Introduction:
During a research session for my own affiliate marketing efforts, I came across this case study of an online marketer called Sherry who is doing her affiliate marketing using free tools. She has created a $2,300 per month business using only free tools that would be available to most people. Whilst I haven’t used this model myself, I thought it was appropriately intriguing that I wanted to let everyone know about it. So…
Can you build an affiliate marketing side hustle, using only free tools that takes just a few hours a month?
Surprisingly, the answer is yes, and here’s how one enterprising new marketer did it.
Sherry earned her first dollar two weeks after she started, and a year later she is earning approximately $2,300 a month. She’s also the first to admit that if she invested more time in her business, she would likely be earning more money. But still, $2300 a month for just a few hours of work isn’t bad.
Here's what Sherry did, and as you read this, see if you can notice the one thing that she DIDN’T do that would easily double or triple her income.
Where Did Sherry Start?
She went to Clickbank and spent an hour deciding what program she wanted to promote first. She also could have gone to JVZoo, Digitstore24, CJ Affiliate or any other low-barrier-to-entry affiliate network she chose.
In choosing her first product, she thought about what was important to her, what her interests were and what she loves to talk about.
She settled on marketing programs because that’s where her interests lie, and for her first affiliate product she ironically chose a course on how to do affiliate marketing. This allowed her to promote something she was deeply interested in while also adding to her affiliate knowledge by taking the course.
In this case she was able to get the course for free by connecting to the product creator. But keep in mind most product creators won’t give out their product for free unless you can prove you’ve got some experience in affiliate marketing. Then again, it never hurts to ask if you’re sincere.
Where Did Sherry Send Potential Customers?
How Did She Create Ideas for Appropriate Content?
As Sherry was doing her affiliate marketing using only free tools, she went to ChatGPT to generate content ideas. She wanted ideas to make YouTube videos that were all about how to do affiliate marketing.
Then for each of these ideas, she continued to query ChatGPT as well as doing her own research to create video outlines.
YouTube Affiliate Marketing Solved Sherry’s Next Step
She then recorded videos for YouTube, making one video for each topic. She followed a detailed outline rather than a script so that she could sound natural. And she continued to record and post these videos at the rate of 3 or 4 per month.
For each video she pasted her landing page link on the first comment so that her viewers could click the link, and at the end of each video she asked viewers to find and click the link.
She also did plenty of research on how best to optimize her videos to get traffic from YouTube.
How Did Sherry Promote Her New Videos?
In addition to the videos, Sherry made posts on Pinterest and Instagram. She did this by going to Canva and using the Pinterest template to make eye-catching visuals targeted to people who wanted to learn affiliate marketing. Again, these were linked to her landing page. Even though some affiliate marketing tools, such as Canva, have a free option, this makes it no less impressive to use. (Note: I actually use Canva myself and I can vouch for it having both a free option while still being an incredibly versatile design tool)
She posted on social media about trendy topics such as new affiliate programs and news, and always used one of her visuals to grab interest and get the click.
And that’s it! Her efforts drove visitors to her landing page, who were then directed to click the link to go to the affiliate sales page.
Did You Spot What Sherry Didn’t Do?
Now then, did you notice what Sherry did NOT do that could have greatly increased her income?
Sherry didn’t capture the email addresses of the visitors to her landing pages. While she did use the landing page to check where her traffic was coming from, all she had on that page was a headline and bullet point list with a button that sent people to the sales page. It works for her, and she does make sales.
But I would have instead created an irresistible free lead magnet and given that away on my landing page, directing traffic to the offer only after they signed up for my freebie and corresponding newsletter.
Of course, that is more work because you’ve got to create a lead magnet and write emails, but it’s also far more profitable in the long run to build a list that you can continue to send offers to.
You’ll notice that all the tools Sherry used for her affiliate marketing were 100% free, so her only investment was her time. And she readily admits her first few videos weren’t all that good. But like anything else, practice allows you to improve, and her income is steadily rising over time.
Oh yes, and she’s creating a dynamite lead magnet so she can start building her list, too.
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