I’ve been doing affiliate marketing for years now but when I think back to when I got started, man, I was super frustrated. I wasn’t really getting clicks on my links, I wasn’t making sales and I didn’t really know what I was doing wrong and so I think you’re going to love this video and some of the insights that are going to help you get more views on your content and ultimately make more money with affiliate marketing even if you’re just starting so let’s dive into it.
Like, what are some tips that you would give both to the brand and also to the creator when it comes to making money as an affiliate? – Yes, I mean, for affiliate marketing I liked how you said you need to know how to convert. I think that it’s so important to really think about, essentially, the customer journey. There’s actually a really good article to look at by Think With Google, they go deep and they studied one, like, SUV purchase and they studied how many touchpoints this woman made and it was over 400. And of course, that was a much more expensive purchase, like $35,000 or something but I really like to think about, you know, all the way from what is the psychology of the person that’s searching the internet?
What is it they’re looking for? And so even for the creator and then a brand working for a creator just because you include a product in a video or even review a product, there’s some like very important, just, maybe subtle and small, like a call to actions that are important but they’re critical.
Like if you’re missing that thing and I think that’s that verbal call to action, that verbal education of hey if you wanna check out links to these resources it’s in the description below. Like if the creator misses the call to action, then there’s a disconnect to that affiliate marketing probably even being profitable. Furthermore, this is you know, you’re inside of my mind here if I think about kind of even why should someone click the link.
If you can layer on a reason why to say but hey don’t just take my word for it, if you wanna check out the links to this camera in the description below, read the reviews on the other side. And one of the things I’ve thought about where I actually, whether it’s good or bad, avoid products, I just don’t even make the video in the first place if it doesn’t have good reviews.
That’s the customer journey. If I’m like it’s great but then they click through and they land there and they’re like wait a minute, well then your integrity seems like, it’s just confusing why does it have two and a half stars? – And it might have a good product but horrible service and horrible logistics and then that destroy your credibility still.
So that’s literally thinking past your video and of course that’s also another tip I’d give to creators is that to really have integrity in the whole process, to of course always be transparent, to be authentic, to review products, or to be open with what’s good and what’s bad about them and so it is funny, I actually just avoid the product, I end up not making the video at all.
I only like, because why start the process unless let’s talk about something that’s really going to help people. I know maybe people need the reviews of stuff that isn’t bad but a lot of time I just like to find, and our promise is like, what’s the best camera for YouTube, we really want to narrow down like what are the three best options, really do our due diligence and then make those recommendations and then think through that like, entire kind of customer journey past our video because a great way to kill your brand is to recommend something, the same thing with your product, to sell some products that once people receive them, they’re like this sucks. – Yes this doesn’t work very well. Why did somebody tell me to buy this?
You have no longevity if everyone that is interacting with your stuff doesn’t see that the stuff you recommend is actually good and then I think the other thing is having, being a true practitioner. I think where we broke through in affiliates is a lot of people in the industry especially back when I started were preaching to others, their peers, who were really fancy, had a lot of technical knowledge, and who, of course, people that get into cameras and tech are usually kind of snobby about it, they’re whatever and so I kind of went the route of I’m not, I don’t know the best you know, filmmaking camera with the best, all of these details and color grading and, but what I know is that these beauty gurus, we went straight to YouTubers, people who did not want to be camera specialists but people that just were looking for tools that were easy to use, so it’s like empathy for the creator that’s like the flip screen matters, to be able to touch your screen and have it stay in focus matters, the mic input matters, user-friendliness matters.
And so it was interesting, I had to in the middle there endure some criticism from people like oh well it’s not the best camera and you’re like you don’t understand, you’re not my audience, like if you’re already off in this fancy world, that’s cool, but we really blew up by almost making it kind of like cameras made friendly, cameras made simple.
Cameras made for YouTubers that’s what it is. So I hope you got value out of that video and if you did can you hit the like button. And if you actually want to check out our jump start series with affiliate marketing, these were just a few kinds of overview insights and tips that’ll serve you but if you are looking for a more step-by-step approach of exactly how to use YouTube and affiliate marketing to generate sales, make money and build really a life and a business on your own terms, then I’ll link to that free series on the YouTube card and I’ll put a link to it in the description below as well. Question of the day, what is your YouTube channel about? Like what niche are you in? You know, I’m in the tech niche right, we talk all about cameras and gear and that’s a lot of what we talk about with affiliate marketing but I’d love to hear from you.