How to Start Affiliate Marketing in 2023 (7 Simple Steps)

 How to Start Affiliate Marketing in 2023 (7 Simple Steps) 

How to Start Affiliate Marketing in 2023 (7 Simple Steps)

Thousands of independent creators, entrepreneurs, and online publications use affiliate marketing to drive millions in revenue every single month.

So do hugely respected websites such as the New York Times, Forbes and NerdWallet.

And according to Statista, spend on affiliate marketing programs by businesses grew to $8.2 billion in the US last year. That's up 76% in the last 6 years alone.

But getting a slice of the billion-dollar pie isn't as simple as slapping a few affiliate links on your blog.

In fact, most beginners who try affiliate marketing fail to see the financial results they were promised by countless blogs and videos on the internet.

Read on to avoid common mistakes that hold beginners back, plus the most important affiliate marketing tips to help you become successful, sooner.

Here's our guide to start affiliate marketing the right way:

Research your niche

Choose the right platform

Pick profitable affiliate programs

Create optimized affiliate content

Drive traffic to your affiliate site

Build a simple affiliate marketing funnel

Track and increase your affiliate sales

But first, a few affiliate marketing fundamentals you need to know.

What is affiliate marketing?

Affiliate marketing is a business model where brands share revenue with publishers and content creators in exchange for leads and sales. It works similarly to a salesperson being paid a commission for a successful sale.

The more sales you make, the more money you earn. Affiliate commissions can range from cents on the dollar to hundreds of dollars per referral. Done right, affiliate marketing could help you earn more than your current job or diversify the revenue of an existing content business.

Here's an overview of how affiliate marketing works:

You share an affiliate link on your website, blog, or in a social media post

A customer clicks your affiliate link

Customer is redirected to the advertiser website

Customer is tracked as being referred by you through a cookie

Customer makes a purchase

An affiliate network attributes the purchase to you and issues a commission

Commissions appear in your affiliate dashboard

You get paid (!) by the affiliate network

There is no single profile for a successful affiliate marketer. They range from independent entrepreneurs to teams at well-known news outlets and online publications.

And since you aren’t responsible for the delivery of a product or service, affiliate marketing is low risk. You don't need a degree in marketing or any specific qualifications to be a successful affiliate marketer. With the right resources, almost anyone can generate affiliate revenue.

In today’s world, the success of an affiliate depends heavily on their ability to capture an audience and attract the right kind of traffic. To do that yourself, you need to craft quality content and optimize it for conversion.

And it all starts with understanding and creating affiliate links.

What is an affiliate link?

The main way affiliate marketing works is through affiliate links. Affiliate links are trackable links with a unique URL assigned specifically to you. They help advertisers know that you sent them a specific customer, so they can pay you a commission if that customer makes a purchase.

Here's an example of the structure of a typical affiliate link:

The most important thing to know as a beginner is that in order to earn a commission, the customer who converts needs to come through your unique affiliate link.

Then there's the way you earn your commissions. For the most part, there are two main models for earning affiliate revenue:

CPA (Cost Per Action): You earn every time someone from your audience completes an action. Depending on the program, the action could be making a purchase, starting a free trial, or filling out a form with contact information.

CPC (Cost Per Click): You get paid for clicks the advertiser considers to be quality visitors, even if they don’t complete a specific action.

Different affiliate programs will offer different payment models, and some may even pay you for both leads and conversions. We'll cover how to pick good affiliate programs later in this guide.

While you're here, here are a couple more key affiliate marketing terms you should get familiar with. These will also help you pick affiliate programs with a high earning potential:

Cookies: Cookies are small files that are stored on a customer’s device when they click an affiliate link. They help businesses and affiliate networks remember that you referred the customer to them, so they can give you a commission later on.

Cookie duration: Cookies typically have expiration dates. Affiliate links tend to have expiration dates between 15 to 30 days, but they can run for as little as 24 hours up to a year or more. Cookie duration matters to affiliate marketers because customers may come back to a purchase days or weeks after a customer first clicks on an affiliate link.

Affiliate networks: Brands typically set up their affiliate programs on third party platforms called Affiliate Networks. These platforms bring brands and affiliate marketers together. There are dozens of affiliate networks, with the most popular including Impact, Flexoffers, Clickbank, PartnerStack and Rakuten.

Is affiliate marketing worth it?

As an affiliate marketer, your earning potential is unlimited. And how many people can say that?

How much you earn depends on you, your chosen niche and your ability to optimize your content and revenue streams. But that doesn't mean that most affiliate marketers end up becoming online millionaires.

According to PayScale, the average Affiliate Marketer earns between $3,000 and $6,000 per month (or, $36K to $72K annually).

And the top 1% of earners generate tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of dollars per month. They tend to be full-time affiliate marketers with dedicated teams, and several years of experience.

But you don’t have to go full-throttle to create a sustainable business. The best part of affiliate marketing is that it can supplement your 9-5 income from day one.

And with enough patience and dedication — replace it entirely.

7 steps to get started with affiliate marketing

The biggest, open secret to affiliate marketing is that your earning potential is highly dependent on the niche you choose. That is, what kind of audience you want to serve and the types of products that audience needs to buy. So you need to know what to look for in a niche before launching your affiliate marketing business.

Here are the steps you need to get right from the beginning:

Step 1. Choose a niche based on research

Rushing to catch the latest fads can lead to trouble when these trends end faster than they appear (fidget spinners, anyone?).

Doing niche research is the best thing you can do to make sure your affiliate business has high earning potential and will make money for years to come.

In the process, you'll analyze the competitive landscape, learn about affiliate programs available in your niche, and be able to create a sustainable affiliate marketing strategy and content plan.

Here's an overview of the niche research process:

If you’re looking for niche ideas, there are plenty of free niche research tools that will help you get the ball rolling. Just quickly, here are three popular tools for niche research:

Google Trends – Trending topics and searches, organized by geography

Answer Socrates – Find out which questions people type into Google

Exploding Topics – A Google Trends alternative with curated results

That said, if you're starting affiliate marketing with no money or a small budget, I recommend picking a topic you're passionate about. That way, you won't get bored or hate your niche when you're writing 50+ articles on the topic.

But a topic you like isn't enough — it needs to be able to make money.

Again, tools like Google Trends are good for vetting niches that you discover and making sure they're not just passing trends. In all likelihood, you're going to want to choose an evergreen niche which generates income all year, every year.

Finally, it’s also important to understand the competition to find your entry point into the market.

You might want to start a blog about web hosting (one of the most lucrative affiliate niches), but the amount of capital and content it takes to compete might be out of reach for beginners.

Look for medium-competition niches, where there are a few established players, but you can better serve a smaller audience, distinguish yourself, and expand later on.

For example, instead of "web hosting" for everyone, you could start with "salon website builder" and focus on teaching professionals in the beauty industry. By starting niche, you can build a tight-knit community around your brand and even gain an advantage in ranking on Google.

Further reading: Niche Research: 5 Steps to Finding Profitable Affiliate Niches

Step 2. Choose the right platform

With a niche in mind, it's time to decide where to host your affiliate content and what type of content you want to create.

There are two main choices for affiliates starting out: a website or a YouTube channel.

YouTube can be an excellent place to grow an audience, build a brand, and promote affiliate products to an audience that trusts your recommendations.

But there are some downsides to starting with only a YouTube channel:

Video takes longer to produce than written content. Which limits the amount of content you can create when starting your project.

Videos are harder to outsource. Especially if you're the face of the channel, it means you'll need to be involved with every video.

Harder to grow your email list. YouTube doesn't have a built-in way to collect email subscribers. Yet email is one of the most effective channels for affiliate marketing.

YouTube channels tend to make less affiliate money. There's simply more friction to getting clicks on your affiliate links from a video compared to a well-optimized blog post.

Ultimately, it's great to have both a website and YouTube. Embedding videos on an affiliate website is also an excellent way to boost conversion. But if you're a total beginner, you'll probably find it easier to start affiliate marketing with a blog.

WHEN IS YOUTUBE A BETTER CHOICE?

YouTube is probably a better choice when you're entering an ultra-competitive niche. For instance, if you want to promote credit cards or teach your audience about email marketing. Since video is a more complex medium to master, that also means there's less competition and you can lean more on your personality to build trust and stand out.

Step 3. Pick profitable affiliate programs

Signing up for affiliate programs is easy. But spreading yourself too thin is one of the top affiliate marketing mistakes beginners make.

You want to start with a finite number of affiliate programs with good commissions, solid conversions, and reliable demand.

Here are three key ways to pick a good affiliate program:

First, assess earning potential

Affiliate programs vary greatly in terms of payment scale. Some programs offer a few cents per conversion. Others pay out hundreds of dollars for a single lead.

Programs with lower payouts are often easier to join and promote, which makes them appealing but require a higher number of sales for the same amount of revenue.

Here are the three main ways to make your affiliate math "work out":

High volume, low commissions. This includes most Amazon affiliate sites. To earn $5,000 per month from 5% commissions, you need to generate $100,000 in revenue for Amazon. If the average customer spends $100, that's 1,000 orders to reach $5K in earnings. To do well here, you usually need a lot of traffic (meaning, a lot of content).

Low volume, high commissions. For example, luxury affiliate programs (expensive watches or luxury fashion) and photography affiliate programs (expensive camera equipment). Both are more niche, but require fewer conversions to reach a revenue goal.

High volume, high commissions (...and high competition). Financial affiliate programs (like credit cards and bank accounts), or SaaS affiliate programs (like web hosting and email marketing tools) are both good examples. These programs are so profitable, you may struggle to compete.

While you're at it, check the affiliate program's cookie duration. Longer cookie durations (over 30 days) give you time to get your audience to a buying decision.

Shorter cookie periods can still be effective for those customers who have already made the decision to buy. If you choose to work with programs with shorter cookie durations, be sure that your content targets people later in the buying journey.

I'll explain how the buyer's journey fits into affiliate marketing in a second.

Second, assess the competition

Some competition can be a good sign. If other people are doing well in the niche, there's a good chance you can too. The easiest way to find competitors is to simply google for the kinds of search terms you'd love your website to show up for.

Then, check which affiliate programs your competitors are promoting most heavily on those pages. Find out what terms they offer, and how to join the program.

This is one of the most effective ways to vet affiliate programs, as long as your competitors are further along than you are.

BEWARE A LACK OF COMPETITION

No competition might sound like a good thing, but usually means the niche is not viable. Or worse, they've already tried, failed, and moved on. But if there are clearly other people making money in a niche, it's a signal that you can as well.

Third, evaluate brand alignment and reputation

You are building your own brand and image at the same time as you’re promoting the products and services of other businesses. Be selective in choosing who you represent. Working with businesses that don’t align with your brand leads to audience mistrust and harm your brand long term.

You also want to check that the brand you're promoting is likely to convert. That means looking at their sales pages, mobile-friendly design, and other online reviews. Think about what you would consider when buying the product as a consumer.

Now that you've selected some affiliate programs in your well-researched niche, it's time to create content.

Step 4. Create optimized affiliate content

None of the previous steps matter if you don’t have high-quality content that converts.

Creating content for affiliate marketing is more than simply adding links to an existing blog post. You need to help your audience make a decision on a product or service, directly on your website, through strong copywriting and appealing design.

Some examples of high-converting affiliate marketing content include:

Product reviews: Nearly 97% of consumers look at online reviews before making a purchase decision, so product reviews are a staple amongst affiliate marketers.

Product roundups: Roundups based on a specific theme or category lead different readers to relevant products and diversify your revenue away from a single link.

Product comparisons These are similar to product reviews but place similar products side-by-side to highlight pros and cons. Product comparisons are extremely helpful to orient audiences.

Resource pages: Resource pages are compilations of your favourite tools and resources. Resource pages that focus on solving a problem for your audience won’t be the highest converting pages but will help to present you as an expert to your audience and gather all of your affiliate links in one place.

