If you aren’t familiar with affiliate marketing, Elisabeth Archambault is an excellent source to learn from. In this video from PubCon South, Elisabeth offers up some advice on finding merchants and products to start your affiliate program.

As stated in her session, Elisabeth says affiliate marketing in a nutshell is the act of promoting other people’s stuff in order to get paid for the results they receive. Affiliate marketing is also very flexible, which is one of the reasons why Elisabeth loves it so much.

First of all, you have to find merchants to work with. Elisabeth advises starting with something you know and are familiar with. If you are going to be promoting a merchant and selling their products, it only makes sense that you need to have a knowledge of them in order to be effective.

Elisabeth adds that as you become more experienced with affiliate marketing, you will then be able to branch out in other profitable opportunities. She says to look for these specific qualities when looking for a merchant:

-    A variety of promotional tools
-    Informative stats and reliable tracking
-    Effective communication
-    Earnings potential/reliable payment
-    Committed to best practices

Lastly, in order to make money with affiliate marketing, you have to work hard. Just as there are essentially no limitations to it, there are also no guarantees.  If you don’t successfully promote your merchants, then you will not get a return. Instead, you have to create sustainable value for the merchant in order to have a secure income for yourself.

“There’s no limit if you’re good at what you do.”