This list includes the top 10 affiliate programs that I use and promote. Affiliate marketers need tools… and these are the best tools I have found that I use in my business.
I didn't buy these all at once. I have accumulated them over time and they have more than paid for themselves and they still do. They save me time, they give me insight into my businesses, key words, tips, trainings…
AND I get paid.
Over the years and up to today my business has focused on web design, blogging, marketing, SEO and PPC for many businesses (not just my own) – and a I have used some of these tools for many years.
I also taught a class online on marketing with WordPress – and used a lot of these tools in that class too.
If I don't use it, how can I recommend it? If I would not pay for it, I would not recommend it.
One of the criteria for being an affiliate for something (this is important to me):
would I recommend it whether there was a pay-plan or not?
These tools work. They pay for themselves with their usefulness, they save me time (time is money) and I have several additional streams of income because naturally, people who work with me use some or all of these – and I give lots and help and support to people who join my team. As well as TEAM SUPPORT!
If you have been struggling as an affiliate marketer – start with #1 and work up the list.
Hanging with like minded people who care about your success is important too – that's #2.
3 & 4 are essential tools to build your business.
#8 is essential for anyone with a home business in the United States America.
The affiliate programs from #7 — all the way to #1 can provide residual income — that means that once a person signs up for that program — as long as they keep using that program — you get paid. That's huge. Especially if you are helping people succeed in affiliate marketing.
When people succeed online – they tend to keep the tools that help get them that success.
5, 6, 7, 9, and 10 are things I use to size up my competition and “outrun the competition” – much like the two men who saw a lion and one reached in his bag to put on his sneakers. The other man said – “You can't outrun a lion”
And he replied,
“I don't have to outrun the lion, I only have to outrun you.”
For affiliate marketers, the “lions” are the people who are ranking on the search engines for our keywords. Those are the people we need to be a smidgen ahead of. And most of them have a head start.
Don't feel defeated, though. Put on your sneakers.
If you don't start today, they will be further ahead in a year or five years.
I have been on the Internet doing some form of marketing since 1994 – and I still remember the first dollar I made.
The first $1,000 week.
The first thousand dollar day.
Life is good working for yourself and I love to help other people achieve their goals working from home or anywhere they want to be.
Many people try to make money with a website and fail – and they never try again.
The thing is, we have to keep trying or we will fail. Permanently.
A friend of mine jokes about how he called in sick to work one time and said,
“There's something wrong with my eyes,
I just can't see coming in today.“
Saying that can get you fired from a real job.
I set my own hours, decide where to work, for how long and who I want to work with.
I can't see doing anything else.
I love what I do.
When you find something you love to do, you will never work a day in your life.
I am looking forward to YOU doing what you LOVE!
Top 10 Affiliate Marketing Programs for Affiliate Marketers:
#10 Envato
- As an affiliate, you are paid 30% of that person's credited amount or 30% of the purchased item price (whichever is higher). If they add $20 credit into their account, you get $6. If they buy a $200 item, you get $60.
Why do I use Envato? I find a lot of themes & plugins for WordPress at Envato. I started noticing that they were coming up in the search engines when I was looking for certain functions in a blog theme – and then, when I was looking for plugins to make WordPress work the way I want – but I could not find a free theme or plugin that did what I wanted.
I build a lot of websites and I am a visual person – so I want the sites I build to look right.
Websites have to work right too.
The Panorama Motel website is built on an Envato theme and we just love how it came out.
For a one time fee, we have a theme where we can add reservation capability if we so choose –
(Coming soon) and there are no monthly fees for the capability to take reservations!
Envato has some great themes and plugins are priced reasonably.
No theme is perfect – but I can make any theme work with the right framework and plugins.
If you have any experience with writing themes or plugins, contact Envato to sell your stuff. I'd love to hear from authors who have sold their inventions on Envato – to know if it's a good business model.
- Free trial
- 48% commission based on sales – it's a $149 product (one time).
Why do I use Market Samurai? I love this tool. It does keyword research, looks at SEO competition in a way that is very visual with red for bad, yellow for okay, and green for good. I am able to drill down on keywords to write posts on and get ranked for in the search engines… so the people I am writing for… can find me.
Because it's a one time fee (no ongoing monthly fee) people love this tool. I love this tool.
I've been using Market Samurai since August of 2008 – when I bought it for $69 – one time.
Market Samurai has made me my money back a thousand times if not more!
An elegant, graceful, and powerful weapon – much like the fabled swords of the ancient warriors for which it is named.
Swift, sharp, and deadly accurate, Market Samurai is a required resource for anyone who markets online.