Tutorials: Tutorials are an opportunity to highlight exactly how a product works in an easy step-by-step process. Customers are likely to trust and buy a product when they can see exactly how it will work for them.

Ebooks: Topics don’t always fit into a nice blog post or or email. This is where ebooks come in. They give you an opportunity to do a deep dive into a topic. As a bonus, you can use the ebook as a lead magnet to build your email list.

Affiliate content also goes by other names, such as commerce content. But no matter what you call it, don't forget to include an affiliate disclosure which informs your audience that you may earn a commission if they buy from your links.

Once you've chosen a content format, it's time to optimize the page for conversion.

Conversion 101 for new affiliates

Here are some of the most important ways you can do that without a ton of complicated plugins.

Button placement: Good button placement and design is particularly important for getting people to respond to your call to action, whether that be to sign up, subscribe, or learn more. Button placement should be noticeable, with CTAs that spark interest like "Read more reviews", "Check the price", and "See more photos".

Here's an example of a product review with a prominent button above the fold of the browser:

Early buttons in the content make it easy for people who are convinced to scroll to the top and click-through to the affiliate offer.

Callouts: Also called text boxes, these visually separate important information from the rest of the blog. You can use them for compelling quotes or statistics that influence your visitor's decision in their buyer journey.

Here's an example from Themeisle's review of Elementor:

Positive reviews and install count both act as social proof that this product works great.

Graphs, charts, and comparison tables: As much as quality written content is necessary, visual summaries of information are just as important. Give users a glance overview of key details by including graphs and charts.

Here's an example from a site comparing smart watches for kids:

Images: People often make purchase decisions based on emotion. Images that reinforce a particular feeling embodied by your content nudge readers towards converting. Even better if you can include photos of the results a product has helped you to achieve.

For example, in this makeup review, the author shows themselves trying each product:

Images of the product being used or the results of products help illustrate the benefits.

Banners: Banners may be eye-catching and stand out, but they also are easily ignored due to a “banner blindness” and people tend to ignore banners entirely. You can include them, but make sure to have plenty of tasteful text links and buttons — those will be your main conversion drivers.

Popups: Although controversy surrounds popups because they can be annoying, they are also highly effective at converting your readers. Each popup is an opportunity to recapture audience members through strategies like discount codes and limited time offers.

Step 5. Drive traffic to your affiliate site

Now it's time to drive traffic to your carefully selected offer. This can be done through social media platforms, SEO blog posts, and email lists.

The key is you want to either reach people who are looking to buy, or capture their email address to educate and inform readers before prompting the purchase.

Here are some of the best free traffic sources for affiliate marketing:

Social media sites like Twitter, TikTok, Instagram, Pinterest, and Reddit are all great free traffic sources for affiliate marketing, but they do require some time and effort to make them work.

But the most successful affiliates also invest in growing traffic through SEO.

By targeting buyer intent keywords, you can reach visitors who are heading to Google right before making a purchase. Using this technique, it's much easier to get clicks on your affiliate links and earn commissions than trying to sell to people who aren't ready to buy.

Another free traffic source we can't recommend enough is affiliate marketing through email.

The direct nature of emails means tailored messages are delivered straight to your prospects' inbox. This helps them learn more about a product and moves them towards a buying decision.

Email works great for regular product curations, sharing time-sensitive deals, and reinforcing your top recommendations to your audience.

Step 6. Build a simple affiliate marketing funnel

An affiliate marketing funnel is a carefully laid out process that guides users from the start of their buyer journey to the point where they are a repeat customer.

Funnels are critical if you need to take an audience who isn't ready to buy (such as most visitors from Pinterest or other "inspiration"-based channels), and warm them up to your brand and offer.

By using a funnel, the reader sticks with you through all the stages of the buyer's journey. Even if they joined you weeks or months before they're ready to make a purchase.

Here's how you can visualize the buyer's journey:

The buyer’s journey consists of four main stages:

Awareness: The prospect notices and identifies their problem

Consideration: The prospect considers possible solutions to their problem

Conversion: The prospect makes a purchase decision and thereby becomes a customer

Loyalty: A positive customer experience leads to trust and repeat purchases

Here's how to practically implement a simple funnel, so you can convert cold traffic into customers.

FUNNEL OR NO FUNNEL?

It’s possible to send customers directly to the affiliate website through single pieces of content, especially with low-ticket offers that have straightforward value propositions. Funnels are an especially suitable strategy for high-ticket affiliate programs that require a longer education period before customers are ready to buy.

Stage 1. Collect leads through email affiliate marketing

After a visitor lands on your website, it's time to convert them to an email list using free offer opt-ins. This can be a downloadable PDF guide, email course, resource library, or other gated content.

Getting started with email might sound intimidating, but it's an early investment you won't regret.

Read our related post about affiliate marketing through emails for how to get started, step by step.

Further reading: Email Affiliate Marketing: How To Use Emails To Boost Your Affiliate Revenue

Stage 2. Send leads to affiliate landing pages

Once a prospect is on your email list, you have better control over their buyer’s journey to guide them as needed and fill in the gaps. This is your opportunity to provide information specific to where they are in their journey.

Emails about yourself, the results a product helped you to achieve, testimonials from other buyers, tutorials and guides can all help the prospect become confident enough to make a purchase.

Once they're ready, you can link to your affiliate landing page. These are yet another space to connect with your audience, encourage them to move to the buying stage, and help you build trust before your prospect lands on the advertiser’s sales page.

Stage 3. Optimize your funnel

What makes marketing funnels incredibly helpful is they show you where to adjust and improve your processes. With a funnel, you can pinpoint the exact stage where someone drops off the journey.

When you know that, tweak it to provide an improved process for the next person through the funnel.

Stage 4. Bag repeat sales by emailing your list regularly

Customers that have made their way through the funnel are still good prospects for other offers.

Your email list now gives you the opportunity to provide additional email content that will lead them through a new buyer’s journey and guide them through the funnel for a different product.

Further reading: How to Build a High-Converting Affiliate Marketing Funnel in 5 Steps

Step 7. Track and increase your affiliate revenue

Finally, it's time to talk tracking.

Proper tracking is one of the most important aspects of successful affiliate marketing.

It's the difference between fumbling around aimlessly in the dark for your keys, or taking a step back and turning on a light switch.

Giving yourself visibility into what's working and what isn't in your affiliate marketing strategy is what helps you make more money, faster, and with fewer pieces of content.

And there is no better time than the very beginning of your affiliate website to set up a system that will scale with you. Here are the two main ways to level up your affiliate strategy with tracking:

First, get basic affiliate tracking in place

There are two types of affiliate tracking:

Tracking a network does for you (attributing your sales and tellling you which products people bought through your links)

Tracking you have to do for yourself (figuring out which pages, affiliate links, text and visual elements are converting).

To handle the second case, you can use SubID tracking. SubIDs are additional data that you attach to your affiliate link, which ultimately gets recorded next to every conversion that results from that exact link.

Typically, a SubID is a query parameter you can add onto existing affiliate links. Here's how SubIDs fit into your affiliate links:

If you're familiar with Google Analytics, SubIDs work similarly to the utm_campaign parameter.

For more information on SubIDs, read our guide to SubID tracking for affiliates. It's a little technical, but you'll be grateful you set it up right from the beginning.

You can also forego doing this manually, and use an affiliate marketing tool like Affilimate to fully automate this process.

Then, start to run some tests

Now that you have tracking in place, the first step is to choose which blog post you want to run tests on. Consideration needs to be given to high traffic posts, posts with new traffic, posts with high intent but low RPM (revenue per thousand visitors).

Once you’ve chosen your blog post, run tests to assess its performance and how it can improve. Here are some ideas for tests you can run on your affiliate content:

Adding comparison tables

Switching the text on call-to-action buttons

Inserting links to alternative affiliate products

Decluttering by removing links that aren’t yielding any conversions

Testing different link text

You can test which techniques are converting by using unique SubIDs. You want to assess not only whether the new elements are causing more clicks and revenue, but also how much the piece of content is generating relative to the number of viewers.

Again, you can use a tool like ours to automate this process without resorting to gluing together data from multiple sources in complicated spreadsheets:

Running successful tests is also one of the most effective ways to invest in and flip websites, once you've developed a feel for it.

Get these two strategies right from the beginning, and you're several steps ahead of most affiliate marketers today.

Affiliate marketing mistakes to avoid

Once you nail the broad overview of affiliate marketing, make sure you don’t slip up on the details.

There are several small, seemingly unimportant decisions that add up to make or break your success. Here are some of the most common affiliate marketing mistakes to avoid:

Making your intro too long. Whether you’re writing content or producing videos, you have seconds to capture your audience’s attention. Keep your intros short and sweet and make sure you’re making it clear what they’ll gain by sticking with you.

Targeting the wrong part of the buying cycle. If your audience doesn’t understand the offer, they won’t convert, no matter how hard you try to sell. Your content should match where your audience is in the buying cycle, providing education where needed.

Not including a clear top recommendation. Product roundups and comparisons are high-converting content, but consumers are looking for a clear recommendation. Make it easy for them to make a decision by letting them know your preference.

Not suggesting and linking to alternative affiliate products. Consumers are growing more and more skeptical. Pushing a product as the cure to everything will raise red flags. Instead, make honest evaluations and acknowledge the benefits of alternatives. Even better is if you can capture revenue by using affiliate links for competing products.

Not tracking affiliate metrics. The most successful affiliate marketers treat their marketing as what it is — a business. Tracking allows for revenue optimization based on data-driven insights, rather than gut instinct or guessing.

Avoid these mistakes, and you'll be doing better than 90% of new affiliate marketers who lose their readers before the very first click.

What you need to know about affiliate marketing in 2023

Consumer behavior has changed dramatically in the last year. Affiliate marketing has to keep pace with new technical and legal requirements in order to stay relevant, accurate, and privacy compliant.

Starting is the hardest step, but don’t let your efforts go to waste. Keep these affiliate marketing trends in mind to build a sustainable business model and future-proof your revenue.

1. Brands want partners, not just affiliates

Affiliate marketing hasn’t always had the best reputation, but with a bit of a refresh, the win-win business model is still full of promise for brands and publishers alike.

This shift comes in the form of a rebrand from affiliate marketing to “partnership marketing”.

Brands and businesses are moving towards quality partnerships instead of quantity relationships. Before, brands would have their business promoted by thousands of influencers and content creators. Now, greater selectivity is being employed to choose the right people to represent and promote them.

Creators that have genuine connections with their audiences will be favored by brands to promote their image in a meaningful way. Brands are looking for creators that will use their audience trust to represent them with authenticity and integrity.

You can demonstrate this to brands with engagement metrics, such as an email list with solid click-through rates or a social media account with an active comments section. This also gives you leverage for negotiating higher commissions.

2. Diversification is more important than ever

Success in the affiliate space is seldom tied to a single income source. Robust income as an affiliate means diversifying your streams and being a part of a variety of programs. If you stick to only one program, rate cuts and program adjustments are a massive blow to your expected earnings.

This is exactly what happened to Amazon affiliates both during the early stages of the pandemic and again in early 2021.

Programs that rarely engage with their affiliates on a one-to-one basis also offer very little recourse for affiliates when things go wrong. Although programs like Amazon can be convenient and lucrative, introducing alternatives guard against dramatic loss of income as well as add to your current earning potential.

3. Multi-channel is your moat

A multi-channel approach supersedes any results that can be achieved through a single platform.

Combining both “owned” platforms, such as your website, blog and email lists, with “rented” platforms such as Instagram, YouTube, and Pinterest provide you with the best of both worlds.

