Make Passive Money Step-by-Step With Affiliate Marketing For Beginners In 2022

I had a basic understanding of blogging when I first get started. However, I was unsure of the best method for generating passive income. So I did some research and came up with three possible revenue streams for my blog:

1. Affiliates Marketing
2. A Store
3. Advertising

I was new to affiliate marketing at the time, and I didn’t know much about it. I tried it with my first blog, but it didn’t produce the results I desired. By 2021, I’m earning a full-time living from blogging, with affiliate marketing accounting for 85% of my earnings!

That is why, in this guide, I am sharing my knowledge and strategies. I made $172 in affiliate commissions in its first month. That may not seem like much, but I was incredibly proud of what I’d accomplished! I thought I’d cracked the code to affiliate marketing success! (Ha!)

But I was adamant about learning everything I could about affiliate marketing for beginners! I read e-books, conducted market research, identified the best affiliate products to promote, and took careful notes on everything I discovered. Three months later, in March 2020

My revenue went over $1000 simply by utilizing affiliate marketing

The most exciting part? I kept track of everything I learned as well as the strategies I employed, and I’ll share them all in this guide.

What Is Affiliate Marketing And How Does It Benefit You?

You want to start making money online as a side hustle, and you want to do it through affiliate marketing? Awesome! But if you’re brand new to affiliate marketing, you’re probably wondering, “How exactly does affiliate marketing work?”

Affiliate marketing’s premise is straightforward: you promote and sell other people’s goods.You earn a commission for each purchase if people buy the product as a result of your marketing efforts.

With that said, affiliate marketing can be profitable in two ways:

1. If you don’t have your own product, you can earn passive income as an affiliate marketer by promoting one that you trust and love.
2. If you have a product and want to increase sales, you can create an affiliate program and pay others to promote it.

To put it another way, affiliate marketing is a method of separating (1) product development from (2) product marketing.

The majority of bloggers and content creators begin their affiliate marketing careers by promoting and selling others’ products.

However, despite the fact that you will save time when creating a product, this path will require a significant amount of effort. Your main goal is to get enough people to visit your blog so that you can make enough money as a commission.

The Complete Step-by-step Guide To Affiliate Marketing

So, you’re all set to start building your affiliate marketing business and earning your first commissions sooner than you thought.

I’ll take you through all of the steps you’ll need to take to become a successful affiliate marketer and earn money online.

Just be sure not to leave anything out. One step at a time, work your way through this affiliate marketing for dummies manual. I’m here to walk you through it so you can immediately implement my tried-and-true strategies!

This is a lengthy guide, so bookmark it and share it with your friends!

1: Niche.

The first step is to decide which niche your affiliate website or blog will target.

Simply put, a niche is a target market. In an ideal world, there will be enough demand for your affiliate products in that niche for enough people to visit your website and become customers.

You don’t want to go after a too broad niche, though. The more specific your niche, the easier it will be to find the right audience for your message.

Additionally, selecting a narrowly focused niche will aid in your Google ranking. You can expect free, natural traffic to your website if you do it this way.

Here are some questions to ask yourself in order to discover the ideal niche:

What Is It That You Are Really Interested In?

If you want to learn affiliate marketing for beginners and make money online, you’ll need to devote a significant amount of time to research and content creation on your chosen topic.

If you choose a niche that you truly enjoy working in, all of that work will be much easier.

What’s The One Topic You Just Can’t Seem To Get Off Your Mind?

If you’re not sure what you want to do with your life, consider what you enjoy talking about with others.

It might be the perfect niche for you if you can’t stop talking about a particular subject.

Examine your browser’s history to see which sites you frequent visit.

Is It Possible For You To Profit From Your Niche?

It’s fantastic to be enthusiastic about a niche. But whether you can monetize it is just as important.

I understand your desire to profit from affiliate marketing. That is exactly what this guide is all about! You must find a niche where you can earn commissions in order to achieve your goal.

2 Construct Your Website

Building a blog or website is the next step in learning affiliate marketing for beginner.

Congratulations if you already have one. You can skip to Step 3 if you want to.

Don’t worry if your website hasn’t been launched yet. Take your findings from Step 1 and I’ll show you how to do it. For this, you don’t need any previous website-launching experience.

Before we begin, there is one thing you should know:

Your website must be self-hosted on a web server that allows you to customize it freely if you want to make money from affiliate marketing.

When you self-host your website, you have complete control over it.

However, the content of your self-hosted website will be yours to keep. If you use a free website platform, your site could be shut down at any time. All of your hard work will be for naught if you lose your content, traffic, and income.