If you don't have this weapon in your arsenal… you will be vanquished by those who do.
- cookie stays active for 3 years unless it is overwritten by another affiliate ID
or if the person clears out their browsers cookies - 20% commission
- Checks are cut every 60 days (Feb, April, June, Aug, Oct, Dec.) for all unpaid commissions totaling $50 or more, accrued through the last day of the previous month
- Everyone in the USA who pays taxes should learn about the home business tax deductions that are available
Why do I use Home Business Tax Savings? I save $4,000 -$6,000 yearly on my taxes by having a home business. No joke!
And I do it legally. Ron Mueller is one of the nation's top experts in small and home based business tax deductions. He is the author of, ‘Home Business Tax Savings Made Easy!' — which has been reviewed and approved by the IRS and is up to date with the 2018 Tax Cuts.
#7 Pretty Links
- 25% recurring commissions on their referred sales and 5% recurring, tier 2 commissions on their referrals' referred sales!
- 60-day tracking cookie
- monthly payments (paid at the first of each month via PayPal)
- $50 payment minimum.
Why do I use Pretty Links? It is easy to use – it's a plugin on WordPress and I can link to affiliate programs, lead pages, and more using my domain name. I knew a woman who was making a sub-domain for every affiliate link she had. When I showed her how easy Pretty Links is, she was blown away and switched right away!
#6 Spyfu
- 40% in monthly recurring commissions
- 365-day tracking cookie
- Paid twice monthly via PayPal
- Residual Income
Why do I use Spyfu? This is the ultimate tool to spy on your competition.
PPC – You can see what keywords they are bidding on in PPC and even the ads they are using! If they continue to use the same ad over a period of time, you know it's successful so you can learn from your competitors. You can even see how much money they are spending on advertising – so you know where you will have to scale to.
Note: I never recommend spending a lot on PPC until you know you are profitable with a campaign at a small scale – and then you can turn up the volume – scaling as you get paid so the ad pays for itself.
SEO – You can see keywords, where they are ranking, what pages are ranking, who they have backlinks from and so much more. It truly is a treasure trove of information on your competition to help you to get the best ranking in the search engines as possible.
#5 ClickMagick
- 100% of your referrals' first monthly payment after a 14-day trial – either $17, $47 or $97 depending on the plan they select – and then you'll get 35% per user per month for life.
- With the discounted yearly plans you'll get a 35% commission right up front – which means your commission can be as high as $278.95 with our yearly Pro plan.
Why do I use ClickMagick? Tracking is the lifeblood of advertising. From the time I placed my first classified ad in a newspaper, I was figuring out ROI and adjusting my strategy to get better results. How do you know what is working without tracking?
ClickMagick makes it easy to track links using a domain name of your choice and you can even do split testing, rotating links and so much more. The ClickMagick training is phenomenal… and the amount of value they add to an affiliate marketing campaign can be measured. Literally.
#4 LeadPages
- 30% recurring commissions for the lifetime of a customer
- Must be a member to be an affiliate
Why do I use LeadPages? Easy to use “lead pages” or “capture pages” as I used to call them. You can do split testing from LeadPages and it integrates with my #2 affiliate program very easily.
#3 Aweber
- 30% commission on that sale (recurring)
- Cookie stays active for 365 days unless they clear their cookies
Why do I use Aweber? I started with Aweber in 1999 and used them for list building until 2010 when I switched over to GVO – a hosting, auto-responder and Internet marketing tools company that I stopped recommending in 2014 – mostly because of long down-times with websites and email was basically undeliverable from the autoresponder.
A list is no good if every email you send winds up in the spam filter and the people on your list don't even see your emails!
So, I switched back to Aweber in 2014. Their deliverability is the highest of any autoresponder.
- The affiliate program pays well and has many bonuses. (Details here)
- If someone signs up as a free member, and they upgrade years later, you get paid lifetime commissions for the referral – never expires.
- Residual opportunity
Why do I use Wealthy Affiliate? I found Wealthy Affiliate back in 2013 but I was not ready, for whatever reason. Maybe the community and training was not as advanced as it is now. They are improving and adding to their tools and training, daily.
In February, when my dog died, I decided I was no longer happy with making $1,000 a week (which was my average in 2017) and I need to make more so that if anyone gets sick and needs care – I am not thinking – we don't have the money to pay for that. I spent $5,000 on trying to get my dog better – but I felt very financially strained doing it.
Plus, I want to help people… who are sick and homeless… or just sick and living in homes that are making them sick. And in order to help people… I need to make more money with my affiliate marketing.
