- Hey, everybody, this is Roberto Blake
helping you create something awesome today.
Now, I know that a lot of you who clicked on this video
are probably upset with me about the title,
but most people aren't good at affiliate marketing,
and there's a very good reason for that.
It comes down to the fact that most people
get into it for the wrong reasons.
Now, personally I feel I think affiliate marketing
is somebody who worked in retail as a teenager
and did that during my college years,
I remember the idea of working for a company,
helping bring in a lot of money for a business,
and then not really feeling like I'm getting
a fair share of that profit or that work.
There are many of you right now,
you work a nine to five job,
maybe you've made your company a million dollars,
but did you get 10% of the value
that your brought in to the business?
There's nothing wrong with wanting
to make money at affiliate marketing,
but I think that a love of you have to lead with value.
I think a lot of people who don't end up
being successful when it comes to affiliate
marketing are trying to make money more
than they're trying to solve a problem for their audience,
more than they're trying to build
themselves as an authority,
establish credibility,
or demonstrate the value of the thing
that they are trying to help sell.
Now, when I was a teenager into my early '20s,
I had worked a retail job,
a lot of what I did focused specifically
around how I could help the customer.
For one thing, I actually worked in a bookstore for a while.
I worked at a Waldenbooks,
later it would become a Borders
'cause that's who owns it.
So when I was trying to sell anyone
a book or recommend them a book,
it really had to do with what they were interested in
or what it is that they specifically
asked for in the first place
and then I would just help facilitate that.
I would help them find something that fit their needs
or their interests and it was really about them.
And I worked at Champs Sporting Goods,
I was a track and cross county runner in high school
when a lot of guys,
especially the military guys would come in
and they would need running shoes,
I would ask them a lot of questions to understand
what it is that they actually need.
I would ask them about their knees, their arches,
I would ask them to show me how they run
and then I would find the shoes,
the sneakers that best fit their body type
and their situation and their specific needs,
not the thing that I could earn the most commission on.
And that's where a lot of you are going wrong.
You are not thinking about what
is the best thing for the customer,
what is the best thing for my viewer,
what is the best thing for my audience.
Now again, I'm not accusing you of anything,
I'm not saying that you're trying to pull one over on them.
I'm saying you have to lead with value for them first
and then you benefit after the fact.
Just shifting your perspective
to where can I provide the maximum value.
A lot of you are trying to sell products
or services or things that really,
you don't have a background
or expertise in to sell it credibly.
I could sell running shoes a lot
better than I could sell basketball shoes.
So I focused on running shoes
'cause I was a runner,
because I know what that's like,
I know what trying to find a good
pair of running shoes is like,
and so I can do that.
When it came to the bookstore,
I would sell the best when it came to books
and also to some of the little hobby craft stuff
that we had that really matched my personality.
I was a nerd,
so I would sell a lot of people Magic The Gathering cards
or I would take them to the comic book
and graphic novel section.
The anime and manga section was where I sold
the best because those things,
I genuinely was interested in and excited about,
so when you are trying to do affiliate marketing,
if you think about the things that you tend to buy,
in my case, I buy a lot of camera gear.
It's not a surprise that the best category
for me besides books when it came to affiliate
marketing was camera gear and electronics.
So what did I do?
I did things like laptop reviews,
I did things like camera buyers guides
and lens comparisons
and that did really well for me in Amazon in my heyday.
And so that is why I was successful with that.
Today I focus a lot of the affiliate marketing
that I do around the services
that I use in my online business.
So when I make online business videos,
it's not surprising to me that I end up
earning very well from those affiliate links.
In my case, my biggest affiliate earned me
five to $6,000 a month off of a single service,
a software as a service plug in
for you to content create.
And that is amazing for me,
but it's really not surprising when you
consider the fact that I've done
so many on YouTube documenting my journey
in how I grew my channel.
