Affiliate marketing is far from a new concept and predates the internet. However, it is with the boom in online retail and marketing that affiliate marketing has become bug business. What is affiliate marketing, and why is it the way forward for e-commerce businesses?
The article that follows looks at what affiliate marketing is, how it works, and why you should consider this method of promotion for your online business.
How Affiliate Marketing Works
Before the days of the internet, if you discovered a new product or shop and were impressed, you’d tell your friends. Word of mouth, we call it, and in a way that’s what affiliate marketing is. However, it is far more sophisticated.
Usually, it works as follows: a brand or outlet asks others to promote their services. These are the affiliates to the brand. They may promote it on a blog, they may own a lot of websites, and they may use adverts and social media. Every time a consumer accesses the website they are promoting via their link and purchases a product, the affiliate gets a percentage.
Some affiliate programs don’t require a purchase but merely for the consumer to click through. Most, however, will require a purchase. So, in summary affiliate marketing is getting others to promote your brand or product and rewarding them for doing so.
Clearly the scope for this sort of promotion is wide – internet use is ubiquitous as is that of social media – so it’s worth looking in more detail at who would make a worthy affiliate. To get to that, we need to look at the three main types of affiliate marketing.
Types of Affiliate Marketing
The three types of affiliate marketing are defined by the involvement of the affiliate. Let us explain by looking at each one.
Unattached affiliate marketing involves affiliates who have no claim to being an authority on the product, and do not have any direct connection. These could be people who simply push a product on social media pages or mention it in a blog. The lack of authority means they are not expected to recommend the product, simply to advertise it.
Related affiliate marketing uses an affiliate who perhaps blogs or writes in a relevant niche. An example could be a travel writer mentioning a luggage brand, or an automotive blog advertising car cleaning products. The affiliates authority in their given field lends them a certain credibility that readers trust, although they are not claiming to have used the product or service they are affiliated to.
Involved affiliate marketing is that in which the affiliate is a user of the product and can put forward positive experiences of the brand. This type of affiliate is the most trusted as they are a genuine authority on the brand, product or service, although they may need to take care as their authority can be diminished should there be negative reports about the product.
Each affiliate comes with benefits, and it’s worth understanding that an involved affiliate – who would effectively become a brand ambassador – will expect a larger payment than the unattached affiliate. Does affiliate marketing work, and what should you look for in an affiliate?
Successful Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing certainly works, but you need to take care in choosing the affiliates to align with your brand. A good first step is to look at blogs that are in your niche, or at websites that review products in your market. Also look for people who offer their services as affiliates. Indeed, there are affiliate marketing professionals who can handle the project for you.
While affiliate marketing comes with many benefits – a broader reach, it’s not expensive, others are doing the job of marketing your products – there are a few possible pitfalls. For example, if an affiliate is writing about your product or service, you have limited control over what they publish. Affiliate marketing can also be subject to fraud. An example of this is fake or stolen details being used to populate online forms involved with the affiliate marketing program.
For this reason, if you do not have the time or cannot afford a dedicated affiliate marketing manager who will keep control of the program, it may be worth outsourcing your affiliate marketing management.
Conclusion
In conclusion, affiliate marketing is a method of promoting a brand, product or service using suitable persons who have online outlets that will expand your brand awareness, and it need to be carefully managed to achieve the right results.
