A savvy entrepreneur is
always looking for alternative sources of revenue and affiliate marketing can
be a powerful way of generating income while cutting through a lot of the time
consuming legwork of manufacturing, branding, and developing marketing strategies.
At its core, affiliate marketing involves bringing a particular product to the
attention of your consumers and sharing the revenue generated from the sale of
that product through you, with whoever supplied the product.
Affiliate Marketing in Real Time
As an example, in order
to provide context, imagine that Happy X is a supplier of natural supplements.
GrowNatural is a health food store that deals with naturally sourced products.
Happy X is trying to promote its launch of a brand new supplement designed to
help people get more essential vitamins and nutrients. All sales are done
online and delivered by Happy X’s supply system through their warehouse in
order to keep shipments centralized and all revenue streams traveling through
Happy X. Happy X has a strong history of delivering a great product but are
looking to expand their reach, so they approach GrowNatural in hopes that they
will help sell their product as an affiliate. GrowNatural also has a strong
base of loyal customers, some of who may not be familiar with Happy X. Should
GrowNatural make any sales through their clientele of Happy X’s product, they
then share the profit.
Responsibilities of, and
Benefits to, the Supplier
As the manufacturer of
the product, Happy X’s responsibilities to GrowNatural is to provide them with
all the materials required to sell the product. Happy X provides GrowNatural
with all the necessary copy and links that they can post on their website with
all the revenue sharing streams and stat tracking in place. In the short term,
although Happy X loses money to GrowNatural in direct sales, Happy X regards
any sales through GrowNatural as sales that would not have otherwise been made.
In the long term, although the return on investment may be less than through a
direct sale, Happy X now has the attention of the customer and has widened the
base of its clientele.
Responsibilities of, and Benefits to, the Affiliate
Affiliate marketing is
really the lazy man’s approach to making sales. Ultimately, the more effort an
affiliate makes to push a particular product the more sales they can expect to
make. It is the affiliate’s responsibility to make their customer base aware of
a particular product and then back that product with their seal of approval.
Any new product opens up a new revenue stream for the affiliate. In this case,
Happy X has done all the work in developing the product and making it available
to the consumer. GrowNatural, as the affiliate, is tasked with merely making
their following aware that this product is available. How they go about this is
completely up to them, but can involve any marketing strategy under the sun. It
can be as simple as a banner on their website or as an involved as an email
blast to everyone on their list. Affiliates that communicate regularly and are
in tune with their audience tend to be the most successful.
Some Do’s and Don’ts
There are some very
salesy people out in the world who generate their entire income through
affiliate marketing. There are even websites and hubs where you can sign on as
an affiliate to sell just about anything. However, it’s usually preferable to
find a niche and stick with it. If you have a particular talent for something,
or consider yourself an expert in any subject, it is advisable to market
products that are closely related to that subject so that you can justify being
an authority on things related to the product.
Don’t
ever market a product you don’t actually believe in. Although it can be
tempting to strike out and begin to market anything that can make you money,
remember that anyone who purchases through is considered part of your
following. They go through you because they trust you and suddenly providing
them with an inferior product can result in losing their trust and the income
that they generate.
