Affiliate marketing allows you to act as a third party to advertise products and earn a commission. Explore the ins and outs of affiliate marketing and how you can start doing it yourself.
Affiliate marketing is a marketing model in which third-party publishers promote a merchant’s goods or services and receive a percentage of the sales or web traffic generated as a result. It is typically considered a key part of modern digital marketing.
Affiliate marketing appeals to businesses because it enables them to meet their marketing goals at a low cost. It benefits affiliates by allowing them to earn income simply by promoting products they use and enjoy. Generating affiliate income requires developing a platform and building an online audience. In addition, it's essential to stay current with affiliate marketing industry trends. New technologies such as generative AI, social platforms such as TikTok, and shifts in consumer behavior over time will change how you interact with your audience and how they react to you.
What is affiliate marketing?
Affiliate marketing is a revenue-sharing marketing method in which a third-party affiliate, such as a blogger, YouTuber, or influencer, advertises a business’s goods or services to help it meet sales or marketing goals. In return for generating sales, the affiliate earns commissions or rewards. A business might work with an affiliate to achieve the following:
Increase sales
Attract more web traffic
Improve brand awareness
Connect with the affiliate's audience
For example, a shoe company could partner with a fitness blogger to reach the blogger's audience of fitness-minded readers. Through the blogger's efforts, the shoe company could experience more site visitors and boost sales. Some of the new customers could go on to become long-term subscribers.
Amazon affiliate marketing program
Amazon Associates, Amazon’s affiliate marketing program and one of the largest such programs in the world, boasts tens of thousands of affiliates earning up to 10 percent commission on qualifying referrals [1].
What makes affiliate marketing attractive is that businesses can partner with affiliates at a low cost. Typically, businesses offer their affiliate marketing partners such rewards or compensation as:
Commissions (percentage of the sales)
Free products and samples
Exclusive rewards
Networking opportunities
Access to training or education
While revenue sharing is not a new marketing concept, modern affiliate marketing usually refers to online digital marketing in which affiliates link to a business's product or service online and receive a percentage of sales or web traffic.
How do affiliate marketing programs work?
Affiliate marketing involves a relationship between four main actors: the affiliate, the merchant, the affiliate network, and the customer. Each plays a unique part in the marketing process:
The affiliate (or “publisher”): This is an individual or entity that promotes the merchant’s product or service.
The merchant: This is an individual or entity selling the product or service that the affiliate promotes.
The affiliate network: A network serves as an intermediary between an affiliate and a merchant’s affiliate program. While affiliates and merchants can connect without an affiliate network, it is a common channel for such relationships.
The customer: A customer is anyone who purchases a product through an affiliate. Merchants partner with affiliates to connect with the affiliate’s audience and convert them into customers.
As an affiliate, you can connect with merchants through affiliate marketing programs. After making some initial connections through a program, you may be able to find other appropriate merchants and gradually build a wide network of brand partners in a particular industry. For example, if you are an affiliate who reviews cell phones, an affiliate marketing program might suggest a range of tech products for you to review. You can then build a network within this industry and focus on reaching new customers who are interested in tech products.
Occasionally, an affiliate and merchant connect organically through direct outreach. For instance, a merchant who manufactures cake pans might connect with an affiliate who blogs about baking in order to get their product in front of the affiliate’s audience of baking enthusiasts.
Affiliate marketing examples
You’ve likely seen examples of affiliate marketing before, even if you didn’t realize it. This is because the most effective affiliate marketing tends to be paired with quality content that readers enjoy and find useful. Although it can be tempting to promote various products to make sales and drive traffic for merchants, affiliates who have developed trust with their audience by highlighting quality products they believe in are more likely to inspire audience members to make a purchase. In other words, quality and relevance sell.
