For most newbies, the strategy of promoting products as an affiliate consists of nothing more than placing a banner or text hyperlink on their blog. And this will generate revenue with the right kind of content.
But there’s more that you can do – tips that raise converts from 3-10% to the upper end of 30%. It’s all about going the extra mile for your readers – doing things that average affiliate don’t go to the effort of doing.
Using a Comprehensive Review Strategy
Most newcomers study how reviews are done. You write a certain number of words, talk about the specs of the product, mention why consumers love it – and make sure you include a superficial “cons” list of the product just to look unbiased.
With a little more effort, your newly created content for this review could set you up with some amazing commissions – and since you place it on your blog, it should serve you well into the future.
First, pick a product that you would buy as a consumer. Don’t just pick anything – be a choosy buyer. It’s always a good idea to buy the product yourself, too. You can ask the product owner for a review copy if you don’t have anything in your budget, but make sure you find out how his sales funnel is set up so that you can report in your review about the one time offers and other stops along the way.
Break your review up into a multi-part series. Don’t do it all in one blog post. This creates curiosity for the next installment and keeps people coming back to your blog.
As you go through the review, make sure you post the links to the previous and next installment at the bottom of each review entry in case your reader happened to enter the site on part 3, for example.
Start the review by evaluating the sales copy. In order to properly form an opinion, you have to know what was promised in the sales copy versus what the product delivers.
What kind of copy is it – a video that plays automatically and has no pause button? If you wish it had a text version, say so in your review. It’s okay to be honest – your conversions won’t be hurt by small preferences like that.
Discuss the buying process. How many one time offers did you encounter? Did you get your download or access to the product quickly and easily? Is the information you bought organized well?
If customer service is involved, talk about how it went. For example, if you couldn’t log into a members’ area and had to contact the product owner for a password reset, did they get back to you quickly and solve the problem?
Go through each section or step of the product and discuss your thoughts without giving away the information. You don’t want to share what was taught exactly, but talk about how you learned something new regarding a specific topic.
Implement the product as you go. This helps you adequately review the product because you’re applying the information that’s being taught. At the end, you can report your findings and whether or not the product worked for you.
Make sure you use the product name and the word review – along with the part number – in each blog post title, like this: XYZ Product Review Part 1. This will be great in the search engines and entice people to choose your review over others.
Using Your Blog for Private, Exclusive Reviews
Another way to up the ante a bit and get people to convert early on for you is to give private access to those who buy the product through your affiliate link. You can do much more with this type of review because the only people seeing it are fellow buyers!
So in a private review, whenever you make a blog post, in the right sidebar in edit mode, you’ll see the top Publishing section. Click on Visibility. It will default to the Public option.
You want to change that for Password Protected for those who buy through your affiliate link. Now your review can go the same way as you did before. But you can also make videos of screen captured images while you implement the product – it’s okay because those seeing it are buyers, too.
Another great thing you can do in these exclusive reviews is provide additional information like your own tips or different ways of doing things. So for example, let’s say you are reviewing a make money online product and the owner says to use a free keyword tool.
You can capture your screen and tell them why you do it slightly different, using a paid keyword tool like Market Samurai. Make sure you include an affiliate link to it in your private blog post because it can help increase commissions.
Your readers will love these private blog groups because it becomes a sort of community, with everyone asking questions and sharing ideas together. And all they have to do to get access is buy through your link!
You can promote the private, exclusive review on social networking sites and to your list. Make sure you do these as a minimum:
- Facebook fan page or group
- Google Plus
- YouTube
You can also give a “lite” version of the review on your blog. This ensures you get the benefit of catering to the search engines – and those who want to see your final opinion before they fork over any money.
If you build a reputation for going the extra mile, people will want to see your additional tips and insight that are included in the private group. For them, it’s like getting another course or a bonus for their purchase!
Creating Content That Complements
Another thing you can do is provide additional value that’s not even part of the review – or sometimes it is.
Things that were left out of the product that you feel should have been included make great additions to your review. It can serve as an incentive for people to buy through your link.
For example, let’s say a newbie product told people to “write articles for their blog,” but the product never explained how to write articles.
You could write a short report that teaches what’s left out and in your review, reassure your readers that you’ve got them covered – all they have to do is send you their receipt after they buy it through your link, and you’ll send them their bonus!
Topics that work well in conjunction with the original course topic also work well. For example, if you’re reviewing a diet plan on your blog, you can write an accompanying exercise guide and give it as a freebie to those who buy through your link!
