This is going to be an easy click by click and step by step affiliate marketing guide for newbies.
If you want to get started with affiliate marketing and have no idea where to get started or you have an affiliate website but you're struggling to make your first affiliate commission this guide is exactly what you have been looking for!
Before You Read this Affiliate Marketing Guide!
To make this affiliate marketing guide newbie-friendly and easy for you to consume I have created this navigation menu.
Please use it so you can quickly understand & read through the guide.
My Personal Experience with Affiliate Marketing
I still remember that day when I made my very first affiliate commission, it was literally the best day of my life.
That day is special to me and I will never forget it.
There is ABSOLUTELY nothing better than working your butt off for several months and then finally see your hard work giving you signs of success.
My first affiliate commission was only $8 but honestly, that was more than enough to convince me that affiliate marketing works.
If you have already made your first affiliate commission then you perfectly know how it feels.
Here's Why Your First Sale is VERY Important!
My affiliate marketing mentor always told me that if you can make 1 affiliate sale online you can make 1 million sales, it's just a matter of doing what you did to make that 1 sale over & over.
That's why you need to celebrate SO much if you make your first sale from your new affiliate site!
Anyways, after I made my first sale more sales started to follow which started to add up month after month.
Fast forward today, I earn a full-time income thanks to Affiliate Marketing! and the best part I was a COMPLETE newbie.
Some of the Affiliate commissions I earned in November 2018 thanks to Wealthy Affiliate!
If you did not make your first affiliate sale yet then just sit tight grab a drink and read this affiliate marketing guide CAREFULLY because I promise you're going to learn some amazing things.
In this guide, I'll share with all the affiliate marketing basics and NOT only you will even learn how to build your OWN affiliate site for free after you read this guide!
If you're interested to know how I started making money through affiliate marketing as a COMPLETE NEWBIE then check out this Free to Join Program.
With that out of the way, let's get started with the basics of affiliate marketing first 😉
What is Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate marketing is simple and straightforward It's simply selling other people's products.
Let me give you an example.
Let's say you're looking to buy a new microphone, this is the first time you want to buy one which means you need someone to help you buy an affordable but good quality microphone.
What is the first thing you're going to do?
Chances are you're going to Google "affordable good microphone".
You click on the first result and you read the list of the best microphones and then you decide to click on a link which will take you to Amazon to complete your purchase.
When you purchase that microphone through Amazon that website owner will earn an affiliate commission from you.
The good news is you can be that site owner and you can make affiliate commissions as well!
Now I want you to watch this video to learn more about what affiliate marketing is.
When you're done with the video jump to the other section to see how affiliate marketing actually works.
How Does Affiliate Marketing Work?
Here's how Affiliate marketing works:
- Create an affiliate website, landing page or a Facebook page.
- Write affiliate content
- Join affiliate programs & grab your unique affiliate link
- Add your affiliate links into your content
- Drive traffic to your affiliate site with SEO, social media, PPC (pay per click), or solo ads.
Wait! What is SEO, Social Media, PPC & Solo Ads?
If you're a newbie and those words are new to you then I'm going to stop here a minute and explain them for you!
- SEO = Search engine optimization means optimizing your site to get traffic from the search engines like Google, Duck Duck Go & Bing
- Social media: Driving traffic from social sites like Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest...
- PPC: buying traffic from pay per click sites like Google Adwords & Bing Ads.
- Solo Ads: When you pay someone to send you traffic from their email marketing list.
These are by the way some of the best ways to drive high-quality laser targeted traffic to your affiliate sites!
A lot of companies like Amazon have affiliate programs.
These affiliate programs are available to virtually anyone. Once you sign up and get approved on an affiliate program. You will get access to your own affiliate links of any product you want to promote.
Once you choose your favorite product and its relevant affiliate link, you can promote the latter wherever you want. You will get paid everytime someone buys using your affiliate link.
There are many ways to promote your affiliate links.
Some people have created very successful online businesses with affiliate marketing while some are just randomly splashing their affiliate links everywhere which is spam.
Spam will never work!
If you approach to affiliate marketing with the right mentality and the right way you will definitely build a successful affiliate website.
That's the goal of this guide is to help you build a successful affiliate site so keep reading to learn more 😉
WHY Should you GO for Affiliate Marketing?
BIG Income Potential!
The biggest benefit of doing affiliate marketing is its big income potential.
There is really no limit to how much money you can earn, the more you work the more money you will make.
