Affiliate marketing is gaining a lot of popularity these days and everyone is trying to get their hands on a piece of this trend. If you’ve been at it for a while now, but you haven’t managed to make any money and you’re losing hope, there’s nothing to worry about.

There are a number of people who start off on the wrong foot, learn from their mistakes and go on to make a lot of money with affiliate marketing. If you want to make sure that you don’t waste anymore time before you too begin your earnings, here are a few mistakes you need to start avoiding.

Force Selling

One of the biggest mistakes affiliates make is that they try to force a product to sell. To begin with, this is not going to help you sell mainly because there are a ton of sites and e-commerce platforms already doing that. The reason affiliate marketers make so much money is because they help buyers understand the worth of the product and see how they can benefit from it. You need to change your focus from selling to helping out these users and before you know it you will manage to make a profit out of your blog.

You need to understand that while there are a ton of affiliate marketing products that you can promote, you need to pick the ones that you think will work well for your blog. When you choose a product, make sure you stay true to it and you don’t drift apart from the product and begin to focus on something else.

You also need to remember that when someone comes to your blog they are looking for information on the product and not a link to buy it. IF you give them the information, they will automatically buy it, but if you don’t, they’ll go elsewhere looking for that information.

Multiple Products

This happens to be the biggest downfall for most affiliate marketers. It usually begins with products that seem to be related to one another, but later on it moves into a totally new dimension. IF you plan on promoting a product, make sure you stay true to that one product and not drift your attention to other ‘related’ products. For instance, if you’re choosing to promote mobile phones, never ever drift away from mobile phones to accessories or headsets for the phone.

Create a blog that focusing on one thing and one thing alone. This not only helps you to focus on creating interesting content, it ensues you stay true to your core area of expertise. When you give advice on one particular product rather than multiple products, visitors tend to trust you more. They depend on your advice and they rely on you to help them choose the right product.

Test

In order for you to be able to choose a product that works, you need to test it out first. There could be a few trial and error products that you might come across and that’s fine. Don’t lose hope if the first few products failed, it usually takes a few products for you to discover the one that actually works well. However, once you find the one that works well, don’t ditch it. Begin to grow your network on the basis of that one product and you’ll see your income graph rising in no time.

Avoid Comparison

One of the silliest mistakes first time affiliate marketers make is to compare two products. There are a number of affiliate websites that often compare the main product to two other products that are similar. What these marketers do not realize is these two other products could also be interesting and there could be a possibility that someone that visits the page could end up liking one of these two products. You may end up redirecting your visitor to another website when you wanted them to go ahead and click on your main product.

The best thing to do in this scenario is to give options to the reader. You should never compare two products. All you should do is give them a scenario where they will have to make a decision. For example, if you have an article for the best computers under a certain budget. Here you can place all the computers that your website is affiliated to and mention the pros and cons of each product. Irrespective of which product the reader chooses, you will be able to earn money.

Don’t Make False Claims

How many times have you read online “This training program helped me earn millions in one month”. Although sensible people find this to be a hoax, there are a number of others out there that fall prey to this. If you promote such hoax claims on your website, people will eventually know that you cannot be trusted. If you move on to other products in future, no one will bother visiting your site because of the false claims that were made in the past. You should always keep things real.

If you feel that a certain online course or training program is beneficial, there is no harm telling people about it. Everyone loves an honest opinion. When people see that you have no ulterior motive with these claims, they will visit your site more often. Affiliate marketing is all about honesty. If you want people to purchase a certain product, putting down other products in comparison to it will not work. You need to inform people about the benefits of your product and how it can make a difference to their life.

Don’t Lose Focus

Affiliate marketing is all about getting one idea and sticking to it. If you are interested in promoting health and fitness based products then that is what you need to stick to. Your reader base will be formed based on what you promote. Always stick to one genre and see what a difference it makes to your earning potential.