Social media is a key component of expanding your reach and gaining new audience members. YouTube alone ranks as the second most popular search engine globally. Content that succeeds across social media platforms drive your target audience to your “owned” online space, namely your website.

Reaching your target audience and creating a direct connection with them as an affiliate marketer requires a multi-channel approach in order to achieve the desired result for driving revenue and creating repeat buyers. Rented platforms are a great way to start an audience, but driving traffic to owned media is essential to future-proof your business against changes to social media platforms.

Ready to take action?

Diversification and multi-channel approaches play a big role in future-proofing your affiliate marketing business.

That means most successful affiliates end up juggling multiple logins and platforms to make the most of their business.

Instead of logging into what feels like a million hard-to-use dashboards, you can use Affilimate to access one central location for all information relating to your affiliate programs.

The Affilimate dashboard also gives you an at-a-glance understanding of how your affiliate marketing content is performing. Keep track of your revenue, identify top-performing content and gain insights into optimization all in one place.

Check out Affilimate's Free 15-Day Trial to bring all your affiliate networks into a single dashboard and attribute your conversions back to content on your website.

Or, sign up for our email list below for free content to help you level up your site and grow your affiliate revenue from scratch.

Jules Costa

Jules Costa is a Brazilian-American freelance writer and money expert who has been featured on NPR, Personal Capital and Boston 25.

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50+ of the Best Affiliate Programs That Pay the Highest Commission

Every day, thousands of publishers benefit from a recurring cash inflow by partnering up with other companies via affiliate programs.

Affiliate marketing is one of the best ways to monetize your blog, especially when you don't sell products or services. Joining an affiliate program can get you exclusive access to new content and special deals for your audience — all while earning you more money.

Download Now: Free Affiliate Marketing Templates

There are many types of affiliate programs, ranging from online courses to website builders to marketing and business affiliates. Here, we're going to explore the best affiliate programs with the highest earning potential to ensure you can make money off the content you provide.

But first — what exactly is an affiliate program?

What is an Affiliate Program?

An affiliate program is an agreement in which a business pays another business or influencer ('the affiliate') a commission for sending traffic and/or sales their way. This can be achieved through web content, social media, or a product integration.

To further understand affiliate programs, let's consider an example. Wirecutter.com, a New York Times company, is a website that lists product recommendations for shoppers. Wirecutter largely earns commission based on affiliate relationships with retailers.

The publication’s affiliate monetization model might make you doubt the legitimacy of its recommendations — but, in fact, it's quite the opposite.

Wirecutter only makes commission when a reader purchases a product from an affiliate retailer and doesn't return the product. Wirecutter, then, has no incentive to promote inferior products. If they did, they'd make less money and turn away readers.

How do affiliates make money?

The affiliate gets a unique link (an "affiliate link") from which clicks can be tracked — typically using cookies. The cookie then tracks the user to see if they make a purchase. If they do within an allotted amount of time, then the affiliate will earn commission.

Each cookie has a "length" or "cookie life", which simply defines how long the cookie will be tracking the user's online activity.

For example, if a cookie has a 30-day life, your referral needs to make a purchase within 30-days of clicking your affiliate link in order for you to get paid — otherwise the lead will no longer be trackable.

If you’re interested in starting an affiliate program, there are different types of affiliate programs, and you'll want to pick the one best-suited for your business. Let's dive into the types of affiliate programs, next.

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Types of Affiliate Programs

If you're looking to promote products or services, there are a few affiliate programs you can consider. When choosing an affiliate program, you'll want to keep in mind the avenues or platforms where your audience spends the majority of their time.

For instance, does your buyer persona typically read blog posts, scroll Facebook, or use search engines when researching new products?

Alternatively, is your buyer persona someone who's always looking for a good deal, and would appreciate a link on a coupon site? Or are they more interested in doing tons of research before purchasing, making your promotion efforts more worthwhile on a review site?

While those are questions you'll have to consider for yourself, let's take a look at some general types of affiliate programs so you can begin brainstorming potential avenues for your own marketing efforts:

Search Affiliates

With this program, marketers pay their own money to promote affiliate offers on search results or other online advertising platforms like Facebook Advertising. This is a great option for marketers with an SEO background and want to A/B test to see which ads result in the most referrals — and ROI.

Influencer Programs

If you’re a blogger or social media influencer who engages with a specific audience, consider partnering with a company whose products would appeal to them.

For instance, if you are a food blogger or YouTube influencer who creates recipe content, consider partnering with a company that sells kitchen appliances by featuring their product in your content in exchange for commission for every product sold via your affiliate link.

Ideally, this would result in additional revenue if your audience likes the products you’re promoting.

Review Sites

Blind buying products online can be daunting for consumers, which is why they often turn to review sites during the buyer’s journey so they can conduct research before purchasing.

Review sites partner with individual companies or affiliate networks to review products and services in exchange for an affiliate link.

Coupon Sites

Similar to review sites, coupon sites partner with companies to provide buyers with discounts on products and services in exchange for a kickback.

Email Marketing

This is best in small doses. You don't want to send out bulk emails to an audience who isn’t interested in promoted products or services. However, with proper consideration for who's receiving the email, this could be an effective method.

For instance, if you work for a marketing agency, you could partner with a company that sells design tools and include an affiliate within emails you send to design clients. This could help your clients create higher-quality content while providing an added source of revenue.

Best Affiliate Programs

HubSpot

Elementor

Moosend

AWeber

Sendinblue

ConvertKit

GetResponse

Fiverr

Pabbly

Unbounce

Constant Contact

Systeme.io

Typeform

Outgrow

Instapage

Thinkific

Kajabi

Teachable

iSpring

Shopify

Leadpages

Wix

WP Engine

Kinsta

Bluehost

Hostgator

GreenGeeks

Target

Hammacher Schlemmer

Spocket

Ulta

Sephora

FragranceNet.com

BH Cosmetics

Boatbookings

Cheapflights

Momondo

Sandals Resorts

Acorns

Sage Financials

Don’t have time to look through all of the programs? We’ve divided this list into several subsections:

Best Marketing and Business Affiliate Programs

Best Online Course Affiliate Programs

Best Website Builder Affiliate Programs

Best Web Hosting Affiliate Programs

Best Retail Affiliate Programs

Best Beauty and Cosmetic Affiliate Programs

Best Travel Affiliate Programs

Best Personal Finance and Investment Affiliate Programs

Best High-Paying Affiliate Programs

Let's get started.

Best Marketing and Business Affiliate Programs

1. HubSpot

Commission: 15% recurring for 1 year or 100% of the first month’s revenue

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: Your preferred method

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sign-up

HubSpot's mission is to help millions of organizations grow better. HubSpot's award-winning CRM platform — which is comprised of Marketing Hub, Sales Hub, Service Hub, CMS Hub, and Operations Hub, and a powerful free CRM — gives thousands of companies the tools they need to manage the customer experience — all the way from awareness to advocacy.

As a HubSpot affiliate, you have the choice between a 15% recurring rate for up to one year or a flat rate corresponding to 100% of the first month’s revenue.

HubSpot’s plans range from $50 all the way up to $3,000+ per month. And it is not uncommon for customers to purchase more than one product at a time. So these payouts could quickly add up.

When you join HubSpot's affiliate program, you gain access to a large creative inventory, including demo videos, banners, and copy examples, all designed to help you earn the most commission possible. Plus, you can cultivate a one-on-one relationship with the HubSpot affiliate team, whose members are all dedicated to helping you succeed.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers, publishers, and content creators who share content about marketing, sales, service, website, and operations for small businesses, enterprises, and individual professionals. This may include any subtopics, such as social media marketing or inbound sales tactics.

If you have a large business audience or want to monetize your content, then our affiliate program is likely well-suited for you. (You can learn more about HubSpot by reading HubSpot reviews.)

2. Elementor

Commission: 50% per sale

Cookie life: 45 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or your preferred method

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $200

Elementor is a dynamic drag-and-drop website builder used to create more than 7% of all the world's websites. With hundreds of widgets, integrations, website templates, and design tools, Elementor users can customize and scale their WordPress website-building process without writing a single line of code.

Unique amongst WordPress website builders, Elementor now offers cloud hosting features, as well.

Yet, Elementor is more than simple software — it has 100k members in its online community where web creators share advice, host meetups, and push each other to professional growth.

Elementor affiliates earn 50% per sale. The software has five pricing packages, ranging from $49 to $999 per year. This broad array of pricing tiers makes it easier for affiliates to strategically market various plans to specific audiences.

With notable affiliates earning north of $10,000 a month, Elementor is an attractive option to consider.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers, publishers, and content creators who share content about web design, WordPress, and digital creation. It’s also an excellent fit for agencies, educators, entrepreneurs, and even developers who’d like their clients to purchase a version of Elementor.

3. Moosend

Commission: 30% to 40% Lifetime Recurring

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or Stripe

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $5

Moosend is an affordable all-in-one email marketing automation solution that enables marketers to promote their business and increase their customer base with engaging campaigns.

Apart from the user-friendly email editor, you’ll get access to online forms, landing pages, audience management tools, segmentation, and personalization features to turn your subscribers into loyal advocates of your brand.

Moosend’s affiliate program allows you to earn up to 40% lifetime recurring commission on every plan your contacts buy. Moreover, the 90-day cookie will give your audience the time they need to make a purchase, while you can earn extra commissions when your contact upgrades their plan.

Moosend affiliates can benefit from the pre-made materials (banners, templates, etc.) and available resources found in their affiliate dashboard. The affiliate team is also ready to assist and help solve problems that may arise.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers, publishers, and content creators who share content about email marketing and automation. Because of Moosend’s budget-friendly prices, we highly recommend it if your audience is made up of entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small businesses.

4. AWeber

Commission: Up to 50% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: One year

Payout Methods: PayPal

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $30

AWeber has been the autoresponder of choice for over one million businesses and entrepreneurs since 1998. It's a great tool for newsletter and email drip campaigns.

AWeber offers a tiered affiliate program. The more you sell, the more you can earn. If you refer up to 10 accounts in one year, you’ll earn 30% commission. If you refer 10 or more customers, you’ll earn 40%. And if you refer 50 or more customers, you’ll get 50%. Pretty sweet, right?

Affiliates of AWeber can earn substantial income through two different channels:

Their in-house program offers a lifetime 30% commission. Plans typically range from around $20 to $150 per month, so the payout can add up.

Alternatively, you can earn up to $300 per account through CJ Affiliate. However, the cookie life with this option is only 45 days, rather than one year.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers, publishers, and content creators who share content about email marketing and automation.

5. Sendinblue

Commission: €5 when a referred user creates a free account + €100 if that user buys a subscription

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or bank transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sign-up

Sendinblue is an all-in-one digital marketing platform that helps businesses connect with customers via email marketing, SMS, chat, marketing automation, CRM, and more. This user-friendly tool is rapidly growing in popularity with over 175,000 users worldwide.

Sendinblue’s partner program has three different streams: one for bloggers, one for agencies, and one for incubators and venture capitalists. For most, we recommend the blogger option, unless you’re an agency that would like to start using Sendinblue with clients.

In the blogger program, you’ll get a flat €5 for each free signup — so even if the customer doesn’t buy a subscription, you’ll still earn! You’ll also be able to track your earnings in real time and get paid monthly. Even more, you’ll get €100 every time you refer a paying customer and join a network of top affiliates like WPBeginner, Capterra, CodeinWP, emailvendorselection, emailtooltester, and many more.

Note: Even though the payout is in euros, the program is open to the United States and your commission will be converted based on currency rates at the time of the payment.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Sendinblue’s free and affordable pricing plans make it a very attractive revenue opportunity for bloggers and publishers in the email marketing space. We especially recommend it if you write for freelancers or professionals with side hustles who want to try email marketing without paying for a tool.

