Affiliate Marketing Checklist

This checklist will outline the simple steps you need to take to get to the very top of affiliate marketing. You’ll see how easily you can start making money from another product and how easily you reach a huge audience.

Start with the Right Approach

The first step is getting the right mindset for successful affiliate marketing. We discussed in the main book what some of the challenges associated with setting up an affiliate program were. What we saw, was that it’s actually very difficult to start earning money quickly unless you’re willing to invest a lot of money into advertising. The solution then is to make sure that you don’t have unrealistic expectations – go into your marketing with the intention of making money but be happy to turn any profit to begin with. Your aim at the start should be to earn a few extra dollars on the side to make your lifestyle more comfortable.

Then be consistent and don’t give up – eventually you’ll reach your goal.

Find Your Product

The next step is finding your product.

The key here is to make sure you find a product that you know you can sell. Look for something that has a proven track record of selling and don’t be shy to simply copy and paste successful business models.

Starting in a smaller niche for your first product is a good idea. Especially a niche such as a specific career with a specific problem that you can address and provide a solution for.

You should also choose a product in a niche that you enjoy writing about/understand and you should pick something that has a clear route to market/a good target demographic.

Think about this before you buy the product. Choose a product and think as well about where you’ll sell it and who will be willing to buy it. Rack your brain for any contacts you have that you can leverage and pick your products on that basis.

Set Up Your Sales Page

Create a sales page that is long and narrow with a red color scheme and lots of ‘buy now’ buttons.

At the same time, make sure your sales text is persuasive – make sure that it utilizes a strong narrative that will hook the reader in and keep them reading until the end. Focus on solving a problem and focus on the value proposition. What value does your product offer? How does it make lives better?

Promote!

Now leverage those routes to market and start trying to promote there. That means getting coverage in magazines and on blogs, as well as getting “shoutouts” from influencers on social media.

Meanwhile, keep providing value in your blog posts and articles to gradually build up your readership and advertising with (highly targeted) PPC if you can afford it.