📝 The Death of Affiliate Marketing: How to Succeed in 2021 and Beyond
Affiliate marketing has been a popular way for people to make money online for many years. However, the traditional methods of affiliate marketing are no longer effective. If you want to succeed in this business, you need to adapt to the changing landscape. In this article, I will share with you my experience of making multiple six figures in affiliate commissions over the last 5 years. I will explain how I did it and what you need to avoid in order to see success in this business. I will also provide you with some free templates and sales funnels that you can use to speed up the process.
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
2. The Traditional Method of Affiliate Marketing
3. The Problem with the Traditional Method
4. The New Way of Doing Affiliate Marketing
5. Finding a Profitable Product
6. The Importance of Recurring Sales
7. Building an Automated System
8. Getting Traffic to Your System
9. Free Traffic Methods
10. Social Media Advertising
11. Paid Advertising
12. Conclusion
The Traditional Method of Affiliate Marketing
When I started affiliate marketing, there was only one strategy that everyone was teaching and doing online. It goes something like this: head over to ClickBank.com, create an account, find a product that's in a good niche, and then just get your affiliate link and start sending traffic to it. The logic behind the strategy was that once you get enough people to click on your link, eventually someone would buy the product and you would make a commission.
Within the first 3 weeks, I was able to generate over $10,000 selling ClickBank products. But it all came at a cost. The refunds came piling in, and the next month I made less than $11,000. Everything just came crashing down in front of my eyes. The reason for this is because I didn't build a real business. This entire strategy was just built around sending people to an affiliate link and then hoping they would make a purchase the first time they saw the product. I didn't build any sort of authority, I didn't collect anyone's emails, or even learn any new skills that could make me more money. This experience was very painful, but it showed me that this method simply wasn't sustainable.
The Problem with the Traditional Method
The problem with the traditional method of affiliate marketing is that it's too focused on short-term gains. You're just sending people to an affiliate link and hoping they'll make a purchase. There's no real relationship building, no authority building, and no long-term strategy. This method might work in the short-term, but it's not sustainable in the long-term.
The New Way of Doing Affiliate Marketing
The new way of doing affiliate marketing is all about building a real business. It's about building authority, collecting emails, and providing value to your audience. The key to success in this business is to focus on recurring sales. You want to find a product that people will pay for every month, and then promote that product using an automated system.
Finding a Profitable Product
The first step in building a successful affiliate marketing business is to find a profitable product. You need to find a niche that you want to go into, and this needs to fall under the category of the top three niches which are health, wealth, and relationships. Additionally, you need to have some level of knowledge or passion for this industry. The reason for this is simple: these are the essential human needs that people can't live without, so there's always going to be a demand.
The Importance of Recurring Sales
The key to success in affiliate marketing is to focus on recurring sales. You want to find a product that people will pay for every month, and then promote that product using an automated system. This is important because these types of products bring in monthly recurring cash flow. You just need someone to sign up for a product or a service one time, and the company will continue paying you out every single month as long as that customer is still signed up to the product or service.
Building an Automated System
My secret to affiliate marketing has always been an automated system. This is an ecosystem that runs 24 hours, 7 days of the week without me having to be present. This is also known as a sales funnel. It's a series of web pages that take someone from being a lead and then converts that person into a paying customer. The key to this funnel is that it's automated. You don't have to manually message your customers. The system is going to automatically follow up with all of your leads and turn them into paying customers.
Getting Traffic to Your System
Once your funnel is all set up, it's now time to start getting traffic so that you can start building up an army of recurring based commission. There are several ways to get traffic to your system, including free traffic methods, social media advertising, and paid advertising.
Free Traffic Methods
If you're starting out on a very low budget, then free traffic is the type of traffic that I recommend for you. The good thing about this is that there's an unlimited amount of traffic out there. You just have to know where to find it and how to use it to be successful.
Social Media Advertising
Social media advertising is a great way to get crazy amounts of traffic to your affiliate system for 100% free. You could potentially be creating lots of short-form content, jumping on this rising trend, and getting some viral videos on your account. These are great ways to get traffic to your system.
Paid Advertising
If you have a bit of a budget and you want to see results in the fastest way possible, then paid advertising is the way to go. Specifically, Google ads or Tik Tok ads are the two most powerful forms of advertising that you can do in this economy right now.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the traditional method of affiliate marketing is dead and gone. The only people that are going to survive in this industry, especially going into 2021 and beyond, are those that are willing to adopt the new way of doing affiliate marketing by using marketing systems while promoting recurring based products. If you can do that, then you would have created a real asset for yourself that will pay you for many months and many years to come.
