6 killer affiliate marketing mistakes
Affiliate marketing is a great way to make money online but is not as easy as we always say. Many affiliate marketers are actually making ENORMOUS mistakes that cost them money, and time, and could hurt or end their reputations forever as affiliate marketers.
However, once you can identify these killer affiliate mistakes, it will be easy for you to amend them so you do not make them in your affiliate marketing campaigns.
If you have been pondering why your affiliate marketing campaigns are not as effective as you projected then, you might be making one or more of these big mistakes that could be extremely hindering your efforts.
In this tutorial, you will know the most common mistakes made by affiliate marketers (Even some highly proficient marketers make these mistakes, so this article is not restricted to only neophytes!) You will also educate yourself on how to stay from these mistakes, and how to prevent yourself from repeating the same mistakes countless times as so many marketers seem to do.
1. Joining numerous affiliate programs
One great temptation faced by affiliate marketers is joining numerous affiliate programs because they think the profitability of affiliate marketing depends on the affiliate program. Well, the secret is all are profitable depending on your marketing strategies and effectiveness.
Honestly speaking, as long as you stick to a legit affiliate program and your marketing strategies are effective you are going to see some awesome results.
Pick your two or three topics, and find two or three affiliate programs for each. Make sure to find at least one massively hot product at each affiliate program that has the potential to convert well in your chosen niche, and stick to promoting that product for a while before you try another product or service.
When you join numerous affiliate programs, you will realize that it takes a very long period for you to reach the minimum withdrawal limit for each affiliate program, because you will be earning $5 in program A, $2 in Program B and $30 on program C. Don’t it look crazy?
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2. Overlooking competition
When is said that, “do not be afraid of the competition”, is also important to be sensible. Expecting to make a fortune overnight in an extremely competitive niche like weight loss is a sure procedure of disappointment.
What to do first is to target niche that:
- You have some interest or familiarity in.
- Have a balanced amount of competition.
- Do not have some competition that is easier to drive traffic.
Note: Point 1 is a very crucial point you should focus on. When choosing a niche, make sure to choose a niche you are interested in and have knowledge of. Click here to see some guides on how to choose a profitable niche.
Choosing a topic you have an interest in could make everything simple for you. Because, it will be easier to create content, easier to the identified target market, easier to get traffic, and easier to sell products since you have an idea of the niche.
Do you need to be a Pro to overcome the market? The answer is no! You could do well in a niche you know nothing about, just learn as you go.
However, if you do not have any interest in the topic, it is going to make it much easier for you to give up. You will be bored because your working days become such a grind that you will throw your hands up in frustration and flip on the television or head up to the lake.
So how do you choose your first niche? Click here to learn how.
After choosing your niches, now check to make sure there are:
- A decent volume of competition.
- Resource available for you to learn.
- Affiliate products to promote.
- Traffic source you can take advantage of.
You want to pick a niche with at least 50,000 existing websites. Even a few million is not a big deal. Sixty million might be pushing it unless you have some cash to pay for the initial promotion. You can find out the number of sites out there that have mentioned your niche by searching Google.
3. Focusing on selling
I know that the main goal of affiliate marketing is making sales. That much is obvious. However, you should never focus on making sales.
Instead, you should focus on helping people. No matter what your market or niche is, you should channel your attention to helping your niche in some way because this is how you add value to your affiliate offers and get more audience that is loyal to your niche, which will trust you and convert to customers.
Always focus on helping your target customers. This will help you build a relationship between you and your audience that you would likely sell to; it will also make your job easier and give you a reason to feel good about yourself at the same time.
4. Sticking to MMO products.
MMO, Make Money Online, is one of the most profitable markets there is, but it is a mistake if you solely rely on that one niche. Do you know that even the experts in marketing have diversified into other markets?
That is because any niche, no matter how profitable a niche is, has a maximum income limit that you can reach. Ultimately, you could effectively reach the entire market, and your earnings will be crippling simply because you have nothing new to offer to them and there is no way you can add value to it.
Certainly, this is an epitome. The fact is no market has an absolute limit, because new customers are born and growing up all the time. However, think about it. Once you have hit a mesa, your income deteriorates.
Nonetheless, if you diversify into other markets, you will have some fresh products to promote and new values to add. You will also have a high probability of making money since you are not stuck in one specific market.
I know it is very tempting to start with, the MMO niche since it is highly profitable and you will learn a lot about it yourself. Unless you offer to help someone in that niche because you are an expert yourself, you are better off trying a niche where you have more to add.
5. Spreading Yourself Too Reedy
This is another great temptation mainly faced by new affiliate marketers, to spread themselves too reedy by bifurcating into too many markets. Maybe they buy 30 domains all at once or probably set up over 10 blogs in different niches in a single week. However, this is fatuity.
You should channel your focus on one or two key niches at a time, and variegate once you have made some real headway into those niches.
However, starting multiple blogs on different niches is not a bad idea as long as you have the capabilities of hiring someone to manage multiple blogs, multiple products, multiple email lists, multiple social media pages and accounts but if not, then you are doing yourself huge disfavour if you vary too widely in the beginning.
Choose two or three markets primarily, and modify supplementary when you have made some real progress into those first niches. Once you can get some decent traffic, a small mailing list that is growing, and a social media presence that is making a difference. Then you can think of starting a new niche.
Do not make the mistake of spreading out too fast. You will realize that you can never make a real difference in any of the niches because you are not putting enough effort into a particular one to make any progress.
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6. Give up easily
If I had a greenback for every person, I have seen given up in the process of making money online, I would have been well-heeled right now. The web is full of affiliate accounts that never send a referral, and blogs with only one to three posts.
What are some reasons why people give up on affiliate marketing?
- Not making money too quickly.
- Not getting traffic quickly.
- Not getting accepted to many affiliate networks.
- Feeling like it is too much work.
- Thinking affiliate marketing is a “scam”.
The major similarity all these have in common is expecting huge results overnight. Affiliate marketing is not a “con” just because you did not make $20,000 or even $1,000 your first month. You cannot expect to get 1000,000 page views with a new domain without backlinks in the first month of starting. All the success stories you see on the internet take time, they require patience.
If you give up too easily, you will never know what could have been. You never know if you could be the next internet millionaire, nonetheless, you will never know if you give up before it happens!
Final thought
Affiliate marketing is not for the weak in heart, nor for those who can give up so easily or migrate from one shiny opportunity to another without thinking.
You can make a huge sum of money from affiliate marketing when you do it the right way, but if you are the give-up type then I guarantee you that you will fail. Affiliate marketing has changed many lives over the past decades, and it can never be a swindle.
Make sure to keep these likely mistakes in mind as you steer your way through the precarious ambient affiliate marketing. Make sure you do not make these mistakes and do not slip down once you start making money. No one is insusceptible to these mistakes!
Success is guaranteed as long as you work hard, keep at it, and avoid these mistakes.
Good luck as you embark on your successful mission.
Let me know the one you have made before, even if not listed here.
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