Is there a business model where you can forego product
development and go straight to marketing and sales?
There is, and it’s called affiliate marketing. As an affiliate
marketer, you get paid commissions on every sale you make. Better still, you
don’t have to put any energy into selling unproven products. If you know how to
do your research, you can build your website entirely around third-party
products that have a proven track record out in the market.
This doesn’t mean that there aren’t any risk factors when it
comes to growing your affiliate website business, however. Here's how to build
a rock-solid business that’s also saleable:
Being aware of the risks and how to avoid them
As good as affiliate marketing may sound, you need to be aware
of certain risks involved in running and building an affiliate business. Here
are several important factors to keep in mind, and how to avoid them:
• The
affiliate program itself. Are you working with an established
company? Is it growing, and is it likely to be around for a long time to
come? For instance, Amazon probably isn’t going anywhere, and would be a
reliable partner over the long haul. You need to take a close look at the
company that you want to partner with, and whether or not it's likely to
have longevity.
•
Strategy. Do you have set targets and goals for how much you want
to profit from your affiliate site? It takes a bit of planning to start your
affiliate business from the ground up, and sometimes you need guidance from an
outside consultant to grow a profitable affiliate website.
• The
product itself. Is there demand for the product, and will
there continue to be demand for it? Some products are passing trends that won’t
have a long shelf life. Finding and promoting “evergreen” products can help you
reduce the risk of losing revenue streams.
• The
terms of agreement. An affiliate website is a valuable property
that can be bought and sold. If you decide to sell your business, you need to
determine whether or not the terms of agreement are transferable to a new
owner. If not, this will affect your valuation. Isabel Isidro, co-founder of
PowerHomeBiz, also notes that commission structures may can be changed by
advertisers, sometimes without notice. So, finding a reliable program should be
a priority.
SEO and link-building
As with many other online businesses, SEO and link-building are
key to growing an affiliate website.
Many site owners in affiliate marketing focus on keywords with
high buyer intent. While that's not a bad strategy, it can present some
risks. First, it’s important to have keyword diversity. Relying too
heavily on one or two keywords can lead to your site being penalized by search
engines. So, when you’re building links, be sure to vary the anchor text.
Second, be aware that purchased links and links from private
blog networks are worth less, and could negatively affect your site over the
long haul.
Additionally, you should also examine how much time and effort
your ongoing SEO and link-building efforts require. Should you sell your
business, this will affect your affiliate valuation.
It’s also an important consideration from the perspective that it’s just one of
many things you will need to oversee and manage in your business.
Optimizing site speed is important, because it can increase
search traffic. There are many ways to go about achieving this goal, such as
using browser caching and Smush.it image compression; and if you’re using
WordPress, there are also plugins that can help you achieve this end.
Fundamentally, if you focus more on natural link-building and
SEO best practices than on trying to game Google, your business will have more
longevity. Recovering from penalties can be difficult, and complete recovery is
typically impossible, so make sure your SEO and link-building strategy are
built around a long-term game plan.
Content
Most affiliate businesses rely heavily on content for organic
search traffic and even for sales, making it one of the most vital components
to your website’s success.
Here’s what you need to be aware of:
• The
development of content can be costly and time-consuming.
How are you going to go about creating content for your business on an ongoing
basis? Will you be hiring freelancers or an agency, or will you be working
on it in-house? Recognize that there are pros and cons to each.
• Your
content needs to be high quality. Since content will be
a significant part of your marketing and sales strategy, you need to ensure
that it is of high quality. In order to attract visitors organically, your
content will have to be both relevant and informative to your customers.
• A
reliance on content poses a risk. Search engines are
constantly updating their algorithms, and since that is the case, a reliance on
content can be risky. This is all the more reason to focus on the creation
of high quality content.
• Your
keywords and traffic sources should be diversified.
This goes hand-in-hand with what was said earlier about SEO.
As for what kind of content to create, product reviews tend to
be the go-to for most affiliate marketers. Offering a balanced perspective,
pointing out a product’s flaws as well as its merits and not talking up
the product are a few key strategies for writing honest and transparent reviews
that convert.
Serial entrepreneur (and Entrepreneur
contributor) Neil Patel suggests:
• Building
your email list to market directly to your prospects
• Hosting
live webinars to educate your audience and make special offers
• Marketing
your business with PPC advertising
Choosing a product to promote
If you want to succeed in affiliate marketing, you have to
choose the right product niche to get into.
Here are several steps for finding a product that’s right for
your business:
• Scan
affiliate marketplaces. You can often find great products to
promote, on sites like ClickBank and ShareASale.
• Look
into the product’s social virality. Find out what’s
getting social shares on BuzzSumo.
• Enter
your keywords into YouTube. You can instantly see how many videos there
are on a particular topic, which can help you validate your niche idea.
Final thoughts
Following the above steps should help you build an ironclad
business that will grow steadily, and can be sold in the future, if that’s
what you choose to do.
Keep in mind that while the strategies described here are
effective, they all require a long-term commitment to your business. There are
no shortcuts.
Written By: Thomas Smale
Credit: Entrepreneur.com
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