I still remember the night my website made its first commission through an Amazon affiliate link. It was just $1 but it filled with so much happiness. It was the confirmation that the affiliate marketing business does work.

This is a detailed guide about how to become an affiliate marketer. If you have found my page it’s because you have already heard what this is about.

HOW TO START AFFILIATE MARKETING WITH A WEBSITE?

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There is a lot of information out there and I know that for many the affiliate marketing business is a fascinating and simple way to start an online business. Note that there is also bad and outdated information online too, so be wary.

You will come across companies that claim to have affiliate marketing training but in reality, they are unscrupulous people trying to cheat customers.

The same thing happens with some website hosting providers. You might get offered incredible deals to host your website and in the long run, it turns out, you lost your time and money due to bad service.

With these comments, I don’t pretend to discourage you but to make you aware so that you proceed with caution when investing your money on a service.

WHAT ARE THE THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW AND TAKE ADVANTAGE OFF WHEN STARTING AFFILIATE MARKETING BUSINESS?

1. Know how affiliate marketing really works in simple words?
2. In what timeframe should you expect to start earning money with your website?
3. What is an affiliate program and how does it work?
4.  What to expect within the affiliate program’s platform? How to create your affiliate links.
5.  Top 5 Affiliate Programs and which one should you start?
6.  Website creation (five minutes process)
7.  What kind of content should you create for your Website?
8.  Where can you find strategic keywords for your website content?
9.  What is the average cost to maintain an affiliate marketing business?
10.  How to promote your affiliate products in a successful way?
11. Where can I receive step by step training that will help successfully build my online business?
12.   Who has the best affiliate marketing training online Program?

1.       HOW AFFILIATE MARKETING WORKS IN SIMPLE WORDS?

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Let’s start by clarifying that affiliate marketing has three pillars: The affiliate who promotes the items and products (You), the affiliate program or network that you sign up with (The merchants that sell or make the products) and the customer who buys them.

You may be wondering now how much could you earn?

I have it covered for you 🙂

2. IN WHAT TIME FRAME SHOULD YOU EXPECT TO START EARNING MONEY THROUGH YOUR WEBSITE

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Becoming an affiliate marketer is a very lucrative endeavor. I would say the sky is the limit when talking about how much can you earn. It will depend on the product you choose to promote and how much work you put into. Remember your income is based on sales commission.

For example, let’s assume the product you are promoting it leaving you a commission of $4 per sale. If your website makes 1,000 sales in a month, you will earn $4,000.

In one year, this would be $480,000. Not bad right?

Don’t get me wrong, you could achieve this amount but with the correct mindset. You need training, passion, persistence and constant hard work. See the income report of a successful affiliate marketer, Pat Flynn.

You can expect to see your first income from commission at the 6 months to a year mark. Can you commit to this goal?

It needs to be said that, if you are currently employed, is not realistic to expect to earn your current salary in 6 months by putting 2 hours of work a day. Everyone would be a millionaire by now. The idea is to realize that this is real and that you can really make a leaving from it. Many of us are enjoying the multiple benefits of working from home with affiliate marketing.

If you are passionate enough for something and believe you can work without pay for at least 6 months, then I think you have made a great choice.

 

3. WHAT IS AN AFFILIATE PROGRAM AND AFFILIATE NETWORK?

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Affiliate Marketing Program:

Are also called associate programs, consist of an agreement in which a store or merchants pays affiliate Web sites a commission to send them traffic and sells. These websites promote a product or products through affiliate links and the marketer(you) receives a commission per the
terms set by the program.

Affiliate Network:

Some companies do not manage their own affiliate program but may be part of an affiliate network which is an intermediary and/or manager between publishers (affiliates) and merchant affiliate programs.

The more robust and complete the affiliate program is, the easier it is to promote its products.

In general, the affiliate program or affiliate network will have everything prepared for you. The promotional banners, widgets and helpful product descriptions for you to use in your promotion.

