10 Ways to Improve Your Online Presence as an Affiliate Marketer

A survey confirmed that over 80% of businesses run affiliate marketing to drive traffic to their website to increase sales. Hence, companies will need a full-fledged tool to help manage their army of affiliates. PayKickstart’s Affiliate Management offers robust sales, lead tracking, and automated payout features. Their Affiliate Portal allows affiliates to perform single sign-on to access tracking links, reporting, and marketing materials.

Today, it is all about having an online presence in the digital world. You have to be available and accessible online to leverage the benefits the digital world brings to the table. Your online presence determines the strength of your business and where you stand in the said market. 

As an affiliate marketer, you want your side income to be profitable enough to make it your only income. However, this depends on your online presence. You want to be an authoritative figure in the said industry so that people trust you enough to trust the products and services you’re promoting. So, how to improve your online presence as an affiliate marketer?

1. Know Your Targeted Area and Audience

In anything you do, the first task is identifying your specialized area. What area in the market that you wish to stand out in? What is your niche? Your goal is to be that someone people go to in your area. 

Then, locate the audience you wish to target. Zoom in and craft your ideal client profile. Know their pain points, understand their purchasing behavior patterns, and what they need and want. You can then understand them better to serve them effectively in the present and future.

Knowing your niche and targeted market helps you craft your strategy better when building your online presence. Also, you can narrow it down to those more relevant affiliate programs that you can focus better on.

2. Identify the Relevant Affiliate Programs

Affiliate marketing is gaining momentum; it is no wonder that most companies include affiliate marketing in their marketing strategy. Hence, this explains the birth of so many affiliate programs. The more you sign up, the merrier. 

While there is merit to this saying, be careful when selecting which affiliate programs you hop on. People are likely to trust a specialist rather than a jack of all trades and a master of none. Hence, once you have identified your niche, look into those affiliate programs that are relevant to you. Shortlist those reputable and trustworthy companies with good returns in their affiliate programs. 

Also, research what is trending and the products that appeal to your targeted audience. Recommending the brands that are already popular is half the battle won. However, be careful not to place all your eggs in one basket. That said, it is good to diversify your affiliate programs but not stray too far from your niche. 

3. Know the Products You’re Recommending

If you want to make a fast buck, affiliate marketing may not do it for you. To be a successful affiliate marketer, you must be patient, sincere, and genuine with your audience. It’s about being accountable for what you say and recommend. To do so, research thoroughly and understand the products you want to recommend inside out. Don’t worry; advertisers usually have an infrastructure to help you with this. 

People must see you as the expert or the person people will go to when needing a solution. Your integrity depicts your online presence as well. While this will take more time before you start seeing profits, it is worth doing as you cannot afford to be short-sighted if you’re serious about being an affiliate marketer.  

4. Launch your Affiliate Website

You should have a website if you want affiliate marketing to be a long-term effort. Your affiliate website needs to match what you’re promoting and selling. Everything from the theme and layout to the content should reflect and jive with the brands you’re helping to sell. Your website, if done right, will help boost your online presence.

Content

It is best that you already have your content roadmap in place. All content must be researched accurately in advance so it can be published along with launching your website. It takes time to create and establish yourself online before people will trust what you’re recommending.

Also, your content should surround the products you’re promoting. People can then understand and relate better. Additionally, you can help convince them that the products you’re recommending are relevant and will help them.

Be SEO-friendly

There are instances where the website is done beautifully but suffers in traffic. One factor could be its ranking in search engines. If you do not rank high in search engines, you do not appear on Page One in the Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs). People seldom go beyond Page One, so they cannot find you, and your visibility drops. 

You want to rank at the top of Page One in the SERPs; this is prime real estate in the digital world. So, ensure your website is SEO-friendly. Your content must be fresh and meaningful. Use relevant keywords with authoritative links. Being SEO-friendly helps heaps in getting you to rank higher. 