6. ConvertKit

Commission: 30% recurring for 24 months

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: PayPal

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sign-up

A new up-and-comer in the email marketing field, ConvertKit helps its customers grow their customer base via landing pages, forms, and email drip campaigns. (You can learn more about ConvertKit by reading reviews.)

ConvertKit's affiliate program is primarily addressed to existing ConvertKit users who feel their audience could benefit from email marketing products. The program offers a lifelong 30% commission for every referred paying customer or webinar subscriber.

With plans ranging anywhere from $29 per month all the way to $2,000+, the income potential is a very attractive offer, and it costs you absolutely nothing to join the program.

The program does not, however, offer any special deals or discounts for any product the affiliate might promote.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Writers, bloggers, and content creators whose audience is interested in starting their own newsletter or side business. ConvertKit’s free and affordable subscriptions make it a great choice for anyone just starting out with email marketing.

7. GetResponse

Commission: $100 for every sale referred, or 33% of recurring subscriptions

Cookie life: 120 days

Payout Methods: PayPal, USD check, ACH, Eurotransfer, or other payment method

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sign-up

Along with email marketing, GetResponse offers landing pages, opt-in forms, webinar hosting, a CRM tool, and plenty of other marketing automation tools. (You can learn more about GetResponse by reading reviews.)

The product has two sign-up tiers: For everyone, including individuals, and for medium-to-large companies. Of the two, the “Everyone” tier is easier to market to the public, so when signing up for this program, think of ways you can incorporate mentions of GetResponse’s plans for individuals and small businesses.

Just like AWeber, GetResponse has two affiliate programs you can choose from (or, you can join both!):

Their self-hosted program offers a 33% recurring commission. With plans ranging anywhere from $15 to $1,200/month, the payout can be pretty substantial.

You can also earn $1090 for every sale referred through CJ Affiliate. However, the cookie life is only 30 days, rather than 120 offered in the in-house program.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers, content creators, publishers, marketing consultants, and online marketing experts who publish content for small businesses and freelancers.

8. Fiverr

Commission: $15-150 per referral; or $10 + 10% recurring for 12 months; or another commission option depending on the product

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: Your preferred method

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $100

Fiverr has a few products you might promote on your own website or blog — including Fiverr (the freelance marketplace with digital services for everything from marketing to tech), Fiverr Pro (access to hand-vetted talent trusted by major brands), and Fiverr Learn (courses for freelancers and businesses looking to expand their skills).

If you work with clients who might need to hire a freelancer for marketing, design, or tech skills, or you write a blog for entrepreneurs and want to promote Fiverr Learn, you might want to consider partnering with Fiverr.

The popular site, with over 5.5 million users, offers affiliates a dashboard to manage and monitor campaigns, and creative assets to help you promote their services. Of course, commission varies depending on the service you want to promote. Take a look at their full offerings here.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Content creators whose audience could use Fiverr’s services — for instance, if you create YouTube videos for small businesses who would benefit from hiring freelancers. We recommend looking at Fiverr’s library of products to find out what would best resonate with your audience.

9. Pabbly

Commission: 30% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: 365 days

Payout Methods: PayPal, Bank Transfer, or Both

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

Pabbly is an online platform that offers multiple marketing and business management tools for email marketing, form building, subscription-billing, email verification, workflow automation, and app integration. The most popular package is Pabbly Plus — a cost-effective bundle of all the Pabbly applications.

Unique features of their affiliate program include:

You can promote all or any of their products to get a 30% commission within 40 days of the sale.

They track sales of all their products using a single cookie. So whatever product you promote, it will get you a commission on the sale of all the products purchased through your affiliate link. Also, this will save you from referring each product separately to your audience.

A single sale of Pabbly products can provide you the minimum commission of $183.

Additionally, they provide a single dashboard for monitoring sales, allowing you to view all your commission-related details — such as sales, referrals, and payouts — in a single place.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Blogger, website owners, or social media experts whose audience would like to try email marketing. Due to its subscription billing tool, Pabbly is especially useful if your audience is interested in starting a subscription service or newsletter.

10. Unbounce

Commission: 20% lifetime recurring revenue

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal, Bank Transfer, or Both

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

This popular landing page platform — used by brands such as Campaign Monitor and Zola — helps users design high-converting landing pages for SaaS businesses, ecommerce sites, and agencies. Unbounce's affiliate program is impressive, giving you the opportunity to earn 20% of the recurring revenue for every customer you refer.

Plus, your site visitors or social media followers get 20% off their first three months using Unbounce, making the exchange valuable for them, as well.

Unbounce provides you with plenty of tools to succeed using their affiliate program, including a Partner coach, custom dashboard to track progress, and training and promotional materials to ensure you're promoting their business as effectively as possible.

If you're a marketer hoping to help clients increase conversions on their landing pages, this partnership could be a win-win for you both.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Marketers, agencies, and bloggers who share content about marketing with a highly interested and qualified audience. If you’re an agency, you can refer them to Unbounce, and if you’re a blogger or content creator, you can share contextual information with your readers and viewers.

11. Constant Contact

Commission: $5 for each referral that signs up for a free trial, and $105 when your referrals pay for a new account

Cookie life: 120 days

Payout Methods: PayPal, electronic fund transfer, check, or direct deposit

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sign-up

Constant Contact offers powerful email marketing tools for small businesses, bloggers, and entrepreneurs. Among other things, users of Constant Contact can create Instagram and Facebook Ads, automate their email marketing campaigns, target new ecommerce customers, and send follow-up emails to increase revenue to their online stores.

The company's affiliate program enables you to earn $5 for all qualified leads, and $105 when the referral becomes a customer of Constant Contact.

Additionally, you'll receive promotional materials, a tracking dashboard, and personalized support to help you succeed with the affiliate program. Constant Contact is used by major brands including Facebook, WordPress, and Shopify.

If you believe your clients or prospects could benefit from email marketing tools, this is a good partnership to consider.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers and content creators whose audience is made up of small-to-medium businesses. Since Constant Contact doesn’t offer any free plans, it’s ideal for you if your audience is ready to commit to a paid purchase.

12. Systeme.io

Commission: 50% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: 180 Days

Payout Methods: PayPal or wire transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $30

Systeme.io is a fast and simple marketing tool that has everything you need to launch, grow, and scale your online business.

There are over 200,000 customers that use Systeme.io to build sales funnels, send unlimited emails, create and manage online courses and blogs, run affiliate programs, build websites, and automate almost every aspect of their marketing.

Systeme.io offers 6 different pricing packages, ranging from $27 per month to $828 per year.

Along with their extensive pricing tiers, they have multiple lead magnets and online courses that can help affiliates pull in the maximum number of leads to their funnels. Affiliates can leverage all 6 pricing plans and onboarding materials to convert new users.

Systeme.io affiliates earn 50% lifetime commissions on all subscriptions and course sales. Plus, they earn 5% second-tier commissions if their referrals successfully promote the platform themselves​.

This affiliate program offers attractive income potential — with a monthly payout of over $100,000 to their affiliates, and over $2,000,000 in total affiliate commissions earned so far.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers, video marketers, and content creators whose audience is made up of freelancers and entrepreneurs. Because of Systeme.io’s course creation tool, it’s a great fit if your audience is interested in starting their own online course.

13. Typeform

Commission: $20 per referral

Cookie life: Unknown

Payout Methods: PayPal or Stripe

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sign-up

Typeform, which offers conversational forms and surveys including Contact Forms, Employee Satisfaction Surveys, and Event Lead Capture Forms, offers a $20 commission on referrals.

That means you’ll earn $20 if a referred customer subscribes to Typeform, regardless of whether they stay subscribed.

This adds up quickly, and the service is relatively cheap, making it easy for your referrals to make a purchase. If you refer 100 customers who sign up for a monthly basic plan, that’s already $2,000.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers and content creators whose audience could use a form tool — for instance, if your audience is made up of small business owners or customer service professionals. But Typeform is such a versatile tool that it could even be used for non-professional purposes, so you can even refer family and friends.

14. Outgrow Affiliate Program

Commission: 20% upfront and 20% recurring

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: Unknown

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: Unknown

Outgrow is an interactive content builder that helps marketers to create personalized content including calculators, viral quizzes, eCommerce recommendations, forms, surveys, chatbots, polls, and assessments.

Personalized solutions like interactive content add real value to the customer and increase user engagement, improve conversions, and generate leads that marketers can then use for segmentation and retargeting.

Along with 20% commission upfront and 20% on recurring payments, Outgrow affiliates receive 24/7 chat support and opportunities to get featured on Outgrow's webinars and podcasts.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Marketers, content creators, and bloggers whose audience could use interactive content tools. Whether you’re writing for a business blog or creating independent content on LinkedIn, you can market Outgrow as a unique solution to engage followers. You can also create interactive content using Outgrow and encourage others to begin using it.

15. Instapage

Commission: 30% to 40% recurring for the first year, then 15% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or Stripe

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One signup

Instapage is the most powerful landing page platform on the market — empowering companies like Verizon, HelloFresh, and Lattice to launch high-performing digital campaigns.

Partners are integral to Instapage’s continued innovation and evolution. The Affiliate Program offers a generous commission structure—with a 30-40% recurring commission for every paying customer. Instapage provides all the tools partners need to succeed, including a dedicated point of contact, promotional materials that are regularly updated, and opportunities to earn more via special contests and limited-time offers.

The program rewards Affiliates with profit-sharing opportunities and supports their efforts with social media assets and messaging. Instapage affiliates can earn:

40% on the first year of a customer's annual subscription

15% of a customer's annual subscription after the first year

30% on monthly subscription

Sign up for the Instapage Affiliate program here.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Content creators and bloggers whose audience is made up of medium-sized to enterprise businesses. Since Instapage’s pricing starts at $199/month, it’s less accessible to freelancers or hobbyists, but it’s well-positioned for audiences with larger budgets.

Best Online Course Affiliate Programs

16. Thinkific

Commission: 30% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or Stripe

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $25

Thinkific’s powerful all-in-one platform makes it easy to share your knowledge, grow your audience, and scale the business you already love. The platform enables users to create, market, and sell online courses and membership sites under their own brand.

You're an ideal candidate for Thinkific's affiliate program if your audience is made up of any of the following:

Content creators with skills and knowledge to share;

Business leaders who want to create courses for customers; or

Entrepreneurs who want to add new revenue streams

As an affiliate partner, your perks include a 30% lifetime recurring commission, a competitive 90-day cookie window, and access to ready-to-post creative and promotional content. Thinkific affiliate partners earn up to $1,700 per referral every year.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

As mentioned, Thinkific’s affiliate program is an excellent fit if you create content for other content creators and entrepreneurs. Thinkific’s subscriptions start at $0/month, making it a great fit for your audience if they’re interested in experimenting with course creation. Remember that they’ll need to upgrade, of course, before you start earning.

17. Kajabi

Commission: 30% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: PayPal

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: Unknown

Kajabi is an all-in-one platform that lets users create online courses, launch marketing campaigns, build landing pages, and design the perfect website.

The Kajabi Partner Program is currently only open to Kajabi users. As an affiliate, you'll receive a 30% lifetime commission for any new member you bring to Kajabi that stays active past their trial period. What's more, you will be treated to special rewards as you progress.

Each level unlocks exciting bonuses only available to Kajabi Partners.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Current Kajabi users who are a fan of the product and want to share it with fellow content creators.

18. Teachable

Commission: Up to 30% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: Unknown

Teachable helps you create and sell beautiful online courses. With over 18 million students and 186 thousand active courses, Teachable is one of the most reputable e-learning platforms. Plus, it's heavily endorsed by Pat Flynn from Smart Passive Income.

