Affiliate Marketing Without Money or Followers: A Step-by-Step Guide for Stay-at-Home Moms

Affiliate Marketing Without Money or Followers: A Step-by-Step Guide for Stay-at-Home Moms

Being a stay-at-home mom is a full-time job in itself, right? I mean, I get it. I’m a work from home Mom that also homeschools, so I get what it means to be busy. But affiliate marketing is TOTALLY DOABLE if you don’t go doing extra unnecessary steps that don’t help, AND take up all of your day. Let’s break down what works, shall we?

Affiliate marketing is a low-risk, high-reward business model that can help bring in some extra cash without disrupting your daily routine. But what if you don’t have any money to invest or any followers to promote to? That’s where this guide comes in. In this post, I’m going to walk you through how to start affiliate marketing with no money and no followers, specifically for us homeschooling moms who have what seems like a negative amount of hours in the day, if that’s possible. 🤣

Step 1: Choose your niche (or what I like to call, Bat Signal) – To start affiliate marketing, you need to pick a bat signal – a specific topic or area you want to focus on. For stay-at-home moms, a promising bat signal can be homeschooling. It’s a rapidly growing group of folks, with more and more parents opting for homeschooling for their children (thank goodness, right?!). You can find a range of affiliate programs and products related to homeschooling, from curriculum guides to educational tools and resources. By being a niche-specific affiliate marketer, you can build a loyal audience of homeschooling moms who trust your recommendations. (If you want to get more specific about your own bat signal, which I TOTALLY suggest, I have a video here where I walk you through how to discover yours.) https://youtu.be/XpCAPs41Yt0?si=7YEDeh4KmeAM7-iI

Step 2: Pick some products/services to share – Ok, so I see a lot of people do this one backwards, but it’s not really their fault. Every Tom, Dick and Smelly out there peddlin’ affiliate marketing courses say to sign up to an affiliate network, then search for something to sell.  That’s a goofball approach, and isn’t honest, so I’m not going to be teaching that, sound fair? Let’s move with integrity if that’s cool. OK, so what I WOULD DO, is go through your bank statement and credit card statements if you have them…what are the monthly renewals? Write them down. Then go to the Googles, and type in what the product or service is, followed by the words” affiliate program” . NOW, you’re going to see products and services that YOU ACTUALLY USE and sign up for THEIR affiliate programs. It’s really bad form, in my opinion, to suggest something to people that you, yourself don’t even use. Insert immediate skeez….and that ain’t us.

Step 3: Promote through social media – Social media is a powerful tool for affiliate marketing. You don’t need a massive following to start – even a few dedicated followers can make a difference. Pick a social media platform that you already spend time on, such as Facebook or Instagram, and start building your presence. ( I may or may not have a FREE 90 Days to 1 Million Followers thing you can do 🙂 ) Share useful information, tips, and insights related to your bat signal, and don’t forget to include affiliate links when you recommend specific products or services. Always disclose your affiliations to your followers transparently.

Step 4: Leverage SEO through blogging – Blogging is my FAVORITE way to establish yourself as an authority in your bat signal community and attract organic traffic (FYI organic means FREE) to your website. By using search engine optimization techniques, you can rank your blog posts higher on Google and other search engines, which means more visibility and potential sales as your long game. Social media posts have about a 2-4 day shelf life….SEO is FOREVERRRRRR. Write blog posts on topics related to your bat signal and include affiliate links within them. Make sure your content is informative, engaging, and valuable to your target audience. (Ok, I have another thing you may like here…90 Days of Content in 90 Minutes, again, it’s a gift from me, so it’s free. But this one is GOLD. It literally shows you exactly what your bat signal people are wanting to hear about, then you just write blogs on that and Google LOVES YOU, which means they push you to the top….which means your people FIND YOU! Cool, right?!)

Step 5: Create video content – Video content is rapidly becoming the preferred medium for digital marketing. By creating video content related to your bat signal, you can capitalize on this trend and reach a wider audience. You can start a YouTube channel or use platforms like Pinterest or Instagram Reels to share short, snackable videos on bat signal topics.(I have 90 days of prompts for you for these in the gift I mentioned above 90 Days to 1 Million Followers if you’re having a hard time thinking of what to post.) Include affiliate links in your video captions and descriptions. Always make sure your videos are high-quality, engaging, and informative.

Starting affiliate marketing with no money and no followers can seem daunting at first, but it’s entirely possible even for stay-at-home moms. By following these steps and focusing on a niche you’re passionate about, you can build a successful affiliate marketing business from scratch. Remember to be transparent with your affiliations, create high-quality content, and be patient. Affiliate marketing can take time to yield results, but with persistence and perseverance, you can make your dream of earning money from home a reality.

Oh, and if you want to put the pedal to the metal, so to speak, I have a one hour Affiliate Marketing Masterclass on Youtube that has people literally making money right after they watch it and implement.

Til next time!

xo Martha

Master the Art of Affiliate Marketing on YouTube & Skyrocket Your Click-through Rates!