Some common examples of affiliate marketing include:
Websites covering general topics that occasionally include affiliate links in blog posts or articles, such as in this list of Kitchen Essentials compiled by the cooking-focused website the kitchn
YouTube videos that include affiliate links in the description, such as the one attached to Android Affiliate’s The Best New Tech of CES 2024 video
Dedicated review websites that cover products that appeal to a targeted readership, such as Gear Patrol and Wirecutter
Affiliate marketing salary
Affiliate revenue is highly variable and can often fluctuate from year to year because affiliate marketers earn pay based on the results of their work rather than a standard hourly or annual salary. Furthermore, it can take time for an affiliate marketer to build an online audience and make a profit. Despite the differences in pay structure, several career sites offer insight into how much the average affiliate marketer can earn. As of May 2025, these sites report the average affiliate marketing salary as:
How do affiliate marketers earn money?
Unlike some sales roles, affiliate marketers can earn money even if the person they refer doesn’t purchase a product. Although some affiliate marketing programs pay per lead, you will also find programs that offer to pay per click or per sale.
Pay-per-click: With pay-per-click affiliate marketing, you can earn a commission every time a user clicks a link that routes them to your affiliate partner’s website.
Pay-per-lead: Pay-per-lead affiliate marketing allows you to earn a commission every time a user you directed to your affiliate partner completes a lead capture action, such as filling out a contact form or subscribing to a newsletter.
Pay-per-sale: Pay-per-sale is similar to more traditional sales commission structures, where you earn a percentage or set amount every time a user makes a purchase for your affiliate partner.
Is affiliate marketing right for you? 4 signs
Becoming an affiliate marketer and even building a thriving affiliate marketing business could be a rewarding career path for you. Four signs that affiliate marketing may be right for you as you consider taking the first steps are:
1. You want to create an income stream based on your interests.
2. You want to build an online audience and create unique content that engages them.
3. You want to create partnerships with brands you love and promote their products to your audience.
4. You are ready to take on an entrepreneurial mindset to grow your affiliate marketing business.
How to start affiliate marketing
Becoming an affiliate marketer involves choosing the niche you'd like to work in and selecting a related digital channel to market your affiliate products or services. You might also join an affiliate marketing network to build relationships and increase your reach. Furthermore, you'll continue to expand your network through various digital channels and strategies, stay up to date with current trends, and continuously build your skills.
Ready to begin your journey? Follow the steps below to streamline the process.
1. Pick your niche.
Affiliate marketers are valuable to merchants because they can reach specific audiences composed of potential customers. The better you define your niche market, the easier it can be to build an affiliate platform and create original content that meets your audience's needs.
Ideally, the niche you build your affiliate marketing efforts around should relate to your interests and those of a sizable, underserved audience. As you brainstorm ideas, conduct research with Google Trends to discover what people are searching the internet for that might correlate to your niche topic.
In this exploratory phase, ask yourself the following questions:
What is a topic, hobby, or field that is of particular interest to me that’s not currently being served?
What physical products or digital products do I use that I would enjoy promoting to others?
How can I add a new angle or perspective to a topic with a lot of competition?
What kind of content would I like to make that would allow me to serve this niche and use my skill set?
2. Pick a marketing channel that matches your niche.
Once you decide on the topic, audience, and products your affiliate marketing brand will cover, you will want to decide on a marketing channel. While creating a dedicated review website is a popular approach, you can also do affiliate marketing on social media platforms such as Instagram. You may find that one channel is more appropriate for your affiliate marketing goals than others or that a multi-channel or omnichannel marketing approach is best.
Some common approaches and channels include:
A dedicated product review website specifically oriented around offering readers insights into products
A website or blog covering a specific topic that includes links to relevant affiliate products in articles or posts about that topic
Social media platforms, such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or YouTube, where you post content related to the products and brands you promote.
3. Join an affiliate marketing network.
Affiliate networks connect affiliates and merchants. While it’s not always necessary to join an affiliate network, you will likely find that doing so will make it easier to build relationships with merchants and ultimately increase your potential to earn affiliate commissions.
The type of affiliate network or marketing program you join will depend on the type of products your audience is interested in. In fact, different types of affiliate marketing programs offer a range of products and services from industry to industry. To optimize your chances of success, research networks and programs that best fit your target product and audience.
Some examples of popular affiliate networks and programs include:
4. Expand your network.
Creating a successful affiliate marketing platform takes time and dedication. To increase your overall audience size, though, it is helpful to use a mix of digital marketing approaches, including:
For instance, you might find that a combination of timely email blasts and SEO content will improve your marketing efforts more than either one on its own.