Ranging from Facebook ads to cake decorating tips, Teachable is suited for a variety of niche subjects. Teachable's affiliate program pays a recurring 30% commission on the referral's monthly subscription fee. Plans can go anywhere from $29 to $499 per month, meaning you'll be able to earn up to $150 a month per sale.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers and content creators who target other freelancers and content creators on a budget. Teachable subscriptions start at free.

19. iSpring

Commission: 10% per sale

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: Unknown

iSpring is an international software development company that produces tools for eLearning content authoring and online training. Their flagship product is iSpring Suite, an award-winning authoring tool that allows the creation of interactive online courses, quizzes, video tutorials, role-plays, and ebooks.

iSpring Suite has an intuitive interface that is familiar to everyone (the tool works as a PowerPoint add-in) and offers solutions for any learning need. And that’s why it has become popular among people from different fields: from university professors to corporate instructional designers.

The affiliate program includes iSpring Suite and iSpring Suite Max, which cost $770 and $970, respectively. Thus, you can earn from $77 to $97 from a single purchase and around $1000/month if you provide 10+ customers monthly. You will receive verified commissions quarterly.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers and content creators who target online instructors who are ready to commit to a paid plan. Since iSpring’s pricing starts at the higher end, you’ll want to think about pricing when sharing it with your audience.

Best Website Builder Affiliate Programs

20. Shopify

Commission: $150 USD for all full-priced plan referrals

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or direct deposit

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $10

Shopify is a complete commerce platform that allows you to start, grow, and manage a business.

With nearly 20 million merchants on Shopify, merchants can build and customize an online store as well as sell in multiple places, including web, mobile, in person, brick-and-mortar locations, pop-up shops, and across multiple channels from social media to online marketplaces.

Millions of entrepreneurs have chosen Shopify to build their business from Hello World to IPO.

The Shopify Affiliate program is made up of thousands of global content creators, course educators, influencers, and review sites who help their audiences launch successful businesses on Shopify, while earning competitive referral commissions, and elevating themselves as leaders in the industry.

The program is free to join and provides an opportunity for experts to monetize their audience and earn a commission.

Shopify affiliates gain access to a global creative library, lead magnets, a monthly newsletter, and curated email programming that are all designed to support content creation and conversion rate.

Through measured performance and referral quality, eligible partners have the opportunity to join Shopify’s invite-only Commerce Coach program that offers higher commission rates and a wide variety of other exclusive benefits.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers, course instructors, video marketers, and influencers whose audience is interested in launching an ecommerce brand.

21. Leadpages

Commission: Up to 50% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or Stripe

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

Leadpages is an online tool that lets you create easy-to-customize landing pages to collect contact information and boost your conversion rates. (You can learn more about LeadPages by reading reviews.)

Their affiliate program is only open to Leadpages customers. Each paying customer referred brings in a lifetime commission of up to 50%. Membership prices range from $49 to $99 per month.

Leadpages will sometimes run special offers, such as a $5,000 bonus for affiliates who drive 10+ sales by a given date. All affiliates get access to banners, sidebar images, and social media-friendly links. You also have the option to share a unique link to a free content page (like a blog post or video) rather than a product page.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Current Leadpages customers whose audience would benefit from a dedicated landing page tool — such as experienced freelancers and startup owners.

22. Wix

Commission: $100 per Premium sale

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: Wire transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $300

If you're interested in unlimited payouts with minimal effort, Wix could be for you. The web development company is one of the most popular web hosting platforms, and offers $100 per Premium referral with no limit on the amount of people you can refer (which means, if you refer 10 people, you've already made $1,000).

Additionally, Wix provides links and creatives, including banners and landing pages in all languages, to make it easy for you to include their link on your site.

However, it's important to note that there is a minimum sales target you need to reach to get paid — $300 per month (if you make less than that, your earnings will stay in your account until you reach that benchmark).

If you feel your website, blog, or social channel is visited on a regular basis by prospects who might be interested in creating their own website on a hosting platform, this could be a good program for you, but if you're unsure if you can meet the minimum sales target for a while, you might want to reconsider.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Bloggers, content creators, and review website owners whose audience would be interested in starting their own website. It’s especially a great fit if your audience identifies as beginners. Due to its code-free builder, Wix is a great starting point for new website owners.

Best Web Hosting Affiliate Programs

23. WP Engine

Commission: $200 per sale or 100% of first month’s subscription

Cookie life: 180 days

Payout Methods: Unknown

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sign-up

There are millions of websites on the internet, and more than 40% are built on WordPress. WP Engine provides super-fast web hosting for thousands of WordPress websites around the world.

WP Engine's affiliate program runs on the ShareASale network. By promoting WP Engine plans, you can earn $200 per signup or 100% of the customer's first monthly payment — whichever one is higher. You gain access to exclusive affiliate discounts you can offer to your audience.

You can also promote StudioPress themes and earn 35% of the sales generated. These purchases get 60 days of cookie tracking.

It's important to note — WP Engine's affiliate program is two-tiered, which means that you'll get paid not only for referring customers, but also for referring affiliates. You get $50 for each of their referrals.

While it may not be easy to find an audience looking to build a new WordPress website, when you do find those users, the profits can be huge.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Content creators and bloggers whose audience is interested in launching their own WordPress website.

24. Kinsta

Commission: Up to $500 per referral + 10% lifetime recurring

Cookie life: 60 days

Payout Methods: PayPal

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

Kinsta was founded in 2013 by veteran WordPress developers "with a desire to create the best WordPress hosting platform in the world." They strive to offer WordPress hosting that is fast, secure, and reliable.

Kinsta's affiliate program pays an initial commission, followed by a recurring 10% monthly payment. Affiliates can earn up to $500 initially, depending on the type of plan the referral has purchased:

Starter: $30

Pro: $100

Business: $150

Enterprise: $500

While 10% may not seem like much, your referrals are likely to have a high lifetime value, thanks to Kinsta's high customer retention rate of 95%.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Content creators and bloggers whose audience is interested in launching their own WordPress website or web application. It’s a great fit if you talk about website hosting or technical topics on your platform.

25. Bluehost

Commission: $65 per sale

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or electronic bank transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: Unknown

Bluehost, a web hosting platform that supports more than 2 million websites, offers a phenomenal affiliate program for any business or entrepreneur looking to monetize their blog or website.

If you promote Bluehost's products or services on your own blog or website (either through custom banners or links), you can earn anywhere from $65 to $130 per sale generated from your website — an incredibly high fee.

Best of all, it's free to join their affiliate program, and Bluehost offers reliable tracking to ensure you get credit for each lead you provide them. Plus, Bluehost offers affiliate managers who can offer support or personalized advice. With such an accessible program, there are a ton of Bluehost reviews with the pros and cons.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Content creators and bloggers whose audience would be interested in purchasing hosting or a domain name.

26. Hostgator

Commission: $65 to $125 per signup

Cookie life: 60 days

Payout Methods: PayPal, wire, or ACH transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sign-up

Hostgator offers both web hosting and building tools, and is incredibly low-cost for startups or ecommerce businesses with limited budgets — for instance, a starter plan costs only $3.84/month.

It's free to become a Hostgator affiliate, and their tiered payouts are substantial — you can make $65 per signup if you provide Hostgator with 1-5 signups per month, and up to $125 per signup if you provide Hostgator with over 21 signups.

You can either embed tracking links on your site or create a custom coupon code. Since Hostgator provides a 45-day money-back guarantee, it's low-risk for your website visitors to try it out.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Content creators and bloggers whose audience would be interested in purchasing hosting or a domain name.

27. GreenGeeks

Commission: Up to $100 for up to 10 sales; custom commission for 10+ sales

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: PayPal

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sale

GreenGeeks, an eco-friendly, secure web hosting platform, allows you to earn up to $100 per sale. They have a tiered program that pays generously — including $50 for just one sale, and $100 for six or more.

Additionally, the company provides a selection of creative assets, content, and banners to ensure you're proud of the link or banner you include on your website or blog.

If you believe your blog readers or website visitors are interested in exploring web hosting platforms (for instance, if you write content for freelancers), this could be a good option to explore.

Best of all, the company promotes eco-friendly alternatives, so you can feel good knowing you're spreading a positive, "green message" to your site visitor.

This Affiliate Program is Best For

Content creators and bloggers whose audience would be interested in purchasing hosting with an eco-friendly aspect.

Best Retail Affiliate Programs

Disclaimer: Commissions for retail stores are much smaller because the purchase price is much smaller. But this also means that it's easier to get your audience to buy those items (low price = low commitment), which could translate into high conversion rates and higher returns.

28. Target

Commission: 1-8% (depending on the product category and sales volume)

Cookie life: 7 days

Payout Methods: Unknown

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sale

While it doesn't offer as wide a selection as Amazon or eBay, Target remains a highly recognizable brand with a variety of different products.

Target's affiliate program operates on a volume-based commission structure, meaning that your commission increases as the number of items purchased increases.

Sadly, a product category that does not benefit from this model is the Health and Beauty products — the commission on this category caps at 1%, regardless of volume.

It's also critical to note — most people tend to prefer buying Target products in-person, rather than online, so this could have an impact on your returns.

29. Hammacher Schlemmer

Commission: 8% on any sale

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: Direct deposit, check, or Payoneer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

Hammacher Schlemmer is America's longest-running catalog with a lifetime of over 150 years, and continues to successfully sell items ranging from electronics to outdoor living gear.

Additionally, the company offers an impressive affiliate program with the potential to earn incredibly high commissions.

They offer 8% commission on any product you're able to sell through your own website or blog. While 8% might not sound like a lot, consider some of the higher-priced items they sell, including a Muhammad Ali Autographed Photo Collage for $5,000, or the Full Immersion Professional Racer's Simulator for $65,000.

Ultimately, if you're able to find products or services on Hammacher Schlemmer's website that align well with your own core offerings or might interest your buyer persona, you might consider partnering with the brand.

Additionally, this affiliate program could be a good idea for an ecommerce business interested in expanding their offerings. Hammacher Schlemmer provides tools (including password-protected online reports) and content to help your online store succeed.

30. Spocket

Commission: 20% per Bronze subscriber; 25% per Silver subscriber; 30% per Gold subscriber (up to 445.50 per subscriber)

Cookie life: 90 days

Payout Methods: PayPal or Stripe

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $25

Spocket, a dropshipping supplier, wholesaler, and distributor of high-quality American and European products, enables entrepreneurs to sell products from thousands of dropshipping suppliers around the world.

They also offer an incredibly impressive affiliate program — you can make up to $450 for each customer you refer to Spocket, and you'll continue to collect commission off your referral's Spocket account as long as they remain a customer.

Their program will also provide you with the tools and resources you need to successfully promote their business. If your website visitors are entrepreneurs or ecommerce businesses, this is a good affiliate program to explore.

Best Beauty and Cosmetic Affiliate Programs

31. Ulta

Commission: 1-5%

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: PayPal, Check, Wire Transfer, Direct Deposit, or ACH Transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $10

Ulta is a go-to brand for beauty enthusiasts who want both affordable and prestigious skincare, makeup, and personal care products. Ulta is popular for its diverse offerings, which can cater to the tastes of a large readership.

Ulta’s affiliate program pays 1-5% in commissions. While this number may seem low, the company is ranked #2 in the beauty and cosmetics online space, meaning that your readers have likely heard of it and could even be current customers.

You are provided with dynamic banners and text links to promote Ulta’s products. The company has ongoing promotions, including free shipping and free products, to help you drive more sales.

32. Sephora

Commission: 5%

Cookie life: 24 hours

Payout Methods: PayPal, Check, or Direct Deposit

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

If you serve a more affluent readership, Sephora is the affiliate program for you. The retailer offers a wide selection of prestige beauty products, including skincare, body care, makeup, and fragrances.

Additionally, they offer a superior customer experience — for instance, they offer a free gift with any purchase and have a strong rewards program.

