What is Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate Marketing is an online sales strategy that allows merchants or brands to sell their products by partnering with individuals or organisations to market a company’s products for a commission. The commission is solely based on performance measures. It could be Pay-Per-Lead (PPL), Pay-Per-Sale (PPS) or Pay-Per-Click (PPC).
The Mechanics of Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate Marketing works similarly to Word-Of-Mouth (WoM), it spreads the responsibilities of product marketing across other parties. With commission and profit sharing, Affiliate Marketing manages to leverage the abilities of a variety of individuals for an effective marketing strategy. These three parties work together to drive the Affiliate Marketing model.
1. Advertiser
Advertiser is a brand or merchant with a product to sell in a market. The products can be either physical objects like electrical goods, or a service like e-hailing.
2. Partner
The Partner can either be an individual or an organisation that markets an Advertiser’s products in an engaging way to potential customers.
Partners promote a product or service to persuade customers to take action in buying the products promoted. This could be through campaigns or highlighting the benefits of a product or service. Influencers, Content Creators and Youtubers are considered as Partners. Another term for Partners is also known as Affiliates. The two terms are interchangeable.
3. Consumer
Consumers are the main drivers for Affiliate Marketing. Partners (Affiliates) share products with consumers on social media, blogs or websites. When Partners are able to promote and engage their audience to buy products, the drive in traffic increases chances of sales for the Advertiser too. Consumers usually won’t be aware of the mechanics behind their purchase, but if a product is marketed to them properly, increase in conversions are usually a result of that.
How do I become an Affiliate Marketer?
Surely you have a lot of questions in your mind. For instance, what skills do you need to be an Affiliate Marketer? No worries, we’re here to help you get ready for your Affiliate Marketing career with just 3 skills.
Skill 1: The Art of Persuasion
Have you ever bought a product from Facebook? What triggers you to make the purchase? Could it be the writing or the visuals? It’s the same in Affiliate Marketing. Not only do you have to market the Advertiser’s products, but you have to get your audience to take action. Taking action in this case would be to either create an account, subscribe to a newsletter or place an order.
To gain traffic for your website, you need to know how to create compelling advertisements and an impressive landing page (first impressions, matter ?). You want to be creative and innovative to intrigue your audience to be interested in the products you are promoting.
Skill 2: Problem-solving in Affiliate Marketing
Problem-solving is an important skill. You might have issues with broken links, conversion delays or lack of content. You need to figure out how to tackle these issues with speed (and of course, quality too). Not only that, decision-making often occurs in problem-solving situations.
Hence, decision-making in Affiliate Marketing is important. The main goal in Affiliate Marketing is to drive traffic, so the chances of potential customers buying the Advertiser’s product increases.
Thus, you might need to make a decision between placing the call to action button that leads to a sign up page or landing page. We can’t rely on hunch or a feeling while making decisions. You need to make the call on setting your priorities and deciding which to pursue.
Skill 3: Technologies and Statistics Behind Affiliate Marketing
A background in technology, such as basic understanding of HTML or CSS, is of great benefit for those who want to venture into Affiliate Marketing. The industry is also strongly driven by data. Affiliate programs are managed from quantitative analysis with an aim to maximise gains efficiently. Anyone with a basic understanding of maths can leverage a career in Affiliate Marketing.
Another important thing to note is that Affiliate links are tracked all the time. We can see how many clicks a link or advertisement gets. Each click has a meaning and every conversion allows you to know where your traffic is coming from. You can see what products drive the highest and lowest conversions. This knowledge is an advantage in optimising your campaigns.
So, now that we have given you the rundown, are you ready to put these skills to the test in Affiliate Marketing? Head over to our sign up page to get started.