5. Be consistent and master your skills.
In addition to taking time and dedication, affiliate marketing also employs a wide range of skills, including:
Conducting market research to understand your audience
Analyzing the competitive landscape to know where you stand among other affiliate marketers in your niche
Improving writing skills to convey ideas and information through a blog, social media caption, or email blast
Improving your presentation skills to convey ideas and information through a slide deck, lecture, or livestream
Improving videography skills to create videos that delight, entertain, and educate your audience
Learning graphic design to generate attractive graphics related to the products you promote and the message you convey
Learning data analysis and marketing analytics to understand how your affiliate marketing campaigns perform
Using software, such as customer relationship management (CRM) tools, to keep track of your marketing, sales, and customer experience data
The exact mix of skills you employ in your marketing pursuit will likely depend on the platform you build, the audience you connect with, and the approach you decide to take. For example, if you run a YouTube channel that reviews collectible toys, you will likely need a combination of video production, presentation, and social media marketing skills. However, if you are instead running a website that features only written reviews of collectible toys, then you will likely need to focus on expanding your content marketing skills.
Over time, you might start using all of these skills and more as you work to drive traffic, produce eye-catching content, and increase affiliate sales.
Watch this video for ideas on how you can design a marketing funnel that helps you reach your audience.
Affiliate marketing tips
As you begin setting up your affiliate marketing business, follow these tips to get the most out of your efforts.
Study affiliate marketing strategies.
Staying abreast of the latest affiliate marketing strategies can enable you to make the most of your time and resources and ultimately earn more affiliate income. Strategies might include offering a webinar on a particular topic and promoting affiliate products during the webinar or building a list of email subscribers.
Consider the rewards you can earn.
When you know what rewards are available to you through different affiliate programs, you can choose which brands can help you reach your affiliate income goals. Be sure to ask potential partners about the commission rate they offer, as well as other rewards for selling products, and factor these details into your overall affiliate strategy.
Build an affiliate dashboard.
An affiliate dashboard is a web-based interface that an affiliate partner or program provides so that you can see how your campaigns perform, generate referral links, monitor your earnings and payouts, and more. When setting up affiliate marketing partnerships with brands, be sure to ask about the dashboard they provide and the information you can track.
Cultivate strong relationships.
Given that affiliate marketing is all about relationships, you'll want to take action to strengthen the relationships you have with your audience and the brands you promote. You can do this by staying up-to-date on the brands' latest developments, products, and initiatives so that they can communicate accurate information to your audience.
1. Amazon. “Amazon Associates, https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/.” Accessed May 14, 2025.
2. ZipRecruiter. “Affiliate Marketing Annual Salary, https://www.ziprecruiter.com/Salaries/Affiliate-Marketing-Salary.” Accessed May 14, 2025.
3. Payscale. “Average Affiliate Marketer Salary, https://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Affiliate_Marketer/Salary.” Accessed May 14, 2025.
4. Glassdoor. “Affiliate Marketer Salaries, https://www.glassdoor.com/Salaries/us-affiliate-marketer-salary-SRCH_IL.0,2_IN1_KO3,21.htm?clickSource=searchBtn.” Accessed May 14, 2025.
https://tinyurl.com/4brwx3c3
Adam Weiss
5 ways AI is changing where and how influence happens in affiliate marketing
AI is shifting discovery upstream, changing where influence happens. Learn how to measure value and performance before the click.
AI is reshaping how people discover, compare and buy products — and affiliate marketing sits at the center of that evolution. From generative search and conversational shopping to AI-curated recommendations, consumers are being influenced before the click more than ever — and that shift is redefining how performance is measured. Here are five ways AI is transforming affiliate marketing and what publishers and advertisers can do to stay ahead.
1. Consumers: Discovery starts before the click
People aren’t finding products the way they used to. Tools like Google’s AI Overviews and ChatGPT’s new conversational shopping feature are compressing the traditional funnel. Instead of starting with a search and clicking through multiple sites, consumers are increasingly discovering and comparing products directly within AI platforms.
