5 Ideas to Increase Affiliate Link Sales

Are you adding affiliate links to your site and blog posts? Do you want to increase affiliate link sales?

Banners and ads may catch a readers’ eye, but many find these to be distracting and annoying. From my experience, I’ve found that the best way to effectively sell affiliate products is to integrate them naturally (aka authentically) into a post.

What is an affiliate link?

An affiliate link is a specific URL to a website that has been encoded with a tracking code (this code typically contains your affiliate ID or username). What that code does is records the traffic that is sent to the advertiser’s site.

If someone makes a purchase after they clicked on an affiliate link. The advertiser’s website keeps track of the dollar amounts purchased and then the “owner” of the tracking code will receive a commission for referring the sale. This action is all part of an affiliate program.

Increase Affiliate Link Sales

How do you integrate affiliate links naturally into a post? By showing readers all the ways they’ll benefit when they purchase.

Here are 5 ideas you could use to market a product on your blog:

1. Write a Review. This is a great way to talk about some of the things you’ve learned about or from the item. People enjoy hearing about your experience with the product.

Real Life Example: Jillian Harris’ Ratana patio furniture

2. Tell your story. People love to hear about what inspired you, what you’ve done, and the story behind your blog post.

Real Life Example: Shauna of The House of Silver Lining taking a lazy morning reading design books in her guest bedroom while enjoying a new mattress!

3. Share a top 5 list (or top 3, or 7 or …). Lists are always a big hit! Can you share your favorite cooking tools, bathroom soaps, bedroom prints, whatever? How about 7 things that helped you grow your business?

Real Life Example: My 5 favorite business books. They are still my favorites today!

4. Do a roundup of your favorite resources. Do you have a camera that you love? An ebook that taught you everything about how to start a blog? (Pssst – I have one coming out this Fall, stay tuned). Some of your favorite items currently on sale? Roundups are always appreciated.

Real Life Example: Jen of Décor Gold Designs has a roundup of weekend picks.

5. Write a “How To” blog post. There are a ton of people out there on the world wide web that like to learn and are curious about how to do something. And guess what? You can walk your readers’ through your “how to” process – that includes everything you used and purchased to make it happen.

Real Life Example: Randi of Randi Garrett Design transformed her young boys room into a teen boy bedroom.

Did you notice that ALL 5 ideas to increase affiliate link sales have one thing in common? That would be YOU! People will connect with things that YOU are sharing – your stories, your ideas, your life.

Your readers want to connect with you. So – instead of saying, “hey buy this!” or “hey this is a sponsored post!” Show them all of the benefits and how enriching it’s made your life… and in turn you’ll connect your readers with something they can truly benefit from too.

Are you a new blog? You can make money blogging using affiliate links too, read more here.

Image sources: 1 & 2 Jillian Harris, The House of Silver Lining, Decor Gold Designs, Randi Garrett Design.