How to Start Affiliate Marketing without Money
How to start affiliate marketing without money is a common question for those wanting to start their own business but don’t have the capital to do so.
The question becomes: does a business model exist that has very little overhead and can be started almost immediately?
Yes, and affiliate marketing is one of the best business models that fits that bill exactly.
In this article, you will discover how start affiliate marketing without money to easily build and grow your business from home.
What Is Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate marketing is selling other people’s products and services and getting a commission for each sale you make, usually in a set percentage. Companies pay from 5-50% and on up from there.
It is a great way for people who want to start their own business but don’t have a product of their own.
How to Start Affiliate Marketing without Money
Here are 4 steps to start affiliate marketing without money…
#1 – Build a Platform
You might think that signing up to be an affiliate for different companies is the first step, but it’s not and I’ll explain why in a minute.
The first step is to build your platform.
If you like writing, build a blog. If you prefer videos, start a YouTube channel. Social media is a great resource to distribute your articles or videos.
Depending on the platform you choose, you won’t need to spend very much if any money.
A YouTube channel is free to start, as you can record videos on your phone. As you make money, you can always upgrade your equipment.
A blog costs a small amount to start because you need to buy a domain and web hosting, but that could be as little as $5 or less.
You want to build an audience and a platform with great content and a number of monthly visits before moving to step #2.
#2 – Sign up with Different Companies to Be an Affiliate
Most companies won’t agree to have you as one of their affiliates if you don’t first have an audience.
It takes time and effort to have affiliates, so most companies only want serious affiliates promoting their products.
What’s more, their reputation and the reputation of their company and products are on the line. If someone halfheartedly and in the wrong way promotes their product, it could hurt their reputation and in turn their overall profits.
But when you’re ready, most companies have a link on their website to sign up as an affiliate. If not, you can contact their support.
#3 – Get the Tools to Help You Promote the Product
Many companies will provide you with various assets to help you promote their product. This can be email swipes, ad swipes, images, or other helpful tools. You can choose to use them or not.
But there are other tools that can help the process of promoting products so much smoother.
For more about tools, see the section below “What Tools Help Increase the Chance of Success with Affiliate Marketing without Money?”
#4 – Collect Commissions
The most exciting of the four steps is collecting your commissions.
When you sign up as an affiliate, you’ll give the company the information needed to deposit money into your account when you make sales. Most companies pay out 1-2 times a month.
How Do You Choose the Right Products to Promote?
Any company that has an affiliate program is available for you to apply to be an affiliate and most companies are happy to get affiliates to promote their products for them.
But not all products and companies are worth promoting.
Here are three questions to consider when choosing what to promote:
#1 – Do you believe in the product?
First, is the product something you like, know and believe in?
Your audience will know if you don’t like or use the product and are just trying to make a quick buck.
#2 – What commissions do they pay?
Secondly, what percentage of commissions does the company pay compared to the price of the product?
If you get paid 30% commissions for each sale, but the product only costs $50, is it worth it to you?
What if you only got paid 5% commissions for each sale, but the product costs $50,000? It makes a difference.
Also take note that most companies have either a free trial or a money back guarantee, or both. You won’t be paid until after the free trial and the money back guarantee, which can be around 45 days for some companies.
#3 – Will it help your audience?
Thirdly, is it a product that will help your audience?
Commissions aren’t everything. You want to promote products and services that will truly help your followers. Make your focus on them, and it’ll be clear what products would be great to promote.
Zig Ziglar said, “You can have everything in life you want if you will just help enough other people get what they want.”
This especially applies to affiliate marketing.
What Tools Help Increase the Chance of Success with Affiliate Marketing without Money?
Affiliate marketing is a long-term business model. So if you want quick results, this isn’t the model you should pursue.
Because it’s a long-term gameplan, the sooner you start the better.
Though it seems like “gurus” are popping up every day online who have had “overnight success”, the truth is this: overnight success takes time.
If you look at almost anyone having success in affiliate marketing, you’ll see that they’ve been at it for a while.
Three of the most important tools needed to be successful with affiliate marketing are patience, consistency, and the right mindset.
Patience is needed because it’s a long-term gameplan; consistency is vital to any pursuit; and the right mindset is needed for those times when it gets tough, because it will.
Here are a few other tools that will help you with the everyday workings of the business:
#1 – A Platform to Build Your Audience
You will want to build an audience and so, will need a platform on which to do so. With a platform you can increase your influence and sales.
Some examples of platforms you could use are social media channels or a YouTube channel, a website, blog or funnel, and an email list.
Dreamhost
In truth, a business without a website is a business that’s not playing all its cards. Having your own website helps you establish authority. It is a great way to create a homebase where you can send customers and subscribers to show them what you offer.