Recent data shows nearly 60% of Google searches now end without a click — a trend that will only accelerate as AI takes a more active role in summarizing content and generating recommendations. Meanwhile, 77% of active AI users say they trust AI-generated content, giving these systems enormous influence over purchase intent.
That creates both a challenge and an opportunity: how can affiliate marketers measure and reward influence that happens before a site visit ever occurs?
2. Publishers: Quality and content rule the new discovery layer
With AI curating the web’s knowledge, who creates the content — and how credible it is — matters more than ever. AI models increasingly prioritize expert-written, trustworthy and original material, rewarding publishers who invest in authority and authenticity.
For affiliate publishers, that means doubling down on expert-led reviews, in-depth comparisons and first-hand testing — the kinds of assets AI systems are most likely to surface when recommending products.
Publishers should also broaden where and how they build audiences. Short-form video, newsletters, podcasts and niche communities all send valuable signals to AI systems, helping strengthen visibility and resilience against algorithmic shifts.
As ChatGPT’s new shopping feature shows, the definition of a publisher is expanding. Platforms themselves — whether AI chatbots or social discovery tools — are becoming affiliates too, recommending products directly within conversations.
This evolution makes fair value exchange more important than ever. Publishers who create the content powering AI-driven recommendations must be recognized and compensated when their work drives sales, even if the referral happens through AI.
3. Advertisers: Attribution becomes the strategic battleground
Traditional last-click attribution no longer tells the full story. AI-powered discovery pushes influence to the earliest stages of the customer journey — long before measurable engagement begins.
That’s why multi-touch and view-through attribution are becoming critical. Brands need to connect influence across impressions, content engagement and even unclicked recommendations to understand AI’s true role in conversion.
Advertisers who use clear UTM parameters, API-based integrations and real-time tracking gain a distinct edge. These systems can map activity across platforms and partners, revealing a more complete picture of how AI-driven discovery contributes to performance.
As AI platforms evolve to include sponsored content or ad-supported experiences, the attribution landscape will expand even further — adding new layers of impression-level and engagement data to connect the dots.
4. Collaboration: Strengthening partnerships with data and context
Successful affiliate relationships today depend on more than links and incentives. Advertisers must equip publishers with the data, context and creative flexibility needed to produce high-quality, AI-friendly content.
When both sides share insights and adapt strategies together, affiliate marketing shifts from a transactional model to a connected ecosystem that drives smarter discovery. Consider offering:
- Detailed product insights and FAQs to fuel credible, informative content.
- Flexible creative assets that can be adapted by channel, audience or AI format.
- Performance transparency to help partners understand what resonates and why.
In this environment, affiliate marketing becomes more than a transactional channel. It’s a knowledge-sharing ecosystem that supports the very AI models shaping discovery.
5. Affiliate marketing platforms: Connecting the dots across AI-driven touchpoints
Affiliate platforms are becoming the connective tissue linking brands, publishers and emerging discovery channels. To keep pace, these platforms must evolve from basic tracking tools into dynamic attribution ecosystems — able to measure influence across content, conversation and context. That means capturing value not just from a click or a last interaction, but from the entire chain of engagement that AI enables.
Leading networks are already investing in advanced tagging, real-time data integration and API-ready infrastructure to support multi-touch and impression-based tracking. These capabilities will be critical as AI-driven environments — from conversational commerce to social recommendations — continue to shape how consumers make decisions.
Equally important is transparency, ensuring every partner in the affiliate value chain is credited fairly for the influence they drive — whether it comes from a review, a creator video or a mention inside an AI-powered shopping chat.
Ultimately, the future of affiliate marketing will depend on a platform’s ability to create a clearer picture of how discovery, engagement and conversion truly connect.
The bottom line
Success in affiliate marketing will come from adapting attribution models, strengthening publisher relationships and investing in credible, expert-driven content — all supported by the right infrastructure.
Platforms that connect signals across touchpoints, capture influence before the click and ensure transparent value exchange will set the standard. The winners will be those who align strategy and technology to make influence measurable, meaningful and fair.
https://tinyurl.com/37areswt
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