How to choose your first affiliate product

There have been a few tutorial based posts recently (the last one was on Kartra Marketplace so please check it out here) so I thought I would jump back to the more conversational style. Today I will discuss how to choose your first affiliate product.

Just a quick note before we start, if you would like to join in this journey please subscribe here.

So, what is an affiliate product?

an article or substance that is manufactured or refined for sale.

You may recall my earlier post regarding affiliate marketing definitions. The product is the ‘thing’ that you market to the consumer. This takes many shapes and forms.

As an extension of this definition, an affiliate product will have a program attached to it. Such a program will offer incentives for creating sales of said product.

What should I be looking for in my first affiliate product?

There are lots of affiliate products on the market today. Peerfly is the largest affiliate product marketplace and has over 75000 active publishers. That’s a lot of information to go through. It therefore stands to reason that you should have some qualifying criteria. It is this criteria you can use to evaluate a product for suitability.

This is list that I propose is not exhaustive and is quite particular to my circumstance. Your list may be different. I do imagine that there will be a core similarity even if the outlayers are different.

Make sure it is digital

Why digital? When choosing your first affiliate product you will be well placed ensuring it is digital. A digital product is, generally speaking easily re-producible and instantly deliverable. This means that you will not have to deal with such pesky things as delivery lead times and pipeline management.

With a digital product the purchase and delivery is often instantaneous. Furthermore, digital products lend themselves very well to recurring payments. Consider how many digital products you subscribe to: Spotify, YouTube, Netflix, Amazon Prime…the list is endless. You pay a recurring fee for these services and in the world of affiliate marketing this translates to…

Recurring commissions

This is the goldmine of affiliate marketing. It is also a very big reason as to why affiliate marketing is so potentially lucrative: recurring commissions.

A recurring affiliate program is a product referral program that offers ongoing commission from customers when they make future purchases.

https://buildapreneur.com/best-affiliate-programs-for-recurring-income/

Recurring commissions are the ultimate in passive income. You sell a product that attracts a monthly fee. This will generally entail an amount of effort to win the customer.

However, this hard work is then rewarded month on month (as long as the consumer remains a customer of the product). So that is a monthly payment without doing any work at all. You will earn that commission while sat at the beach, in a restaurant and even while you sleep. The power is immense.

There is a case study here that is both realistic and highly demonstrative of the power that recurring payments represent. Look at it and start planning that future lifestyle.

When choosing your first affiliate product make sure it solves a problem

I put this after the first two suggestions on purpose because I think it goes without saying yet it is very easily forgotten. When choosing your first affiliate product (and subsequent ones for that matter) make sure that it is solving a problem.

Now, this is a wide reaching statement as problems are vast and varied. It could be a very general problem such as time management or it could be tied to a very, unique niche (dog grooming management systems). Just make sure it solves a problem.

Ensure it includes a free (or very, very cheap trial)

This makes your potential customer more likely to try the affiliate product. If you have done your research fully (and followed the steps above) then the trial should be the snare net.

Product owners are well aware of this approach and will almost always include a free trial of their product. You should not have trouble finding a product that includes a free trial. If the product you have chosen does not include such an offering, it might be a good idea to go back to the start and evaluate another product.

Should I choose more than one affiliate product?

The short answer is no. You, like me, are at the very start of a journey. This is a learning process and the concepts are new. With this in mind it is better to keep focussed on one product.

This has an additional benefit as well – you can apply your newly gained knowledge in a methodical manner. I am sure you can remember your first school science experiments where you created hypothesis based on a single, variable factor. By using different approaches on different products means you are not going to get a full overview of how successful your changes are.

How do I find affiliate products?

Quite simply put, find them!

I have found a very easy way of creating a shortlist of products is to utilise Capterra. Visit the site and start filtering the products based on what you are interested in. Once you have a shortlist, you can start visiting their site, find out if they have an affiliate program and start applying the criteria you have established here.

Simple really!

So what product did I choose?

The million dollar question. I went through this very same process as I have defined here. I made and shortlist and started applying the criteria defined in this article.

And, there was one product that was leaps and bounds ahead of the competitors….Kartra. If you want to shortcut this process feel free to use the link to sign up to their affiliate program and start making money today.