The 'Secret Weapon' to More Affiliate Sales

I told you yesterday about how to earn more money from your writing as an affiliate marketer.

Well today I'm going to tell you the 'secret weapon' to getting more sales than you ever have before.

And that is, knowing what your market wants.

Before you even write one word to try and sell something, find out what it is that your readers want.

Using Google, or any search engine, makes it easy to find what you need to know.

You can search forums, book reviews, social media, blog comments, in fact a quick online search usually yeilds a lot of useful information from anywhere that people are giving their opinions.

Once you find out what they want, then you use this information to tell them how the product you're selling (and it can even be your own book) will provide what it is that they want.

Just get to know their pain and then offer what you're selling as the solution.

I enjoy doing affiliate marketing. Sometimes I even write my own sales page rather than sending customers to the vendors own sales page, if theirs doesn't offer what my readers are looking for. I tailor it to my own market.

I work online in different niches so I'm always trying to keep up with what people are looking for so that I can use my cunning writing skills to sell it to them.

This is why I love being a writer.

There is so many different ways I can earn money from it which helps to keep me on my toes and helps keep me financially bouyant.

And it all started with this ebook:

The Super Affiliate Handbook
By Rosalind Gardner.

How one woman earns over $500,000+ per year selling other people’s stuff online.

http://ruthiswriting.com/links/superaffiliate.html

Straight Forward Way To More Affiliate Income

It's not always easy to earn money from writing.

In fact, most people don't know how to do it.

But like most businesses, you need more than one income stream.

That's why I use different ways to earn money from my writing and one of those is affiliate marketing.

Some people think that it's not possible to earn much money this way, but that's because they're not doing it right.

For a start, putting up banners and links on your website won't work. You may get a few sales that way but not many.

Other things you can do (and I do these too) is:

Write your own sales page for the product you want to sell
Set up a series of emails to promote a product
Use different ways to market like social media and press releases
Try the products yourself and write a review

Of course, there are other things you can do but this is a good start.

And then, there's the math of the whole thing.

For instance, if you're selling a high ticket item like a treadmill, then you could earn $600 or more for each sale. So you only need to sell one a week to make some decent extra money.

Likewise, if you're getting $60 commission, then if you can make one sale a day, it still adds up to $420 a week.

And if you're selling something else for $20 commission, then you'd need to make 3 sales a day to earn $420 a week.

Of course, you need to be selling more than one item so that you can make multiple sales a day.

And you need to be selling quality products, that is, things that your customers want to buy and that will be useful to them.

That's where your marketing skills come in. You write articles, blog posts and emails about what the product is and the benefits of using it.

When I tell people that I'm a writer, they naturally assume that the only thing I write is books.

But my writing business is much more than that because I have several streams of income from my writing.

And so should you if you want to earn as much money as you can from your writing.

Not only is affiliate marketing good for my finances but it allows me to have different things to write about. So if I get bored with one project, I just move onto another.

And the ebook below is how I got started with affiliate marketing.



The Super Affiliate Handbook
By Rosalind Gardner.

How one woman earns over $500,000+ per year selling other people’s stuff online.

http://ruthiswriting.com/links/superaffiliate.html

Always Have Plenty To Sell

If you want to make money from your blog or website, then you need to make sales.

This means having multiple products to sell.

You won't get rich if you're only selling one thing.

So if you've written a book, write more.

And if you make money through affiliate marketing, find more products to sell.

I don't think there are many people in the world who got rich selling just one thing.

(OK so maybe a few lucky so-and-sos made a million or two or three by selling just one thing, but they are the exception, not the norm. http://www.cracked.com/article_19640_the-6-least-impressive-ways-anyone-ever-got-rich.html)

Even bands who have a one-hit-wonder, still make money by touring and appearing on TV shows and on the radio.

And I don't know about you, but as a writer, I want to write more anyway which in turn helps me make more sales.

So if you want to have more things to sell, spend time writing more books.

And in the meantime, if you want to earn more money now, start selling more affiliate products.

You can find a list of affiliate networks (and my own affiliate program) at http://www.cheritonhousepublishing.com/affiliates.html.

One of the affiliate networks listed there is VigLInk and they are by far the easiest to use. You only need to copy and paste a small piece of code onto your website or blog, and they will monetise your content with affiliate links automatically.

You can also use VigLink to find your own affiliate links to use as well, but the best thing I find about them is how they automatically place affiliate links in my online articles (some of which I wrote years ago) and I earn commission without even knowing it.

So now I always have plenty to sell whether I know it or not.

Don’t Feel Guilty About Writing

One of the problems that I find with working from home as a writer, is that others equate it with not having a job.

So they come round, or ring up and expect me to be always available.

Over the years I’ve trained them all to respect the fact that I do work for a living and that I do need time to do it, so I banned them with disturbing me during office hours.

And for a while it worked but now I find myself backsliding and letting them interrupt me again.

The problem is that I often feel guilty about putting my writing before everything and everyone else.

And it’s this unnecessary guilt that I need to lose.

I mean where would JK Rowling be today if she’d given in to her co-workers’ demands to have lunch with them instead of using her lunch hour to write her second Harry Potter novel?

And where would Stephen King be if he hadn’t put his kids to bed early every night so that he could write his next great horror novel while his wife was out at her night job?

These writers put their work before demands from others, especially unimportant demands.

So that’s what I have been doing too.

And do you know what?

It feels good to be back in control of how I use my time and being able to get more writing done.

So if you have others who insist on interrupting your writing time, don’t feel guilty

Just write and make them wait.

And if you need more motivation to write more and spend less time on other less important things, take a read through the Villains' book.

It’s all about being a true villain and explains how to put your mission (your writing) first.

It’s a quick yet insightful read.

I’ve read it a dozen times already and I might just read it again.

http://viewbook.at/villains