Make Your Website Responsive

The number of smartphone users worldwide has already surpassed six billion. Hence, m-commerce sales are increasing by leaps and bounds. You’d want a piece of this lucrative pie. So, ensure you include the mobile users by making your website responsive. You want their user experience on mobile devices to be a pleasant one. 

For example, PayKickstart allows you to monitor your online business on the go. Available on iOS and Android, you can track your referral commissions and quickly access your affiliate links for the products you promote.

5. Blog and Keep Blogging

Including a blog on your website makes sense if you want to capitalize more on your affiliate marketing. Regularly creating original content that is useful and relevant will attract more to your website, establish your online presence, and then solidify your position as the expert in the said area.

Consider writing more zoomed-in articles that highlight a product. These are the best places to include your affiliate links. Your ultimate goal is to motivate the user to complete the sales funnel. 

6. Own Your Audience via Social Media

You cannot afford to ignore social media as the number of users has surpassed 3.6 billion. To be a successful affiliate marketer, you must have a loyal and engaged following who trusts and cares what you say. Hence, create an online presence on social media and use it as an amplification tool to gain higher visibility and build your credibility and reputation to reach more people. 

Choose relevant social media platforms for better engagement. Facebook and YouTube are the usual channels you look into to promote your products and target those of like interests. Facebook Watch or Facebook Live are great ways to promote your affiliate links. Also, consider creating a YouTube channel to build your following by regularly giving the people relevant content. Then, monetize your effort by including your affiliate links. 

You can start small and build on a group of individuals who appreciate what you bring to the table. Cultivate this group, and they will help you expand via more likes and comments. Instagram has an affiliate program that makes it easy to get your affiliate marketing started and tracked on their platform. 

7. Leverage Email

Your website is a great platform to gather and build your email listing. Craft an email marketing strategy as this is a great direct communication line with your audience. You engage them by scheduling emails with content of interest to them and include your affiliate links. However, be careful not to send too many so your effort will not backfire on you. You do not want them to unsubscribe and leave.

Use emails as a powerful medium to remind your leads and customers that you’re still around, thus improving your online presence. Don’t forget to grow your email list and update it. Emails help remind them that you are the go-to person in your industry; they can help you succeed online.

8. Habitually Write Product Reviews

Product reviews are consumers’ first port of call whenever they want to buy something. So, if you regularly write spot-on product reviews, especially in an area, you become a master in that area. Your credibility soars, and your online presence surges. People will trust what you say. Of course, this will take time and effort, but the end justifies it.  

However, when you write product reviews, do so in a focused area, as this helps build your credibility.  For example, if you’re heavily invested in workflow management, reviewing a reputable product like PayKickstart will be integral to building trust with your readers.

9. Be Active Online

Being present and showing up online is one matter but being consistently active is another. You ought to be ‘seen’, and people need to know you are still there. So, participate in relevant forums, blogs, and social media. Being active involves engaging in conversations with your followers; it is a two-way street.

Show that you care and are the expert by always knowing the latest developments and trends. People will perceive you as knowledgeable and passionate. Your authority level rises along with your online presence.

10. Always Review Where You Are

You’ve kick-started your affiliate marketing career, and everything is chugging along nicely. You’re happy and satisfied. However, you cannot afford to slack off as there’s work to be done consistently. Identify the key metrics you’ll be measuring against and analyze the results. Understand what works and what does not, then tweak accordingly to stay ahead of the game.

PayKickstart comes with excellent reporting analytics that you’ll find helpful as an affiliate. You can keep track of your commissions in real-time and get a complete payout report where you can view any pending commissions that you may need to look into. 

Conclusion

It is without a doubt that affiliate marketing can be a lucrative and rewarding career. After all, every person’s dream is to have money continuously roll in, even when sleeping. However, you need to invest time and effort to taste such success. Your online presence determines this success. Hence, follow through with the above, as these are ways that can help improve your online presence as an affiliate marketer.

Pui Mun Beh

Pui Mun Beh is a digital marketer of WebRevenue. She keeps an eye on the latest digital marketing and social media trends. She loves to travel around the world offline and online. Say hello to her at LinkedIn.

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