To properly set up your blog website, follow these steps:

Step 1: Choosing A Perfect Domain Name.

The name of your website is called a domain name. It’s the web address that visitors see in their browsers.

Here are some of my recommendations for naming your child:

• It should be brief.
• It should be simple to remember and spell.
• Include a keyword that is relevant to your area of expertise.

Step 2: Select The Best Website Platform For Your Needs.

It is always my recommendation to use WordPress. as the foundation for your website and blog. It is the world’s most widely used website software.

It’s also free to use, and the best WordPress themes for bloggers and small business owners allow you to completely customize your website.

As a freelance web developer, I use WordPress for all my blogs, websites, and projects.

WordPress.org is free, but you’ll need a web server to host the files, which you can get from a web hosting provider. At this point, you only have to spend money on hosting.

Spending a few dollars now is necessary because if you use a free website platform, you will not be able to participate in all affiliate programs.

Step 3: Purchase Web Hosting.

My website files and data are stored on Bluehost’s web server, which I use as my web hosting provider. As a result, you and everyone else will be able to access my blog at any time and from anywhere on the planet.

Bluehost offers the best value for your money of all the hosting companies I’ve tried. The signup process is simple and quick, their plans are affordable, and you get free, round-the-clock support.

Additionally, Bluehost provides you with a FREE domain name for your website.

Does this make sense?

Go to Bluehost.com for more information and click Get Started

Select your hosting package on the next page. You can get started right away with the Basic plan on the far left:

Setp 4: Install WordPress

It’s now time to set up WordPress on your computer. When you sign up for Bluehost, like I did, they automatically install WordPress for you.

If you’re using a different hosting company, they’ll almost certainly assist you in getting WordPress installed in your client dashboard. Most providers allow you to install WordPress with a single click, which means you’ll be up and running in no time!

Step 5: Select A Theme For Your WordPress Website.

Themes for WordPress allow you to change the look and feel of your website.

You have the following options:

• menus and navigation items
• layouts for web pages
• schemes of color
• typography and fonts

There are dozens of lovely free and paid themes to choose from.

3: Make A List Of Your Favorite Brands And Items.

You’ve decided on a niche for your affiliate marketing campaign by this point. You’ve also set up a website on which you’ll begin creating content about your affiliate products. Congratulations on your great start!

There are 6 billion people on this planet, but how many actually owns a website like you?

Proud of you!

Now, let’s get this party started:

Finding the right products to recommend and promote to your readers is the next most important step in getting started with affiliate marketing. Almost every product, service, and tool that you use has an affiliate program.

Consider your blog’s niche first:

1. What exactly is the subject of your blog?
2. What kind of reader do you want to be?
3. How can they benefit from your content?
4. What kinds of issues do you think you can handle? What kinds of questions do you think you’d be able to respond to?

Make a list of all of the products you use and enjoy that might be of interest to your readers.

Then, for each product on your list, simply do a Google search:

• “the name of the company or the product + the affiliate program” or “the name of the company or product + the affiliate program
• “the name of the business or product + the referral program”

Most of the time, you will be able to immediately join an affiliate program.

4: Select Products That You Are Familiar With And Have Confidence In.

It’s time to narrow down your choices now that you know where to look for affiliate programs to join.

You should only select products you’re familiar with and have used. You should be familiar enough with the product to be able to answer any questions about how to properly use it.

Every affiliate product you promote should be something you truly enjoy and care about.

For the simple reason that:

Affiliate marketing does not include recommending a product you haven’t tried. That’s nothing more than a money-making scheme that is neither transparent nor honest with your readers.

Your readers will catch up to you sooner or later, so be careful what you recommend.

Keep in mind:

If your readers believe you’re being upfront with them, they’ll be much more likely to use your affiliate links. Never promote a product you haven’t tried for the sake of making quick bucks.

5: Concentrate On A Single Type Of Product.

So, you’ve discovered a number of products that you use and enjoy – that’s fantastic!

However, where should you begin if you have a list of 5–15 products? What’s the best product combo for you to start affiliate marketing?

First and foremost, selecting a group of affiliate products that are all relevant to a single reader makes perfect sense.

You should have a very clear idea of who your target market is. It’s simple to choose the right product mix to promote once you understand their issues.

The best way to begin is to select a few products that are closely related and complement one another.

You could, for example, promote your favorite kitchen mixer if your readers are interested in baking.

You might also suggest smaller baking utensils to go along with it. Throw in your favorite flours and baking supplies while you’re at it, too.

Your reader should, in theory, be able to find a number of products that complement each other.

