Affiliate Marketing: How to Authentically Market

Since starting the blog I have had this internal struggle when it comes to the monetization of the content. I knew I would apply for ad networks when I qualified (woohoo! I did it in less than 2 months!) and that I would start to work towards the idea of creating a product (it is coming…I’m up to my eyeballs in production of it…shh it is still super secret) and Affiliate Marketing.

What is Affiliate Marketing? 

Basically you are like a commission only sales force working for a kickback. How’s that for being blunt about it? You link to products you love *please for the love of all you value about your blog, ONLY link to things you actually love* and if someone clicks on your link and buys something you earn a cut. Your link doesn’t add any cost to the viewer so really it is no harm no foul to them but it can create a slippery slope if you aren’t authentic about it.

I currently have only a few affiliate relationships. Of the ones I have I have personally used every single one and would be happy to help someone with any one of the things/products/ideas/recipes I put on this blog. My favorite (and most hands on) affiliate relationship is with Amazon.

I signed up for this because I found that I was already linking to things on Amazon in almost every single post. I started thinking about an old blog I followed, Young House Love, and how I remembered they said something about Amazon sales. So I went off to find their post about Amazon and learned how completely unaware I had been.

I link to things in Amazon the way people search Wikipedia. If I reference a food item, I normally link to it on Amazon. If I mention a specific kitchen tool, I link to it. The thing I love about Amazon is

1. I know I am getting people a super competitive price.
2. I know Amazon, and I know if for some reason something goes wrong they will fix it (I’ve been a member for over 15 years and have had Prime for 10 years. That’s some love and loyalty there!)
3. I LOVE how everything they sell is described/photographed to such great detail it lets my ocd/type A self feel like I don’t have to research any further.
4. They have EVERYTHING.
5. An easy way to make some income while providing a service and not annoying a reader with extra ads.

It felt natural for me to join and the process for linking up is simple. The only down-side is you actively have to link to items in your posts to give people something to view. So if you don’t like linking, then you

Mind you I had only been blogging for a hot minute (I think 16 days to be exact) but I felt like I couldn’t have been more of a newbie.

So I applied and in a few weeks I got my first purchase! I think it was 4% of $3.00. You would’ve thought I had won $1000.00 but no, I think I made twelve cents.

So here is what I recommend about Affiliate Marketing:

1. Choose companies you actually know/love.
2. Realize that when you recommend things you are personally vouching for it. Not legally of course, but because as bloggers your readers get to know you as a person, they take your recommendations as a person and will judge you for them should they turn out to be nightmares.
3. Know your power. Don’t link to more expensive things to drive sales, think of your readers and what benefits them.
4. Don’t go nuts with this. Google is not going to appreciate 30 links to things on Amazon. You will suffer Google consequences even if they are no-follows.
5. Make the links no-follows! (Link goes to an article from Google about no-follows)

Then just give it some time. I actually got an email from Amazon letting me know if I didn’t sell anything for 6 months my account would be terminated. Now I sell about 25 items a month (yes I know, I am a baby affiliate, hardly any sales… growth is slow and steady here).

Any Amazon affiliate questions? I am doing a post about non Amazon affiliate information soon too. If I can help in any way I would love to.

In case you have any interest in checking out my store, here you go. 🙂