Sephora’s affiliate program offers a 5% commission rate on all sales, which is higher than Ulta’s and most online retailers’ commission rates. Like most programs, Sephora gives affiliates access to promotional banners and other creative assets, which you can use on your site and social media accounts.

The only downside to this program is that the cookie length is uncommonly short: The cookie will expire just 24 hours after the user clicks on the affiliate link.

33. FragranceNet.com

Commission: 1-5%

Cookie life: Unknown

Payout Methods: PayPal, Check, or Direct Deposit

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

A leader in the online perfume space, FragranceNet.com gives you access to hundreds and thousands of top designer fragrances and aromatherapy products. It sells other products, too, such as skincare and makeup.

However, due to its specialization in fragrances, we recommend it for bloggers who primarily write about fragrances.

Affiliates earn 1-5% for every purchase generated through their link. The brand gives you access to links and banners, fresh blog content, seasonal ads, and coupon codes to drive your referral to a conversion. The program is run through the Rakuten platform.

34. BH Cosmetics

Commission: 8%

Cookie life: 60 days

Payout Methods: PayPal, Check, or Direct Deposit

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

Born and raised in LA, BH Cosmetics is one of the leading companies in the beauty industry. They are passionate about creating new and innovative beauty trends and dedicated to bringing customers the best in cruelty-free cosmetics. They also run promotions and sales regularly to help convert those leads.

BH Cosmetics affiliates receive an 8% commission on purchases made within 60 days of the user's visit. The site has an average order value of $38 and an on-site conversion rate of 6.46%.

As an affiliate, you'll get exclusive access to coupons and banners you can use on your website, blog, or emails. You’ll also receive monthly affiliate newsletters. Plus, their dedicated in-house affiliate team runs monthly incentives and affiliate contests to encourage you to promote your affiliate link.

Best Travel Affiliate Programs

35. Boatbookings

Commission: 20% + 10% for returning customers

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: Bank transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: One sale

If you think your website visitors might be interested in chartering yachts, you might want to join Boatbookings' affiliate program. Boatbookings specializes in luxury yacht chartering, boat rentals, and sailing and motor yacht vacations.

On the charter value of a boat, Boatbookings receives commission on the net charter value (not including APA or any additional items ordered).

On this commission, affiliates will earn 20% as a base rate, with a possibility for escalating rates if referring multiple clients. When customers return to Boatbookings, affiliates receive an additional 10% commission on that second purchase.

36. Cheapflights

Commission: Up to 50% per click-out

Cookie life: Session

Payout Methods: Bank transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $500

Cheapflights is a travel comparison site that helps users find the cheapest plane tickets.

Cheapflights is another company that rewards its affiliates not for bringing paying customers, but for sending traffic to their partners.

Affiliates are paid a flat fee when a user clicks through — $0.45 per click-out for desktop and tablet, and $0.25 for mobile.

As an affiliate, you get access to various creative assets, ranging from banners to search boxes and travel widgets, that allow your visitors to conduct a search on your site and display flight results on Cheapflights' page. This is their most popular travel affiliate tool and generates the highest revenue per visit.

37. Momondo

Commission: Flat rate — up to $0.65 per click-out

Cookie life: Session

Payout Methods: Bank transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $500

Momondo is a global travel search site that compares cheap flights, hotels, and car rental deals.

Each time someone clicks on a flight on Momondo's website from your site's link, you will earn $0.65 for desktop and tablet users, and $0.45 for mobile users.

38. Sandals Resorts

Commission: 4%

Cookie life: 60 days

Payout Methods: Direct deposit, check, or Payoneer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $50

Sandals is one of the most well-recognized names in Caribbean resort travel. All Sandals Resorts offer luxurious vacations for couples and families traveling to Jamaica, The Bahamas, Barbados, and more.

The Sandals affiliate program pays you a commission for referring users to book either a stay in one of the Sandals Resorts, or booking an activity.

While 4% might seem like a small percentage, these luxury resorts have daily rates that range from $150 to over $2,000 per person — which means, if a couple were to book a romantic week in a Sandals Resort at $500 per person per night, you would earn a commission of $280!

This program is only worthwhile, however, if your site and audience has a true interest in luxury travel to the Caribbean.

Best Personal Finance and Investment Affiliate Programs

39. Acorns

Commission: $10 per qualified lead

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: PayPal, Check, Wire Transfer, Direct Deposit, or ACH Transfer

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: $10

Acorn is a “micro-investing” mobile app that helps people between the ages of 25 and 35 invest their money wisely. If you own a financial advice blog that serves this demographic — especially if they haven’t yet accrued capital or assets — this is the affiliate program for you.

Affiliates receive $10 for every referred customer. You’ll receive a wide variety of creative assets to help you promote the app and a dedicated account manager to help you boost your marketing efforts.

40. Sage Financials

Commission: 7% per sale and $5 per free trial

Cookie life: 30 days

Payout Methods: Direct deposit

Minimum Sales Threshold Before Payout: Unknown

Sage Financials — a cloud accounting solution built on Salesforce that provides accounting, analytics, and reporting tools for small and mid-sized businesses — has an impressive affiliate program that includes a dedicated support team, commission paid directly into your bank account (and currency of choice), and detailed reporting on your performance and earnings.

Best of all, you're able to receive commission even from free sign-ups Sage receives from your website or blog. If you feel your website visitors or blog readers are interested in accounting tools, this could be a good partnership to explore.

Now that we’ve gone over some of the best affiliate programs overall, let’s go over the programs that pay the highest commission.

Best High-Paying Affiliate Program

Semrush: $200 per Subscription

Liquid Web: $150 Per Sale

Coursera: Up to 45% Per Sale

BigCommerce: 200% per Sale

Shift4Shop: $5 - $25 per Signup

Flywheel: 300% per Signup

TripAdvisor: Minimum 50% per Booking

Volusion: 200% per Signup

Invoice Ninja: 50% per Signup

Capitalist Exploits: 50% per Sale

1. Semrush: $200 per Subscription

Commission: $200 per subscription, $10 per free trial, and $0.01 per new sign up

Cookie life: 10 years

Semrush is a SaaS company that specializes in SEO and competitive analysis tools for digital marketers. Its affiliate program offers $200 per subscription, so if you refer 10 people only, you’ll be bringing in $2,000 per month. Plus, they offer a very generous 10-year cookie life.

Since Semrush’s affiliate program functions under a first cookie attribution model, if a referral were to cancel their subscription and sign up again in the future (within 10 years), you still get a commission on that second subscription.

Exclusive Semrush promotional material is available in five different languages, and applicants are automatically pre-approved, so the sign-up process is only a few minutes, enabling you to get started right away.

2. Liquid Web: $150% Per Sale

Commission: $150 per sale, or 150% of managed hosting cost

Cookie life: 90 days

Liquid Web is a web hosting and cloud management service provider. They offer a range of dedicated servers, WordPress server plans, and virtual private servers (VPS) for 45,000 customers across 150 countries.

Liquid Web affiliates earn 150% of the monthly hosting cost with a $150 minimum. Depending on the plan selected, affiliates can earn several hundred dollars per sale. For example, if you get a $400 per month Dedicated plan customer, you would earn a $600 commission, vs $150 if you referred a $29 managed wordpress site plan. There’s also a 50% bonus for prepaid plans.

Affiliates also have access to a dedicated support team, custom landing pages, and get advanced of exclusive promotions.

3. Coursera: Up to 45% Per Sale

Commission: 10-45%

Cookie life: 30 days

Coursera offers over 1,000 courses and specializations ranging anywhere from Digital Marketing to Applied Data Science and Personal Development. Each course consists of pre-recorded videos, puzzles, and assignments.

Coursera's affiliate program runs on the Linkshare network and offers a commission ranging from 10% to 45% with bonuses for strong performance. Courses and Specializations are generally priced between $29 and $99. As a Coursera affiliate, you get access to professionally-designed banners and a monthly affiliate newsletter with curated content recommendations.

4. BigCommerce: 200% per Sale

Commission: 200% or $1,500 per enterprise customer

Cookie life: 90 days

Founded in 2009, BigCommerce is an online store builder that powers thousands of e-commerce stores in over 150 countries. It serves a wide variety of industries, including

fashion, automotive, manufacturing, food, and health.

When you refer visitors to BigCommerce, you earn 200% of the customer's first monthly payment (that's up to $500 per referral!), or $1,500 per enterprise customer.

5. Shift4Shop: $5 - $25 per Signup

Commission: $5 - $25 per Signup

Cookie life: 120 days

Shift4Shop is an e-commerce platform with a high focus on SEO. It provides you with all the tools you need to build, promote, and grow your online store. Users can use Shift4Shop to start an online business, add a shopping cart to an existing site, or replace their current shopping cart platform.

Affiliates earn a commission from $5 to $25 on each referred customer and have access to a wide range of marketing tools and content, including banner images, affiliate marketing-specific newsletters, and more. Affiliates are also put in touch with a dedicated affiliate manager for guidance. Shift4Shop’s affiliate program runs on the ShareASale network.

6. Flywheel: 300% per Signup

Commission: 300%, up to $500 per referral

Cookie life: 90 days

As another dedicated WordPress hosting solution, Flywheel aims to take away all the hassle that comes with web hosting so users can focus on doing what they do best — creating and designing websites.

Flywheel affiliates can earn up to $500 per referral. You get access to tons of creative assets, from banners to co-branded landing pages to stylish social images. The Flywheel team will even work with you to create custom images that can take your commissions to the next level.

It's worth noting that there is no minimum threshold limit to receive a payment.

7. TripAdvisor: Minimum 50% per Booking

Commission: Minimum 50% per booking

Cookie life: 14 days

Crowned the "world's largest travel site", TripAdvisor provides travelers with the wisdom of the crowds to help them decide where to stay, how to fly, what to do, and where to eat. The site helps you compare prices from 200+ hotel booking sites so you can find the lowest price on the hotel that's right for you.

Powered by Commission Junction, TripAdvisor's affiliate program pays a 50% commission off the revenue generated from a user clicking on links and/or ads that send them to a TripAdvisor partner site. Which means, unlike most other affiliate programs in this list, you don't have to wait for your referral to make a purchase to earn your commission. As soon as someone comes from your website and clicks on one of the ads or links on the TripAdvisor website, you get paid.

On average, affiliates will earn between $0.15-$0.75 per click-out. While it may not seem like a lot, since your revenue is only dependent on clicks (and not purchase), this can add up quite nicely.

8. Volusion: 200% per Signup

Commission: 200% per Signup

Cookie life: 45 days

Volusion is an e-commerce solution that enables small businesses to create, manage, and expand their online stores. They provide customers with exports to help them every step of the way, including help with domain purchase, web design, cart integration, SEO, and security.

Affiliates get paid a 200% commission on the referred customer's first monthly payment, which can range anywhere from $29 to $299 (or even higher with their Prime custom tier). As an affiliate, you get access to marketing material to assist in your promotional efforts.

9. Invoice Ninja: 50% per Signup

Commission: 50% on all referrals for four years

Cookie life: N/A; instead of cookie, Invoice Ninja tracks by account creation from referral URL (for four years)

Invoice Ninja, a free open-source invoicing app for freelancers and businesses, offers a Ninja Pro Plan for just $10 a month — and, as an affiliate partner, you can make 50% on all referrals for four years. That means, if you refer 100 Pro users, you'll receive $5,000 every year for the next four years.

Additionally, any user can start free and upgrade when they decide it's worthwhile, so it's easy for your site visitors to give the tool a try. You can provide their affiliate link in your email signature, on a blog post, or in an email newsletter, and Invoice Ninja provides both logos and ads to make it easy to promote their tool. If your social media followers or website visitors are typically online entrepreneurs or freelancers, this could be a good partnership to consider.

