There are many ways to make money online. Some people are happy to create products and sell them online. Alternatively, you can take on a side hustle by offering your services to online businesses. No matter which route you choose, there’s an opportunity to earn money online.
A popular method is to promote products, offers, and websites through affiliate marketing. This type of marketing benefits both the business owner and affiliate marketer. Affiliate marketers make money through commission when a customer clicks a promoted link or buys a product that’s promoted on a blog or website. For the business owner, the key benefit is that they can grow their brand awareness and audience through online marketing – whether that’s SEO, blogging, or social media – without needing to spend large amounts of money on traditional advertising strategies such as radio campaigns and newspaper ads.
Why should you consider becoming an affiliate marketer? There are several reasons. To start, the earnings can be fairly impressive. According to the most recent data from affiliate marketing platform Shareify, the median monthly revenue for affiliate marketers is $16,000. Furthermore, you don’t necessarily need a big website to get started. You can simply start a blog and take advantage of the affiliate marketing opportunities that exist within the platforms such as WordPress and Blogger.
The Many Benefits of Affiliate Marketing
In a nutshell, affiliate marketing is a way of generating profit from someone else’s marketing efforts. When a business signs up with an affiliate marketing platform, they typically become an “authority” in their industry. When people click a product link or buy a product that’s promoted on a blog or website, the business earns a commission.
As an affiliate marketer, you’ll be providing a valuable service to others. When people visit your website, you’re essentially helping them find the information they need by promoting a particular product or service.
In return, you’ll earn a commission when someone clicks a product link or makes a purchase from an affiliate-branded store. Since everyone’s a winner, this type of marketing can be a pretty effective way to make money online.
How to Make Money with Affiliate Marketing
To start, you’ll need to pick an affiliate marketing platform. There are a number of options to choose from, so you need to make sure that you’re getting the most out of your investment. In general, the more you put in, the more you’ll get back. The following are some of the most common types of income opportunities within affiliate marketing:
- Up-selling: This is when an affiliate marketer encourages a customer to purchase a premium product that’s also connected to an affiliate program. For example, a customer is visiting a shoe store and is interested in purchasing sandals. The affiliate marketer for the shoe store might suggest a pair of matching shoes, which would then lead to an affiliate sale. The match is between the product the customer was initially interested in and the one the affiliate marketer recommended. In this situation, the customer only needed to decide whether or not to purchase the matching shoes. If they decided to go for it, the affiliate marketing fee would be a good source of income.
- Product Affiliation: This type of program refers to products that you promote or take a stance on, but don’t sell. For example, you might write an article about the top 10 things to do in Singapore. If a reader then buys an affiliate product (e.g., an AirAsia flight to Singapore) from the platform following your article, you’ll earn a commission. Essentially, for every action a customer takes (e.g., reading your article), you’ll earn a commission. So, if someone buys a plane ticket from a flight provider after reading your article about the best restaurants in Singapore, you’ll earn a small commission.
- Multi-level Marketing (MLM): This is when an affiliate marketer earns commissions based on the sales of the people they’re recruiting. So, in a pure MLM scenario, you might earn a small commission when a customer buys a product that’s offered through your affiliate link. However, the sales you make as part of an MLM venture will also count towards your earnings. If you’re pursuing this path, you need to make sure that you’re selecting a legitimate MLM opportunity that’s been vetted by industry experts. There are many questionable MLM offers out there, so make sure that you’re not getting scammed.
- Generating Leads: This is when an affiliate marketer earns money when a visitor to their website clicks on a text link or opens a pop-up window that contains an affiliate offer. The more you put in, the better your chances of generating traffic and making money. You’ll need to make sure that the leads that you’re generating are qualified, or at least, have the potential to become qualified traffic. It’s often times difficult to determine how effective a lead generation campaign was without having insight into the revenue that was accrued from the campaign.
- CPA Marketing: This type of program earns revenue when a customer makes a purchase at an online store. So, if someone buys a product that’s promoted on your blog, you’ll earn a commission. The fee is usually calculated as a percentage of the sale. For example, if a customer buys a $100 product that’s promoted on your site, you’ll earn $10. This type of program can be a little more complicated than the others, because there are a number of factors that you’ll need to keep in mind. One of the most critical things is that you need to make sure that you’re not being taken advantage of by a con artist. You’ll often need to do some research into the company before you get started.
- Freelance Writing: This is when an affiliate marketer earns money by writing articles for businesses or individuals that have a product to promote. You’ll need to make sure that you’re representing the company in a professional manner. In most instances, the fee is based on a per-article basis. So, if you have a blog with 10 articles published, you’ll earn $100 for every article you write. Whether you’re doing this as a side hustle or a full-time job, the more you put in, the better your chances of making money online.
There are many ways to make money online. Some people are happy to create products and sell them online. Alternatively, you can take on a side hustle by offering your services to online businesses. No matter which route you choose, there’s an opportunity to earn money online.