Do you market affiliate products on your website? Do you actually use those products?

I discovered early on that I couldn’t write a solid, sales-worthy review of a product if I didn’t a) use it, and b) find it helpful. I mean, I could cover my sites with information about Viagra or PokerStars or something, but I’d be lying about any interest I had in them.

A couple of days ago I wrote a post about Glen Allsop and his book Cloud Living. I’m an affiliate for Cloud Living, and proud to be, because the book is useful. I don’t recommend the book just to make the cash – I recommend it because I learned from it and I think you can too.

The same thing goes for all the info-products listed on the Resources Page. I’m an affiliate for some of those products, because I believe in them. I believe they can help you in your quest for a better blog/business/bank account.

Do you flog products to your readers that you’ve never even tried? How can you vouch for them?

I’m one of the people who doesn’t want to be smarmy in my affiliate marketing. I don’t want to feel icky, and I don’t want you to feel sold to. I want to be able to offer you a solution to a problem. If you don’t have that problem, don’t spend money on that solution! Simple as that – no harm, no foul.

I think affiliate marketing gets a bad name because a lot of marketers are happy to just throw links out there without having a clue about the efficacy of the product. I have more than a clue – I’ve used them all myself, at my own cost. Only once was I ever offered a free product to advertise. So I used it, found it helpful, and plugged it with a clear conscience.

How do you do affiliate marketing?

No? Why the hell not? Do you not want to improve your traffic, or make your content more search-able? Tell me, do you just not love your blog? Because if you loved your blog, you’d be reading Glen.

I’ve written about this internet wunderkind before, and I’m shamelessly addicted to his blog and his book, Cloud Living. Glen knows there’s no free ride when it comes to making money online. He works at it, and it pays off.

A sprinkling of what you can learn from the child wizard, the Harry Potter of internet marketing:

• How to Make Money With Blogs
• Increase your Income with AdSense
• Buying & Selling Websites

His book, Cloud Living, puts all the info together in one handy place so you can refer back to it as needed. It’s a digital download, so ordering the book is instant gratification. Check it out, and let me know how it helps you!

Is it weird that I think Gideon Shalwick is way hot since he cut his hair? I mean really, really hot. He used to look like Weird Al with that crazy long curly hair. I’m almost tempted to think he hired a new spokesmodel and just calls him Gideon. But I think that theory stems from the fact that I forgot to put my tinfoil hat on this morning.

Anyway, this post isn’t meant to be about his massively improved appearance. It’s about the fact that he’s up to something.

An email in my inbox today alerted me to the fact that Gideon and Co will be launching a new blogging product in the next few weeks. intrigued, I clicked on the “learn more” link… but didn’t learn that much more. Now I’m really curious!

So, as soon as I know what he’s up to, you’ll know too!

UPDATE from BB: d’oh! I totally mixed up Gideon and Yaro. Yaro was the one with the hair, he did get it cut and it does look good. While I totally screwed up there, I still maintain my original point: Gideon is hot.

Over the past two weeks I’ve answered what affiliate marketing actually is, and how to get started with affiliate marketing. So now you’re into it, and making a few passive dollars every month. Maybe you’re blogging about a specific product in your niche, or perhaps you have a mini-site landing page to talk about one particular item, chock full of keywords.

Now what?

Well, that trickle of income is a nice buffer in your PayPal account, but it isn’t really enough to sustain you, is it? Like, you aren’t going to cash in your law degree and live off the proceeds – yet.

So how can you make more money with affiliate marketing?

Repeat Customers

Let’s say you sell an e-book for $40 and make $25 from the sale. Good for you! That’s $25 in your pocket! But then perhaps you sell something like an identity theft protection tool, which requires recurring payments every month or year. Perhaps the monthly charge is $9, from which you make $4. Over the course of a year, those $4 payments will far outstrip the $25 you made with the e-book.

Diversify your products. Sell some one-off items and sell some long-term items.

Create your own product

Everyone is an expert in something, but most people don’t realize it. Sit down and make out a list of at least 50 things you love doing. Now think about which ones you know a lot about. Is it knitting? Finding bargain antiques? Selling on eBay? Write an informational product based on your knowledge. Include bonus materials like takeaway lists, templates, videos, etc. Pop your item up onto e-junkie, put a widget on your website and/or create a landing page, and sell your own item.

