Can I do affiliate marketing without a website?
It’s a question we’re asked on a regular basis. The short answer is yes. But there’s a little more to it than that.
Can I still do an affiliate marketing without a website?
You will come to see that though definitely viable, each option may take either significant time or financial investment to reach their full earning potential for you.
Promote through social media
Promoting brands through social media is one of the most common ways to share your affiliate links without a website in 2020.
Facebook is currently still the most used social media platform globally and is great for a variety of content types. Here you have the opportunity for more written content that can be accompanied by images or videos.
However, certain audience demographics may spend more time elsewhere. Instagram is a popular platform for brands with strong visual appeal, as it is an image focused form of social media.
It should be noted that this is a fear that should be overcome sooner rather than later, as video is increasing in popularity in online marketing.
Twitter is great if you want to be short and succinct in your marketing, but struggles to allow for longer-form content that could be necessary for some products and brands.
LinkedIn is a professionally-driven social media network. As such, products promoted here should really have more of a business focus.
TikTok is now emerging as a place for marketers to create content which could help increase sales. To fully utilize the social media app to increase sales, affiliate marketers need to be able to place links within their content.
As you can see, the four major social media platforms have their benefits and pitfalls.
Youtube videos
Firstly, Youtube is commonly classified as a search engine before it is categorized as a social media platform.
Audiences watching Youtube videos are already primed and searching for advice and information, or ‘warm leads.’
Paid ads
Paid ads, as the name suggests, take initial investment from a publisher to see a return on that investment. Paid ads are available on lots of platforms, with varying costs. These can be extremely effective if you find the right niche with a good CPC (Cost Per Click).
One of the most popular platforms is Google Ads. These ads are relatively easy to set up and have a good interface to be able to track the successes or failures of the adverts.
Forum browsing
Finding online forums where people are asking questions about your specific affiliate marketing niche takes time but within these spaces can be lots of very warm leads.
Where people are asking for information, you can offer valuable advice with the knowledge you’ve gained as a publisher and then provide your affiliate marketing link alongside it.
EDMs (Email marketing)
Building an email marketing list is a tried and true form of marketing. It means you can utilize your database across other platforms but, most importantly, speak to your database very directly.
It’s very important to consider data privacy laws when it comes to email marketing, as it is your responsibility as a publisher to adhere to these in different regions around the world.
‘Traditional’ marketing
We’re talking print, radio, and flyers here — ‘old school’ marketing tactics. These come with their own varied costs, but as long as the link or coupon code is unique to the publisher, this data can still be tracked.
