Sometimes to make money online, you don’t even have to offer a product or a service of your own. Instead, all you need is a website.

Maybe this sounds too good to be true, but this is the basis behind affiliate marketing. Moreover, it is a fast-growing industry, with some sources such as Statista predicting that businesses will spend more than eight billion dollars on affiliate marketing in the next year.

Intrigued? Keep on reading to learn what exactly affiliate marketing is and how it works.

Affiliate marketing – the basics 

Affiliate marketing lets you earn money by promoting someone else’s product or services. In return, you get a commission. In most cases, this commission is a certain percentage of the sale(s) generated by your site. Sometimes, though, this commission can be a fixed amount that you get paid monthly or weekly.

On top of it all, joining an affiliate program can get you access to special promotions and deals for your audience while helping you earn more money.

The way you will promote the material is up to you – video reviews, blog posts, plain old text reviews, or simple product links. You can also do this referral marketing via email campaigns or social media.

The one different thing is the way you get paid. Some affiliates get money when a visitor to their site just clicks the link (Pay Per Clik or PPC). Others only get paid when the visitor buys something (Cost Per Acquisition or CPA).

The pros and cons of affiliate marketing 

If you have a blog or a website of your own, consider engaging with affiliate marketing.

Unlike starting a business that involves upfront costs and many risks, this endeavor is practically risk-free. 

Besides, as an affiliate marketer, you do not need to limit yourself to just one product or service. Instead, you can advertise several different companies and thus increase your odds of making a substantial amount of money.

But, there is a slight downside to affiliate marketing as well. Since it is so easy to do, low risk, and scalable, nearly everyone wants a piece of this booming industry.

This means that you must find a way to make yourself stand out from the crowd. One specific way to do that is by creating your niche, a specialized range of products or services that your site will promote.

How does it work? 

Suppose that you start working as an affiliate marketer. The merchant gives every marketer a unique link that helps them determine which affiliate was responsible for a sale.

Once a visitor to your site clicks a link leading them to the merchant’s site, a tracking cookie is placed on their device. This cookie usually expires after some time – most frequently, it lasts 24 hours. 

Here is why that is important: apart from letting the seller know who is responsible for the sale, a tracking cookie also allows you to get paid even if the visitor postpones their purchase. Besides, every additional purchase that the buyer makes while on the seller’s site gets attributed to you, thus increasing your profit.

How much money can you make? 

Like you have read above, affiliate marketing is a competitive thing. So influencers, news broadcasters, and even movie stars are in on it.

However, you shouldn’t let this discourage you. Simply manage your expectations and know that it will be a while before you start making any substantial sums of money.

Once you find the right niche(s) for your site and audience and get the ball rolling, you might be one of the folks that make significant earnings via affiliate marketing. For example, Patt Flynn from Smart Passive Income earned over a hundred thousand dollars during just one month of 2017. Other successful marketers such as Ryan Robinson make toughly twenty thousand dollars per month.

How can you make it? 

Be persistent, work hard and build your brand and you might be earning as much as they do. Remember that the people who make a lot have been building their online presence and authority for many years. 

Have a site or a blog that people want to visit, one that offers insightful answers to their questions or valuable content that solves their problems. Once you build your reputation and develop a steady and loyal following, the money from affiliate marketing will follow.