As an affiliate marketer if you promote and sell your products in an honest way, then, is a win-win for both parties, the affiliate marketer and the merchants.

IN A PRACTICAL WAY

For example, if you use Amazon’s affiliate program to promote binoculars, the following process will take place.

You have written a review of the binoculars in your website. You have included details that your readers will be looking for before buying the product. You start to receive traffic on your website and people start finding your review through Google. If any of your readers decide to buy the binoculars and clicks on your affiliate links and buys the product, then you, the affiliate, will earn a commission.

4. WHAT TO EXPECT WITHIN AN AFFILIATE PROGRAM PLATFORM? HOW TO CREATE YOUR AFFILIATE LINKS?

I think you will find it interesting to see how does the process work from within one of the most popular platforms in the business, Amazon’s affiliate program.

1. When you subscribe to Amazon’s affiliate program you gain access to the platform you see above. Regardless of your niche or your website’s focus, you will be able to choose any product to promote.

• Product links
• Banners Native Shopping Ads
• Mobile Popover
• Link to Any Page

2. Choose the product you wish to promote

In the above example I chose:

• Waterproof Binoculars

3. Then, you click “Get Link” for the product. This link contains your affiliate ID and you will insert that code in your website. After that, this code will appear on your website as a banner or picture.

5. TOP 5 AFFILIATE PROGRAMS AND WHICH ONE SHOULD YOU START WITH?

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As a small introduction, Amazon’s affiliate program is, without a doubt, one of the more robust programs out there. The quantity and variety of items make this store one of the more attractive ones to start with.

And now on to the list.

1. Amazon Associates Affiliate Program

Amazon has the biggest affiliate marketing program in existence, with products from more than 1.5 million sellers. Even though there are other affiliate programs that might be more lucrative, offering up to 75% commission, I always start my projects with Amazon’s program due to the advantages it offers.

• There is no minimum requirement for monthly user traffic before you apply
• Immense product variety
• Ready to use banners, widgets and pop-up links
• Well known store and website
• It can work with virtually any niche or focus you give your website

 

2. Awin.com

This is an affiliate program oriented to financial services and products. Fashion products, travel items, sports, home, and beauty. You can find a full list of AWIN Sellers on their website. Some of the biggest brand names include yatt, Etsy, AliExpress, and HP.

The commission rate varies per seller.

3. Clickbank.com

This program focuses on digital products like electronic books, specialized online courses, etc. The average commission rate is very good and can be up to 75%.

 

4. eBay Partners

eBay is one of the top 10 most popular online stores. They offer products for any niche and focus your website might have. You can see their commission terms Here.

 

5. CJ by Conversant Affiliate Network

This is one of the oldest affiliate network and one of the biggest. Just like the rest, you can register for free and start to explore their terms and catalog when deciding on a product.

Now that you may have chosen an affiliate program, let’s talk about how to promote it in an efficient way.

6. WEBSITE CREATION (FIVE MINUTES PROCESS)

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Building your website is a simple process. It was a daunting task in the past if you did not know about programming, but today not so much. New technologies allow you to build your website in just five minutes with the need to know anything about HTML.

Register on the free training course through Wealthy Affiliate University where you can follow in my steps and at the end have your own website ready to be monetized.

You can also read my full review about the best Website builder for blogs here

>>>Best Free Website Builder for Blogs<<<

7. WHAT KIND OF CONTENT SHOULD YOU CREATE FOR YOUR WEBSITE

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• Best of product
• How to’s
• Reviews
• Benefits
• Pros and Cons

8. WHERE CAN YOU FIND STRATEGIC KEYWORDS FOR YOUR CONTENT?

I personally use a tool to find keywords that speed the whole process. The tool I use is called Jaxxy and I 100% vouch for its effectiveness and consider it to be an essential investment.