With affiliate marketing, you can earn hundreds, thousands or even millions of dollars the more work you put in the better your affiliate paycheck will be.
According to Payscale, the average affiliate marketer earns $55,786 per year.
That's not bad.
As I said affiliate marketing can even make you a millionaire if you do it right.
For example, Pat Flynn is who is a VERY successful affiliate marketer has a net worth of around $2 million!
Affiliate Marketing Gives You Freedom!
You can do affiliate marketing wherever you live as long as you have an internet connection and a computer.
The best part is you can still work in your 9-5 job and do affiliate marketing part-time until it starts making you money.
Another good thing about this opportunity is it's very flexible!
Do you want to take a vacation to relax and get recharged? No worries you can literally take your affiliate business with you wherever you go!
Did you start making money and you want to make money on autopilot with affiliate marketing without doing anything?
Just invest some of your affiliate earnings into a good writer and they will take care of your affiliate content while you're in a vacation!
For example, I used to write content and make Youtube videos to increase traffic to my site, but recently I hired a virtual assistant who is now taking care of my Youtube channel.
Now I don't have to make Youtube videos anymore but 5 videos a week are still being uploaded regularly to my Youtube channel thanks to my VA which means more traffic and affiliate sales on autopilot!
Now I'm taking a course on how to hire a quality writer, so soon I don't even have to write content for my site!
With affiliate marketing you can make money, after a few months or years you can use some of your affiliate commissions and invest in a writer or Youtuber as I did.
This is how you keep earning affiliate commissions on autopilot while you're sipping a nice drink on the beach 😉
Can you see what kind of freedom Affiliate marketing can give you?
How many jobs do you know that can give you the flexibility & freedom that affiliate marketing offers?
Not a lot for sure.
No Face-to-Face Selling
If you're an introvert or a shy person you will be VERY happy to know that with affiliate marketing you don't need to meet anyone in order to sell them a product.
This is not MLM or network marketing where you need to try to sell stuff in person and have many face-to-face interactions.
Thanks to affiliate marketing, you simply write content or make videos, the content you produce will bring sales for years even when you're sleeping!
That's the power of affiliate marketing!
No Experience Needed! (Anyone Can Do it!)
Are you a newbie with 0 experience? Don't worry I was too and now I earn a decent income thanks to affiliate marketing.
Affiliate marketing is simple to understand that anyone can do it, the catch is it takes time to see results (more on that later) and that's the #1 reason why people quit.
Thanks to affiliate marketing you don't need any experience, programming skills or coding!
I personally was a newbie as I said before and now I own this beautiful affiliate site that you're reading that I'm really proud of!
Affiliate marketing turned ordinary people into millionaires and made businesses millions - Bo Bennett
Affiliate Marketing is Affordable! (No Big Investments Needed!)
Thanks to affiliate marketing you really don't need to invest a lot of money.
For example, when I got started I invested $49 every month, that monthly fee is LITERALLY the only investment I put into affiliate marketing.
With $49/month I get:
- Step by Step affiliate marketing training
- Support from successful affiliate marketers
- Live webinars
- Websites + hosting
- Keyword research tool
- & more!
Below you can learn more about the same program that I paid $49/month for which is the #1 reason I'm successful with affiliate marketing.
Who is Affiliate Marketing for?
Affiliate marketing is for anyone that wants to build an amazing income online.
But it's still not for everyone.
Affiliate marketing is for those that are patient, hardworking and don't have the 9-5 mentality.
What is the 9-5 Mentality?
The 9-5 mentality is the number one reason why the majority of people don't make any money from affiliate marketing.
People with the 9-5 mentality expect to get paid for every hour they put into affiliate marketing.
Affiliate marketing does not work like that, to be profitable with this business you need to work hard for several months in order to see your hard work pay off.
It's like farming, the farmer needs to plant lots of seeds, water them and do all that leg work for several months and then expect to see the results from his hard work.
With affiliate marketing, you need to lose the 9-5 mentality and adopt the entrepreneur mentality.
That's exactly what you need to be a successful affiliate marketer!
How Can You Make Money with Affiliate Marketing in 2020?
Well, there are different ways to make money with affiliate marketing.
Some prefer promoting affiliate products on their Youtube channel or Facebook page, while some build a single landing page and an email list to promote affiliate products to.
Those are all amazing ways to make money with affiliate marketing.
But what is the best way to make money with affiliate marketing for a TOTAL newbie?
