Did you know that something as simple as recommending genuinely good products and services that’ll benefit your audience can earn you thousands of dollars a month?

By building your brand and producing great content, you can successfully add another stream of income through affiliate marketing. 

You may have to put in a little bit of effort at first. But once the ball gets rolling, money will come pouring in even as you sleep.

In this article, we’ll be taking a deep dive into affiliate marketing, how you may earn from it, and how to get started. 

What is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing involves earning commissions from marketing or recommending certain products and services. 

Each time your audience successfully makes a purchase through your affiliate links, you get a cut from that sale. 

According to a recent study, 92% of people trust brands and products recommended to them by their family and friends. This phenomenon is more commonly known as “word of mouth”. 

Affiliate marketing falls under “amplified word of mouth” marketing. This modern version of mouth marketing covers targeted campaigns that help increase organic “word of mouth”.

88% of people rely on online reviews written by other users when deciding to make a purchase. The more positive reviews a product has, the more likely they are to convert leads into sales.

Influencers, trusted review sites, and blogs earn money by reviewing products and recommending these to their followers.

How to Make Money Online with Affiliate Marketing

There are plenty of ways to get started with affiliate marketing. Here are some of them:

Start a Blog or a YouTube Channel

The key to winning on the Internet is producing content that adds value to people’s lives. Your content may be entertaining, informational, or both. But they should always provide something beneficial to keep your users coming back to your brand and build your credibility along the way.

Aside from the difference in medium, there are also key differences between blogging and vlogging. SEO in blogging follows different rules and timetables compared to YouTube SEO. The conversion pipeline can also vary.

However, these two channels are very effective in pulling people in. The top two biggest search engines are Google and YouTube. If you amass a solid amount of followers that trust you, you will earn a portion each time they click on your affiliate links and make a purchase.

Join High-Paying Reward Sites

Reward sites can help you earn money when you complete simple online tasks such as watching videos and taking paid surveys. 

Reputable reward sites such as GrabPoints and ZoomBucks incentivize their members to earn points each time they complete marketing-related tasks. 

The members can use these points to redeem various digital rewards from cash rewards to generous gift cards. Claim gift cards from well-known retailers such as Amazon, Starbucks, and many more. 

But did you know that you can still earn points even when you are not online or busy doing other things? 

Thanks to the great referral programs these sites offer, you may invite as many people as you can using your unique referral code. Here’s where having a great network of people who trust you can pay off.

Get a portion of the points whenever your referral earns. With this method, you may earn a high number of points and collect awesome rewards with zero to minimal effort.

Make Use of Coupon Codes

Some brands allow you to create coupon codes. Make sure to take advantage of this privilege. 

Your coupon code is attached to your affiliate account. It works similarly to an affiliate link where you get credit if anyone uses it. 

Having a coupon code is beneficial, especially if you have a YouTube channel. Your viewers no longer have to click your affiliate link and go to another site. They can just use your coupon code upon checkout to receive a discount.

Then, you will get your affiliate commission.

How Affiliate Marketers are Paid

Affiliate marketers are paid per click, per sale, or per lead. 

Getting paid per click involves redirecting potential customers from your blog, YouTube channel, and any other marketing channels to the seller’s website where the product is listed. 

Paid per sale involves getting a small percentage whenever someone buys the product through you. 

Lastly, you may also get paid per lead. This means that you get paid depending on how many conversions you were able to facilitate. Conversions can be in a form of a newsletter subscription, downloading a guide, or taking a product’s free trial.

Is Affiliate Marketing Even Worth it?

A full-time job, while stable, can only provide you with a fixed amount of salary per month. Not only will you have to spend 40-45 hours per week at work, but the money coming in can be very limited. 

Affiliate marketing can help you achieve more flexibility in your finances.  This makes it a great way to make money online while working from home.

First, starting out doesn’t have to cost a lot of money. Unlike starting a business where you have to create and develop your own product, you only need time and effort to create valuable content and persuade people.

Secondly, you don’t have to trade your time for money in affiliate marketing. You don’t have to meet 40 or more hours of work per week. Earn money even when you are asleep. 

After the initial effort of content creation and marketing, you can enjoy great earnings whenever someone makes a purchase or converts through you.

Lastly, running your own marketing channel–may it be a blog or a Youtube channel–allows you to handle your own schedule. 

Create content from anywhere, add embed links, and then you are good to go. 

Affiliate marketing is especially suited for those who prefer to work from home and find the office environment to be stifling.

Give affiliate marketing a try. Who knows, you might just be a few clicks away from success.