When you start out with affiliate marketing, there are a lot of unknowns. It is a market that requires you to be up on the most recent trends to get ahead. It also requires you to put in time and effort to get things moving in the direction to you want. Unfortunately, this means that there is a lot of room for error. Making errors breaks trust, and you can’t afford to break the trust of your readers. In this article, I’d like to quickly cover the six big mistakes affiliate marketers make so that you can learn and hopefully avoid these mistakes yourself.
Joining Too Many Affiliate Programs
Joining too many affiliate marketplaces right when you join can be completely overwhelming. Yes, you’ll have a lot of tools at your fingertips, but you won’t be able to focus on how to use them or what to do with all of them. Choose programs that complement your products and your content. Picking your first affiliate network should be as easy as identifying what kind of product you want to talk about, and then figuring out which network is the affiliate for most of these companies. Staying focused is a great way not to lose yourself in a sea of links and information.
Not Helping Your Website Visitors
If you fill your page with too many links that scream, BUY THIS, everyone will eventually just stop listening. They aren’t interested in buying everything under the sun from you. Most people who go to a website go there to learn, for information, for entertainment, or to get help with a problem they are having. The last thing they want is to be sold to. Getting them to trust you and the products that you are looking to recommend is an excellent way to show them that you aren’t just selling them stuff all the time. One of the biggest mistakes affiliate marketers make is trying to OVER monetize their sites and making every page essentially a digital brochure for products and services they are pushing. Instead, try to help out your readers with advice and tips. Maybe make a few posts about what not to buy, and what products do not have a good rating to keep them trusting that you aren’t just throwing every single thing at them. If you help them, they will be more likely to return for more helpful information. For more detail about this, check out my article on using the CTPM process.
Not Enough Testing
Whatever you send out to your readers should be tested. This means that you should open all links and be sure that they lead where you intend. There is nothing worse than opening a link expecting it to result in one thing and having it be broken or lead to something completely different. It breaks that trust with your readers that you are working so hard to build, making them think it is not worth their time to click your links anymore. By testing everything yourself, you can avoid this blunder. Build trust with your customers rather than breaking it. Even if you think your link is perfect, open it anyway. You never know when one little character can throw off your entire link. Send yourself a test email. Click the links in your social media posts. Don’t just automatically trust that the affiliate link is sending your readers where it says they are going. Affiliate networks deal with so many links in a day that sometimes things slip by them. Double check and save yourself the hassle later.
Not Enough Tracking
You should be using unique links with every post to be able to track where your clicks are coming from. There are several different platforms and websites available that can help you turn your links from plain old into a link that can help you analyze everything. One of the biggest mistakes affiliate marketers make is inadequate testing. If you test, you know what you need to change to increase profits. Knowing all the variables can make a huge difference in your marketing strategy over time, allowing you to become more in tune with what your customers want and need from you. If you can anticipate their moves, you can provide better service and better links, improving your delicate relationship with your readers.
Not Making Comparisons
Another one of the biggest mistakes affiliate marketers make is trying to promote just ONE product. When you make a post talking about a product, you should be comparing it to other products on the market. This gives you the chance to post not just one, but three links to additional products. This gives your readers something else to look at, and your opinion might not be the end all for them. They might decide to click all three links and make a purchase of another model. If you hadn’t posted the other links, they would have just decided that they didn’t like the product you were selling and taken their business somewhere else. With multiple options, you open up more choices for more people to shop.
Moving Around From Topic To Topic
One of the biggest mistakes affiliate marketers make is getting distracted by new and shiny objects. Posting about anything and everything makes it look like you don’t have focus and you are trying to be a know it all. Pick a topic or two to post about and stick with it. Ignore everything else flying by is just outside noise and will distract you from your primary focus. Affiliate marketing takes a lot of time, patience and focus on reaching your goal. Letting everything distract you from your goal will not help you get anywhere. Make sure you choose a good niche and stick with it.
Avoid these big mistakes affiliate marketers make and you’ll be on your way to making some serious progress in your business. The extra time spent right from the beginning will be worth every minute spent, building trust and relationships with your clients. Being seen as someone that they can trust is half the battle and will keep them coming back to you and your content again and again. You need repeat business if you expect to make any money in this profession. Treat it like a full-time job and give your work the time and attention it deserves.
