Disclaimer! This post includes affiliate links.
Over the past few months, more and more of my readers have been asking for more affiliate marketing help. I’ve spent so much time sharing all the resources I can to help people make money with affiliate marketing, yet I don’t have a post on affiliate marketing platforms.
When it comes to affiliate marketing, you really need to take the time to learn the legal side and as much about affiliate links as you can. There is absolutely no easy way to make money through affiliate marketing. You have options, focus on growing and engaged audience that trust you and embed relevant tried and tested affiliate as recommendations into your content.
Alternatively you focus on building a blog following through a platform like Pinterest, and drive 10,000s of thousands to viewers to your blog, in the hope it’ll convert to sales. You could try your hand at ranking 1st on Google for affiliate rich content, which would naturally convert to high sales. For example my WordPress Theme’s post currently ranks on the 5th page of Google, it’s a highly competitive keyword but even on page 5 it still brings me daily sales. Even then you still have the option to use twitter, instagram, or your mailing list for affiliate marketing.
However you choose to start your affiliate marketing strategies, you’ll first need to join some platforms. These are the 10 Affiliate Marketing platforms I’d recommend for beginners.
Awin
Awin is one of my favourite affiliate marketing platforms. Awin cost £5 to sign up for, but the money is returned once you hit the first payout amount.
The platform has thousands of brands, you apply to individual brands and they will either decline or accept your invitation to join. Once accepted you can create affiliate links for that brand and any others you have via the Toolbox.
It’s one of the easiest platforms to track sales, and with such a wide variety of brands onboard, it’s a platform that is universally relevant to most bloggers.
I’m currently signed up with a number of advertisers, including Etsy, Swan, Lastminute.com and a lot of beauty/homeware brands. Commission and cookies length change brand to brand so lookout for that.
Travel Payouts
Obviously due to COVID people aren’t travelling right now. But one of the best travel affiliate programs I’ve across is Travel Payouts. They have a whole range of advertisers which you can use to monetise your website such as Booking.com, AirBnb, Trip.com, Trainline. It’s a bit similar to Awin in that you apply for offers, and wait to be accepted or declined.
I really recommend this if you write about UK based travel or international travel.
Ultimate Bundles
Ultimate Bundles is a great platform those who are starting out with affiliate marketing – especially if you have a blog where your main niche is blogging, or your audience is mainly bloggers. This because the products are bundles of ebooks and courses that are highly discounted.
It’s perfect for those with a mailing list, especially if you have a large mailing list. This is because the offers change and you can send out an email with the latest offers every so often. I know plenty of smaller bloggers who have used this platform really successfully to bring in high commission sales.
Gumroad
Again if you’re in the blogging niche this might be one of the best platforms for you. Gumroad is a little different in that product makers/sellers can add you as an affiliate for their products. It is by no means an easy platform to make affiliate sales, but with time and effort it can be a platform you make really successful sales with. All you need is a Gumroad account, and to contact some seller to get started.
Gumroad also pays out weekly via bank transfer or Paypal. Which makes it one the best for payouts.
Blue Host/ Lyrical Hosting
Particularly with bloggers, I find that these are the two main hosting platforms people opt for. Both have an incredible affiliate program.
Having an affiliate link for your hosting, is a must as blogger. It’s one of the easiest ways to have affiliate link, because you’re already actively using the service. All you need to do is get your link and pop it in your resource page or in relevant content. Why it might not bring in large sales, it is definitely a super handy link to have, as most bloggers with WordPress or other platforms need hosting.
Shareasale
Share a sale is an American based affiliate program and may be good for you to use if you get lots of traffic from the US. The platform has a lot of really good brands, and some that are popular with bloggers (for example Tailwind used to be popular on it). They are also partnered with Awin.
They payout on the 20th of every month and have over 4,000+ merchants including more than 1,000 that are exclusive.
Creative Market
Creative Market is a very popular choice amongst bloggers for affiliate links. This is because the site has a-lot of products that most bloggers would find genuinely useful, such as blog themes, stock images, mockups and more. It even has fonts that you can buy and upload for Canva, which is perfect for Pinterest designs to make your branding more unique.
If you’re actively buying from Creative Market and advertising them, then signing up for their affiliate program is a no brainer. You earn 15% for every sale made, which isn’t bad commission for a platform like this.
BookShop.Org
I didn’t want to leave my book blogger readers out on this post, as I know a lot of the platforms here are geared more towards the blogging, lifestyle and fashion niche.
