Affiliate Marketing - How to Get Started - Part 2

As with all Internet Marketing businesses, to get started with Affiliate Marketing you need to find a small niche for yourself.

Start by thinking of things you are interested in/know about. If you are still stuck, try subjects your friend/family members are knowledgeable on. (Friends and family are a good resource and should be able to answer questions that arise).

The next stage is most important.  Have you picked too wide a market? What is the main keyword associated with your niche.  Perhaps you breed dogs and chose that subject for your niche in the hope you can have a large worldwide market of dog breeders (who need information and products, right?).

Type your keyword in a Google search box in inverted commas:

“Dog breeding”

Here are the results.

Near the top of the page, on the right hand side is the number 742,000.  This is the amount of websites competing for a good position for this keyword.

How about narrowing your niche to give you a good chance of success.  Maybe “Breeding Mastiffs” to start with, and then move on to other breeds.

Well there are only 1,350 competing for that keyword. You could dominate the search engine results in 7 days with such small competition. 

Of course, you have also reduced your audience – however, remember that many successful affiliate marketers have hundreds and hundreds of small niche markets, all earning a few dollars each per day, which adds to large amounts. This is also the easiest way to get started before you try a market with more competition.

So, who is interested in breeding mastiffs? How many people google those terms? If no one is looking for advice, products or information on mastiffs, you could be wasting your time.

Wordtracker is a great tool to find out this information. There are 2 versions. Free and paid.  So you can check out the free version, but when you start to get serious, it is highly recommended get the paid version for the latest statistics.

There are also a number of keyword analysis programs which will effectively give you data on keywords,

Keyword Elite is probably the best in the market.

Keyword Analyzer  is cost effective.

Although you are probably dying to get into the nitty gritty of affiliate marketing, I am going to stop here simply because I want to really emphasise the importance of keyword research.

IN SHORT, you cannot make money unless you do research on keywords.

Next, we will find products to suit your niche, and start making commissions for plugging them.

Please leave a comment if you have any questions so far.