9. WHAT IS THE AVERAGE COST TO MAINTAIN AN AFFILIATE MARKETING BUSINESS?

Things that will come into play are website hosting cost, a keyword research tool, Affiliate marketing training (step by step videos, coaching, and networking) and the domain name will cost you about $400 a year.

My recommendation is that you start with affiliate marketing and training programs that are totally free. If you come across affiliate programs that charge to allow you to promote their program I would say to beware and do proper research before paying.

The good news about this affiliate business is that you can start by subscribing to various platforms totally free.

 10. LEARN HOW TO PROMOTE YOUR PRODUCTS IN A SUCCESSFUL WAY

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There are many ways to promote your products. I have found very interesting that many affiliate marketing experts advise that you should focus on promoting around 10 items or less.

If we analyze why we can understand that is wiser to promote a product that you know well. Over time you become an expert, refining your knowledge with every day that passes, creating different methods and strategies and as a result of, all of this, leads to higher sales conversion.

Various ways to successfully promote your products paid and free options. However, for a beginner, paid to advertise can be very risky. Be aware that the most successful affiliate marketers learn strategies to advertise their products totally free.

To achieve it, these affiliate marketers learn SEO techniques with the objective of positioning their articles on the first page of search engines of the likes of Google, Yahoo, and Bing. This way they ensure massive and constant traffic on their website.

You also can learn SEO but also can promote your products through social media, email marketing, and YouTube. All of this builds trust with your readers.

One very good way I recommend is that you handle all of your affiliate marketing from your own website. This is the same as building your business on your home turf. The rest are alternative ways.

11. WHERE CAN I RECEIVE STEP BY STEP AFFILIATE MARKETING TRAINING TO HELP ME BUILD MY BUSINESS?

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I can definitely understand that you want to know where can you receive good training. One of the foundations for success is knowledge.

Please be critical, there are many online programs that are not good or even legit. These programs will promise that you will earn thousands in a short period of time and the reality is, many are just a scam.

Another thing to be mindful is that sometimes you will find other types of programs that will be similar to affiliate marketing. Among those are the multi-level or pyramids types that sometimes are very different than a straight affiliate marketing business.

One last item to cover is the affiliate marketing training that are outdated. Please verify the sources of information of any affiliate marketing training so that you don’t waste your time or money.

Well, let me talk about…

 

12. WHO HAS THE BEST AFFILIATE MARKETING TRAINING ONLINE?

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My #1 recommendation is Wealthy Affiliate, without the shadow of a doubt. This is where I trained when I started some years ago and its where I still collaborate as a coach, helping others in their initial stages.

You can subscribe to the training without worries and its totally free, and in case you were wondering, NO CREDIT CARD IS NEEDED. 🙂

What do you get from this training?

You get 10 lessons that will guide you, step by step, through the process of building your website and at the end you will end up with your own business website ready to be monetized. All of this WITHOUT PAYING A SINGLE DOLLAR

After you have your plan of action and your website looking good, the rest is hard work to create helpful content. When you least expect it, you will be earning passive income that little by little could become your principal source of income.

That’s my experience LOL!

Wealthy Affiliate has a super robust platform that you need to see with your own eyes. This platform is great for both, beginners and seasoned experts alike.

There are two membership options

• The Starter membership that I referenced above, totally free and without expiration limits.
• The second one is the Premium Membership and is the one I recommend after you have gained your bearings in this business.

I also recommend the premium option because of everything that offers. Is very economical when compared to other programs (only $29 a month). It provides all of the tools that you will need, from expert help to build your website, 25 unlimited website hosting, coaching, keyword research tool, solid SEO strategies, 24/7 technical support and a community of over one million members that will be eager to help you achieve your goals.

As mentioned above, I recommend the FREE membership because you always have to try a service before you commit to a purchase.

One thing I won’t forget is my Bonus for you. If you feel this business really interests you and will motivate you, register through the link below and you have my commitment to be your personal COACH. I do this happily.

So, count on me in Wealthy Affiliate and I will see you on the training.