BookShop.Org is a bit of a new platform, but one of the best for book bloggers as you’re able to make 10% commission per sale. Which is genuinely so much better than any book commission you’d get through Amazon. You’re also able to support independent book stores which is a big plus.
Bonus: RewardStyle
RewardStyle is an invitation-only, end-to-end influencer content marketing channel leveraged by one million brands worldwide. It is an incredible platform, if you are a fashion blogger, or have a professional looking fashion website. This would be one for you.
If you want some tips on how to get accepted, this is a really good post How To Get Accepted to Rewardstyle & Liketoknow.it.
Let’s Talk Amazon
Since we’re at the end of this post, let’s talk Amazon Affiliates. I’ve mentioned this many times across my blog, but Amazon is not an easy platform to make sales with. I personally believe, and I know this won’t be something a lot of people want to hear, but if you struggle to make the qualifying sales you won’t be making any substantial money from the platform. You could honestly be investing your time and effort into a platform that has a better commission rate and payoff.
If you have a niche specific blog, then Amazon maybe absolutely perfect for you. But unless you have a high readership and viewers that aren’t other bloggers you may really struggle.
I know a lot of people actively advertise Amazon as a great starting off platform, I previously have, but the more I use it & the more I actively understand about the platform I really think it isn’t.
Let me know in the comments some of your favourite affiliate platforms, and if you use any of the platforms on this list.
These are just some starting suggestions but most brands do have their own affiliate programs, for example Papier or Love My Style have their affiliate programs available to join on their own website.
If you enjoyed this post why not check out The Best 14 Stock Libraries For Bloggers and 6 Big Reasons Affiliate Marketing Isn’t Working For You.
I’m only now looking into monetization streams so this is really helpful! I’ll have to come back to consider all of these thoroughly. Thanks for the list!
Really great post. I’ve been doing some very small affiliate work via Adtraction and I do have a Bookshop.org link set up but I’ve been looking at ways to expand. Thank you!
This is a fantastic starting point for me – I was otherwise only really aware of Amazon, so this is incredibly helpful, thanks for sharing
Such a great list of Affiliate Marketing options. I haven’t heard of some of them, so I need to check them out! Thanks so much for sharing!
This is such a great list! Affiliate marketing is something that I’d love to get more of an understanding of but I feel as though it’s not really something that works with my blogging niche. I’ll have to look into these platforms x
https://www.femaleoriginal.com
Do you happen to know of any that are specifically good for mental health and wellbeing bloggers?
What a great helpful post! Thank you for sharing that with us!
Awin sounds amazing! Thanks so much for the inspo!
Katie | katieemmabeauty.com
This is great Kayleigh! We are always on the lookout for what is best or not as platform and found Awin vert straightforward and easy to use. I never heard of bookshop.org so I am going to check that out as well as Share a sale! Thank you so much xx
This is such a helpful post thank you, I’ve been wanting to get more into affiliate marketing lately xx
This is a fantastic post thankyou. I’ve not really looked into affiliate marketing as started my book blog as more of a hobby but figured if couldn’t hurt to look at options. I had only heard of Amazon so I will check out bookshop.org thanks!
This is such a useful post! I forgot all about AWIN and I am signed up to it, so I will have to have a look again! There’s a few sites I haven’t heard of before, but will have a look into them too, so thank you for sharing.
Aimsy xoxo
Aimsy’s Antics
I have heard all of them! So happy 😀 I recently join bookshop because I’m sharing books category on my blog now. I haven’t try with Awin since I already joined CJ Affiliate and ShopStyle – I think they work the same like Awin or Shareasale. Thank you for sharing this x
Currently I use Amazon, but glad to learn other affiliate networks that I can work with. Thanks for sharing this post.
This is such a helpful post! I used to use Awin but I never got much benefit out of it personally so I cancelled my account, I use Shopstyle Collective and that pays out well x
Lucy | http://www.lucymary.co.uk
Thank you for sharing this. I’ve been looking in to ways I can start affiliate marketing as I’ve never tried it before so this is so helpful!
I have joined Awin and Lyrical Host’s affiliate programmes. I am not making many sales at the moment, but I am slowly improving my blog and it’s growth to help me get there. I find your posts really helpful.
Jotting all of these down! Thank you so much for all the useful blog advice!!❤️
This is soo helpful! I’m hoping to monetise my blog one day so I’m going save this post to refer back to. There’s just so much to learn!