This is why I created this affiliate marketing guide and below I'll give you step by step instructions that are perfect for beginners to get started with affiliate marketing.
How to Start Doing Affiliate Marketing - Step-by-step for Beginners
As I said above, there are many ways to get started with affiliate marketing.
But today I want to share with you absolutely the best way to get into this business model the right way as a newbie.
Here's what you will need to get started:
- Newbie Friendly Affiliate Marketing Training
- Website
- Traffic
- Affiliate programs
PS: With My Recommended Affiliate Marketing Training you will also get websites, support, hosting and more!
Here's how you will be creating your first affiliate website!
Step 1: Choose an Interest
The first thing you need to do before starting with affiliate marketing is to choose an interest which is a topic aka niche that your website will be about.
When you choose a topic you will be only promoting affiliate products within your chosen topic.
The niche you choose must be something you're genuinely interested in or something you love or are passionate about.
As you can see with affiliate marketing you can make money using your passion!
If you want more information about choosing your niche here's a great video that explains everything in details.
click on the video to learn more about choosing a niche
Step 2: Build a Website
The best way to make money with affiliate marketing is through your website.
A website is an evergreen money making machine. After you put in the required hard work and time, your site can work for you 24/7.
You can make money while you're sleeping. People will be visiting your website and buying affiliate products on your site when you're on your bed!
I just love it when I wake, check out my email inbox and find out that I have made commissions!
Here's a guide on how to create a professional looking site easily.
| With advanced website builders like Siterubix newbies like you and me can easily create a fully functional website in seconds! |
Step 3: Get Visitors (SEO & PPC)
Traffic is the most important thing. The more traffic (website visitors) the more affiliate commissions you will earn.
Getting people to your site is probably the hardest thing in affiliate marketing. But with focused hard work, the right guidance and patience you can get thousands of highly targeted visitors to buy using your affiliate links.
Here's how you can get visitors from Google, Yahoo, and Bing and make them buy your affiliate products.
- Find a problem.
- Write an article about the problem & how to solve it.
- Promote an affiliate product that will help solve the problem.
- Earn affiliate commissions
The more articles you write the more affiliate commissions you will make.
The training I personally use will also teach you how to bring traffic to your site and how to convert it into affiliate sales!
Step 4: Earn Revenue
From Visually.
Now that you have a fully set up website with visitors. It's time to earn revenue, there are many amazing affiliate programs you can join.
Here are some of the best affiliate programs out there:
Here are other great affiliate programs.
Once you sign up for an affiliate program and get approved. Find the right product you want to promote, get your affiliate link and add it to your website articles.
Make sure you don't join many affiliate programs. Remember you can make a full-time income if you focus on one affiliate program.
How Much Can I Earn with Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate marketing is a very profitable business model. There are people that have created 5 figures online businesses with affiliate marketing.
While there are people like me that are making around $3500 per month.
How much you earn depends on you:
- How much time you will invest.
- How fast you will learn.
- And many other factors.
One thing that you need to know is that affiliate marketing is not a job. It's a business. It works but requires time and patience. It may take you several months to see your first earnings.
In fact, it took me FOUR months to earn my first $8. Since then I have been making a consistent income. The point is this requires, time, hard work and lots of patience.
5 Tips to Succeed with Affiliate Marketing
1) Treat Your Affiliate Marketing Business Seriously
Do you want to make money with affiliate marketing and finally quit your boring job?
Then you want to treat your affiliate marketing business VERY seriously if you want it to pay off.
The biggest mistake I used to do when I was just starting out is working on my site whenever I feel like and hoping to make lots of money.
It does not work this way, if you want to get successful at this you want to either get all in or go home.
It was when I got all in into affiliate marketing that I started making real money.
I have even quit my university studies when I saw how much money my friends have been making with this amazing online business!
If did not get serious with affiliate marketing I'd have NEVER earned this kind of affiliate commissions!
2) You Need to be Patient
There are a lot of scammers in the affiliate marketing world. I'm pretty sure you came across tons of websites that promise you to get rich online within a week or two.
With affiliate marketing, you need to be VERY patient because it's not a get rich quick scheme (and get rich quick schemes don't work anyway!)
If you're willing to stay focused and work hard even when you're not making any money then you will see success with affiliate marketing
3) Be Consistent (Don't Slack)
This is something I was lacking when I was getting started with affiliate marketing.
Consistency is the key to success with this business.
When writing content on your site or filming videos you need to be consistent with that.