One website hosting company that I really like and use is Dreamhost. It costs a little more than other companies like GoDaddy for domains, but it doesn’t have the hidden fees that many companies have and also directly links to WordPress.
Start using Dreamhost for your domain and website needs.
ClickFunnels
ClickFunnels is a platform for digital marketing that is used to help businesses get more leads and sell more products and services. You can build sales funnels quickly and easily with its drag-and-drop building blocks. This helps walk your customers through a clearly defined and optimized buying experience that will lead them exactly where you want them to go: to the checkout.
Click here to start using Clickfunnels today.
#2 – Keyword Research Tools for Affiliate Marketing without Money
A great way to grow your business is through a blog where you use SEO.
SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, requires finding and using keywords in your posts, which seems time consuming. However, in time it can be very profitable and worth the time spent setting it up.
You can start with very little overhead with only a domain and hosting (which can literally cost less than $5/mo.). When it comes to using SEO for affiliate marketing, you can really get started with these and use free tools while bootstrapping it.
It really is the ultimate way to start affiliate marketing without money.
You can also use SEO with YouTube to rank higher and reach a larger audience.
It may take a lot longer to grow your business by using these methods, but to be able to do so with little or no money makes it worth it.
In order to use SEO, it’s important to be able to do keyword research, especially if you’re contributing content to your blog or to YouTube. Using keywords help you rank higher and ultimately get more link clicks and affiliate commissions.
Here is a list of some of the more popular and very useful keyword research tools available:
Google Adwords Keyword Planner – Click the link, then go to keyword planner.
#3 – Email Marketing
Email marketing is a must for any business, including affiliate marketing.
It keeps the bridge of communication open with your audience so you can market and sell to them again and again.
For affiliate marketing, some email marketing software is better to use than others, as some autoresponders don’t like affiliate links, so it’s important to do you due diligence in choosing one.
However, one of the best things you can do is communicate to your autoresponder support team and ask them how you can use it for affiliate marketing the right way. Communication makes a huge difference.
#4 – Learning the Ropes of Affiliate Marketing
There are two courses I would recommend to learn the ropes of affiliate marketing.
Many people have earned an abundant living with affiliate marketing by using the information taught in these courses. Between the two, you’d have all the information you’d need to be successful with affiliate marketing.
Affiliate Secrets 3.0
This course teaches all you need to know about YouTube, Email Marketing, Funnels, and ads and traffic sources, among other things.
The instructor teaches step-by-step how to implement affiliate marketing in your business to be able to have the most success. In addition, he teaches how to have a business exclusively through affiliate marketing.
Check out Affiliate Secrets 3.0 here.
SEO Affiliate Domination
As mentioned above, SEO is one of the tools that creates the most success with affiliate marketing.
One resource to help you get started with SEO is in a course called SEO Affiliate Domination.
In this course, you’ll discover how SEO works and why it’s necessary to use it with affiliate marketing. It goes over blogging, writing articles, how to rank high with Google and YouTube, and so much more.
Check out SEO Affiliate Domination here.
FAQ Section: Affiliate Marketing without Money
What Are the Benefits of Affiliate Marketing? The Pros and Cons…
Affiliate marketing is a great industry for multiple reasons. There are a few downsides to it though too. Here is a list of the pros and cons of affiliate marketing…
Pros:
- It’s not a saturated industry…there are plenty of commissions to go around.
- It can create near passive income.
- It’s something you can do from anywhere with the internet and a computer or smartphone.
- There is a large online affiliate marketing community for support and collaboration.
- There are plenty of resources and courses to help you learn and succeed.
- It’s easy to become an affiliate.
- You don’t need to have a product of your own in order to start or to make money.
Cons:
- The more common affiliate marketing niches, like making money online, can seem like scams if not presented correctly.
- Facebook ads can be tricky. Facebook doesn’t like the make money online niche of marketing and can shut you down. Using retargeting ads gets around this.
- Email marketing can also be tricky, as some email responders don’t allow you to use affiliate links, but there are ways around that.
- Affiliate marketing can seem spammy if not done correctly.
In a Nutshell
There are numerous skills and a great amount of information you can learn to be successful in affiliate marketing. Just remember to take it a step at a time.
Many people who ‘fail’ at business fail because of information overload. They learn, learn, learn and never implement the knowledge they are gaining.
Though learning is vital, action is key. Implement what you learn along your affiliate marketing journey and success will eventually come.
Disclosure: I may receive affiliate compensation for some of the links in this post at no cost to you if you decide to purchase a paid plan. You can read our affiliate disclosure in our privacy policy. This site is not intending to provide financial advice. This is for entertainment only.