have no Idea why they still use the older version, and I am not technical enough to know the advantages or disadvantages of it. However, I do know that that is the problem, because I spoke to the Getresponse live chat, and that fixed the problem.
How To Fix The API Key That Isn’t Working?
In order to fix the problem, we need to get the API keys to the same updates or versions. Now, I doubt that you will get Clickfunnels to update their whole API key system, and that would probably take a long time. So what do we do Instead?
Well, the only other way to fix it is to contact your Integration provider in order to request an old version of the API key. The Integration that I had the problem with was Getresponse, and luckily they have an amazing live chat support team and I could quickly contact them to request an old API Key. If your Integration provider does not have a live chat function, then you will have to contact their support team with whatever options are available i.e email/phone.
If You Are Still in Trial With Your Email Marketing Software & There Is No Livechat
If you are still in your trial with your Email Marketing Software provider and they do not have a live chat, then I recommend that you switch to GetResponse as they offer a 30 Day Free Trial, and they are very low cost for beginners as the price only increases with your list. They also have an excellent support team, and any Issue can be resolved in less than 10 minutes. They also have every single Email Marketing feature that is available on the market, so it is definitely the email marketing software that you want to use!
Also, they offer a lot of features that clickfunnels does. If you are just wanting to build lead funnels, you can do that with GetResponse too for less than half the price of ClickFunnels! I explain it all here.
This is important to get an idea of your target audience, otherwise, you will be promoting to the wrong people!
I would recommend that you choose a niche that interests you at least a little, so you don’t get bored promoting it!
It does not matter what niche you choose, but it would be better if you are a little interested in it, and know about the niche.
So, for example, if you are interested in the Health & Fitness Niche, you can choose a product in the Health & Fitness Niche such as a weight loss product.
While you can choose any niche, I recommend that you have a look at these 5 niches:
E-Business & E-Marketing
Health & Fitness
Business & Investing
Self-help
Spirituality, New age & Alternative Beliefs
This is just because these Niches convert like crazy, due to their pain points!
However, don’t worry if you aren’t interested in any of these, every other niche has products that convert crazily too.
For example, there is a woodworking product which many people are promoting which converts amazingly, and the most important thing is that you are interested in the niche you promote!
Now, when it comes to choosing a product, you must get this right.
This is because you don’t want to promote some garbage product where 70% of your sales get a refund. This is why you should put some thought and research into this decision!
There are a few important things you should check out before promoting a product.
This is to find out whether it is a good product to promote.
1. Gravity
The Gravity score indicates how many other affiliates are successfully selling the product this week.
This is a great indicator, as you can see if the product is converting.
Avoid really low gravity scores as this means nobody is selling the product this will make it harder for you to sell the product.
High gravity scores are good as it means many other affiliates are selling the product, and if they can do it you can too! A good gravity score is anywhere from 50+ onwards.
2. Pricing
This is also an important factor you want to think about. As it plays a big role in your return on investment.
I usually like to go for mid ticket products.
Not too low and not too high. So, for example, I wouldn’t go under $20 as the commission would be too low, but I wouldn’t go over $200 as it would be too hard to sell the product.
I also like to go for products that charge every month as this is a great way to create passive income.
Here are some things to look out for when looking at the pricing of your product:
The Cost to the buyer – I would go for products between $40 to $200 for good commissions
Recurring Charges – Passive Income!
Upsells/Downsells/Cross-sells. You want to try and find a product that has multiple stages in the funnel, to get more commissions!
Trial options = Increased Conversions
I would also like to advise you that there isn’t a set way to choose what the best products are by price, it depends on the value that the customer receives.
So, just research the product and see how good the value is considering the price!
3. Reputation/Reviews of the product
Looking at reviews and the reputation of the product you are trying to promote is also very important.
This is again, as you want to promote a product with value.
This value has to be enough for the Customer to keep the product, otherwise, you will get large refunds and chargebacks.
So it is important that you look up reviews of the product, and make sure to check out a lot of them because there are always the following issues:
Affiliates creating fake reviews for commissions.
Non-affiliated other marketers writing bad reviews to drive traffic to their products. (You can often catch these out by them not showing the members area)
Other fake reviews that are paid for by some sort by the vendor.
So once you think you have found a product make sure to browse google and youtube for reviews. Also, remember to keep those issues above in mind.
How to Promote Clickbank Products
Now that you know how to find the right niche and product, let’s look at how to promote Clickbank products.
I have laid this part out as a list with a mixture of low cost, and higher cost methods.
This is to make sure there is a great option for everyone. Now, I also did not want to include the usual “FB ads” that everyone already knows about.
In this list, it is more methods that aren’t as usual, but as effective, if not more! So let’s jump right into the list of 5 killer ways you can use to promote Clickbank products.
Important Note: In this article, I may reference some paid funnel builders because at the time, GrooveFunnels wasn’t out yet. You DO NOT have to use the paid versions I wrote about in this article, as you can sign up for Groovefunnels for completely free!
Using this link you can get free lifetime access with no credit card required!
1.Social Media
First on our list is using social media to promote ClickBank products.
However, I recommend that you use social media to drive traffic to a lead magnet to collect email addresses.
By doing this you can sell to your customers in the future and it will be a lot more profitable as it will be easier to convert a visitor into a lead.
By just posting your ClickBank affiliate links, you will not get a lot of clicks, and only 1 click out of 100 will turn into a sale.
So, that is not an effective way to promote ClickBank Offers.
However, by giving away a free “how to” course, you will be able to get a lot of email addresses, and the average value of an email lead is $1 per month. You can then sell your affiliate products in the future.
Next on our list of ways to promote ClickBank products are Udimi Solo Ads.
A solo ad is an email ad, so you will purchase it from somebody who has a large email list in your niche.
