Let's face it, if you have a blog and you are on Twitter not doubt you'll hear a lot about affiliate links and making money from your blog. I see so many questions about this and try to answer them because I have actually been in the affiliate industry for 5 years now ,so I get it!
I thought I would create a blog post on how to monetise your blog and just give a really simplified selection of the options...
Join an affiliate network directly...
- What is an affiliate network:- An affiliate network is a platform that allows brands/publishers to get tracking links to add to their website. If a consumer were to click on that link and make a purchase, the sale will be tracked and attributed to the relevant publisher.
- Pros:
- You can join as many affiliate networks as you like.
- Have direct relationships with multiple brands
- Exclusive CPA offers from brands direct
- Cons:
- The dashboards are old and clunky, they aren't as sleek and easy to use as some of the sub-networks
- It takes time - you have to find different brands and then apply to their programme and they have to accept you.
- How do you get paid: if someone makes a purchase through your blog and they don't return the item(s) the brand will pay the commission after 30 days which will be reflected in the dashboard. One thing to note is that sometimes it can take a little while longer depending on how good the brand is as paying their invoices
- rewardStyle is a sub-network that uses affiliate networks for tracking but you don't need to long into different affiliate networks because rS has all the brands in one place.
- Pros:
- You only need to log into one dashboard to have access to all brands
- Dashboard looks cleaner and made for content creators/bloggers in mind
- If you are a big blogger rS will negotiate tenancies with brand for paid campaigns
- Instant access to 100s of brands
- Paid on CPA
- Cons:
- You have to be accepted onto the network - these guys can be rather fussy about who they work with
- You cannot get contact details for specific brands on their network, they are very much the middle man between you and the brand
- How do you get paid: in exactly the same way as working with an affiliate network direct.
Join Shopstyle Collective...
- Shopstyle is a newer subnetwork competing with rS a little but they works slightly differently in the sense they pay on a CPC (per click) as opposed to CPA (per sale), if you get a lot of traffic to your blog this might be a good option because you may earn more. However works in a similar way to rS because they use affiliate networks tracking and you have access to all brands.
- Pros:
- Quick and easy to sign up - anyone can join!
- Really easy to get links and create collages
- If you are a big blogger rS will negotiate tenancies with brand for paid campaigns
- Instant access to 100s of brands
- Paid on a CPC
- Cons:
- You cannot get contact details for specific brands on their network, they are very much the middle man between you and the brand
- CPC fee is often much lower than the CPA rate
- How do you get paid: in exactly the same way as working with an affiliate network direct.
Join Skimlinks...
- This is another subnetwork that works like SC and rS but they aren't made specifically for bloggers in fact this tool is often used to monetise magazines and lots of different types of content.
- Pros:
- Quick and easy to sign up - anyone can join
- Add a piece of HTML to your blog and this will automatically add an affiliate link behind any brand URL you add to your blogpost, which means you never need to log in and get links
- Good analytics tool to check your daily/weekly/monthly stats
- Instant access to 100s of brands
- Paid on CPA
- Cons:
- Dashboard isn't as visual as SC and rS.
- You can't get banners easily
- How do you get paid: in exactly the same way as working with an affiliate network direct.
So there we have it a quick snapshot into some websites you can use to monetise your glorious content, seriously guys it's so easy it's worth find more out about these networks. I hope this post helps a little but if you have any questions just let me know.
Link on the following links to read more about Awin (affiliate network), rewardStyle, Shopstyle Collective, Skimlinks.
Do you monetise your content?
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