Other things that I sell as an affiliate,
I have an online coaching business,
so one of the things that I do
is I recommend the products
and services that I actually use
to run that online business.
So with me, I do my coaching,
my membership site, my courses,
I do that through Kajabi.
So what I do is I make videos about
how to start a stay at home business,
how to start an online business,
I talk about my experience
and then I share some of the features
and benefits of the product
and that helps me with somebody
trying to make a buying decision.
They're trying to decide what is in their best interest,
and I'm putting an option in front
of them and educating them about it.
It's not about pushing people to buy
something that they don't have a use for
or that they don't believe in
or that you don't believe in
or that you have no use for.
I'm gonna help you with breaking some of this down.
I want you to think about who is your ideal audience,
who is it that you actually are serving,
what is it that they are trying to accomplish,
what resources and tools are you familiar
with that would help them accomplish that goal
and can you in some way demonstrate
an outcome that's desirable to them?
If you can do those things,
I think you'll be more successful in affiliate marketing.
Heck, I think that if you can do those things,
you'd be more successful in business and sales period.
It really comes down to a simple question,
how does this thing add value to somebody's life,
how does this thing improve or enhance their life,
their situation or move them toward
a desirable outcome or goal that they have?
'Cause besides that,
they really don't spend money on things
that don't give us those kinds of experiences.
So that's something that I want you
to think about when it comes to how
you're positioning yourself as an affiliate marketer.
How do you become a resource
for the person that you're trying to reach.
So let's say for example what you want
to do is let's say you are a photographer,
let's say you wanted to sell cameras specifically
to an audience that might be interested in buying them,
what can you do to help somebody who's in the market
for a camera make a buying decision?
Making videos that actually teach them
how to use this thing when they have it
in their hands probably would be helpful.
The same thing if you were trying
to sell software as a service.
If you actually specifically show something
that this can help them accomplish,
then they're more likely to buy it because
they're buying this to solve a problem,
they're not buying this just to help you make more money.
When you ask most people why do businesses exist,
they'll tell you businesses exist to make money.
That's not really how it works.
Blockbuster wanted to make money,
they don't exist anymore.
So there you have it.
Businesses exist as long as they
can facilitate the needs
or desires of a consumer at a price
that people would pay.
That's why businesses exist.
They could have the desire to make money,
that has nothing to do with their ability to exist.
So again, why do businesses exist?
Businesses exist when they provide
a product or service that we want
at a price that we are willing to spend on.
That's it.
That's what it really comes down to at the end of the day.
A price that we decide is acceptable
for an outcome that we want.
Which means that if you want
to stop sucking at affiliate marketing,
it's your responsibility to become
a trusted authority and resource
and to find a way to add value to your audience.
If you can add value to your audience,
then you will be more successful as an affiliate marketer.
You will earn more affiliate sales,
you will earn more commissions,
you will have people that recommend
that people check you out.
You will get more traffic
and then you will get more conversions.
That's what happens when you are a resource for people
and they respect what you have to say
and they're able to in some way get
results by following what you have to say
and you've proven your merit to them,
you've proven your value.
Your ability to earn will increase in proportion
to the amount of value that you can add to people.
It's really down to that.
Question of the day,
how are you going to add value to your audience?
Let me know in the comment section.
Would love to hear from you.
Also, let me know if you have any
questions about affiliate marketing
or how to make money online
or how to earn passive income
and remember, I have links to other videos
that can help you in the description down below,
and of course, I have affiliate links
for all of my resources
and the things that I've used to grow my online business.
Also, I'm thinking of doing a follow up video
for this one because I can actually think
of a couple of more reasons why you
might suck at affiliate marketing.
And again, I know some people
are gonna be mad at me about this title.
Anyway, like this video if you liked it,
don't forget to subscribe,
check out the other awesome stuff here on the channel.
As always, you guys,
thanks so much for watching
and don't forget,
go out there and create something awesome today.
Take care.
(upbeat music)