Here are the next 4 steps to get your affiliate marketing business going (after you have found products you want to promote)…
1. Build a website or blog: This step is essential even for affiliates who plan on using paid traffic only. Having a website or blog makes an affiliate look professional and legitimate. Plus, to promote affiliate products, you will need a platform to showcase them. You can create a website or blog where you can write reviews, create how-to guides, and share valuable content related to your niche. This becomes your headquarters and command center where all your best content and product offers are housed. Plus, you can cross-pollinate blog posts into social media posts and vice versa.
2. Create a lead magnet: People like free stuff. What can you offer your audience for free in exchange for some of their information? Usually, information is free and easy to distribute to people, so create a free product offer, such as an e-book, brochure, training videos, etc., that you can offer on your website, blog, social media, and paid advertisements. The concept behind a lead magnet is that people will request free information in exchange for providing something like their email address. This helps turn traffic into leads you can follow up with via email (see #4).
3. Drive traffic to your website: This is a big and possibly the most important one. Affiliates (like me) get tripped up over what strategy to use to generate traffic. However, you must drive traffic to your website or blog to earn money through affiliate marketing. Some approaches are search engine optimization, social media marketing, email marketing, and others.
4. Lead prospects to your lead magnet offer: This step is about turning your audience that visits your blog or website into leads. You can have an action step on your main webpage to click a button to get the free lead magnet content. Once someone clicks on the button, it takes them to an opt-in page to input an email address to get the information via email and join your email list. You now have a lead that you can follow up with to provide more educational information and build a relationship with.
Great, but what’s next? This is the subject of my next post!