﻿3 Affiliate Basics That Still Work
Forget the Fancy Tricks. Start Here.


If you’ve been around affiliate marketing for any length of time, you’ve probably seen plenty of promises. There’s always a new traffic trick, a new funnel, or some new strategy that’s supposed to change everything.
Some of those ideas can be useful. Others disappear almost as quickly as they arrived. But underneath all the new tools and shiny objects, a few basic things still matter.
Thankfully, they aren’t terribly complicated.
Here are three affiliate marketing basics that are just as important today as they’ve ever been.
1. Give the Product Room to Breathe
Years ago, affiliate marketers were often told to build a completely separate website for every product they promoted. You certainly don’t need to go that far anymore.
A good review, blog post, landing page, or simple bridge page can do the job just fine. What matters is giving the product enough space to explain what it actually does and why someone might be interested in it.
Before recommending something, think about the same questions you would probably ask before buying it yourself:
* What exactly is it?
* Who is it meant for?
* What problem does it solve?
* What are the main benefits?
* Is there anything I should know before buying it?
If you’ve used the product yourself, even better. Tell people what you liked about it, how you used it, and whether there was anything you weren’t particularly crazy about.
A review doesn’t have to make every product sound like the greatest thing since sliced bread. In fact, a little honesty usually makes the recommendation more believable.
You also don’t want to simply copy the vendor’s description, paste it onto your page, and add an affiliate link. The vendor already has a sales page.
Give your reader something different. Share your own experience, answer a question the sales page missed, explain something that confused you at first, or tell the reader who you think would benefit most from the product.
And if you receive a commission when someone buys through your link, let them know. A simple, easy-to-see affiliate disclosure keeps everything clear and above board.
2. Give People a Reason to Come Back
One thing we sometimes forget is that a person can be interested in what we’re promoting and still not be ready to buy it today.
Maybe they’re busy. Maybe they want to think about it. Maybe payday isn’t until Friday. Or perhaps they simply got distracted halfway through the page.
That’s one reason building an email list can be so valuable. Instead of hoping someone remembers your website a few days from now, you can give them an easy way to stay in touch.
A small freebie related to the subject can work perfectly well. It doesn’t have to be a 75-page masterpiece.
You could offer something simple such as:
* A short report
* A checklist or cheat sheet
* A quick-start guide
* A short email course
* A useful collection of tips or resources
The important thing is that it gives your reader something they actually want.
Once someone joins your list, don’t immediately turn every email into another sales pitch. Send useful information and give them a reason to keep opening your messages.
Share a tip. Answer a common question. Tell a short story about something that happened to you. Recommend a helpful resource when it makes sense.
And yes, you can promote affiliate products too. That’s part of the reason you’re building the list in the first place.
The old affiliate marketing advice used to claim that people needed to see an offer seven times before they would buy. There really isn’t a magic number.
Some people make a decision quickly, while others may follow you for weeks or even months before purchasing anything. The better goal is to stay useful and stay in touch without making people feel like every email is trying to pry open their wallet.
You may also have heard the old warning that putting the word free in an email will automatically send it to the spam folder. Email deliverability is a lot more complicated than one word.
Good sending practices, proper email authentication, useful messages, honest subject lines, and sending to people who actually asked to hear from you matter much more.
In other words, treat your subscribers like people instead of email addresses.
That’s still pretty good advice.
3. Find People Who Actually Want What You’re Offering
Affiliate marketers talk a lot about traffic.
We want more clicks, more visitors, more subscribers, and more people coming to our websites. But simply getting more traffic doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll make more sales.
Imagine sending 1,000 people who have absolutely no interest in gardening to a website selling gardening tools. You technically have plenty of traffic, but you probably won’t have many customers.
I’d rather have 100 visitors who are genuinely interested in gardening.
That’s the difference between traffic and targeted traffic.
Years ago, affiliate marketers were often told to write a certain number of articles every week and expect a predictable number of visitors and sales in return. Wouldn’t it be nice if everything worked that neatly?
Today, people might discover your content in all sorts of places:
* Google and other search engines
* Facebook groups and social media
* YouTube
* Pinterest
* Email newsletters
* Blogs and niche websites
* Online communities
* Paid advertising
You certainly don’t need to use all of them.
In fact, trying to be everywhere at once is a pretty good way to spend your whole day creating content and wondering when you’re supposed to actually run your business.
Pick one or two places where the people you want to reach are already spending their time. Learn how those platforms work and concentrate on creating something useful there.
Then pay attention to what happens.
Look at things such as:
* Which links people are actually clicking
* Which emails bring visitors back
* Which subjects get the most interest
* Which traffic sources produce subscribers
* Where your buyers are actually coming from
There’s no dependable rule saying that exactly one out of every 100 visitors will buy something. Conversion rates vary depending on the offer, audience, price, traffic source, sales page, and how much the visitor already trusts you.
Your own numbers will eventually tell you much more than somebody else’s favorite statistic.
Don’t Make It Harder Than It Has to Be
Affiliate marketing can become complicated very quickly. There’s always another tool to try, another platform to join, another funnel to build, and another person telling you that you’ve been doing everything wrong.
Sometimes it helps to ignore all of that for a moment and get back to the basics.
Give the product you’re promoting enough room to explain why it might help someone. Give interested people a way to stay in touch with you. Then work on getting your message in front of people who are actually interested in what you’re talking about.
You don’t need to be everywhere, and you certainly don’t need thousands of followers before you can get started.
Get the basics working first.
Then you can worry about the fancy stuff.


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