Disclosure: Bear in mind that some of the links in this post are affiliate links and if you go through them to make a purchase I will earn a commission. Keep in mind that I link these companies and their products because of their quality and not because of the commission I receive from your purchases. The decision is yours, and whether or not you decide to buy something is completely up to you.
You can do everything right: pick the right niche, promote the best offers, create awesome content, and yet you STILL not get many visitors to your website. Why? Because you don’t know how to get traffic!
Getting traffic to your website is perhaps the most important detail that will determine your success as an affiliate marketer.
Now, I’m not talking about the 5 o’clock rush hour traffic you sit in every evening after work. I’m talking about the boatload of web users who visit your website. Web traffic is a common way to measure how effective your online business is at attracting an audience directed to your website or an affiliate product.
Even though you can go about getting traffic in different ways, in this post, I want to specifically focus on one method, good old paid traffic.
Most of us know that traffic can either be paid or organic. And what kind of traffic you decide to use really depends on how quickly you want to see results.
This post focuses primarily on paid traffic (with the exception of one method) because, out of the two traffic methods, It’s faster and more flexible.
Also, If you are a new affiliate marketer, looking for quick results, paid traffic is your best option.
With that being said, I don’t want to downplay the significance of Organic traffic either. Having great organic reach should always be your goal because, with it, you maintain the longevity of your brand.
In the end, organic reach will increase in proportion to the content you create, which truly allows your business to become passive.
This, however, is a conversation for a later post.
Today, I will give you the Top 5 Paid Traffic Sources For Affiliate Marketing.
Let us get into it
Now, before you write me off as crazy, let me first explain. Bing ads, more so than Google ads, are a lot more affiliate friendly.
How? Well just think. Google is a monopoly, that makes up more than 90% of all web searches. This is insane when you consider that Bing’s market share is only 2.32%
But, when it comes to advertising, Google, with it’s higher search volume, isn’t actually the ideal platform.
What Bing lacks in volume, it certainly makes up for in performance.
Although smaller, Bing actually has three search engines at its disposal–Bing, Yahoo, and AOL. The three platforms are owned by Microsoft and so when you advertise on one, your ad is seen across all three.
If that is enough, According to Report Garden, Cost Per Click is, on average, $ 7.99 on Bing. This is a fraction of Google Adword’s average, which is $20.08.
In fact, the average cost-per-click on Bing Ads can be up to 70% lower compared to AdWords.
Google is also considered more stringent when it comes to setting up ads as well. The process of setting ads up and getting them approved can sometimes be more difficult, which for new affiliates, is just an extra headache.
Trust me when I say there is nothing more frustrating than spending money to learn pay-per-click only to get your ads repeatedly shut down.
If you still aren’t convinced that’s okay. I just ask that you will at least consider leveraging Bing into your paid-ads arsenal.
Once again, let me just explain myself.
Although you don’t hear too many people mentioning Twitter Ads, they are definitely an effective method in getting traffic to your website and affiliate offers.
Twitter can be very targeted and also more user-friendly than platforms like Facebook.
Yes, Facebook is easily the most active social network, but with advertising, you have to consider other factors like:
When you look at Facebook, users range across all age groups, with even “social seniors” having an account today.
(This explains why you have your parents and grandparents posting embarrassing baby pictures on your feed.)
Meanwhile, Twitter targets a much younger audience, with its most popular user base being those in their late 20s and early 30s.
Another important point to consider is the intent of each platform’s audience. Believe it or not, Twitter and Facebook users, get on the platforms for different reasons.
With a younger audience, Twitter is a much faster-paced platform. Users on Twitter are there to enjoy new and trending topics, they are there to follow pro athletes, politicians, and celebrity crushes.
Facebook, on the other hand, is deep-rooted in the connection between close friends and family.
While one audience type doesn’t necessarily trump the other, Twitter definitely houses more intentional buyers, which is what we really care about In affiliate marketing.
But, perhaps the best part about advertising on Twitter is the fact that you only pay when you’ve achieved your marketing objective.
So, say you set your objective for website conversions, you only pay when people convert on your site.
This alleviates the issue of dumping money into your ads, without seeing results. With Twitter, you only pay once you get the desired results.
This next paid traffic method is one that affiliate marketers have mixed feelings about. There are those that swear by solo ads and then you also have those who find them to be risky.
Whether solo ads work for you or not really depends on your type of niche. But before I get into that, I want to make sure you know what solo ads are.
Solo Ads are advertisements on another person’s email lists in which your product is the only thing being advertised in that email.