After all, if you can persuade someone who has never baked cupcakes before to start doing so on a regular basis, they’ll be more than willing to place a large order.

If you’re affiliated with a bunch of high-quality baking supplies, you can make your readers’ lives easier by directing them to a starter kit for newbies that they can purchase all at once.

Keep in mind, though:

Don’t include affiliate products that aren’t baking-related. That will only confuse your readers and undermine your authority as a blogger in your field.

You wouldn’t put kitchen mixers and car dust covers together in the same article, for example. That’s illogical.

6: Enroll In The Best Beginner Friendly Affiliate Marketing Programs.

So, you’ve discovered products that you enjoy and can promote using your knowledge.

It’s finally time to join the affiliate programs you’ve chosen.

Selecting the ideal affiliate marketing programs can take some time, but it’s an important step in your affiliate strategy.

There are two types of affiliate programs in which you can participate:

1. Programs for single affiliates:
   Some businesses have their own affiliate programs that you can sign up for right on their website. A link to “Affiliate program” or “Referral program” is usually found in the footer. Or you can simply google it!
2. Networks of affiliates
   Affiliate networks and platforms are preferred by some businesses. They manage hundreds of different companies’ and products’ affiliate programs from a single website. When you join a network, it’s a lot easier to find new products to promote and track your progress all in one place.

Affiliate Programs That I Use The Most Are:

These are the high-paying blogger affiliate programs that helped me in this process:

• Bluehost
• Mailerlite
• Tailwind
• Grammarly
• Udemy

Affiliate Networks That I Use The Most Are:

You can easily join and search for your favorite products on large affiliate platforms. Here are a few that I’ve used and found to be excellent:

• ShareASale
• Commission Junction
• ClickBank
• Affiliate Program with Amazon

Amazon is the most popular affiliate network for promoting consumer goods like books, household items, and supplies. By becoming a member, you will be able to promote any item that is sold on their site.

You can make a custom Amazon affiliate link when you sign up. You’ll get a small commission for everything they buy on Amazon if someone clicks on your link.

If you can’t find information about an affiliate program on the company’s website, feel free to contact them directly.

Let them know how much you appreciate their product and how it can benefit your target market. Say you’d like to assist them in increasing sales and inquire if there is any financial incentive for you to promote their product.

Don’t worry if they don’t have one. You’ll still be able to make commissions from other products on your list.

Furthermore, the more requests a company receives for an affiliate program for their product, the more likely it is that one will be established.

Before You Join An Affiliate Program, There Are Some Things You Should Know.

Keep the following points in mind before signing up for any affiliate marketing programs:

1: You will need a content-rich website.

You’ll need to fill out information about your website, traffic, niche, and target audience as part of the application process for each affiliate program.

The best way to avoid being rejected is to publish at least 5-15 high-quality articles on your website before submitting your application. You should be fine as long as they relate to the affiliate program and your website looks good.

2: You’ll be rejected somehow.

Unfortunately, even if your website is well-designed and contains relevant content, you may be rejected on occasion.

If you’re turned down by an affiliate program, look for an email address to contact and request more information. They will frequently provide you with specific information, such as suggestions for improving your website or content.

Don’t get discouraged if you’re turned down for a single affiliate program. It happens to everyone, including myself, so it’s completely understandable.

3: Payments are slow to arrive.

Different payout schedules apply to each affiliate program. After the end of the month, your payment could take anywhere from 10 to 90 days to arrive.

A 30-day refund period is common for some products. You will lose your commission if a customer chooses to cancel their order and receive a refund.

Almost every program has a minimum payout threshold, which means you must earn a certain amount in commissions before you are paid. It could be as low as $5 or as high as $50 as the threshold.

4: Keep track of your programs’ progress and results.

It’s easy to become overwhelmed once you’ve signed up for a few affiliate programs.

You want to keep track of the programs you’ve applied to, been accepted to, and been rejected from, especially if you’re new to affiliate marketing.

I keep track of my affiliate commissions monthly using Google Sheets/ Notion app.

7: Select The Most Effective Marketing Channel For Your Affiliate Products.

It’s time to start thinking about the content you’ll need to promote the products you’ve found.

It only makes sense if you have a blog to write in-depth blog posts about your affiliate products if you have one. That’s what I do, and I’m able to cover my living expenses through passive income. (Not to mention some money saved!) )

If you’re new to affiliate marketing and blogging, I’ve written a comprehensive guide on how to start a successful blog from scratch.

Create videos that will assist your audience if you have a YouTube channel. Use Instagram to direct curious followers to your affiliate links if it’s your primary social media platform.

