New Bloggers often want to quickly monetize their site immediately or shortly after launching and before building an audience. Most will not be able to make much earnings from their site without first growing a tremendous amount of site traffic.
Notwithstanding these realistic limitations for beginner bloggers, one of the ways they can earn income before growing traffic is through affiliate and referral marketing.
They are different things although mistakenly often mentioned interchangeably.
What is Affiliate and Referral Marketing?
Affiliate Marketing is when products and services partner up with online publishers including bloggers and other website owners and offer them a sales commission every time one of their readers click a link and eventually purchases a product or service from the affiliate.
Popular Affiliate marketing company Commission Junction, an industry leader, explains it well:
For new bloggers, getting accepted to an affiliate network may be way easier than getting paid advertising especially when web traffic is still low, but if you are blogging in a niche area, you can benefit from referral commission without having the traffic.
Simply, blog what you know and occasionally write about a product or service you’ve used in the field and add a link asking your readers to try it out. You get paid if they purchase the service or product based on your recommendation.
Also, another benefit of having affiliate marketing banners on your website is that they may entice potential direct advertisers to buy an ad on your site. Affiliate click-per-purchase banner ads may resemble general ads.
Pay-Per-Call
In addition to just posting a banner or linking a word to an affiliates website, some affiliate marketing networks also offer Pay-per-call (also called Cost-per-Call). It too is a Performance-based advertising model and compensation method.
Pay-per-Call is similar to online Pay-per-Click (PPC) advertising. However, with Pay-per-Call instead of paying a fee per Click, the merchant pays the service provider a fee per Call for connecting the consumer to the advertised number.
Some creative companies like Skimlinks are making it easier for bloggers by creating a plugin (it works on Blogger too) that skims content on posts and auto-hyperlinks words to affiliates. Bloggers get paid when a reader clicks the word and buys something from the affiliate. Many major sites like LuckyMag.com, Refinery29, and Gawker use it.
There are literally dozens if not hundreds of affiliate marketing companies and networks. Affiliate Summit conference has on its page of conference attendees a pretty comprehensive listing of the various affiliate networks.
Can I share an affiliate link in social media and not just on my blog?
Many affiliate marketing networks will give you the option of creating a short link (like a bit.ly) so you can share a shortened version of your personalized affiliate link embedded with your publisher id in it. Given that Twitter, for example, is limited to 140 characters as other social media sites have limited caption space, you’re covered.
This option is great for influential social media personalities who may not have a blog or website they update regularly but who want to monetize their massive social media reach.
You should and are legally required per the Federal Trade Commission, if you are a US blogger, to disclose the fact to your audience, Facebook friends and others online that your are an affiliate promoter of a product you are sharing to them to buy, and that you will earn a commission if they actually do buy it.
Not all do and they use the shortener options to hide the fact that the link has embedded affiliate info in it.
Links that have the words “id:__” like below is indicator that the link is an affiliate link:
REFERRAL MARKETING
Referral marketing is when a site generates a “lead” and sends traffic to a third party site or get their readers to do something simple as join the third party site, usually by signing up or providing an email.
This type of monetization program is and can be more lucrative because the publisher gets paid just for the email account referral, in some cases, even if the referral doesn’t purchase the product.
Online subscription or invite-only discount shopping boutiques and shopping sites often rely on referral marketing to build up their customer database.
Their business model includes paying popular fashion bloggers, for example, a referral fee for getting their readers to join their online fashion eCommerce site.
If you were wondering how some top fashion bloggers & YouTube vloggers earn so much, it is a combination of being a paid brand ambassador for many design houses and because they refer their readers to make purchases embedded with their commission-based affiliate codes.
Here are some of the Affiliate and Referral sites I work with and if you are learning about these resources for the first time here, I would appreciate it if you would pay it forward and sign up with them using my referral link. Join up and start earning money off of your blog today!
1. Google Adsense - The most popular and best known is Google Adsense. Website owners add code from Adsense which feeds ads onto the sites. Google pays on a CPM – Click per mile/thousand basis. It’s pretty hard to generate much income though if you have low traffic so that’s why the more recent affiliate networks in this list are better for new bloggers.