Does your schedule allow you to create 3 articles per week? Then keep writing 3 articles per week in a consistent way.
Affiliate Marketing or the Gym! Consistency is the Key to Success
If you go to the gym to build muscle, you will need to be consistent, once you stop being consistent you will start seeing your muscles getting weaker and weaker slowly that's literally the case with affiliate marketing.
When I start slacking off with my affiliate sites I notice my website traffic decreasing slowly but when I work on it consistently it keeps growing up!
So make sure you're consistent!
4) Promote 1 or 2 Affiliate Products Max!
The biggest mistake that new affiliate marketers make is promoting lots of affiliate products, there are many affiliate programs that offer high payouts that true.
But if you promote lots of affiliate products your readers won't trust you.
You need to be familiar with the products you promote.
Familiarize, try and test the affiliate products you want to sell first, this will earn you the highest commissions and you will come across as a trustworthy affiliate marketer.
Selling lots of affiliate products might work but selling only 1 or 2 products you trust and you personally have tried will make you more money with literally the same effort!
5) Affiliate Reviews are the Best!
From my 3 years affiliate marketing experience I learned that writing reviews is the best and most profitable way to make lots of affiliate commissions.
If you click around my site you will notice that most of my posts are product reviews.
Sometimes I write "how to" and list posts, they do well but affiliate reviews are the best.
So if you can make sure you write reviews on your site they are really easy to write and more profitable.
6) Be Honest & Real
Lying to people and writing biased reviews is something that lots of affiliate marketers are doing unfortunately.
In affiliate marketing, people LOVE honesty, integrity, trust is very important in this game.
If people trust you, then you'll become a successful affiliate marketer.
If you read my affiliate reviews I say things exactly like they are, I never lie just to make a quick buck!
7) You Need Someone to Model
Tony Robbins said it best:
Tony Robbins
If you want to be successful, you need to model those who have already made success in your field
That's true if you want to be a successful affiliate marketer you need to model successful affiliate marketers.
Modeling does not mean blindly copying someone but just doing the same things that made them successful.
I personally joined this Free to Try Program and I met lots of successful affiliate marketers that I got mentored by and set as models to follow.
Affiliate Marketing Website Examples
If you're into affiliate marketing or about to get into it chances are you want to see examples of successful affiliate marketing websites.
That's a good thing, I personally always check what my competitor sites do and what the most successful affiliate marketing sites are doing that I could do to improve my site.
I always look at my other affiliate marketers sites and try to see things like:
- Type of affiliate content they write
- What affiliate programs my competitors promote
- Where they get backlinks & social shares
- What are their top performing posts
- Their domain authority
These are just some of the things I have a look at when I need some inspiration & ideas to improve my affiliate sites.
My friend Dylan has just put together a nice post of 10 Affiliate Marketing website examples.
These affiliate sites pull in lots of traffic & money, if you check them out and notice what they have in common you will definitely know what to do in your own affiliate site!
You can also watch this video to get more inspiration and ideas to apply to your own affiliate marketing business.
Best Affiliate Marketing Tools I Personally Use
If you want to get started with affiliate marketing there are some tools that you will need like bread.
Over the years I came across lots of useful & useless affiliate marketing tools.
If you want to check out the best tools that you really need you're in luck because I have just published a post about the best affiliate marketing tools for beginners!
Affiliate Marketing FAQ
How long does it take to earn with Affiliate Marketing?
This is my favorite answer to this question.
Please watch the video below:
What are the best Affiliate Products to Promote?
There are so many affiliate programs you can join, as a newbie I recommend you the Amazon affiliate program, they have millions of products you can promote.
On top of that people trust & love to shop from Amazon right? 🙂
Do I Need a Step-by-step Affiliate Marketing Training?
Well, if you're an affiliate marketer that has some traffic and affiliate sales I don't think you really need it but it will be helpful though.
But as a total beginner, I think you should Invest in training because it will save you lots of costly mistakes!
I personally learned affiliate marketing from this free to try affiliate marketing training.
How to Start Affiliate Marketing with Amazon?
- Start a website within a niche (topic) you're passionate about
- Sign up for Amazon affiliate program and promote the products related to your niche
- Write content related to your niche
- Drive traffic to your Amazon affiliate content.
Here's a full Amazon Affiliate Marketing guide for Newbies.
Can You Learn Affiliate Marketing for Free?
Yes you can but I don't recommend it.
Trying to learn everything by yourself will get you to quit in no time.
I tried it once but will never do again.