The best place to buy solo ads is Udimi. Udimi offers high-quality clicks for a very cheap price (usually around $0.40) and has a protection system against scams or fake clicks.
The benefit of solo ads is that they are incredibly cheap and easy to use.
Each seller on Udimi will have a description in which they will state in which niche their list is in.
It’s very easy to use because you don’t need any skills in running ads, all you need to do is find a vendor in your niche and order the clicks.
When using Solo ads, you should also first drive traffic to an opt-in page so that you can build your email list.
The Udimi solo ads guide will help you learn about this method if you are interested in using solo ads for your affiliate marketing business.
3. Instagram pages (no cost-low cost)
Next on our list is Instagram pages, although Instagram is, of course, a social media platform, I wanted to put this one in separately.
The reason being that there are two different ways you can use Instagram for social media.
The first one is by growing an Instagram theme page which works incredibly well, as when you have built up your audience, you can sell them affiliate products.
To grow a theme page on Instagram is a lot easier than other social platforms due to the ease of following people, the Instagram algorithm & the fact that you only need pictures as content.
The second way is by buying shoutouts from Instagram pages, as often they sell shoutouts for incredibly cheap. In fact, in my 40 cents per lead case study, I actually only paid $40 to be featured on pages with over 500,000 followers.
Again, if you combine this with a strong & relevant lead magnet, it’s a great way to promote ClickBank products.
4. YouTube Channel
YouTube, the biggest video platform in the world is also the biggest search engine in the world.
That means its a great place to go and get some traffic to your ClickBank products. You can do this by creating videos around your niche and researching keywords that you can rank for.
YouTube takes a lot of consistency, so you will have to keep uploading videos, but in the end, it will be worth it, as you will generate tons of traffic for completely free, just from YouTube.
Again, YouTube is a platform that works for any niche, so it is definitely something that you should consider!
You may also want to have a look through the YouTube affiliate marketing guide, where you will learn what kind of offers you can promote, as well as what kind of content to create around your products.
5. Blogging (Low cost)
Next, we have blogging, what I like to call the writing version of YouTube.
This means it also requires a lot of building up & staying consistent before you will be able to see any results from it.
What I also must say, is that blogging requires a little more SEO (search engine optimization) than YouTube.
Also, in a study by the Income School YouTube channel, they found that it usually takes around 35 weeks until you hit 90% of your Google ranking potential.
That means that blogging is definitely a long term strategy for affiliate marketing. If you want to start a blog, you can head over to Bluehost and get high quality hosting for $60 per year.
If you are looking for premium hosting, you can also consider one of these two hosts that I compare here: WPX Hosting vs Kinsta.
6. Facebook & Instagram Ads
Next, we have Facebook & Instagram ads, which are arguably the least beginner-friendly method on this list.
The problem with Facebook & Instagram ads is that they are so competitive and that you don’t know where the user is that is seeing them. For all you know, they could be running to catch the bus, whereas, on traffic methods such as Google or YouTube, they are usually actively searching for your content which results in higher conversions.
However, that doesn’t mean that Facebook ads aren’t profitable, because believe me they are, they just require a lot of testing.
The reason I put all of these points into one is that they are extremely similar and you can only really benefit from these if you own a blog.
Forums, Quora & Blog comments can all be used to drive traffic to your blog.
However, these blog posts can contain affiliate links & opt-in forms to build your email list.
On forums, you will want to post niche relevant content while linking to your site that has more information on the topic.
When using Quora for affiliate marketing, you will want to answer questions and link to your site as a source or also say that they can find more information there.
“Hey [blog name], I really enjoyed this post, especially the part about [something about their post]! I recently also read this review/article [insert your site], is it true that this product can help me create lead magnets really quickly? I would really appreciate your opinion on this. Thanks!”
This way you are getting free links to your site and when somebody else is looking through the comments, they will often click on that link.
8. Pinterest
Pinterest is another place that you can get free traffic from your blog in which you have affiliate links to ClickBank. However, I wanted to give Pinterest a separate point for a couple of reasons.
The first one being that it is a little more complicated than forums, quora, and blog comments. Now, the second reason is that most users on Pinterest are female, according to Income school it is something around 93%.
That means there is a high chance that your target audience, is not on Pinterest.
However, if you do have a product that has somewhat of a female target audience, I would definitely recommend using Pinterest.
Google & YouTube ads (because YouTube is owned by Google) are also one of the best-paid methods to drive traffic.
They can both be managed from the Google ads dashboard.
Both of these platforms are incredibly profitable because they are high-quality traffic, especially Google as the user who sees your ad is actively searching for what you have to offer.
While YouTube ads aren’t quite as high quality as Google ads, they are as profitable, if not more.
The reason for this is that they are incredibly cheap, YouTube is extremely popular and they still have a really high quality.
The reason for this is that for example, if you are in the weight loss niche and you target users watching videos about weight loss, they are still searching for a solution.
Even if your ad often disrupts them, you still know what their problem is and you can offer a solution to them.
So, in a way, they are still actively searching for a solution. As this is paid to advertise, I would recommend doing a lot of research before jumping in.
10. Email Marketing
Lastly, we have email marketing which is arguably the most important one of these methods.
I left it last because whichever method you are using, you should definitely be building an email list along the way. In the digital marketing space, email marketing & affiliate marketing are the joint first place for driving the most sales according to business insider.
In affiliate marketing, 99% of successful affiliates use email marketing and you should too. Apart from the autoresponder costs, it’s a completely free method of getting traffic.
It also helps us to increase the value of a visitor, by turning them into an email lead.
Now, I hope this has helped you find the way you want to promote Clickbank products. In order to find the right way for the ClickBank offer that you are promoting consider the following things and choose the best-suited option:
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