It’s not passive income at the beginning, while you’re creating it, but then you can sit back and just sell the item once it’s done.

Recruit your own affiliates

So now you have your product on e-junkie, a widget on your blog, and a nice shiny landing page. You’ll make a few bucks here and there no doubt, but there has to be a quicker way, right? Yes. Recruit your own affiliates! By offering the usual 25-75% of the profits, you can enlist an army of other web writers and forum junkies to pimp your product for you. They make money, you make money – everybody wins!

Learn more about affiliate marketing

There’s enough information out there about affiliate marketing to write a nice long book. In fact, one has already been written. It is the go-to resource for those interested in becoming an affiliate, becoming a super-affiliate, and recruiting affiliates. Check out Rosalind Gardner’s Super Affiliate Handbook.

Last week I published a post on what affiliate marketing is. This week, let’s talk about getting started as an affiliate marketer.

Affiliate marketing is a great way to earn a passive income. Someone else creates the product, you pimp it, and you make a cut of all sales. It’s like being a retailer.

Top Affiliate Programs

The mother of them all is Amazon. But there are others.

• e-junkie has info products like e-books and programs
• Commission Junction you will find higher-end vendors like Apple, Audible and more
• Clickbank digital products like e-books, video programs and more

Pretty much any online site where payment is taken provides an opportunity for affiliates. If your readers are into online poker, there are plenty of online poker sites that offer affiliate programs. Just google “your niche + affiliate programs” and you’re sure to find something that will provide value to your readers and cash to your pocket.

Start Marketing

Once you have chosen a product or service to represent, write about it. Tell your readers what they stand to gain from buying/joining. Be sincere. Don’t make absurd promises, but talk about how the product or service can help the buyer in their own lives. Maybe that help is in the form of learning; maybe it’s entertainment.

If you find a great product that is far outside the niche of the website you already run, build a mini-site for that product! A URL and a simple landing page with keyword-dense copy will attract search engine traffic. Any other sites you own can also direct traffic over to your mini-site/landing page.

Earning Money

When a product or service is sold through your affiliate link, you can earn between 25-75% of the sale, usually to your PayPal account. If you sell one, a hundred, or a thousand copies of an e-book that someone else wrote, you receive that money. That’s why it’s considered a passive income: someone else does the work, you make the money. Whee!

Next week, I’ll post Affiliate Marketing: Beyond the Basics

To learn more about affiliate marketing and how to make a full-time passive income, check out Rosalind Gardner’s Super Affiliate Handbook.

Once you finish reading the ‘Super Affiliate Handbook,’ you will have all the information you need to start your own profitable affiliate marketing business quickly, easily and inexpensively.

Affiliate marketing is a great way to earn passive income off your website(s). Someone creates a product, you talk about it, sell it and earn a portion of the sale – anywhere from 25-75%.

The idea is to choose products and programs that you can be enthusiastic about. You can’t just say “Buy Product X” if you don’t know a damn thing about it. Believe me, it’s an easy mistake to make, and I think most affiliate marketers made it in the beginning. I know I did!

Find products and services you can benefit from yourself, and then you’ll know how to pitch them to other people. For example, I have no trouble reselling Ali Hale’s blogging products, because I’ve used them and they work. I’ve made money off the tips she offers, as well as from the affiliate sales. I believe in the products, so I have no trouble telling you to buy them – I know you won’t be disappointed.

How do you market products?

Lynn Terry has a great article on getting started with affiliate marketing and choosing how to present the products you wish to resell. You can either set up a mini-site specific to one product, or you can choose products within your own niche and talk about them on your regular site – that’s what I do here at Girl on the Write.

Getting Started

So how do you get started with this affiliate thingy?

• Find the products you wish to represent
• Sign up for the affiliate programs
• Create an e-junkie or ClickBank account (you’ll find many worthwhile products to represent via those two programs)
• Start pimping!
• Earn money!

See, it’s that simple.

Well, ok, maybe not that simple!

Stay tuned for the next installment – Affiliate Marketing: Getting Started