Creative ways to promote affiliate links (& make more passive income!)
Thinking of becoming an affiliate marketer for a product you love? Great plan! Affiliate marketing is a super simple way to make a little money by sharing a product you truly love. It’s easy to start and, once you get a little creative, it’s really easy to promote your affiliate links tastefully across all your platforms.
Keep reading for more on what affiliate marketing is, when you should become an affiliate, and how to promote affiliate links creatively. Passive income, here you come!
(BTW, did you know you can become a Big Cat Creative affiliate? It’s true! If you love our products, click the link to get apply—you’ll be so pumped that you did!)
What is affiliate marketing?
Affiliate marketing is a marketing strategy that some companies use to increase their sales, grow their audiences, and make more money online.
The way it works is pretty simple: the company connects with affiliate marketers—people who have some kind of platform, and who use and like their product/service—and asks them to share it with their audiences. As a thank-you, the affiliate marketer gets a cut of every sale the company makes as a result of their work.
Affiliate marketing is really popular right now—with over 80% of brands using it to sell their products (crazy, right?). But it makes sense, because it’s pretty awesome for everyone involved: the companies, the marketers, and the consumers.
Companies benefit from extending their reach and making sales they otherwise wouldn’t.
Marketers benefit from getting paid for sharing products they already love.
Consumers benefit from learning about new products from people they trust.
Let’s say you’re a food blogger and you love a certain brand of almond butter. You use it all the time, you have recipes using it, and you always recommend it to your readers. Then one day, you find out that the almond butter peeps has an affiliate program, so you apply. They approve you and give you a special code or link to share with your audience, and you start sharing it. You link it in your blog posts, you swipe up to it in Insta stories, and you feature it on your website. As a result, your followers buy the almond butter through your unique link or code, and you get paid. The company is pumped about making a sale that they probably wouldn’t have landed without your help, and the kickback you get is their way of saying thanks!
As long as it’s done ethically, which it most often is, affiliate marketing is an awesome thing to be a part of!
Affiliate marketing as a side hustle
Affiliate marketing is a great, low-effort way to make a side income. It doesn’t have to be hard at all! If a company or product you love has an affiliate program, simply sign up with them to get your unique code or link. Then, promote the product, service or company wherever it makes sense to.
This can be as low-maintenance as setting up a few links using the places we’ve suggested in this post, and letting them do their thing! Whenever someone stumbles across your link and buys—even if it happens while you’re sleeping—you’ll make money. (Not too bad, is it?)
As for how affiliate marketers get paid, it can be per sale, per click, or per lead, depending on the agreement. So, if you’re considering becoming an affiliate, make sure you understand what has to happen in order for you to get paid!
When to become an affiliate
To keep things ethical and above-board, you should really only become an affiliate marketer for a company if:
You’ve used and trust their products or services
You actually LIKED (or even better, loved) the product or service
The company is on brand for you, and/or in your niche
Here’s a little test: Would you talk about this product even if you didn’t get paid? If the answer is yes, then it’s likely a perfect fit for affiliate marketing!
Steer clear of becoming an affiliate for a company if:
You don’t personally love what you’ll be selling
You haven’t tried the product yourself
The company employs shady business or sales tactics
The company’s values don’t align with your values
Using the product/service could be risky in any way (like a sketchy diet pill!)
You’d only be talking about the product for the money
How to promote affiliate links on your website
1. On your resources page
If you don't have a resources page (also known as "tools" or "favourites") on your website yet, you should totally add one! It's such a simple way of being able to share your best resources and tools with your audience (using affiliate links, of course!).
Some awesome examples of resource pages are Elle & Company, Jenna Kutcher and Natalie Franke. (There's tons more out there, though!)
2. In your website credit area or footer
If you built your website using one of our templates (or another companies), you could add a link in your footer or anywhere else that you've talked about your website! Or, if you’ve used other things around your site like stock images, website copy etc, you could link these in your website credit area as affiliate links too. Something like, "Template by Big Cat Creative," or “Stock Images by Photos&Co” linked with your affiliate link, would do the trick!
3. On your blog
Share a review of the product in a blog post
Share your fav tools/products round-up and include it
Share a how-to post where you can mention the product to help them with this how-to
4. In your blog sidebar
This one is simple: utilize the traffic to your blog by adding a Pinterest or square sized graphic into your sidebar! Upload the image and add your affiliate link to the image and boom, you’ve now got an affiliate link on every blog post around your site!
(If you’re a Big Cat Creative affiliate, we have templates you can use for this that you can access through your Affiliate Program Welcome Pack.)
5. In your welcome emails & sequences
Okay, I know emails aren’t exactly your website, but they’re kinda close! You’re likely setting up your welcome email(s) at the same time as your website, so I figure you can batch this task in with the others easily enough!
Emails are one of the best ways to increase your clicks and conversions. You could put your affiliate link into an existing email sequence that you have, or you can create one from scratch for the product. The options are endless with email!
How to promote affiliate links on Social Media
Promoting your links on Pinterest is simple and crazy effective. Your product-company might create pre-made Pin graphics for you, but if they don’t, you can create your own graphics in Canva! Then, add the Pin to Pinterest, add a description with keywords relating to the product, then add your special link. Then, when anyone clicks on the Pin, it will go to the product via your special affiliate link. Easy!
Add your affiliate link to your Insta bio. This is a must-have so you can mention your product in your Instagram Stories or Instagram Post, with an easy “link in bio” call to action.
If you use Linktree or have a custom Instagram menu on your website, then you should totally add your affiliate link there, too!
Keep an eye out (or go hunting!) for relevant threads where you can recommend your product as a solution to the poster’s problem. Just remember to follow group rules and disclose that you’re using an affiliate link!
TIP: Add a bonus incentive
If you’re promoting something that tons of other people are also promoting at the same time, you can add your own bonus incentive which will encourage people to purchase through your link, rather than someone else’s.
For example, you could say: “If you purchase XYZ through my affiliate link, you’ll also get XYZ”
This bonus is totally up to you and is your responsibility to see through. This is a great trick when there’s lots of affiliates promoting the same thing.
If you’re promoting someone else’s course, you could throw in a free Facebook group/mastermind for anyone who purchases through your link, or a 30 minute strategy call. You could also throw in something basic like an Amazon gift card! Totally up to you.
If you’re using this method you need to make sure you’re considering two important factors:
You want your incentive to be as good as, or better than your competitions, so you make more clicks (that’s the point of this strategy)
But at the same time, is your incentive actually going to be worth it after all of the extra work or money you put into it? Don’t get sucked into the competition of trying to beat-out other affiliates and end up making more work for yourself to the point that it’s not even worth it!
Become a Big Cat Creative Affiliate!
Thinking about becoming an affiliate? We make it sooo easy. Our recently launched affiliate program and welcome pack is your roadmap to making a side income by sharing the Big Cat Creative products you love most.
Looking for more business tips? Check out the posts below 👇
How to Grow your Business and get Clients with Instagram in 2022
5 easy writing tricks for better DIY Copy
How to get started with Email Marketing: a simple guide for beginners
Want to Start an Online Business, But Not Sure What to Specialize in?Read This!
Our Best Tips for Managing Money as a Small Biz or Freelancer
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