No matter what product or service we are talking about, marketing is one of the most important areas that every online business needs to plan properly. Without appropriate strategies, there is no way one can reach out to the target audience and make an unforgettable impact. Several types of marketing are there that one can get engaged in. but, it is affiliate marketing which has proven to be quite beneficial for both the businesses and the marketers.
One can implement an affiliate marketing strategy using various ways like SMO, SEO, and others. However, it is the PPC affiliate marketing that has proven to be more useful and high yielding as compared to other mediums. In the following article, we will be focusing on how affiliate marketing and PPC are related. Also, we will talk about how to merge these techniques together for a fruitful implementation.
What is affiliate marketing and how it’s done?
Before we discuss any other topic, first we need to focus on explaining what affiliate marketing is and what is the job of an affiliate.
Affiliate marketing is a concept based on revenue sharing. Here, the marketer is an individual person or a group who works disconnectedly from the brand. They are not associated with one particular brand solely. The job of an affiliate is to promote a product, a service, or the brand itself on various platforms like social media, search engines, and so on.
In this type of marketing, the audience will first know about the brand or the product from the advertisements posted by the affiliate. If they are convinced, they will discover further where they will be led to the brand’s official website. On purchasing the product or availing the service, the business will gain revenue. And, it is this revenue which will be shared with the affiliate based on a certain commission percentage.
For a successful affiliate marketing strategy, three pillars need to work harmoniously. These pillars are:
- The merchants who are basically the businesses themselves
- The affiliates who work independently as a bridge between the business and the audience
- The consumers who are the target audience
What is PPC in digital marketing?
PPC or Pay Per Click is basically a mode of internet marketing. Here, an advertiser will post an ad for which he wouldn’t have to pay like one has to do in traditional advertising. Rather, in PPC, the advertiser needs to pay a certain fee when their ad will get one click. As the PPC ads will direct the traffic to the brand’s website, this internet marketing is a method to buy visits. So, you won’t have to rely completely on the probability of organic advertisements.
Often you will see that when searching something on Google, you will get several advertisement links at the top. These ads are relevant to the topic you are searching for. If you click on the ad link, you will be directed to the product page or service page without any third-party medium. As you will click the link, the advertiser needs to pay for that click, thereby buying your visit.
What is PPC affiliate marketing?
Affiliate marketing can be done in four ways-
- Pay per click affiliate
- Pay per lead affiliate
- Pay per impression affiliate
- Pay per action affiliate
Out of these four ways, today we will be focusing on the pay per click affiliate.
Affiliate marketing provides an interactive medium to the audience. Hence, they can learn more about the product or the service and visit the website. Now, if you are using advertisements as a strategy to increase your reach in the market, you will have to pay a certain fee for the clicks. However, the fee will be charged only for those clicks that will be converted into leads for the business. This is how the pay-per-click affiliate programs are arranged.
How to implement PPC affiliate marketing for better results?
Every marketing technique will need a proper strategy. Without a plan, you cannot proceed successfully and meet the goals. The same is with PPC affiliate marketing. For implementing the technique, you need to know the right ways for doing so. And that’s what we will talk about in the following section.
Selection of the niche
No matter what, the first step of every type of affiliate marketing starts with the selection of the niche. Almost all the industries implement affiliate marketing for gaining more leads and it has proven to be highly profitable. But the same can’t be said about the affiliate. One might not be comfortable with travel works and if the affiliate is choosing the niche, the productivity will be put at stake. Hence, as an affiliate, it’s your duty to ensure that the niche chosen is your strong point. After all if the first step is not taken correctly, you won’t be able to walk forward without tripping over at every step.
Laying organic PPC first
You may get confused if you are going to spend money on advertisement marketing, what is the use of laying down an organic structure at first. Well, for a successful PPC affiliate marketing for beginners, it is best to explore your ability to draw traffic via organic ads. As you won’t have to pay anything for organic marketing, there is no harm if you try and fail in your strategy. At least, you will know that the same plan won’t work for your PPC affiliate marketing where you will have to pay the fees.
Proceeding with keyword research
Your next task will be to proceed with keyword research but only when the organic marketing strategy has worked out. We have already explained previously that when a targeted audience will search a keyword on the search engine, your ad will be displayed provided you have used the same keyword. Hence, it is mandatory for every affiliate marketer planning the PPC strategy to start keyword research early. If you are including irrelevant words and phrases, you will never be able to drive the traffic to your post, let alone build traffic for the merchant. You can use keyword generation tools that will display all the top results as per your niche.
Choosing the advertisement platform
Be it for pay-per-impression affiliate programs or the PPC affiliate programs, you need to select a proper advertisement platform. Starting from social media to search engines, you will have several options in hand. Now it will depend on you as to which platform will be profitable for your PPC affiliate campaigns. If you are a social media marketing expert and have a huge follower base on social media platforms, going for Instagram or Facebook ads will be the ideal choice. Similarly, if you are an SEO expert, Google ads will be a good choice.
Researching competition
Next, you need to start working on learning more about the market competition. As an affiliate, it’s your responsibility to ensure that you are aware of the competition statistics. It will help you to understand the competitive brands of the merchant whose product or service you will be promoting, Also, based on the stats, you will have the chance to improvise your strategy such that you don’t lose the audience and the leads in turn.
Composing PPC ads
You need to work on the content of the PPC ads carefully. These ads are similar to the content you see on websites. Hence, they will work the same way in bringing more traffic to your campaign’s landing page. While composing the ads, you need to list down the keywords and plan their density properly so that no stuffing is present. Also, the content must be impactful, to-the-point with no bluff, and spot-on. Make sure that the ad is formed in a way such that it can raise curiosity and appeal in the targeted audience. After all, the main purpose of the PPC ads is to compel the audience to look further into what the merchant is offering.
Building the campaign landing pages
As a marketer, you need to build the campaign landing pages. For this, you first need a campaign structure which will match your PPC affiliate marketing strategy. Once the structure is chosen, work on the theme and template such that they are appealing and clear enough to attract the audience. Overcrowding and over stuffing of information and other elements will never sound compelling, no matter how well you have composed the PPC ads.
Working with in-house marketing team
Lastly, to make a successful PPC affiliate marketing strategy, you need to work closely with the in-house marketing team of the merchant. They will have more detailed information about the brand and the product and whether or not they have already made an impact on the audience. With working by your side, your plan will be stronger and firmer. Hence, you will have more success rate as compared to other affiliates who like to work alone.
Conclusion
We understand that it’s not easy to become successful overnight as an affiliate marketer. But, if you are devising a proper strategy, the rate of your success will increase considerably. Moreover, with a plan formulated beforehand, you will know how to proceed step by step without making silly mistakes. After all, the competition is fierce and a lot will be at stake. Hence, you can’t afford to make a mistake because that will definitely cost the revenue of the business.
Mandeep Singh, the founder of SEO Discovery, the leading digital marketing company is an experienced campaigner in the field of SEO marketing and the arena of digital selling.