Not only is your offer super-targeted, but you also don’t have to compete for ad space against other affiliates’ ads.
Like I said a moment ago, the effectiveness of solo ads really depends on your niche.
I would recommend that you give solo ads a try if you fall into any of the categories
1. If you are a Marketer who has a bit of budget.
You don’t want to jump straight into buying the first offer you see. It’s best to reserve a couple of hundred dollars to do some basic testing with solo ads.
2. If you’re in a niche where pay per click prices are through the roof.
Niches such as Insurance and online education have rediculous CPC. For these niches, solo ads may cost less than what you’d pay on AdWords or Bing.
3. If you’re in a niche that’s completely oversaturated with content (like affiliate marketing or weight loss).
4. If you’re in a niche with competitive search engine traffic.
Now, remember, solo ads are emails offered by a one-person seller so, Sometimes the methods in which these emails are gathered are less-than-ideal.
These email lists can span between being amazing or complete garbage so, know how to recognize trustworthy list owners.
Here is a good checklist to run through to make sure you make an informed decision.
Although there is an inherent risk with Solo Ads, the reward far outweighs them. If done properly Solo Ads can really help your ad campaigns
I know the title of this post says Top 5 Paid Traffic Sources For Affiliate Marketing (which technically, you can use paid ads for this method ) this list wouldn’t be complete if I didn’t talk about the world’s second-largest search engine.
In the time it takes for you to read this blog post, thousands of hours of new content will have been upload to Youtube.
Videos are the way of the future and YouTube is a testament to how wildly profitable they are. But, I am talking about utilizing Youtube for its free traffic.
As an affiliate marketer, it’s wise to leverage YouTube in your campaigns. You can do this by creating videos and placing affiliate offers within the video description.
If you think of the most successful content creator on YouTube, you can be sure they are promoting at least one affiliate offer somewhere in their videos.
On top of being free, YouTube drives highly targeted visitors to your content.
And once you build trust with your audience, it becomes easier to convert them into paying customers when the time is right.
You are definitely going to want to launch a Youtube Channel at least in conjunction with a website.
Doing so gives you more options for monetization and ultimately drives more traffic to your website.
The last form of traffic I want to discuss today is one that not enough people give credit to.
Banner ads, in my opinion, are like dropping your offer like a precision strick, right on your target market’s door.
All you have to do is perform a simple Google Search of the most popular forums in your niche and there you have relevant traffic.
Some other benefits of banner ads include:
You can market them at an Affordable price: Unlike other forms of advertising, banners are cheap to create and share.
Not sure how to create a banner ad? You can use services like Fiverr to get them done professionally, for cheap.
They Increase Brand Awareness: because banners are so effective in drawing attention if someone sees your banner across several websites, it raises brand awareness. Not to mention, competition for banner ads is low, meaning you have a higher chance of creating familiarity with your audience.
They Are Target Specific: When you use banner ads on specific forums, you remove the uncertainty of trying to convince customers about your offers.
You can also be sure that the customers who click on your ads are potential leads. Why? Because they wouldn’t have clicked your ad unless they were interested.
If you haven’t been using Banner Ads in your advertising then its time you change that. They are a long-term, flexible, and cost-effective tool for marketing your company.
There it is for you, my Top 5 Paid Traffic Sources For Affiliate Marketing. I know some of you guys are thinking right about now “what about Google?” or “What about Facebook?”
We obviously know those are two top tier choices and I still encourage you to use them. However, I wanted to look into options that are considered more “affiliate friendly,” options that can be easily implemented today if you wanted.
Platforms like Google and Facebook have a bit of a learning curve and the odds of being successful with them right away are low.
These are the top 5 I recommend you run with if you are just starting out.
And even if you have been in the affiliate marketing game for a while, these are still good options for you to try.
It’s always good to change it up a bit!
My challenge to you is to at least use two of these options to start driving traffic. See what kind of success you have and make sure to let me know how it goes.
Here’s some homework for you: read From Nothing by Ian Pribyl. Not only is this book an asset in every new affiliate’s journey, but Ian’s information is also accurate, actionable, and it works. You should definitely see a change in your online business if you apply what he teaches.
If reading isn’t your style then I recommend looking into Wealthy Affiliate. It is perhaps one of the best, free, programs out there that cater to all experience levels. They have played an important part in helping me grow my very own online business.
As always, I hope you guys enjoyed today’s post and found the information helpful. Feel free to reach out to me with any of your comments or questions.
Your feedback is the only way for me to get better at what I do.
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