How to write affiliate blog posts

Be honest when recommending products to your readers

I hope that title is straightforward enough for ya lol. I want it to give a really clear idea of what this post is about. Being that this is one of the ways I earn a living from my blog, I thought I’d elaborate a little on it.

So you’ve bought a product online, and tried it out. Or maybe you haven’t even bought it, but you decided to join their affiliate program. Now what do you do from there?

Well, you can plaster your affiliate link all over Twitter and Facebook, or all over your blog’s sidebar, or a million other places. One of the best places to put it is right inside a blog post.

You may have thought of that idea before, but were too scared to try it. Or you may have tried it, but it didn’t work and no one bought the product. When recommending a product to your readers, you need to put yourself in their shoes.

Why should they care about the product?

What’s appealing to them about the product? What BENEFITS would they get from buying it? Why should they even care that you’re babbling about some product to try and get them to buy it?

Well first of all, you should NOT only recommend stuff to your readers in order to get a commission. Your FIRST priority should be to HELP THEM in some way. Let’s say I recommend a product here on my blog, in a blog post (which I do on occasion). Let’s say it’s a product teaching you how to sell ebooks online.

The first reason I’m gonna be recommending that product to you is because I feel it’s gonna help you achieve financial freedom. The second reason is because it’s how I earn my living.

If your main goal with recommending a product to your audience, is to help them in some way, then that will show through in your blog post. Trust me. If you only wanna make money from your readers and not give them value, then that will show, too.

I’m babbling, but all that being said, how do you actually write the post? How do you recommend the product? I could write some big elaborate post tellin you a bunch of bullshit *secret* formula.

The *not so secret* formula

But there isn’t really a secret formula. I’ll tell you what I wish someone had told me when I first started out….JUST BE REAL, and don’t jerk your readers around. When you’re recommending a product, just simply say “here’s what I got, here’s what it’s gonna do for you, here’s what you need to do next” (learned that little gem from Frank Kern – thanks, Frank! )

Ok don’t say it exactly like that, but you get the idea. The “here’s what it’s gonna do for you part” is obviously the benefits your readers will get from buying the product. And the “here’s what you need to do next part” would be them clicking the affiliate link.

In other words, don’t write some 3,000 word bullshit post about how this product is so great and blah blah blah. Nobody wants to hear all that crap. If you think the product could possibly be a scam, but you don’t know for sure, say that.

IF you think it’s just a mediocre product, say that. What I’m tryin to say is JUST BE HONEST with your readers. Be totally real and upfront with them, and they’ll appreciate you and trust you for it.

Be cool about it

Just *be cool* about recommending the product, don’t make your whole blog post sound like you’re trying to shove it down their throats. You can always use the soft sell approach, you know, “Here’s the link, if you wanna check it out, that’s cool. If you don’t, that’s cool too.” People respond to the realness, and the casualness of that type of approach.

And the blog post doesn’t have to be super long either, it can be as short as you want it to be. People tend to like shorter posts better anyway.

I would recommend before you start writing affiliate blog posts, to have at least a few hundred daily readers or so. And I wouldn’t recommend doing it constantly because you might be seen as a spammer.

Just be helpful and they’ll thank you for it. I hope after reading this you give it a shot and have some success with it. If you don’t know where to get started just head over to Clickbank.com…they have TONS of products for you to recommend to your readers. Just be sure if you don’t actually buy the product, to do as much research as you can on it.  Good luck.

P.S. Make sure you have an honest, straightforward disclaimer on your blog somewhere that says something like “I may get a commission from recommending products to you from time to time” – like I have here on my blog. Be honest and let your readers know that if they buy products you recommend that they’re helping to show their support for you and your blog. If you wanna see an example of someone who links to affiliate products, check out Johnchow.com .

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