How to Make Your First Sale in Affiliate Marketing in 7 Steps

Let’s see together what are the steps to generate profit with affiliate marketing.

1. Choose a niche

Before you even start building your first site, you’ll need to decide which niche to target. If you already have it in mind, you are well on your way! This is without a doubt one of the most difficult and vast steps.

Some key questions to ask yourself when choosing your niche:

• What topics am I already passionate about?
• What topics can I write 25, 50, or 100 posts on without a problem?
• Is there room in this niche for a new affiliate?
• Is there enough interest/request for products in this niche?
• Are there affiliate programs available in this niche?

Effective research is key in complex niches like health, real estate, online gambling, etc. For an example of thorough market analysis relevant to Nevada in the USA, aspiring affiliates can refer to resources providing valuable insights into the Nevada iGaming industry.

When starting out, we recommend focusing on a small market segment rather than an entire industry. Pick a niche that you are genuinely passionate about and knowledgeable in.

2. Build a site

Assuming you have not already built a site, this will be the next step. Fortunately, building a site is not as complicated or labor intensive as in the past.

The easiest way to get your affiliate site up and running is WordPress. It is fully customizable and made specifically for marketers like you.

If you also want to build a WordPress platform tailored to your business without spending too much money and time, then WordPress Warrior or Elementor is the ideal solution for you.

3. Look for affiliate programs

Now that you’ve chosen a niche, and your site is up and running, it’s time to find products to promote (although you’ve already done some simple research in step 1).

Choosing an affiliate program will take some work, but don’t be afraid to invest some time in it. It will be worth it to choose the right program!

When choosing an affiliate program, keep these aspects in mind:

• If you use ClickBank, the products should have more than 50 percent commission (preferably 60 percent) and have a high ranking (this means they are in demand).
• For CPA (cost per action) programs, commissions are about $1, and not overly restrictive on how you can promote them.
• For physical products, look for commissions above $40.

Once you have decided which programs to use, sign up and move on to step number 4.

4. Create excellent content

Now that your site is ready and you are part of an affiliate program, you are ready to begin the most time-consuming (but potentially also the most lucrative) part of producing affiliate content.

This is where the overused but truer-than-ever phrase comes into play: “Content is king.”

Your goal will be to turn the site into an authority in your niche, and the most effective way to do that is to create fresh, unique, high-quality content.

This is likely to consist of:

• Product reviews
• Posts that talk about common problems, questions or issues relevant in the marketplace
• Timeless content
• Free e-books and videos
• A professional autoresponder for email marketing

If you’re tempted to fill your site with content built by two-bit articulators, you’ll see that in the long run it won’t help you present yourself as an expert in your niche (and it will mean less traffic and few sales).

5. Train your audience

Acquiring an audience for your site is a step that will happen naturally once you produce excellent content.

There are a few ways to do this faster, including:

• Promote your content on Social Media (Facebook, Twitter, Google+, etc.).
• Writing guest posts on popular blogs
• Building a mailing list (where you can promote your content)
• Using simple SEO techniques to increase traffic to your site through search engines

You can also consider requesting not-too-expensive banner ads on small niche sites, or try your hand at Google AdWords to bring some traffic to your site.

6. Promote affiliate offers

And finally, the part we’ve all been waiting for!

Here comes the hard part. Some unreliable affiliates will go straight to this point by skipping those 1 through 5. And that’s what will set you apart.

Once you’ve proven that you offer quality content in your niche, it’s time to keep adding quality by promoting products that will be useful and helpful to your audience.

You can do this by providing detailed product reviews, promoting on banner ads or with pop-ups on your site, working with affiliate programs by offering giveaways or contests, or giving discounts to your readers on affiliate products.

It is only a matter of time before you can complete your first sale.

7. Lather, rinse, repeat

Your ongoing work as an affiliate marketer involves repeating steps 4 through 6 continuously (with number 3 needing to be repeated occasionally).

Review of key points

It may seem like an immense amount of work to do everything necessary to bring your site to life and build your reputation. But once you’ve made your first sale, I guarantee that getting to your first sale is a thrill you’ll want to repeat every day forever.

The key points we addressed today are:

• Choosing your niche
• Building a site
• Searching for products and affiliate programs
• Producing excellent content
• Training an audience
• Promote your affiliate products
• Replicate steps 4-7 on an ongoing basis

As you can see, there is a real and proven strategy for Affiliate Marketing beginners. Get to work, and you’ll soon reap success.