The world of affiliate marketing already takes enough effort to set up. Finding the best traffic sources for affiliate marketing is only another layer of torture.

Wouldn’t it be amazing if your affiliate blog just took off by itself? But sadly, this isn’t the way it works.

There are thousands of affiliate blogs out there that have no idea how to market themselves. Let alone know where to market themselves in the first place.

Don’t stress yourself out too much, though. Affiliate marketing has a plethora of traffic sources at its disposal.

There’s a place for everyone to earn their desired income goal each month. Even if you’re using affiliate marketing as a passive income stream, you still need a traffic source of some sort.

It doesn’t matter if you want paid or cheap traffic sources for affiliate marketing. There are numerous options available to suit any affiliate niche.

Keep reading to find the best traffic source for your affiliate products!

What is Affiliate Marketing?

If you’ve been a publisher for a while, you’ll know exactly what affiliate marketing is. But for the sake of those who don’t know, affiliate marketing is the mutual exchange between affiliates and publishers.

The publisher provides marketing for the affiliate and receives a commission in return.

The affiliate network will provide referral links and ads for the publisher to market.

The publisher is then compensated based on the selected form of commission.

There are various types of commissions available, including:

  • Cost per click;
  • Cost per action;
  • Cost per lead;
  • Cost per sale;
  • Cost per install.

 
The commission type and rate can be discussed between the affiliate and publisher.

There is also the option for a lump-sum payment each month over a fixed rate per interaction.

This has become a surprisingly popular commission type within the affiliate market.

However, if a publisher works with a brand via affiliate network, commission type and rate are often displayed in the Program Information section and both are readily available before joining any given program.

There are important steps that must be in place before you can earn a decent income from affiliate marketing:

 
Choosing a niche that suits your interests and schedule is essential. Have you ever tried to sell a product you disliked for months on end? It’s tedious, and you’ll lose interest very quickly.

Even if you start out with a smaller niche, this is better in the long run. Plus, it’s easier to start out with a small niche, as your server needs will be minimal.

Once you’ve gained momentum, you can start adding new niche content. Make sure you upgrade your server as you go along!

While publishers need affiliates to market, it can take time to find the right one.

The better route is to go through a platform like Admitad Partner Network.

Admitad is vital for a successful exchange between publishers and affiliates. Admitad perfectly matches publishers with the best affiliates for their chosen niche.

Join Partner Network Now!

Top Traffic Sources for Affiliate Marketing

Once you’ve set up your affiliate products and content, you’ll realize that you need a platform to market them on.

While any of the following options are great, they won’t be enough on their own.

It’s up to you to decide which ones are complementary to your niche and content. As well as how many traffic sources you’ll need to reach your income goals.

Whichever source you decide on, you’ll need to put in effort over months to see the results you’re looking for. Only putting in effort for one month won’t secure your future!

Display ads are one of the best paid traffic sources for affiliate marketing. For over a decade, display ads have been a staple traffic source for advertisers.

Regardless of what you’re selling, there’s always a way to turn it into an ad. There are new blogs and websites created every day that need products to advertise.

Ads are your best friend if you’re a publisher looking for places to market or an affiliate looking for advertisers.

Display ads are the perfect form of paid traffic because they are extremely versatile. There are various types of display ads that you can incorporate into any affiliate blog:

  • Social media ads;
  • Native ads;
  • Banner ads;
  • Retargeted ads;
  • Geofencing.

 
Using any of the above ad types, you can flood your platforms with all the display ads you’ll need. As long as your viewers don’t get too irritated!

The more ads you can casually place across your blog and social media accounts, the less work you’ll have in the future.

Setting up the initial display ads does require more effort. However, once they are in place and the platform hosting them is up-to-date, viewers can keep using them.

If there’s a month where you can’t put in as much effort, these display ads will collect revenue in the background for you. This should be a passive traffic source within your affiliate efforts.

Make sure to increase the likelihood of viewers finding your ads by using some of the options listed below.

2. Social Traffic

Each day, a new social media network is created. Legendary platforms like YouTube and Twitter have attracted drama throughout their lifespans. It’s no wonder people are looking for new and exciting networks to join.

Although the older networks must still be appreciated, platforms like Facebook house the part of the Internet that is scared of new. Those looking for stability.

If you want to generate the most traffic from these networks, you must understand their nuances.

Older platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn require consistent content. Your marketing should be professional and relatable to older generations.

When it comes to Instagram and TikTok, however, you’ll need to seriously up your game.

The best advice for creating content is this: “There is no content in content worth knowing. Only context, structure, and form.”

Your content must suit the context it’s in.

Once you’re sure the content is perfect for your various audiences, it’s time to let it shine. The better content you provide, the more income you can make. However, remember to monetize your social media accounts as much as possible.

Besides using built-in monetization methods, platforms like ConvertSocial allow you to further monetize accounts.

Using YouTube and Instagram alone, you have to meet certain requirements before monetizing. Like reaching a thousand views or subscribers. ConvertSocial, on the other hand, lets you start right away, without a huge following.

ConvertSocial allows you to earn revenue through hundreds of popular social media networks, such as:

 

3. Blog Posts and Articles

Blogging is the most reliable traffic source for publishers. It’s also one of the best free traffic sources for affiliate marketing.

Whether you use posts or articles to market, your traffic will increase organically.

There are a few ways to go about marketing your affiliate products through your blog, namely:

  • Product Reviews;
  • Product Comparisons;
  • Product Roundups;
  • Tutorials;
  • Listicles.