10. Capitalist Exploits: 50% per Sale

Commission: 50%

Cookie life: 365 days

Capitalist Exploits provides trade recommendations for investors and anyone looking to outperform the market by sharing only the best low-risk/high-reward opportunities to subscribers.

If your target audience consists of investors, high net-worth individuals, people interested in investment, financial advisors, or wealth managers, then this program might be for you.

Capitalist Exploits pays a 50% commission on any referred sale with absolutely no limits. Their products range from $1,575 to $3,499. This means each referral brings you a minimum of $787.50. Affiliates also receive exclusive access to paid membership trials for your audience.

Affiliate Networks

Can’t decide on which affiliate program to try first? Consider joining an affiliate network. Instead of offering products from only one company, affiliate networks act as a marketplace and provide a larger pool of brands and offers to choose from. This option may appeal to beginner affiliate marketers because you don’t have to manage as many partnerships at once. Plus, there’s no limit on how many affiliate networks you can join, so the possibilities are endless.

Are you a blogger or small business who would like to join an affiliate program to generate income? Below, we’ll explore the top affiliate programs that you can join.

Best Affiliate Marketing Networks

Amazon Associates

eBay Partner Network

Rakuten Advertising

PartnerStack

CJ Affiliate

ShareASale

FlexOffers

1. Amazon Associates

Commission: 1-10% (depending on the product category)

Cookie life: 24 hours

Amazon is one of the most popular online shopping platforms, so if you're looking to buy something, chances are you'll find it on Amazon.

Amazon Associates get commissions between 1% and 10%, depending on the category the product purchased falls under. The most valuable items to promote are clothes and luxury beauty products, both of which can earn you a 10% cut on the price.

One of the main advantages of doing affiliate marketing with Amazon is that people already know the company and love to shop there, so it's not a hard sell. The company has very high conversion rates, especially around the holidays. And because the product selection is so vast, it fits most kinds of businesses.

If you write about animals, for instance, you can promote cat treats or dog toys. If your audience is interested in cars, you can recommend jumper cables — you get the idea.

Additionally, if someone ends up on Amazon through your link and buys something other than what your content links to, you still get commission on the user's entire cart.

Ultimately, the only downside is some categories have particularly low commissions, such as video games and electronics.

For businesses with large audiences, Amazon recently launched its new Amazon Influencer Program as an extension to the Associates program for social media influencers.

You get similar benefits to the online Associates program, as well as your own page on Amazon with a unique URL to showcase the products you recommend to your followers.

Currently, you must have a YouTube, Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook account to qualify. Amazon looks at the number of followers and other engagement metrics of your social media accounts to determine whether you're eligible for the program.

2. eBay Partner Network

Commission: 1-4%, depending on the category

Cookie life: 24 hours

With over one billion listings from a wide range of product categories, eBay's affiliate program shares a lot of the same advantages as Amazon's — well-known brand, high conversion rates, and a diverse selection of products.

The eBay Partner Network pays a commission of 1% to 4%. You earn a percentage of the revenue eBay earns from that purchase, based on the product category.

High-ticket items you can promote fall under Parts & Accessories, or Fashion. You can have a look at the complete rate card here. The one downside of this program is that it offers a cap for each category — with most falling well under $1,000. Your earning potential is thus limited.

3. Rakuten Advertising

Commission: Depends on the merchant

Cookie life: Depends on the merchant

Formerly known as Linkshare, Rakuten is one of the oldest affiliate networks in the game. Because Rakuten has been a trusted name in affiliate marketing for so long, it has been able to establish partnerships with some of the biggest brands in the world including Sephora, New Balance, and JetBlue.

Despite Rakuten’s impressive partner roster, it only has partnerships with around 1,000 merchants — which is far less than other competing networks.

Still, if you’re a small business or new to affiliate marketing, it may be advantageous to sign up with Rakuten so you can get access to affiliate offers from brands your audience recognizes.

Like many other affiliate networks, commission rates vary based on the product and what merchant it comes from.

4. PartnerStack

Commission: Depends on the merchant (average is 25% recurring)

Cookie life: Depends on the merchant (typically 90 days)

PartnerStack is the go-to affiliate network for B2B technology partnerships.

When you join the network, you’ll gain exclusive access to some of the world’s most reputable and top-paying B2B affiliate marketing programs like Gorgias, Sendoso, and Webflow.

If you’re new to B2B affiliate marketing, it operates very similarly to B2C affiliate marketing — except the commissions are usually higher and typically paid out for longer. Think recurring revenue of 20-100% of a sale for the lifetime of the customer you helped create.

Through the in-app dashboard, you’ll be able to easily monitor your performance across all of the programs that you are currently part of. Built-in partner engagement features like challenges, in-app messaging, learning materials, etc… allow for more connectivity and engagement with the partner program managers.

Like with other affiliate networks, you will need to apply to each individual partner program separately, but you’ll be paid out altogether once a month via Paypal or Stripe once you hit the network’s $5 payout threshold.

If you are looking to work with top-tier B2B companies that provide higher commission and conversion rates, the PartnerStack Network should be the first place you start your search for affiliate marketing programs.

5. CJ Affiliate

Commission: Depends on the merchant

Cookie life: Depends on the merchant

CJ Affiliate (formerly known as Commission Junction) is one of the most popular affiliate networks out there, holding 7.69% of the market share.

One of the benefits of using CJ Affiliates is its selection of brand partnerships which cover many verticals including retail, travel, finance, and network & home services. Currently CJ partners with over 3,800 brands including household names such as Barnes & Noble, Office Depot, J.Crew, and Blue Apron.

6. ShareASale

Commission: Depends on the merchant

Cookie life: Depends on the merchant

ShareASale partners with thousands of merchants of all types, so finding the right affiliate product is a breeze — no matter what your niche is. Some of its most well-known brand partners are Etsy, Reebok, and Warby Parker.

After joining the network, you have to apply to the individual merchants you want to use. Once approved, you’ll be able to generate affiliate links and view sales stats on the ShareASale dashboard.

Because of the wide variety of products and merchants available, commission rates vary.

7. FlexOffers

Commission: Depends on the merchant

Cookie life: Depends on the merchant

FlexOffers has an impressive affiliate database that is comprised of over 10,000 ad partners from over 65 networks. It partners with some of the biggest retailers on the planet including Samsung, Nike, Microsoft, and Macy’s.

FlexOffers’ easy-to-use dashboard includes access to over 650 million products so you can find the offer that works best for you. Once you find the product you’re looking for, you can then take advantage of its automated affiliate links so you don’t have to create it manually.

Commission rates vary based on the merchant and publishers are paid every month on NET 60 terms, meaning that each month’s commissions are processed 60 days after the last day of the month.

Ultimately, when deciding which program to choose, there are many key elements to keep in mind, including how established your online following is, and how much you want to earn.

And, most importantly — who is your audience, and what are they interested in?

Think about what your website visitors or your social media followers need and could benefit from, and choose an affiliate marketing program that will let you promote products in support of that. Once you do that, you’ll be well on your way to exponentially multiplying your affiliate income.

Editor's note: This post was originally published in April 2019 and has been updated for comprehensiveness.

Topics:Referral Marketing

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Consistently, a large number of distributers benefit from a common money inflow by banding together up with different organizations through partner programs.

Partner showcasing is one of the most amazing ways of adapting your blog, particularly when you don't sell items or administrations. Joining a member program can get you selective admittance to new happy and exceptional arrangements for your crowd — all while bringing in you more cash.

Download Now: Free Associate Promoting Formats

There are many sorts of partner programs, going from online courses to web designers to advertising and business members. Here, we will investigate the best subsidiary projects with the most noteworthy acquiring potential to guarantee you can bring in cash off the substance you give.

Above all — what precisely is a partner program?

What is an Associate Program?

An offshoot program is an understanding where a business pays one more business or powerhouse ('the subsidiary') a commission for sending traffic or potentially deals their direction. This can be accomplished through web content, virtual entertainment, or an item mix.

To additionally comprehend partner programs, how about we think about a model. Wirecutter.com, a New York Times organization, is a site that rundowns item proposals for customers. Wirecutter generally acquires commission in view of partner associations with retailers.

The distribution's partner adaptation model could make you question the authenticity of its proposals — however, truth be told, it's an incredible inverse.

Wirecutter possibly makes commission when a peruser buys an item from a partner retailer and doesn't return the item. Wirecutter, then, has no motivating force to advance second rate items. In the event that they did, they'd get less cash-flow and dismiss perusers.

How do offshoots bring in cash?

The partner gets an exceptional connection (an "member interface") from which snaps can be followed — ordinarily utilizing treats. The treat then tracks the client to check whether they make a buy. In the event that they do inside a designated measure of time, the associate will acquire commission.

Every treat has a "length" or "treat life", which essentially characterizes how long the treat will follow the client's web-based movement.

For instance, on the off chance that a treat has a 30-day life, your reference needs to make a buy in no less than 30-days of clicking your subsidiary connection for you to get compensated — generally the lead will at this point not be identifiable.

Assuming you're keen on beginning an associate program, there are various kinds of member projects, and you'll need to pick the one most ideal for your business. How about we plunge into the sorts of associate projects, next.

Included Asset

Member Promoting Formats

Finish up the structure to get to these formats.

Open structure

Howdy 👋 What's your name?

First Name

Last Name

Hello invalid, what's your email address?

Email Address

Furthermore, your telephone number?

Telephone Number

What is your organization's name and site?

Organization

Site

What number of representatives work there?

What number of representatives work there?

1

Get Your Free Layouts

Sorts of Partner Projects

On the off chance that you're hoping to advance items or administrations, there are a couple of subsidiary projects you can consider. While picking a subsidiary program, you'll need to remember the roads or stages where your crowd invests most of their energy.

For example, does your purchaser persona commonly peruse blog entries, scroll Facebook, or use web indexes while investigating new items?

On the other hand, is your purchaser persona somebody who's continuously searching for a reasonable setup, and could see the value in a connection on a coupon site? Or on the other hand would they say they are more keen on doing lots of examination prior to buying, putting forth your advancement attempts more beneficial on a survey site?

While those are questions you'll need to consider for yourself, we should investigate a few general kinds of member programs so you can start conceptualizing expected roads for your own showcasing endeavors:

Search Partners

With this program, advertisers pay their own cash to advance partner offers on query items or other web based promoting stages like Facebook Publicizing. This is an extraordinary choice for advertisers with a Website optimization foundation and need to A/B test to see which promotions bring about the most references — and return for money invested.

Force to be reckoned with Projects

On the off chance that you're a blogger or web-based entertainment powerhouse who draws in with a particular crowd, consider cooperating with an organization whose items would speak to them.

For example, assuming you are a food blogger or YouTube powerhouse who makes recipe content, consider cooperating with an organization that sells kitchen machines by highlighting their item in your substance in return for commission for each item sold through your offshoot connect.

In a perfect world, this would bring about extra income in the event that your crowd loves the items you're advancing.

Survey Locales

Blind purchasing items online can be overwhelming for customers, which is the reason they frequently go to audit destinations during the purchaser's excursion so they can lead research prior to buying.

Audit locales cooperate with individual organizations or partner organizations to survey items and administrations in return for an associate connection.

Coupon Destinations

Like survey destinations, coupon locales cooperate with organizations to furnish purchasers with limits on items and administrations in return for a payoff.

Email Promoting

This is best in little portions. You would rather not convey mass messages to a crowd of people who isn't keen on advanced items or administrations. Notwithstanding, with appropriate thought for who's getting the email, this could be a viable technique.

For example, in the event that you work for a promoting organization, you could cooperate with an organization that sells configuration devices and incorporate a subsidiary inside messages you ship off plan clients. This could assist your clients with making more excellent substance while giving an additional wellspring of income.

