Affiliate Marketing: What It Is, How It Works, and Examples
Posted: Wed Jan 22, 2025 10:05 am
Affiliate marketing is the way to start generating an income for many entrepreneurs looking to build an online business, or for marketers who want to monetize web traffic.
It's one of the most popular methods for generating passive income online, and there are plenty of tried and tested strategies to get you started on the right foot.
What is affiliate marketing?
Affiliate marketing is a strategy where a company rewards affiliates, whether a customer or another company, for generating traffic and conversions. To earn the reward, affiliates post links on their websites, blogs, vlogs, social media, and emails. For each visitor who makes a purchase through that link, the affiliate receives a commission.
Benefits of Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is profitable, measurable and scalable. That's why it's so attractive to businesses, as it allows them to launch an advertising and sales strategy without investing large amounts of money.
Improve passive income: allows you to generate income passively, without investing directly in digital or traditional advertising campaigns.
It can be implemented quickly: a saudi arabia whatsapp lead marketing campaign, for example, requires time and resources, and even then its success cannot be guaranteed. On the other hand, an affiliate marketing campaign can be implemented quickly and with a very small investment.
It's measurable: Because of the use of links provided to affiliates to promote your offer, this strategy is perfectly measurable. Traffic and conversions are the metrics you'll want to analyze in affiliate marketing.
It has a very wide reach: this strategy is spread across a wide variety of sites and social networks. Each affiliate will have their own strategies for generating resources through commissions. Some will use their YouTube channel while others will do so on Twitch, during a streaming session, or on their professional blog, if they are influencers who promote writing.
It has a low cost per acquisition: this strategy generates a cost only when a visitor becomes a customer or performs another action that you have agreed upon with your affiliates. In this case, a commission is paid, and that's it.
What is affiliate marketing?
What parts make up affiliate marketing
Affiliates
These are individuals or companies that promote offers. They are also known as promoters.
The affiliate network is the structure designed to work with affiliates, reach agreements and maintain a specific communication channel for notifications, news and more.
The creators of the product
It is the company that designs the product or service and implements the affiliate marketing strategy.
Consumers
These are the end users of the product or service.
Parts of Affiliate Marketing
Who are affiliates in affiliate marketing?
An affiliate, also known as a promoter, can be an individual or a company. Typically, they are bloggers or content creators active in the industry of the product they are promoting.
Affiliates help promote the product or service by creating content, whether it's blog posts, videos, or other media content. They may also promote the content and make a transaction by placing ads, drive search traffic with SEO (search engine optimization) strategies, or build a database with emails.
When one of your visitors generates a transaction, which can be a purchase or a form submission with their data, the affiliate earns a commission. The amount of the commission you receive will depend on the terms of the affiliate program.
Who are the creators of the product (or sellers)
A seller, also known as a product creator or product advertiser, is usually the creator of the product or service. They offer revenue sharing and commissions to people or other companies (or affiliates) who have a significant fan base for their brand.
The seller can be a company like HubSpot, which offers a commission to each affiliate that is able to get its visitors to make a purchase, or it can be an individual, like online marketing expert Pat Flynn, who offers an affiliate program with his podcast.
Sellers or product creators can range from a start-up entrepreneur with no employees to a large company. They are sellers as long as they are willing to pay their affiliates to help them generate a transaction. Other times, the seller doesn't even have to be the creator of the product. This is the case with the Amazon Associates Program .
What are affiliate networks?
An affiliate network is an intermediary between sellers and their affiliates. In some cases, the network is not necessary, but some companies choose to work with a network to add more trust to the deal.
The network manages the relationship and provides third-party checks and balances. Third-party checks are important because they ensure that the possibility of fraud is reduced.
Some popular networks are ClickBank and ShareASale .
There are sellers who choose to work with an affiliate network because they lack the resources or time to track, report, and manage payments to their affiliates. Additionally, they may choose to work with many affiliates or advertisers within the affiliate network.
Who are the consumers?
Consumers or clients are those who make the transaction. They are the ones who buy the product or send a form with their data and thus guarantee the affiliate a commission.
How Affiliate Marketing Works
Affiliate marketing works in a very simple way. In principle, a company creates an affiliate program.
People with experience in this type of strategy register in the program and receive a link. Registration is usually done from a company platform, through which contact is maintained with the affiliates . It is a network that allows communication to be maintained and messages or notifications to be sent.
The affiliate designs their content and promotes it. Typically, as an affiliate you will get paid when a visitor to your site completes a transaction. The transaction can be anything from a click, a form completion, or a sale. In most cases, affiliate marketing is performance-based, meaning you get paid as an affiliate only if one of your visitors interacts.