To summarize, present your affiliate links naturally using the most appropriate channel you have.

Furthermore, make use of all available promotional tools and channels. Simply ensure that it is understandable to your target audience.

For example, how should your readers know you know what you’re talking about if you promote the best web hosting provider for bloggers but don’t have a website?

8: Create Content To Promote Your Affiliate Product.

Now consider how you can incorporate the products you want to promote.

If you want to make money with affiliate marketing, the quality of your content is critical. And you can’t just make any content; it has to be comprehensive and of the highest quality.

The most important thing to remember is that your content should be shareable. It must address all of the issues that your readers face and provide concrete solutions.

Here are some content ideas for any niche if you want to get started with affiliate marketing right away:

1. Reviews of the product:
   If you’ve had a great time with your affiliate product, tell your audience about it! Tell them how that particular product aided you in resolving a problem or achieving a specific goal.
2. Guides on How-to:
   The majority of people are looking for step-by-step instructions on how to get started with a product and how to properly use it. You should be familiar enough with your affiliate product to write a step-by-step guide for your audience to use.
3. Comparisons
   Create a comparison for your audience to help them discover the best product for whatever they are interested in if you know your affiliate product is the best on the market. Compare your kitchen mixer to its top competitors to see if it really is the best.

The best way to figure out what kind of content to make is to think about:

• What you’re attempting to promote
• What are you promoting it for, and why are you promoting it?
• You’re going to promote it to a certain group of people.

You must be aware of how a product review or how-to guide affects your audience. Is that what they’re looking for?

The best way to come up with great affiliate content is to forget about your affiliate earnings entirely.

Make a blog post as if you’re recommending a product to a friend. Maintain a conversational tone and emphasize the advantages of using that particular product.

Your content must be truly beneficial to your audience!

Of course, creating in-depth content for your audience will require a significant amount of time and effort.

However, once your blog post or YouTube video is published, your affiliate links will continue to generate revenue for months or even years.

Finally, look through your existing content to see if there are any opportunities to promote your affiliate products in older blog posts or YouTube video descriptions.

9: Look For Affiliate Products That Aren’t As Well-known As The Ones You

Once you start earning affiliate commissions, it’s a good idea to do a quick search for other products to recommend to your readers.

Let’s say you’re an affiliate for a specific kitchen mixer. Congratulations on your accomplishments!

Some of your readers may be delighted with it, but others may be looking for something different, either at a lower price point or with features that your current mixer lacks.

If that’s the case, it’s only natural for you to seek out and test a different product that checks all of your readers’ boxes.

After all, not every reader is the same, so while some may be satisfied with the products you’ve already recommended, others may be looking for something new.

So you’ve decided to do a quick search on your affiliate platform to find product alternatives to try out.

You don’t have to go out and buy four different kitchen mixers right away. Begin with something more manageable, such as baking utensils.

10: Compile A List Of All The Products You Suggest.

Now, I understand that this advice is divisive, and that not all bloggers support it. A round-up blog post can come across as pushy and salesy, depending on how it is written.

However, here is what I believe:

It’s perfectly acceptable to create a long blog post or a separate sub-page on your website where you list all of the tools and products you use that are related to your blog niche for your readers to see.

This, however, only makes sense if the list will be useful to your readers.

Consider how you’d react if you were confronted with a similar product list. Are the other items on it something you’d be interested in? You would, I’m sure.

Go ahead and do it if you’re confident that all of your affiliate products are related and cater to your target market.

A well-organized resource page is a great way to make it easy for your readers to find all of the products you suggest.

11: Make Affiliate Links That Are Only A Few Words Long.

When you join an affiliate program, you will be given a unique affiliate link that you can use in your blog posts or YouTube videos.

Because your affiliate link is trackable, the affiliate program knows who sent the customer their way, and you earn a commission.

Your affiliate link, on the other hand, is frequently long and cryptic. It looks like some https:bababa.com/baba?ba&aff=you

This link now appears to be a complete disaster. When you’re writing blog posts and want to incorporate it into your content, it’s difficult to remember.

Shortening and making your links more user-friendly is the solution.

So, what’s the best way to make short links?

It’s a lot less difficult than you might believe. I use Pretty Links, which is a free WordPress plugin. It gives me the ability to create a short link for any affiliate link I have. Furthermore, the plugin is very simple to use.

Your affiliate partner’s affiliate link may be changed at any time. They could be switching to a different affiliate platform or tweaking their tracking tools in other ways.

