On-line companies admire that online marketing is without doubt one of the most effective methods to extend gross sales. Its low-cost and performance-based mannequin of promoting services additionally make it extra preferable to email marketing. As a matter of reality, statistics present that online marketing will quickly surpass email marketing by the top of 2021.
That stated, online marketing is taken into account to be the most effective methods to monetize a blog. So, discovering a very good associate is helpful. Even so, any on-line enterprise can relate to how taxing it’s to search out the correct affiliate marketer.
An affiliate partnership is not nearly hyperlink constructing, however discovering a associate with related objectives and can provide you entry to their buyer base (and vice versa).
Many concepts come to thoughts when in search of an affiliate marketer: becoming a member of affiliate recruitment companies, reaching out to networks, or partnering with influencers. However there’s a surefire methodology that’s usually ignored — inspecting affiliate hyperlink buildings.
On this article, we’ll discover the construction of an affiliate hyperlink. Then, we’ll clarify methods to establish a competitor’s affiliate URL together with the affiliate marketer who’s doing the marketing.
Within the occasion you’d prefer to recruit a discovered affiliate, we’ll additionally present you methods to attain out in knowledgeable a persuasive method. Let’s get began!
What’s an Affiliate Hyperlink?
An affiliate hyperlink is a particular URL that has a singular affiliate ID. It helps establish your web site and drive natural site visitors to particular web sites. Retailers additionally use them to establish who despatched site visitors to their websites and decide whom to credit score a sale.
Figuring out affiliate hyperlinks a competitor makes use of will help companies attain out to associates. The final word purpose right here is to introduce your corporation and invite the affiliate to hitch your associates program and profit from their spectacular advertising and marketing expertise.
Usually, affiliate hyperlinks are just like different URLs, besides they’ve further info, such because the affiliate’s ID or web site and the precise web page you’re promoting to assist the client land on the correct web page.
The position of those options within the string varies based mostly on the service provider. For instance, Amazon Associates place the positioning ID after the provide ID, whereas different networks do the alternative.
That is a vital function to think about as a result of you could find yourself crediting one other affiliate along with your sale for those who get it improper.
How Do You Establish Web sites Utilizing Affiliate Hyperlinks?
Figuring out affiliate hyperlinks is an uphill job as a result of many affiliate bloggers hardly disclose this extra info. On-line retailers like Amazon require affiliate marketers to disclose this information to the viewers, however many different entrepreneurs do not adjust to this rule.
If associates do disclose this info, it’s solely after the content material is curated. Consequently, most entrepreneurs monitor referral site visitors from entrepreneurs utilizing customized hyperlinks.
Which means as a substitute of linking to a daily web site handle, it features a distinctive identifier that may provide help to monitor the referral.
Instance of Amazon Affiliate Hyperlink:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B073QXYW38?linkCode=ogi&tag=goodhousekeeping_auto-append-20&ascsubtag=[artid|10055.g.399[src|[ch|[lt|
If the code after the product ID (B073QXYW38) is removed, the link (https://www.amazon.com/dp/B073QXYW38) still works because the values after the product ID show how the customer found the product.
The code after the product ID is the link identifier. In our example, it’s linkCode=ogi&tag but in most cases ‘?tag=097-20’ is used. This code identifies the content creator who sent the reader to Amazon to purchase the product. In our example, the blogger’s ID is Goodhousekeeping.
With thousands of affiliate programs, it’s essential to identify possible identifiers without actually clicking on the link. One method is to keep an eye out for these four words in URLs you suspect to be affiliate links:
The words are often followed by an ‘a’ or ‘=’ and a word, number, or name, which is the affiliate marketer’s ID.
Using a Link Analysis Tool to Find Affiliate Links
If you know what you’re looking for, you can easily spot affiliate marketing. Here’s a step-by-step guide to help you spot competitor practices.
The first step to finding reliable affiliate bloggers is to look for a tool specially designed to discover and analyze backlinks. For this discussion, we’ll use Ahrefs because it focuses on backlinks to provide marketers with in-depth insights about new and lost backlinks. Its primary tasks include:
- Reviewing competitor link profiles to discover link building opportunities
- Identifying top-performing competitor content to identify new ideas for content strategy for your site
- Finding websites linking to broken pages on your site
After signing up with Ahrefs, open the website and paste the domain or URL, e.g., https://competitor.com
Choose the exact domain or URL mode from the drop-down menu.
View the backlink report on the left-hand menu:
You’ll see the backlink the competitor uses and lots of data including the site’s traffic (the estimated search traffic to the linking page), referring page (where the link originates), and anchor text (the text using in link building).
Next, export the links from Ahrefs into an Excel sheet to create a list of links you can use for link building.
How to Reach Out to Affiliate Bloggers
After you’ve compiled a list of links, you still need to find the email addresses for the affiliates in order to reach out.
Most bloggers don’t mind helping a growing brand. Besides, it’s a win-win situation; they can earn passive income and you can advertise your products to their audience. However, the way you approach them can make or break your marketing strategy.
Here are 7 tips on how to reach out and connect with affiliates
1. Cut to the Chase: Use Grovia
If you want the most complete affiliate recruitment solution on the market, you should check out the Partner Discovery software at Grovia. This tool finds top-ranking content publishers for the keywords you want to rank for.
Grovia gives you links to relevant sites and contact information for authors, editors, and decision makers. It collects your contacts in the CRM, then allows you to create custom email sequences from the dashboard. We’d happily recommend this time-saving tool to any affiliate manager.
2. Write a Straightforward Message
The blogger may have other marketers requesting to advertise through their platform, so you want to get to the point right away. Note that there’s a fine line between being careless and straightforward too. You don’t want your email to end up in the trash.
3. Make an Offer
This is one question that goes through the blogger’s mind when you ask them to promote your product or service. Unless you’re a big brand, you’re bound to gain more customers through link building. The offer should be tailored to the blogger you’re talking to. For bloggers, it can be a percentage of the sales made.
4. Tailor the Email to Each Blogger
It’s tempting to create an email list and pitch using the same email to all the recipients. Although, we recommend that you take the time to personalize your message. Every blogger is different; a paid review offer may lure some while others may find it off-putting.
As such, it’s essential to tailor the pitches to the blogger’s preferences. Research the types of blog posts they like and what they’re currently doing to earn a living. Such information can help you write a good pitch and woo them with an attractive offer.
Be as creative as you can! You can even create short videos using video editors like Movavi so your email stands out.
5. Ask them to Review Your Product or Service
Product reviews are an effective affiliate marketing strategy. Although, it’s important that a blogger’s content is related to your products or services.
6. Send a Follow-up Email
Sending a follow-up email shows the blogger that you want to work with them. They also come in handy if they didn’t read the first email, or it got lost. It’s best to leave a good impression even if they don’t respond.
7. Offer a Unique Commission
If you’re going to ask a blogger to be an affiliate, it’s best to give them a different commission. Such incentives encourage them to promote your products regularly.
Wrapping Up
Affiliate marketing remains the most effective way of increasing reach and sales or growing a brand, but the strategy you use matters. Analyzing affiliate link structures from competitors and other sources is a good start because it makes it easy to find potential affiliate bloggers.
In this article, we covered:
- How to identify websites that use affiliate marketing
- How to use a link analysis tool, such as Ahrefs, to find affiliate links
- How to reach out to marketers and recruit them to your affiliate program
When it comes to blogging, rankings are primarily dictated by content quality; thus, finding out where your competitors are linking might just put your business ahead in the affiliate marketing game.
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