Best Subsidiary Projects

HubSpot

Elementor

Moosend

AWeber

Sendinblue

ConvertKit

GetResponse

Fiverr

Pabbly

Unbounce

Steady Contact

Systeme.io

Typeform

Grow out of

Instapage

Thinkific

Kajabi

Workable

iSpring

Shopify

Leadpages

Wix

WP Motor

Kinsta

Bluehost

Hostgator

GreenGeeks

Target

Hammacher Schlemmer

Spocket

Ulta

Sephora

FragranceNet.com

BH Beauty care products

Boatbookings

Cheapflights

Momondo

Shoes Resorts

Oak seeds

Sage Financials

Try not have opportunity and energy to glance through the projects in general? We've isolated this rundown into a few subsections:

Best Promoting and Business Associate Projects

Best Internet based Course Associate Projects

Best Web designer Offshoot Projects

Best Web Facilitating Offshoot Projects

Best Retail Offshoot Projects

Best Magnificence and Corrective Offshoot Projects

Best Travel Offshoot Projects

Best Individual accounting and Venture Partner Projects

Best Lucrative Subsidiary Projects

How about we begin.

Best Promoting and Business Associate Projects

1. HubSpot

Commission: 15% repeating for 1 year or 100 percent of the main month's income

Treat life: 90 days

Payout Strategies: Your favored technique

Least Deals Limit Before Payout: One sign-up

HubSpot's central goal is to assist a great many associations with developing better. HubSpot's honor winning CRM stage — which is included Promoting Center point, Deals Center, Administration Center, CMS Center, and Tasks Center point, and a strong free CRM — gives great many organizations the devices they need to deal with the client experience — as far as possible from attention to backing.

As a HubSpot subsidiary, you have the decision between a 15% repeating rate for as long as one year or a level rate relating to 100 percent of the primary month's income.

HubSpot's arrangements range from $50 as far as possible up to $3,000+ each month. Furthermore, it is entirely expected for clients to buy more than each item in turn. So these payouts could rapidly add up.

At the point when you join HubSpot's member program, you get sufficiently close to a huge innovative stock, including demo recordings, standards, and duplicate models, all intended to assist you with procuring the most potential commission. Furthermore, you can develop a one-on-one relationship with the HubSpot offshoot group, whose individuals are undeniably committed to assisting you with succeeding.

This Partner Program is Best For

Bloggers, distributers, and content designers who offer substance about promoting, deals, administration, site, and activities for private ventures, endeavors, and individual experts. This might incorporate any subtopics, for example, online entertainment advertising or inbound deals strategies.

If you have an enormous business crowd or need to adapt your substance, then our offshoot program is reasonable appropriate for you. (You can study HubSpot by perusing HubSpot surveys.)

2. Elementor

Commission: half per deal

Treat life: 45 days

Payout Strategies: PayPal or your favored strategy

Least Deals Limit Before Payout: $200

Elementor is a powerful intuitive web designer used to make over 7% of the relative multitude of world's sites. With many gadgets, combinations, site formats, and configuration instruments, Elementor clients can tweak and scale their WordPress site building process without composing a solitary line of code.

One of a kind among WordPress web designers, Elementor currently offers cloud facilitating highlights, too.

However, Elementor is more than straightforward programming — it has 100k individuals in its web-based local area where web makers share counsel, have meetups, and push each other to proficient development.

Elementor associates acquire half per deal. The product has five estimating bundles, going from $49 to $999 each year. This expansive cluster of evaluating levels makes it more straightforward for subsidiaries to advertise different designs to explicit crowds in a calculated manner.

With striking members procuring north of $10,000 every month, Elementor is an appealing choice to consider.

This Member Program is Best For

Bloggers, distributers, and content makers who offer substance about website architecture, WordPress, and computerized creation. It's additionally a fantastic fit for organizations, teachers, business visionaries, and even engineers who'd like their clients to buy a variant of Elementor.

3. Moosend

The most effective method to Begin Associate Showcasing in 2023 (7 Basic Advances)

Great many autonomous makers, business visionaries, and online distributions use subsidiary advertising to drive millions in income each and every month.

So do enormously regarded sites, for example, the New York Times, Forbes and NerdWallet.

What's more, as per Statista, spend on subsidiary showcasing programs by organizations developed to $8.2 billion in the US the year before. That is up 76% over the most recent 6 years alone.

In any case, getting a cut of the billion-dollar pie isn't quite so basic as slapping a couple of partner joins on your blog.

As a matter of fact, most fledglings who attempt subsidiary promoting neglect to see the monetary outcomes they were guaranteed by incalculable web journals and recordings on the web.

Peruse on to keep away from normal slip-ups that keep novices down, in addition to the main partner promoting tips to assist you with becoming effective, sooner.

Here is our manual for start associate advertising the correct way:

Research your specialty

Pick the right stage

Pick beneficial subsidiary projects

Make advanced subsidiary substance

Direct people to your offshoot site

Construct a basic partner promoting channel

Track and increment your offshoot deals

On the whole, a couple of subsidiary showcasing essentials you want to be aware.

What is subsidiary showcasing?

Offshoot promoting is a plan of action where brands share income with distributers and content makers in return for leads and deals. It works much the same way to a sales rep being paid a commission for an effective deal.

The more deals you make, the more cash you procure. Partner commissions can go from pennies on the dollar to many dollars per reference. Done well, partner promoting could assist you with procuring more than your present place of employment or differentiate the income of a current substance business.

This is an outline of the way partner promoting works:

You share an offshoot connect on your site, blog, or in a virtual entertainment post

A client clicks your partner interface

Client is diverted to the promoter site

Client is followed as being alluded by you through a treat

Client makes a buy

An offshoot network credits the buy to you and issues a commission

Commissions show up in your member dashboard

You get compensated (!) by the member organization

There is no single profile for an effective partner advertiser. They range from autonomous business people to groups at notable media sources and online distributions.

What's more, since you're not liable for the conveyance of an item or administration, member showcasing is generally safe. You needn't bother with a degree in showcasing or a particular capabilities to be an effective member advertiser. With the right assets, nearly anybody can produce partner income.

In this day and age, the progress of a member relies vigorously upon their capacity to catch a crowd of people and draw in the right sort of rush hour gridlock. To do that without anyone else's help, you want to create quality substance and enhance it for change.

Furthermore, everything begins with understanding and making subsidiary connections.

What is an offshoot interface?

The primary way offshoot showcasing works is through member joins. Offshoot joins are identifiable connections with an interesting URL doled out explicitly to you. They assist promoters with realizing that you sent them a particular client, so they can pay you a commission in the event that that client makes a buy.

Here is an illustration of the design of a regular partner interface:

The main thing to be aware as a fledgling is that to procure a commission, the client who converts needs to get through your one of a kind member interface.

Then, at that point, there's the manner in which you procure your bonuses. Generally, there are two primary models for procuring subsidiary income:

CPA (Cost Per Activity): You procure each time somebody from your crowd finishes an activity. Contingent upon the program, the activity could be making a buy, beginning a free preliminary, or finishing up a structure with contact data.

CPC (Cost Per Snap): You get compensated for taps the promoter views as quality guests, regardless of whether they complete a particular activity.

Different associate projects will offer different installment models, and some might try and pay you for the two leads and transformations. We'll cover how to pick great member programs later in this aide.

While you're here, the following are a couple more key subsidiary promoting terms you ought to get to know. These will likewise assist you with picking offshoot programs with a high procuring potential:

Treats: Treats are little records that are put away on a client's gadget when they click a member connect. They help organizations and offshoot networks recollect that you alluded the client to them, so they can give you a commission later on.

Treat term: Treats ordinarily have lapse dates. Member joins will quite often have termination dates between 15 to 30 days, however they can run for just 24 hours as long as a year or more. Treat length matters to subsidiary advertisers since clients might return to a buy days or weeks after a client first taps on a member connect.

Subsidiary organizations: Brands regularly set up their member programs on outsider stages called Associate Organizations. These stages bring brands and member advertisers together. There are many member organizations, with the most well known including Effect, Flexoffers, Clickbank, PartnerStack and Rakuten.

Is subsidiary promoting worth the effort?

As a member advertiser, your acquiring potential is limitless. What's more, what number of individuals can say that?

The amount you acquire relies upon you, your picked specialty and your capacity to streamline your substance and income streams. However, that doesn't imply that most subsidiary advertisers wind up becoming web-based tycoons.

As per PayScale, the typical Offshoot Advertiser acquires somewhere in the range of $3,000 and $6,000 each month (or, $36K to $72K every year).

Also, the top 1% of workers create many thousands or even a huge number of dollars each month. They will generally be full-time associate advertisers with devoted groups, and quite a long while of involvement.

In any case, you don't need to go max speed to make a practical business. The most amazing aspect of associate showcasing is that it can enhance your 9-5 pay from the very beginning.

What's more, with enough persistence and commitment — supplant it totally.

7 moves toward begin with offshoot showcasing

The greatest, loosely held bit of information to member showcasing is that your procuring potential is exceptionally subject to the specialty you pick. That is, what sort of crowd you need to serve and the kinds of items that crowd needs to purchase. So you want to know what to search for in a specialty prior to sending off your member showcasing business.

Here are the means you really want to get right all along:

Stage 1. Pick a specialty in view of examination

Hurrying to get the furthest down the line prevailing fashions can prompt difficulty when these patterns end quicker than they show up (twirly gigs, anybody?).

Doing specialty research is everything thing you can manage to ensure your member business has high bringing in potential and will make cash long into the future.

Simultaneously, you'll break down the serious scene, find out about offshoot programs accessible in your specialty, and have the option to make a reasonable subsidiary promoting procedure and content arrangement.

Here is an outline of the specialty research process:

Assuming you're searching for specialty thoughts, there are a lot of free specialty research devices that will assist you with getting this show on the road. Only rapidly, the following are three well known instruments for specialty research:

Google Patterns - Moving points and searches, coordinated by geology

Answer Socrates - Figure out which questions individuals type into Google

Detonating Subjects - A Google Patterns elective with organized results

All things considered, on the off chance that you're beginning partner promoting with no cash or a little financial plan, I suggest picking a point you're enthusiastic about. Like that, you will not get exhausted or disdain your specialty while you're composing 50+ articles on the subject.

However, a point you like isn't sufficient — it should have the option to bring in cash.

Once more, apparatuses like Google Patterns are great for verifying specialties that you find and ensuring they're not simply passing patterns. More then likely, you will need to pick an evergreen specialty which creates pay the entire year, consistently.

At long last, it's likewise vital to comprehend the opposition to find your entrance point into the market.

You should begin a blog about web facilitating (one of the most worthwhile partner specialties), however how much capital and content it removes to contend may be from go after novices.

Search for medium-rivalry specialties, where there are a couple of laid out players, yet you can more readily serve a more modest crowd, separate yourself, and grow later on.

For instance, rather than "web facilitating" for everybody, you could begin with "salon web designer" and spotlight on showing experts in the magnificence business. By beginning specialty, you can construct a very close local area around your image and even increase a benefit in positioning on Google.

Further perusing: Specialty Exploration: 5 Moves toward Tracking down Productive Member Specialties

Stage 2. Pick the right stage

In view of a specialty, now is the ideal time to choose where to have your partner content and what kind of satisfied you need to make.

There are two primary decisions for partners beginning: a site or a YouTube channel.

YouTube can be a brilliant spot to grow a group of people, fabricate a brand, and elevate member items to a group of people that confides in your suggestions.

Be that as it may, there are a few drawbacks to beginning with just a YouTube channel:

Video takes more time to create than composed content. Which restricts how much happy you can make while beginning your task.

Recordings are more diligently to rethink. Particularly assuming you're the essence of the channel, it implies you'll should be associated with each video.

Harder to develop your email list. YouTube doesn't have an implicit method for gathering email endorsers. However email is one of the best channels for subsidiary promoting.