I was looking for training to help multiply my income and reach my new goals…
I found a company that had a training program called AWOL Academy for $17,997…
While researching that program… and deciding it was not a good deal… I found Wealthy Affiliate.
Free for 7 days, $19 for the first month and then you can either pay monthly for $49 a month or yearly for $359 a year.
- All the training anyone could want in affiliate marketing
- Community – very active and supportive
- Hosting – up to 50 sites
- Jaaxy Keyword tool –comes free with Premium
- Too much to list here – follow this link for more details
#1 YOUR Passion
Find a product or a service that answers a need you have, and then reach out to people like you with your solution. This is the key to a successful business. Find where what you love to do intersects with your skills and helping people.
***Find something that helps people in your niche – your niche should be whatever you are passionate about.
- Do what you love and you will never work a day in your life
- Follow your bliss, the world will open doors where none were found
- You can have everything you want in life
if you help enough other people get what they want.
Why do I use passion in my business? If I didn't love what I do, I'd find a reason not to do it.
There is nothing like that feeling when everything is flowing easily and people are contacting you to thank you for helping them and changing their lives for the better. When someone says “thank you” and you say, “my pleasure” and you really mean it because it is a pleasure to share and serve people who are looking for your knowledge, product or service.
I hope you find your passion.
Here is another post I wrote that might help you find your passion:
Work from home business ideas – follow your bliss
I'd love to hear from you in the comments – let me know if you use any of these affiliate marketing programs and I'd love to hear what your passion is.
I truly hope this helps you in YOUR affiliate marketing business.
Hello Heather,
This is a great source of vital information for website building
maybe some day I’ll be tech savvy enough to use some of these tools but right now I’ll just have to go along with the basic stuff.
I will bookmark this and refer back to it when the time comes to move on up
oliver
You will get there! I am putting a post together with free tools that I use – so keep your eye out!
Very interesting article! I was looking for more ways to maximise my passive income . I will try maybe 1 or 2 programs from your page!
Thank you.
Passive income is the way to go – let me know if you need any help – you can’t go wrong with any of these tools!
I wasn’t sure what you meant by ‘affiliate programs’ after reading the title so I was interested in reading more. How long have you been in business online? Oh I see 1994 that is interesting.
I like your qualifiers for affiliate plans. Adding ethics to our business plan is sorely needed today. As I read I feel my interest building to know more about these tools.
Do you still believe marketing to others in order to get them into marketing to others is a good business for newcomers to get into? I imagine you do or you would focus on others things on your blog. It is reassuring to see someone who has the experience you do online still promoting it.
You have a very interesting and what seems to be very useful tool box of affiliate programs. I’m glad I read all of it.
Very cool article and so well put together. Thanks. I’m on your main site now. So much to learn.
Hi Paul – I don’t think that new marketers should go into the business of helping newcomers to market. The “making money” or “work from home” niche has a lot of competition – so it’s a challenge and it may take a long while to see return on your efforts.
I do think Wealthy Affiliate does a good job of showing people how to pick a profitable niche to start with.
Since I joined Wealthy Affiliate a little over a month ago – I decided to go through the Affiliate Bootcamp first and then start working on other niche sites. I used to teach a class in WordPress marketing – and I have been doing this a long time – so I have a lot I can share.
Writing about what I have been doing for over 20 years comes easy – a lot easier than some other subjects for me. Pick something you could talk or write about all day and still have interest in learning more, helping more people, and teaching more.
Hi Heather,
All I can say is WOW!! Thank you for sharing this. This would be my bookmark from now..Very helpful.
Great! I am glad you found it helpful!
Hi Heather,
thanks so much for a very informative post. I can see you’re passionate and experienced and I’m definitely bookmarking this page.
all the best,
Michelle
Thank you for the compliments – I am glad you found it useful… feel free to share it, too!
Lots of information in this post! Thanks, Heather. 🙂
My pleasure! I am glad you liked it!
Heather,
Great article and it is written very well. I am not a tech wizard and sometimes the tech terms loses me but I could follow along and even learn a few new things, always a bonus. I have heard of some of the companies you mention and think you are close to the mark on your reviews. The one that I think should be #1 is Passion&Ethics. I think you have both and it is refreshing and novel to find it in today’s somewhat jaded world.
With Respect,
Sanders
Very nice of you! Thank you. I am glad I didn’t go over your head – and if you consider yourself non-techie – then I did do a good job with all these techie tools! Passion & Ethics should be #1 – you are right! But you can’t sell those! Find something you are passionate about and help others. 🙂