Affiliate marketing can be a difficult and challenging business, however there are some myths surrounding it that perhaps need to be dispelled. This article focuses on the niche businesses that actually promote the products on behalf of other companies.
The other side of affiliate marketing are the companies that manage the actual products and provide the links and statistics to support affiliate marketers, but information on that is in another article.
Myth One – Affiliate Marketing is Easy
Affiliate marketing can be seen as an easy option for starting a business. After all you just need a website and a few affiliate links and you are ready to go.
However, this is the first myth that needs to be mentioned because affiliate marketing is no easier than any other form of business venture. It is very time intensive, which can become the biggest resource that goes into developing it into a full time income source.
Time and Resources
The biggest challenge that affiliate marketers face is the time required to develop a website. In order to provide detailed information for visitors there needs to be a substantial amount of content developed, this requires the following resources.
- Researching the topic in order to understand the issues.
- Developing keywords and applying SEO techniques to ensure good ranking positions.
- Writing content.
- Sourcing video and other media sources to support the written content
- Promoting the content and material produced – on multiple social media and promotion platforms.
Myth Two – Only Certain Niches Can Be Profitable
It can also be easy to assume that some niches are more profitable than others. The trick is just to find the right niche in which to make money.
In fact all niches can make money it depends on how they are developed and promoted. The skills that are needed to make a successful business are therefore what is important, not the particular choice of niche.
The choice of niche is often dependent upon,
- What drives your passion?
- What interests or hobbies do you have?
Learning all the skills of promoting and creating content is the vital part of affiliate marketing. Programs such as the Wealthy Affiliate University show that any niche can be profitable with the correct skills and knowledge.
However don’t be tempted to fall for myth number three.
Myth Three – A Broader Niche is Better and Means More Products
Affiliate marketing has traditionally been associated with niche marketing businesses. These businesses focus on a small sub sector of an industry and become specialised in the issues.
“Niche Smartphone Shows Web Opening Or Specialty” by Stuart Miles (freedigitalphotos.net)
It works because by focusing on such a small area, it allows authority and expertise to be developed, which form the basis of building trust with potential customers.
This can prove very challenging because any content that is developed has to be quite focused and specific. Instead the temptation might be to become more generalised and offer a broader range of affiliate products.
However this means the expertise becomes less, trust isn’t as easily established and the model of marketing becomes weakened.
Myth Four – The Affiliate Market is Shrinking
Affiliate marketing sites are constantly changing which may give the impression that the market is turbulent or shrinking. However the growth in companies using affiliate schemes has been consistently increasing.
Affiliate schemes originally started in the U.S in 1994 and have now extended to many other countries across the world. According to Marketing Land the luxury goods market is the latest industry to embrace affiliate schemes as more and more people continue to make purchases on-line.
Businesses are also seeing the benefit of affiliate sites, as a report (also cited on Marketing Land) showed that shoppers coming from affiliate sites tended to spend slightly more money than other customers.
Myth Five – Google Penalises Affiliate Links
There have been a lot of changes to Google’s algorithm over the last couple of years. Most of the changes have been to improve the quality of material and content being produced on websites.
As part of the process of upgrading content available to searchers, many affiliate sites were hit with Google penalties and lost their ranking position. For this reason many affiliate marketers decided that Google was specifically targeting them.
The reality is that Google does not like weak content sites. Early affiliate sites were often very weak and were often promoting the same product and simply providing the same details and information.
The penalties can be avoided though by producing strong content, such as;
- original material
- detailed product reviews
- opinions and thoughts on the broader industry or niche topic
- answering questions that potential customers might have about products
Myth Six – Affiliate Marketing is Just About Selling Products
Many affiliate marketing sites nowadays use a content based marketing strategy. In other words they use content to inform readers and potential customers and build a relationship with them.
Marketing and sales can often be seen as two different functions within business, but in affiliate marketing they come together. However the focus isn’t just on sales.
Content is produced to inform readers about the product, the industry, the company and other aspects that could be seen as relevant to the industry. The scope of content is now a lot broader and is a key part of the overall affiliate marketing business.
Myth Seven – You Only Need to Write Content
Although content is very important, the work doesn’t stop there. In fact producing good quality content on your website is just the first step in marketing.
There are other stages that also need to followed.
- Add images that will attract the readers attention.
- Differ the content to cater for people who prefer to watch a video, or listen to a podcast, or skim read over an article.
- Provide links to your posts on different social media sites, this can include Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Tsu, LinkedIn.
- Promote your website on industry forums relevant to your chosen niche.
“Social Media” by ddpavumba (freedigitalphotos.net)
Promotion is also ongoing, so posting to Twitter needs to be done regularly.
The same post will need several promotions and gradually needs to be added to all your social media and marketing sources.
Myth Eight – Everyone Will Like and Share My Posts on Social Media
Social media is a great source of free advertising, but there are times when paid advertisements are also needed.
In order for people to share your content they usually like to know that you are also engaging with others on social media sites. This means that as well as promoting your own content you need to curate content, i.e. share other work that is relevant to your industry or niche.
Why Share?
There are a number of reasons why sharing is good and a productive way to disseminate material, as well as gain more followers.
- It shows that you are social and interested in others on the site and the material that they produce. This leads to a sense of reciprocity and people share your stuff back in return.
- Curating content is quicker and easier than writing your own, but you are still giving value to your own followers and potential customers.
- Sharing other content implies that you are reading broadly and studying your niche, which leads to more trust and respect from others as you are seen as an authority on the topic.
The downside to all this social media work is that it all takes time, however as with all marketing approaches it is an investment for a return.
Myth Nine – You Need A Lot Of Traffic To Your Website to Make Any Money
Traditional forms of marketing have relied on a numbers approach. The more visitors the more conversions is the agreed practice.
This belief is accepted because generally advertising is aimed at a broad sector of the population and only a small amount of that population will be interested in purchasing. The conversion level is always small.
In content marketing the target audience is more focused, by the time someone arrives at your website they are already interested at some level in what you are offering. Therefore traffic to the site doesn’t need to be as high because conversion levels should be higher and so more sales can be achieved with far lower numbers of visitors.
Affiliate and content marketing aim to achieve a relevant number of quality visitors rather than large numbers of uninterested visitors.
9 Myths of Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is definitely challenging but before you embark on setting up a new business, make sure you don’t believe any of these myths.
- Affiliate Marketing is Easy
- Only Certain Niches Can Be Profitable
- A Broader Niche is Better and Means More Products
- The Affiliate Market is Shrinking
- Google Penalises Affiliate Links
- Affiliate Marketing is Just About Selling Products
- You Only Need to Write Content
- Everyone Will Like and Share My Posts on Social Media
- You Need A Lot Of Traffic To Your Website to Make Any Money
