affiliate-marketingThere are lots of ebooks about affiliate marketing today doe to the fact so many people work from home to make money on the Internet.

Actually there are millions of people today who work at home as their job. One of our neighbours works from home full time and loves not making the long commute to work.

I did that for a few years but decided I would rather work from home as my own boss. I learned I can work from home even in New Brunswick Canada and make a good living selling other people’s products, known as affiliate marketing.

What is Affiliate Marketing

About as simple as I can put it, Affiliate Marketing is the act of promoting other people’s products and/or services for some kind of gain. In most cases gain means earning money.

Looking for a more in-depth explanation then checkout Wikipedia for What is Affiliate Marketing?

There are millions of dollars a day, maybe even per hour, being made in affiliate marketing which should excite you as it does me because I make some of that money each and every day whether I’m working or not.

Saying that doesn’t mean affiliate marketing is easy. There is a lot of competition to deal with and to get the job done efficiently you will need to learn some things to give you a fighting chance.

Take the right steps and you can do make money in affiliate marketing. On the other hand, start with your eyes closed and you may not do so well.

After years of learning about affiliate marketing I have put most of my focus toward the following niches.

  • fishing
  • gardening
  • playing guitar
  • puppy training
  • money making blog

I have tried other niches where I didn’t have any experience and soon dropped them to focus on niches I do have experience in. It’s so much easier to maintain site where I know the niche.

Buyers Is What Makes Affiliate Marketing Work

Before I work any niche I first do research to determine if enough money is being spent in that niche to make it worth the effort. Basically…

…Are People Spending Money In the Niche?

My favourite niche today is sport fishing. As a sport fisher of more than 30 years I do know that other fishers are making lots of purchases in the sport fishing niche. The fact of the matter is most of us tend to over spend on this niche which is perfect for me.

I have been blogging about my fishing experiences for years now and each year I make more money because of all the posts from previous years. They just keep drawing free traffic from the major search engines.

Researching so that you know there’s money to be made in the niche is the first step toward your success. But that’s just the first step, you also need to know how strong your competition is.

How I Earn Money From My Niches

My goal is to make money with my blogs as I do this full time working from home so what ever I do needs to lead me to making money or I’m wasting my time. There is just me, no employees and I like having a life.

I don’t really have secrets to share but I do have years of experience that some others don’t have yet. That can mean money if you know what you’re doing.

Before I can make money from my readers I need to have something to share they will read. I have to have an interesting or fun story. For my example I it will be about how I kicked my fishing buddies butt all day long until I shared one of my lures with him.

When I keep my reader reading I have the potential to make an affiliate sale. This means I need to have a product or service to link to. An affiliate link from an affiliate network I belong to.

An Affiliate Product Sale Through A Story Example:

Last day of the year for the three of us, Ron, Kevin and myself. Late fall can be a very productive time of year as the bass and Chain pickerel are stuffing themselves here in New Brunswick.

Well we were out two weeks ago and were using red worms and just about anything actually but this day they were either heading south for the winter or being extremely picky.

After more than an hour without even a follow I decided to try something I used to use for Northern pike in Ontario and that was a big ole Red Devil.

First cast off to the side of the boat to see how it was running and it got smacked hard by a 23” chain pickerel.

My fishing buddies were all excited to see what I caught it with so I tried my best to keep it hidden and build on the excitement. When I finally showed them they both sighed but not in a good way. Neither of them had a Red Devil. I laughed out loud because I couldn’t believe they would not have a Red Devil.

We are fishing buddies so I had to tease them telling them it was the only one I had. Then I gave them each one but they were smaller than the one I had however after a few minutes it was obvious that size didn’t matter this day.

After a few hours of fish after fish I thought I would try a #3 Mepps. I knew the trout and bass love them, why not a chain pickerel. Just a couple of casts and I had a fish on.

I was curious to see if they had just turned on back when I first put the Red Devil on so I went back to use the baits we started with. The pickerel had no interest in them at all.

Our last day on the water for 2011 was spectacular and even better it wasn’t freezing cold, just comfortable. ‘Til next year happy dreams.

Notice I highlighted the name of the lure in red and bolded it. Those would be affiliate links leading my readers to where they can buy Red Devils or anything else once they get to the landing page and I commissions.

I would also include an image of the lure, maybe even a picture at the beginning with a chain pickerel and the lure hanging from it’s mouth. A picture says a thousand words and can help you earn more.

A Cookie With That Affiliate Link?

I am not referring to cookies you eat. I am talking about snippets of code used to remember you visited the affiliate site. This is not like your browser history and is a good thing.

When a visitor clicks your affiliate link the cookie notes you visited the affiliate page and my affiliate ID so that if the visitor returns at a later time the system remembers them and you get paid commission on any purchased they make. How cool is that.

The cookies can remember for weeks and even months after the initial click so you could keep earning as they keep returning to the affiliate page.

So affiliate marketing is an awesome way to make money or even your living, given time and some work. Start small and get it right before scaling up.

Related posts:

  1. Work At Home Affiliate Marketing Planning
  2. Work From Home Affiliate Marketing Success
  3. Work From Home Methods To Earn Money Online
  4. How Affiliate Marketing Helps Us Make Money Blogging
  5. How You Can Make Affiliate Marketing Money Working From Home

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Filed under: affiliate marketing • create a blog • niche marketing • work at home

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