How to be a Successful Affiliate Marketer?
- Invest in affiliate marketing training.
- Find successful affiliate marketers to model.
- Be real & honest
- Help people & solve their problems.
How Much Time Should I invest in Affiliate Marketing?
As much time as you can, 2 hours a day is good if it's consistent.
Affiliate marketing is pretty flexible you can set your own time & schedule and stick to it.
Is Affiliate Marketing Competitive/Saturated?
Absolutely not, only people that give up quickly will tell you that affiliate marketing is dead!
There are over 4 billion people on the internet buying stuff so Affiliate marketing is growing more in 2019 not the other way around.
What are the downsides of Affiliate Marketing?
- It takes time to see results.
- You need to be patient and very hard working like anything in life.
Affiliate Marketing Guide for Newbies (Final Words)
I hope this 2019 affiliate marketing guide for beginners was useful to you.
Affiliate marketing is an amazing and reliable way to make a consistent income.
But it requires patience and lots of hard work.
Affiliate Marketing Newbie?
- Are you ready to start your own affiliate marketing site?
- Get support from a big community
- Get help & 1-1 support from me & many other affiliate marketers?
- Work anywhere you want in the world
- Enjoy delicious affiliate commissions?
If you want to jump start your affiliate marketing success I recommend you to check out this:
It's the same training that has turned me from a newbie to a full-time affiliate marketer!
Hola cual es os sitios mejor para ganar comisiones, trabajar online desde de casa. Puede ayudar.
Sorry but I don’t speak Spanish, I understood what you said but I can only help you make money if you speak English 🙂
This was a great article that gave me a lot of ideas and options. And it is simply put! Very good information and I am going to use these tips for sure in my affiliate marketing program. I especially like the information about affiliate marketing with Amazon. I have been looking into this and hopefully I will be successful! Keep up the good work!
Thanks a lot, Christian, glad to hear my affiliate marketing guide was useful!
Awesome affiliate marketing guide, it really put things into perspective for me. Initially, I was really intimidated by the concept of affiliate marketing.I am not really a technological geek, but as you said, anyone start with affiliate marketing.
I have always dreamed to build my very own online business, and I am willing to put in the time and effort. Your guide has helped me to make the decision more easier. I am ready to sign up.
Thanks for all the help
You’ll definitely make it if you put in time & effort! That’s the secret man.
I agree that your first affiliate sale is important and one that you will always remember. It’s an amazing feeling when you realize that you can make money online, even when you sleep!It was interesting to see what an average affiliate Marketer earns per year as I had never seen that statistic before. Just goes to show that with the right amount of concentrated effort you can build a business that replaces a full-time job.Getting a VA when the time is right is an excellent tip, as is hiring a writer. Re-investing part of your earnings will definitely help you scale your business much faster. Thanks for the great info and tips.
Yes, Les, absolutely affiliate marketing can replace your job, lots of people did it already, I did it too! A VA can scale your business faster while you’re doing other things, how awesome is that?
This is really comprehensive. Eventually, thanks for sharing your best experience with us.
Thanks for your comment Stella 🙂 Wish you a great start of the year!
Anis
Hi Anis,
Thanks for stopping over on my blog earlier today.
Great tips for beginners and I can see you are endorsing WA, which is a huge option. I once was ambassador there. Been off due to local political issues. But will be back.
Hope your week is going great
Hey Enstine, you’re blog is amazing, yeah WA is an amazing platform and I saw your profile there, hope you will get back soon.
Happy holidays! 🙂
Anis
I am a beginner in affiliate marketing and I struggle with staying consistent.
What are some things I can do to help me?
I signed up for the WA free offer and I just have a hard time sticking with it.
I am interested in learning what I need to know.
Since joining WA I have stopped chasing the push button offers.
Hi Jamie, I recommend you follow the WA training and stick with it, when you learn the basics of affiliate marketing you will start applying on your site.
Remember, don’t try to do everything quickly
Start doing little by little in a consistent way, so you keep going and don’t feel burn out!
I like your 5 quick tips for attaining success in affiliate marketing. Although the words “work hard” and “be patient and consistent” sound scary to newbies, at least you are being honest for mentioning those words so people will have a correct expectation of what this business really is.
I’d like to ask…
How long have you been associated with Wealthy Affiliate? How much money have you already earned from this online business?
Hi Gomer, I have been associated with WA for 2 years, I’ve made enough money to pay off my bills, you can learn more about how much I make by reading my WA review