 
Product reviews involve creating an entire article or page dedicated to a product.

The product information, like dimensions, colors, weight, and photos, can be added here. Though the purpose of the article is to give a thorough review of the product.

Publishers will list the pros and cons as well as add customer reviews at the end.

Product comparisons are very similar to product reviews. The only difference is that the article will pin the two products against each other. The benefits and drawbacks will be determined by its superiority to the compared product.

Roundup reviews have become surprisingly favored among publishers. Product roundups include a comprehensive list of products related to a single topic. Such as the Top Brooms of 2022 or the Best Affiliate Programs.

Roundup reviews do contain product information. Though often only the product name, product image, and referral links are included.

Product tutorials are a fantastic way to get your viewers involved in the product. Not only can they see what the product looks like in real life, but they can understand how it works.

Customers can be skeptical when it comes to online shopping. You can double your sales revenue purely through videos of the products.

A listicle is a type of article that contains a list of ideas, items, or products. A product can have a listicle of pros and cons that provide further understanding of the item.

However, listicles are used more for content than products.

4. Email Marketing

Email marketing has become one of the many neglected traffic sources for affiliate marketing and CPA. The reason is simple: people view any sort of email marketing as spam or a scam.

After seeing what the Internet has done to people, they have a right to be scared of it.

That’s why email marketing is a goldmine for revenue. A trustworthy email listing creates a level of intimacy with clients. Few traffic sources can provide such personal communication.

The best email marketing tips that will boost your traffic are:

  • Embrace personalized emails;
  • Automation saves hours of work;
  • Make emails that are of value, not only for promotion;
  • Test email content thoroughly;
  • Create cliffhangers that invite subscribers to find out more;
  • Avoid using all-caps (this comes off as aggressive).

 
Email marketing has been overused as a promotion tool. To make this a reliable traffic source, your emails should foster customer relationships.

Email notifications pop up on most users’ phones every day. They see the subject line and the first sentence before anything else.

Your subject line should compel viewers to open the email.

Once a subscriber is inside the email, any personalization seals the deal. Talk to each customer in the first person, like you’re talking to a friend.

Most email listing services provide an option to add personal details to emails sent out.

You can include any information you have about them, like their name, surname, job, or even interests. The point of these emails is to invite customers back to your platform.

5. Collaborations

Whatever content or products that you are trying to market, you’ll earn much more if you work with others. A collaborative effort is the best traffic source for affiliate marketing.

You can partner with an influencer, another publisher, or even a business.

Within the partnership, there are various ways to go about collaborating, such as:

  • Sponsored content;
  • Influencer gifting;
  • Giveaways;
  • Competitions;
  • Guest blogging;
  • Brand ambassadors;
  • Competitor collaboration;
  • Account takeovers;
  • Product reviews.

 
While collaborations are an effective traffic source, they are also the most social traffic source.

If you struggle with communication or have a fear of public speaking, this might be beyond your reach. Every influencer and publisher is human like yourself. They have emotions and make mistakes.

Give your partners time to create the perfect content. You can’t blame an influencer for your own lack of communication!

Any collaboration should be a mutual exchange between the parties involved. Make sure that you pay your partners for their hard work.

As the marketer, it’s your choice to settle for commission rates that are too low for the effort you’re putting in.

Either negotiate with your affiliate or find a new one in our catalog that suits your needs.

The best types of collaborations are done through video content or live-streaming.

A recent survey shows that 64% of consumers prefer videos when viewing content. Make your content as easy for your audience as possible.

Even if that means making a video so that they don’t have to read anything!

6. Organic Search Traffic (SEO)

The use of SEO has become vital within affiliate marketing and businesses everywhere.

How else do you expect your content to be at the top of viewers’ searches?

Nowadays, if your content isn’t optimized for search engines, it could end up on the 50th page of search results. Barely anyone goes past the second or third page of results anymore.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is anything that forces content to rank higher in search results.

Thus, increasing the organic traffic received through web browsers. Some basic but necessary SEO practices include:

  • Selecting the right keywords;
  • Improving your website loading speed;
  • Checking for plagiarism;
  • Indexing your website pages correctly;
  • Optimizing the click-through rate (CTR) of content;
  • Running SEO checkers on all content created.

 
Creating the right content means nothing if your viewers struggle to search for it. Many publishers focus purely on SEO and ranking as high as possible.

That’s why you need to focus on making your content as unique as you can. Your blog will naturally rank higher if there is no other content like it out there. Make use of the hundreds of free (or paid-for) plagiarism and SEO checkers. You’ll thank yourself in the long run!

Conclusion

When you’re first looking for a traffic source for affiliate marketing, you’ll be compelled to go for the popular sources. However, the traffic sources that seem to make more money for others won’t always make more for you.

The sources that will benefit you the most will be the ones that you have time for. Having ten different social media accounts means nothing if they aren’t kept up-to-date.

If you’re struggling to make movement in any type of traffic source, you need to evaluate your content.

Are you sure the niche you’ve selected interests you? Do you enjoy marketing the products that your affiliates have provided you with? Do you enjoy sitting behind your laptop all day just to keep your content consistent? If you answered no to any of these, then it might be time to change up a few things.

Affiliate marketing is definitely not for the faint of heart. Nor is it for those looking for a get-rich-quick scheme.

Affiliate marketing can be a full-time job.

Even as passive income, affiliate marketing requires more work than other side hustles. Make sure you know what you’re getting yourself into!