2. Commission Junction- To assist publishers and advertisers manage their relationships and make everything seamless, CJ brokers its massive database of hundreds of brands allowing publishers to apply for and get accepted as an affiliate. Once accepted, the blogger or publisher gets access to html code links to embed on their site.
3. ClickBank -This company connects smaller brands, creators and large ones with digital marketers. Publishers and bloggers simply browse offers for promoting a brand and then if they accept, do whatever online promo required and earn money on the sale.
4. Linkshare -Rakuten LinkShare is a leading provider of Affiliate Marketing, Paid Search, and Customer Acquisition company which is one of the industry leaders. The UK-based company has a portfolio of thousands of brands and companies that use it to get access to millions of websites and blogs. Site owners apply for an affiliates program and if accepted get access to links and codes for ads they can embed on their sites. Sign up using my Affiliate referral Link HERE!
5. Skimlinks – Using innovative technology, Skimlinks finds specific product references in your content and turns them into links to where your users can buy the items mentioned. Sign up using my Affiliate referral link HERE!
6. Affiliate Window- Like Linkshare, it is also UK-based but it essentially also offers a wide range of multinational brands and links them with content producers and other digital marketers. Join me on Affiliate Window by signing up using my referral link HERE!
7. Amazon- Unlike the major affiliating networking sites, Amazon.com is its own massive commerce site. It has many programs that ecommerce sites, self-publishing authors bloggers and other publishers can take advantage of.
8. RewardStyle – This is an invite-only affilliate network site for Fashion bloggers. For those accepted, the site pays a commission when readers purchase an item referred to them from the fashion blogger. This pay-per-sale option is perfect for highly influential bloggers who have followers who are like “sheeple” in that they want exactly and precisely what they wear or recommend. I applied for it and got rejected, perhaps because they may have noticed I was already partnered up with their competitor, Shopstyle.
9. Shopstyle Shopsense – This site, owned by Popsugar entertainment company that runs a series of celebrity and fashion websites, is the equivalent of Google AdSense for fashion bloggers. It is a combo of pay-per-sale and pay-per-click. Sign up and get access to thousands of labels and brands. Use a code to embed widgets or images onto your website and get a commission if your readers click through and purchase a piece of clothing, or toy or other item from the Shopstyle affiliate bank. The good thing about shopsense compared to Reward Style is that you also generate commission for clicks not just for sales. It’s a better option for new fashion blogger still building up an audience.
REFERRAL MARKETING
10. HauteLook – Is a discount online boutique of Nordstrom rack. It is available only to members. To join and get access to the major fashion deals, users must provide their email to sign up. However, it also offers a $20 commission on orders from friends when they make their first purchase.
Sign up for HauteLook using my Affiliate referral link HERE!
11. Rue La La – Like HauteLook, Rue La La is also a discount online fashion website that offere deep percentages off for past season and other overstock. It pays members a $10 referral bonus for the first order friends they refer make. Sign up for Rue La La using my Affiliate referral link HERE.
12. Dreamhost – In the tech world, there are many webhosting companies that pay for referrals for hosting. Dreamhost pays $97 for each referral if you sign up though its Affiliate program. If you are looking to get hosting, check you my affilliate link HERE.
13. Yahoo! Small Business Affiliate Program- Similar to Dreamhost, Yahoo!’s hosting subsidiary pays commissions starting at $40 for business referrals from your site. It is currently paying out $500 per sale to affiliates when they refer a 5 year hosting client. That’s an awesome deal! If you’re looking for hosting as low as $1.75 per month, Sign up up HERE!
PAID BLOG SPONSORSHIP
14. IZEA- Izea has taken the headache out of sponsored posts by creating a platform where brands can present opportunities for bloggers and other influential publishers to consider offers to tweet, share images, post about or blog their products. Bloggers simply apply and pick which program best fits the audience and get paid up to $100 or more per share. Sign up for IZEA today using my affiliate referral link HERE!
HIGH ROLLERS
There are many high paying affiliate programs out there too. One that caught my eye but would require having a rich set of contacts is:
15. Jet Charters - This jet rental company pays out $275 for each booking…and for every $200 payout, you also get a $500 credit towards your own jet set booking including fuel! Sweet!
This is a great place to start! Good luck