You’ll have to manually update every single affiliate link on your blog if you’re using the long default affiliate links. That will take a long time if you have a few dozen affiliate blog posts.

You’ll be done in one minute if you use Pretty Links and include the short version of your affiliate link in your blog posts. It’s as simple as updating your pretty link to point to the new version.

12: Clearly State That Affiliate Links Are Used.

Finally, there’s the legal aspect of affiliate marketing.

Make sure anyone who clicks on your affiliate link understands you’re affiliated with a company and earning a commission.

The FDC disclosure rules apply if you receive any form of compensation from a company whose product you mention and promote.

13: Begin Promoting Your Content Online.

You need to start generating visitors once you’ve set everything up and published your blog post with your affiliate link.

You want as many people to see your content as possible, and you want to direct them to the sales page of your affiliate product. After all, you can’t make money if no one reads your content.

You can use a variety of tools to drive traffic to your blog and grow an engaged audience.

Here are a few strategies for ensuring that people can find your content and convert into website visitors:

Email Marketing:

When it comes to affiliate marketing, email marketing is one of the most effective tools you can use.

Why?

Because email allows you to communicate directly with your readers on a more personal level.

You have a direct line to their inbox if you have a list of email subscribers, but only if they find your emails useful and valuable.

Whatever you do, don’t forget to establish trust and introduce yourself to your audience. They’ll be willing to listen to your affiliate product recommendations once you’ve earned their trust.

Make sure you send a quick message to your subscribers if you already have one. Inform them that you’ve just published a new article about a product you adore and believe they won’t want to miss.

Now is the ideal time to start building an email list if you haven’t already. As soon as you launch your blog, you should start collecting emails!

To get started, go to Mailerlite and create your first email list for free.

SEO (Ssearch Engine Optimization)

Search engine optimization, or SEO, isn’t as difficult as many bloggers believe.

Understanding what people are looking for and how to provide them with the best possible content is central to SEO.

The most exciting part?

Search engine organic traffic is absolutely free. It also becomes more intense over time. You can expect more traffic the longer you keep blogging and producing high-quality content.

A quick Google search can help you figure out what people are looking for. For instance, type in a relevant keyword to see what questions people have about your affiliate product.

Now, make a list of everyone’s questions and concerns. After that, in your blog post, provide them with the best possible answers.

Bluehost’s hosting plans, for instance, are one of my go-to affiliate products.

I had no idea how website hosting worked when I first started my blog. However, since I began using their blog hosting, I’ve never had to deal with technical jargon or spent sleepless nights worrying about website issues.

So, for my Bluehost tutorial, I went to Google to see what questions new bloggers have.

In the People also ask section, I typed in “bluehost wordpress hosting” and found a number of common questions:

These questions were combined with my own, and I double-checked that I had addressed them in my guide.

As a result, that blog post now receives a significant amount of traffic and is one of my most profitable articles.

Don’t worry if you’re unfamiliar with SEO and don’t know where to begin. In WordPress, you can easily optimize your articles using the free Yoast SEO plugin.

Increase Your Traffic By Using Pinterest:

Pinterest is much more than a social media platform. That’s not all!

Pinterest is superior to SEO in terms of speed. Although you should not ignore SEO, good search engine rankings take time.

You should learn how Pinterest works if you want to see traffic almost immediately.

With over 400 million monthly users, Pinterest can help you drive traffic to any blog topic you can think of.

People use Pinterest to get ideas and inspiration, which is ideal for recommending useful affiliate products!

And, fortunately for you, a lot of bloggers are misusing Pinterest! Despite the fact that it is a search engine, they underestimate its power and treat it as if it were a social network.

Make Use Of Social Media:

You can also use Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to promote your affiliate articles. Determine which social media platform your target audience prefers and begin to establish a presence.

It might take a while for you to get going. However, as your audience grows, your affiliate commissions will increase more quickly as well.

Check out my guide on how to quickly increase the traffic to your blog for more information.

Good Luck To You All

So that’s it. I hope that this affiliate marketing for beginner guide has clarified what affiliate marketing is for you.

You should now have a better understanding of how to find the best affiliate programs in your niche, write great content, and drive traffic to your website.

Nurture the relationship and trust you’ve established once you’ve built an audience. Begin by recommending products that are useful and valuable to them. Share your product success stories while remaining non-salesy.

Check out our step-by-step guide on how to make money blogging for beginners for a detailed guide to monetizing your blog.

Your affiliate marketing efforts will pay off eventually, even if it takes a while to see significant revenue. Believe me when I say this:

I know it’s been a long read, but congratulations on getting this far. Congrats! And I with you all the best luck!