What is Affiliate Marketing and Why Should You Care?
Affiliate Marketing is the process of earning commission by selling other peoples products. And you should care, because for almost every product you purchase there is a program willing to pay you commission. Whether you shop at walmart, kmart, aeropostle or whether you more into business training from Brian Tracy or Mindfulness classes from MindValley, these are just a handful of the commissionable opportunities.
You should care because chances are you’re reading this blog post because you have a hobby that you’re interested in
monetizing. Take a minute to step away from the obvious trading time for money methods of making money. You know, where you do something for a certain number of hours, and get paid for those hours. Take a deep breath. Now, imagine investing the time up front… and allowing that initial time investment to create a waterfall of passive income.
Affiliate Marketers are people who fill a need, generally an educational need. They have an information (for lack of a better term) PRODUCT, that helps someone do something.
Now, think about your hobby. Ask yourself these questions:
- Are there other people (like me) interested in this hobby?
- Are there other people (like I used to be) just getting started in this hobby?
- Is there any information that I wish I had had when I was just getting started?
- Are there any tips or tricks that I know, that not many others know?
- Have I discovered a new way to … do something?
Too often we discount the copious amounts of information we have gathered over the years as we pursue activities that we find easy and enjoyable. More often then not, we also believe that because something comes easily to us, it must not be very valuable.
Listen, I’m just as guilty as the next person. I can churn out a website, and write blog posts until the cows come home, because I enjoy it. I enjoy helping other people experience success, I enjoy helping other people make money, I really enjoy hearing back from someone that read something that activated their imagination and helped them start… something. And because it’s so easy for me, I sometimes discount the effect the information can have on someone else.
This is life changing stuff!
Literally. LIFE CHANGING
Affiliate Marketing give every single individual on the planet the opportunity to take what they know, and get paid. Here, I’ll put it to the test.
Knitting. no problem. I just googled “knitting affiliates” and got the following results:
Now, imagine you have a knitting blog. You are sharing patterns, pros and cons, maybe even selling your completed products or information… but you can also just be writing without selling. Apply to any of these affiliate opportunities, and mention them in your post, with a link. When your site visitors click and fulfill the requirement for commission (usually you either get paid for traffic or purchases) you make a commission.
I’ll be honest, knitting is not a hobby of mine. BUT my first initial affiliate website was a Coupon site: www.imprimircuponesgratis.com and www.crazycouponwoman.com both of which are simply grocery coupon websites. Very simple, no membership required, nothing but great access to coupons. AND… I write several posts a month, put the coupons on the posts and I make money EVERY SINGLE DAY. That is the power of affiliate websites.
My goal for you today is to start to get you thinking about what’s possible. Start to get you thinking about HOW you can take advantage of “what you know” and turn it into online income. Take what you enjoy, what you EASILY ACCOMPLISH every day, and turn it into money passive income. It’s called passive income, because you create the entries in your website once, and
they continue to make money.
Passive income isn’t something new. Passive Income also known as Residual Income is something that is the standard in several industries. Take the music industry for instance. When an artist writes a song and it is recorded, they receive payment every time it’s played. They don’t need to rewrite it every time to get paid, no. They write it once, and get paid every time it’s played. Same with book authors. If you write a book, you only write it once, and every time it sells, you get paid. EVERY TIME. You don’t need to rewrite it every time. That is passive, that is residual income.
Affiliate Marketing is the easiest way to step into that type of market place, and it is especially easy using the information you know about your favorite topic. From Dating to Diners if you have a hobby or interest or talent, your unique voice will draw your audience towards you and the placement of ads promoting additional education or access to valuable information or (in my case) coupons, will turn your hobby into income.
Still need more help? If you feel like you’re ready to take the next step, and that means actually creating a website around your hobby or interest and learning how to create content and provide the value that will drive the traffic to your site, then I suggest you take the free courses at Wealthy Affiliate. This is the program that helped me jump start my online income. As a veteran website developer I was making money every day, but it was this training that kept me focused and helped me design more valuable content and engagement that kept by visitors coming back for me. (Plus it’s free, so you can get started today)
For more information about Affiliate Marketing or for any questions or comments … PLEASE either comment below on this post or email me directly at info@turnyourhobbyintoincome.com
Have an amazing day!