Hey hey! Did you know a whopping 80% of brands have affiliate programs? And, would you believe that over 65% of affiliate marketers cozy up with their audience on social media? That’s right!

What’s more, it’s no secret that YouTube is a goldmine with over 2.6 billion users each month and a billion hours of video watched daily. That’s a gigantic sea of people waiting for you to make waves with your YouTube affiliate marketing.

Ever considered YouTube Affiliate Marketing? It’s no different from your regular affiliate marketing, just a change of scenery really. YouTube is just another marketing avenue where you can spread your magic to the target audience.

Remember, friend, affiliate marketing is all about promoting and selling another company’s goods or services for a commission. Now, sometimes there’s an extra layer between sellers and affiliate marketers – affiliate networks. They handle all the backend and manage the relationships between sellers and affiliates.

Now, where does YouTube fit into this jigsaw puzzle? Simple. Affiliate marketers need a platform to promote products. YouTube affiliate marketers have chosen to promote through videos they create for their channels. They need to be savvy about what products will appeal to their audience, those who subscribe to their channel. (In HBR, I teach you how to not only use YouTube, but have a full system of places you share, all working together and building your relevant audience day after day after day. 🎉)

Promoting affiliate products on YouTube? Perfect! You’ll want to place affiliate links where your viewers can see them. YouTube offers more opportunities for this than many other social and video networks, like Instagram and TikTok. You can include affiliate links in your video descriptions or pin them in the comments.

Another neat trick is to place an “i” button at the top right of your video to promote another of your videos. It’s a little card that acts as a link to another video. Cool hack, right?

Why should you use YouTube Affiliate Marketing? Well, it’s simple. You want to be where your audience hangs out. YouTube is the “how do I” channel, which is great for folks that share affiliate products that are solution based. (which most are if you really think about it) Nowadays, with smartphones in every pocket, it’s also super easy to create and upload videos to YouTube.

Successful affiliate marketing is all about knowing your audience and recommending products they’ll love. But beware! You don’t want your videos to look like long-winded TV ads. Your videos need to add value and there must be a reason for people to watch them.

YouTube affiliate marketing has its own charm. It’s as simple as setting up a YouTube channel and uploading videos. But you’ll need an audience before you start seeing people clicking on your affiliate links and buying, so let’s talk about that.

Making money with YouTube affiliate marketing? It’s as easy as one, two, three, four:

Decide on your channel’s target audience. (I call this bat signal, here’s where I easily break down how to find yours.

Make informative and entertaining videos for them. The word here is “infotainment”.

Find affiliate products that would pique their interest. (Here’s a short training I did on that.)

Promote your videos and affiliate products. (Here’s a must have checklist to help)

Do the above steps consistently for a few months, and you’ll be surprised to see people buying through your affiliate links!

You can also put an email opt-in in all of your YouTube video descriptions so that viewers could join your mailing list.

Just remember, don’t fall into the trap of trying to promote as many products as possible, regardless of their fit for your audience. There’s no point making videos no one wants to watch. ORRRRR looking like a weirdo skeezball, catch my drift?

Successful YouTubers tend to follow this rule of thumb: Stick to one central theme. This isn’t just for YouTube; the same applies to blogs, podcasts, or any social posts you make. (for my students, it’s their bat signal)

And what type of videos should you make to capture your audience’s interest? Mix it up! You can create product reviews, how-to videos, tutorials, best-of videos, and even unboxing videos.

And finally, here are a few tips to up your YouTube affiliate marketing game:

Identify the best keywords for people to find your videos. (this can be best understood in a free training I did here)

Don’t make your videos look like ads. Remember, people watch YouTube to learn or to decrease reading time. Make em easy and relatively easy to digest)

Find the Perfect Spots for Your Affiliate Links. YouTube gives you a much wider playground than Instagram or TikTok to place your affiliate links. This platform is so much more welcoming when it comes to embedding links around your videos, especially in the video descriptions. So, seize this golden opportunity! Slip in those affiliate links in the right spots whenever it makes sense.

Jazz Up Your Thumbnails You know, click-through rates play a significant role in YouTube search rankings. When folks feel drawn to your video, they’re more likely to click through. So, what’s the secret recipe? An irresistible video thumbnail combined with a tantalizing video title. This duo can significantly pump up your click-through rate. (PS, you don’t need to be a designer, just use this)

Honesty is the Best Policy with Affiliate Links Don’t fret! If your videos are top-notch, people won’t give a second thought to seeing your affiliate links. This holds particularly true for folks engrossed in your niche. I promise you’re thinking more about it than anyone else.Legally speaking, you’re required to disclose your affiliate links in most places these days. Plus, you’re obligated to inform that you may earn a commission if people splurge through your links. But here’s the deal, most folks won’t mind this. In fact, they’ll cheerfully follow through to your links if they want to grab the products, especially if you can offer a deal to them with your link!

Ok, so that’s it! Affiliate Marketing on YouTube in a nutshell, no go DO IT!

See you next time!

xo Martha