Affiliate marketing is the process by which an affiliate earns a commission for marketing another person’s or company’s products. The affiliate simply searches for a product they enjoy, then promotes that product and earns a piece of the profit from each sale they make. The sales are tracked via affiliate links from one website to another.
How Affiliate Marketing Works
Affiliate marketing involves referring to a product or service by sharing it on a blog, social media platform, podcast, or website. The affiliate earns a commission each time someone makes a purchase through the unique link associated with their recommendation.
Commission rates vary depending on the company and the offer. On the low end, you’ll earn about 5% of the sale but, with some arrangements, you can earn as much as 50%, usually when promoting a class or event. Affiliate marketing programs also provide a flat rate per sale instead of a percentage.
Benefits of affiliate marketing for businesses
There are many digital marketing strategies that can be used to grow the business. There are some good solutions such as referral programs, email marketing, content marketing, social media marketing etc.
But the thing is, none of them offers as many benefits as affiliate marketing. A good affiliate marketing program allows businesses to promote themselves on various levels, blending smoothly with other marketing strategies in a consistent way.
Unlike a sales team, affiliate marketing works for you 24/7, making money for both parties at all times. A passive sales funnel for a business is crucial if the company wants to expand and scale faster.
There are some general benefits that anyone wishing to go down this path can expect to receive
- easy setup and implementation
- low ongoing costs
- high conversion rate
- increased competitive advantage
- low, or nonexistent risk
- a new way of making a profit and potential passive income
- networking possibilities with influencers
The different types of affiliate marketing networks.
There are a lot of affiliate marketing platforms out there which provide different commission rates on different products and different availability in regions, so you don’t have to worry about sticking with one platform.
1. Click Bank
ClickBank is an affiliate network that has a lot of digital products, it offers physical products as well.
Whereas platforms like ShareASale have a lot of big, nationally known merchants, ClickBank is definitely more on the “smaller” end of merchants.
For example, you’ll find a lot of merchants who are selling eBooks, online courses, or membership sites. These merchants might not have the name recognition of a national or international brand, but they can be great offers if they fit your niche.
There’s also a downside, though – some of the ClickBank products just aren’t very high-quality products. And while ClickBank has gotten better with its review process to filter out the bad merchants, you’ll still want to be careful about which merchants you choose to promote.
What you need to know about ClickBank
- Niche/product types: ClickBank definitely leans towards digital products, but you’ll find some physical products as well (and ClickBank makes it easy to filter between the two).
- Average commission rate: Depends on the specific merchant you sign up with, but usually pretty high. You’ll find both percentage and flat-rate commissions.
- Cookie duration: Depends on the specific merchant you sign up with, but usually ~60 days.
- Minimum payout: $10
ClickBank pros and cons
Pros:
- Lots of smaller niche offers that you won’t find at other affiliate platforms
- Pretty high commissions for most merchants
- $10 minimum payout makes it easy to get paid
- Offers weekly payments
Cons:
- ClickBank’s generous refund policy means you might lose commissions after the fact
- You have to wade through some low-quality products
2. CJ Affiliate – Commission Junction
CJ is one of the biggest and the best affiliate networks out there, which means that you’ll be able to connect with thousands of both big and small merchants. Unlike other affiliate marketing networks like click bank, the CJ is available in almost every region.
Some of the big physical and digital companies using CJ are:
- Lowes
- Priceline
- Overstock
- IHG (Hotels)
- Office Depot
- GoPro
- Grammarly
What you need to know about CJ
- Niche/product types: CJ covers a range of niches and both physical and digital products.
- Average commission rate: Depends on the specific merchant you sign up with.
- Cookie duration: Depends on the specific merchant you sign up with.
- Minimum payout: $50 for direct deposit or $100 for the check
CJ’s pros and cons
Pros:
- Huge range of big and small merchants to choose from
- A nice back-end dashboard to help you manage your affiliate marketing efforts
- Has a deep link generator bookmarklet that makes it really easy to generate links
Cons:
- The dashboard is a little complicated when you’re just getting started.
3. ShareASale
ShareASale is one of the popular affiliate networks out there. Whereas Amazon Associates is focused entirely on Amazon products, ShareASale houses affiliate programs for 4,500+ merchants, both big and small.
From one spot – the ShareASale dashboard – you can sign up to all these merchants, generate links, and view your statistics.
You’ll need to individually apply to merchants and be approved by each merchant, which is a pretty standard approach for an affiliate network like this.
Overall, ShareASale is a great option for both digital and physical products.
For example, on the digital side, you’ll find plenty of WordPress theme and plugin shops, hosting providers, etc.
And on the physical side, you’ll find plenty of big and small merchants. For example, there are Warby Parker (sunglasses), Sun Basket, Wayfair, Reebok, NFL Shop, plus thousands of other small and large businesses.
Basically – no matter what niche your website or blog is in, you can probably find some offers worth promoting.
What you need to know about ShareASale
- Niche/product types: A little bit of everything, including both physical and digital products.
- Average commission rate: Depends on the specific merchant you sign up with.
- Cookie duration: Depends on the specific merchant you sign up with.
- Minimum payout: $50
ShareASale pros and cons
Pros:
- Thousands of merchants for both physical and digital products, including lots of well-known merchants
- Trustworthy – They’ve been around for many years and work with lots of big brands
- Lots of exclusive merchants. Over 1,000 of the merchants at ShareASale only work with ShareASale
- Has a bookmarklet that makes it easy to generate custom affiliate links
Cons:
- The dashboard design is a little clunky