It's one of the most popular methods for generating passive income online, and there are plenty of tried and tested strategies to get you started on the right foot.
What is affiliate marketing?
Affiliate marketing is a strategy where a company rewards affiliates, whether a customer or another company, for generating traffic and conversions. To earn the reward, affiliates post links on their websites, blogs, vlogs, social media, and emails. For each visitor who makes a purchase through that link, the affiliate receives a commission.
Benefits of Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is profitable, measurable and scalable. That's why it's so attractive to businesses, as it allows them to launch an advertising and sales strategy without investing large amounts of money.
Improve passive income: allows you to generate income passively, without investing directly in digital or traditional advertising campaigns.
It can be implemented quickly: a saudi arabia whatsapp lead marketing campaign, for example, requires time and resources, and even then its success cannot be guaranteed. On the other hand, an affiliate marketing campaign can be implemented quickly and with a very small investment.
It's measurable: Because of the use of links provided to affiliates to promote your offer, this strategy is perfectly measurable. Traffic and conversions are the metrics you'll want to analyze in affiliate marketing.
It has a very wide reach: this strategy is spread across a wide variety of sites and social networks. Each affiliate will have their own strategies for generating resources through commissions. Some will use their YouTube channel while others will do so on Twitch, during a streaming session, or on their professional blog, if they are influencers who promote writing.
It has a low cost per acquisition: this strategy generates a cost only when a visitor becomes a customer or performs another action that you have agreed upon with your affiliates. In this case, a commission is paid, and that's it.
What is affiliate marketing?
What parts make up affiliate marketing
Affiliates
These are individuals or companies that promote offers. They are also known as promoters.
The affiliate network is the structure designed to work with affiliates, reach agreements and maintain a specific communication channel for notifications, news and more.
The creators of the product
It is the company that designs the product or service and implements the affiliate marketing strategy.
Consumers
These are the end users of the product or service.
Parts of Affiliate Marketing
Who are affiliates in affiliate marketing?
An affiliate, also known as a promoter, can be an individual or a company. Typically, they are bloggers or content creators active in the industry of the product they are promoting.
Affiliates help promote the product or service by creating content, whether it's blog posts, videos, or other media content. They may also promote the content and make a transaction by placing ads, drive search traffic with SEO (search engine optimization) strategies, or build a database with emails.
When one of your visitors generates a transaction, which can be a purchase or a form submission with their data, the affiliate earns a commission. The amount of the commission you receive will depend on the terms of the affiliate program.
Who are the creators of the product (or sellers)
A seller, also known as a product creator or product advertiser, is usually the creator of the product or service. They offer revenue sharing and commissions to people or other companies (or affiliates) who have a significant fan base for their brand.
The seller can be a company like HubSpot, which offers a commission to each affiliate that is able to get its visitors to make a purchase, or it can be an individual, like online marketing expert Pat Flynn, who offers an affiliate program with his podcast.
Sellers or product creators can range from a start-up entrepreneur with no employees to a large company. They are sellers as long as they are willing to pay their affiliates to help them generate a transaction. Other times, the seller doesn't even have to be the creator of the product. This is the case with the Amazon Associates Program .
What are affiliate networks?
An affiliate network is an intermediary between sellers and their affiliates. In some cases, the network is not necessary, but some companies choose to work with a network to add more trust to the deal.
The network manages the relationship and provides third-party checks and balances. Third-party checks are important because they ensure that the possibility of fraud is reduced.
Some popular networks are ClickBank and ShareASale .
There are sellers who choose to work with an affiliate network because they lack the resources or time to track, report, and manage payments to their affiliates. Additionally, they may choose to work with many affiliates or advertisers within the affiliate network.
Who are the consumers?
Consumers or clients are those who make the transaction. They are the ones who buy the product or send a form with their data and thus guarantee the affiliate a commission.
How Affiliate Marketing Works
Affiliate marketing works in a very simple way. In principle, a company creates an affiliate program.
People with experience in this type of strategy register in the program and receive a link. Registration is usually done from a company platform, through which contact is maintained with the affiliates . It is a network that allows communication to be maintained and messages or notifications to be sent.
The affiliate designs their content and promotes it. Typically, as an affiliate you will get paid when a visitor to your site completes a transaction. The transaction can be anything from a click, a form completion, or a sale. In most cases, affiliate marketing is performance-based, meaning you get paid as an affiliate only if one of your visitors interacts.