I cant tell you how helpful this post is! I need to get my back into aff marketing and this is going to be my cheat sheet!
Rosie
This is such a helpful post. I totally agree with you about Amazon. I am with Awin and have not made any money Yet but it is early days – I think I need to apply to be with more brands. Thanks for the tips 🙂
Ooo thank you for sharing about Bookshop! I had no idea! xx
Really great, helpful post as always. I think I’m a bit away from monetising just yet, but it’s nice to know there are lots of options!
Your posts are always so helpful! I’ve been researching affiliate marketing, but always get stuck on which platform. Thanks to this post, I’m approved to Shareashale and I’m thinking about Bookshop.org.
Have you ever heard of lemonads?
lemonads is by far the best affiliate platform in 2021.Validation is super simple and fast, you can have a dedicated Affilaite Manager as soon as you make a little volume and especially no need to wait 30 or even 60 days to get paid.
I have been considering some of these but the book one is of great interest. It is where I tend to use affiliates most but I’d love something more book related.
Thank you so much for sharing x x
Great suggestions I use RewardStyle and I think it’s great. I was signed up for Amazon but I just link the product through rewardstyle and still get paid sometimes higher than the actual amazon affiliate program.
I haven’t had much success with affiliate marketing, although I have tried a few of the ones you have mentioned. I wish I had a list, because then, I think I could do well with Ultimate Bundles. I really like the ones they offer!
We definitely need to set some sort of affiliate link up! Such a helpful post!
I don’t use any affiliate links/brands on my site but if I ever think of going in that direction this post is very useful. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for sharing I really want to start doing affiliate!
I’ve never bothered much with aff links as I don’t find them that easy to fit naturally in the majority of my content but the commission from my Lyrical link in my sidebar has been so good! This has definitely given me a couple of new ones to look into though x
I’m no where near the point on my blogging journey that I’d be looking at affiliate links but it’s good to have these posts to read to know what to do in future! I’m glad you added the book one in as I think going forward book reviews is something I’d be looking to get into! Brilliant post as always!
I also didn’t have success with Amazon affiliate marketing though it was the first one I tried since I read it was easy for beginners. Tried it twice too! You’re right about the things you’re selling needing relevance to your readers. I guess living in the Philippines, most of my readers are not users of Amazon.
Liz
Wow. I hadn’t heard of most of these. Time to do some retooling.
I have been saying that about Amazon for a while now. If you find yourself having to beg other bloggers to make your initial 3 sales to qualify, take a step back. It’s not a negative thing and doesn’t mean your blog isn’t good, it just means that the Amazon links that you’re sharing don’t appeal to your audience. The key to successful affiliate marketing is bringing products and brands to the attention of your readers that they actually want to purchase. After all, no sales = no affiliate payments. Rather than trying to force something to work that isn’t performing, take the opportunity to explore something else!
Thank you for sharing such useful posts which can help Bloggers. My experience with Amazon Affiliation was also not very pleasant, I am glad to know I am not the only one. 😀
This is another of your very helpful posts! I’ve never really thought about affiliate marketing as a book blogger but I like the idea of bookshop.org for helping out independent bookstores. I will definitely be checking them out. Thanks for sharing!
I’ve tried to join AWIN, ShareASale and RewardStyle but they never accepted my applications. 😢 I feel like it’s very tough when you’re new to this whole blogging stuff to get affiliate links. However, I hope I’ll be able to grow and try out these platforms again as well as the others that you’ve mentioned!! Thanks for this great article.xx
I use Amazon Affiliates, but just for a month, currently evaluating this affiliate program. However, I’ve not heard of other programs listed by you. It is interesting to try how they work. Your post is very useful to me. Thanks!
This is so helpful!! So many of theSe I’ve never heard of. Thank you!
This is a really good post about affiliate links. I have been looking for info about this subject and I appreciate you sharing these links.
Thanks for this post! I am still learning about affiliate marketing so this is really helpful.
Thanks for sharing this valuable information. I am considering affiliate marketing as a resource. I’ll definitely be looking into these websites!
As someone who is considering signing upto affiliate links, this was a really useful post so thank you for sharing this post which I’m going to call “my guide”. I had no idea there were so many different ways to make money via affiliate links on my blog!
This is so helpful,thanks. Great post 💛💛💛💛
This is such an interesting post! As a book blogger, I will definitely check out bookshop.org. I’m a European book blogger, so I’m not sure how that works, but I’ll definitely take a look at it ☺️