Instagram Affiliate Marketing: 15 Methods To Learn And Implement Today

Businesses can find affiliate marketers in just about any medium, and Instagram is one of the fastest-growing platforms for affiliates to share their content. If you aren’t already using Instagram affiliates to promote your brand, then it’s time to start. 

Instagram Is An Ideal Platform For Affiliate Marketing. 

This is because it offers various mediums such as live streams, videos, and images to give buyers a 360-degree view of a product before purchasing it.

Affiliate marketing is powerful because it feels less like an ad and more like a recommendation from a trusted friend. Great affiliate markets have a high chance of making conversions.

Whether you’re in the planning stages of your affiliate marketing strategy or if you’ve been doing it for a while, these 15 methods will help you get the most out of your affiliates.

What Is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is a marketing method in which brands use affiliates to market their products instead of an in-house marketing team. Affiliate marketers are people with an online presence and following, such as a blog, social networks, or YouTube channel, who promote products for other brands.

Brands can find influencers organically or through affiliate networks. Affiliate marketers use special affiliate links assigned by the brand to track their sales. When they make a sale, they earn a cut based on the commission rates set by the brand. It’s a mutually beneficial relationship for affiliates and brands.

Image source: MarketSplash

Brands often focus their marketing efforts on an affiliate marketing strategy because user-generated content is often much more effective than content a brand creates. 

Influencers have a built-in audience of followers who like and trust their opinions, so they can help you sell products and increase brand awareness while they earn affiliate commissions.

How Affiliate Marketing On Instagram Works

Instagram has over a billion users, giving your brand access to a wide variety of people. Some Instagram creators have large, dedicated followings. If your brand can get in front of these audiences, you’re sure to make a profit.

With Instagram, you can go through affiliate marketing programs to manage your affiliates, create your own, or use Instagram’s new in-house program.

Instagram affiliate marketing is slightly different from other social media platforms, as creators can’t share links within their social media posts. Fortunately, there are other ways to share links, such as in a bio or a story. 

15 Instagram Affiliate Marketing Methods

You can use many different techniques when starting and promoting your affiliate marketing campaign for Instagram. However, below are 15 of the best strategies for Instagram affiliate marketing.

• Use The Right Influencers As Your Affiliate Partners
• Offer A Coupon Code
• Create Reels & IGTV Content
• Have Your Affiliate Link In Your Instagram Bio
• Choose A Niche And Stick To It
• Always Look At A Potential Affiliate’s Engagement Rates
• Affiliates That Have Other Potential Distribution Platforms Are Key
• Promote Across Instagram Posts & Stories
• Optimize Your Affiliate Landing Page for Conversion
• Create Sponsored Ads
• Keep Track Of Your Affiliates
• Share Good Quality Content With Your Affiliates
• Have Clear Expectations & Prerequisites For Your Affiliate Program
• Create Incentives For People To Join Your Affiliate Program
• Be Aware Of The Relevant Legal Requirements

1. Use The Right Influencers As Your Affiliate Partners

Choosing the right social media influencers is essential. 

Check out an influencer’s audience demographics to make sure they align with your buyer persona. You want influencers who have a following representing your target audience, so you’ll get your product in front of those most likely to buy it.

It’s always good to go through a vetting process when choosing affiliate marketers.

Ensure that they create relevant content that will work well with your brand/product. Also, check to see if they’re already working with any of your competitors.  

Image source: MarketSplash

2. Offer A Coupon Code

Social media influencers often like to give their followers something extra to make new products affordable to their target audience. Offering a unique coupon code for an influencer and their audience can be an effective strategy. 

Even offering a small discount creates an air of exclusivity that will entice followers to make a purchase. Give the code a name related to your influencer’s name or social media handle. You’ll make a strong connection with an influencer and their followers when a special offer is “just for them.” 

3. Create Reels & IGTV Content

While Instagram posts are a great way for influencers to share your product, they should also utilize Reels and IGTV. These channels are beneficial for a few reasons. First, they can add affiliate links directly to both, which they can’t do in a post. It’s easier for followers to click through to your product.

Next, video is an essential part of any marketing strategy. In 2021, over 83% of internet users in the US viewed video content, and that number is only increasing.  Users want and expect video content, making it one of the most effective methods of reaching them.

4. Have Your Affiliate Link In Your Instagram Bio

There are a few ways to promote your affiliate program to potential influencers as a brand. You can have a landing page on your website that affiliates can find organically, and you can also promote yourself through affiliate networks.

One of the best strategies is to promote yourself where the influencers already are: on Instagram. Continue to create high-quality content on your page. You’ll attract customers and influencers. Include a bio link to your affiliate program so that influencers can easily get more info. For affiliate link creator, simply signup for an affiliate program and use that affiliate link for your Instagram account.

5. Choose A Niche And Stick To It

While some marketers favor a “spray and pray” marketing approach, most agree that niche influencer marketing is more effective. Instead of trying to reach everyone and choosing a wide variety of influencers to promote your product, choose a niche and find affiliates within that niche.

When you stick with a niche, you’ll find the most likely customers to buy your product. You and your affiliates can put all of your energy into converting them instead of wasting money and energy on people who will likely never buy your product.

6. Always Look At A Potential Affiliate’s Engagement Rates

When choosing an affiliate, one of the first things you should analyze is their engagement rates. Engagement rates are measured by how often followers like, share, and comment on a post on social media platforms. 

While follower count is important, engagement rates often give a more honest picture of how well an influencer’s content performs. Additionally, Instagram users can buy followers, but it’s harder to fake engagement rates.

 7. Affiliates That Have Other Potential Distribution Platforms Are Key

While it’s important to find Instagram affiliates with high engagement rates and many followers, it’s all the better if you can find someone who has a presence on other platforms. The more distribution platforms they have, the better.

For example, many influencers have large, engaged audiences on Instagram and TikTok. Your product will be able to reach an even wider audience, and these influencers should have even higher conversion rates.

8. Promote Across Instagram Posts & Stories

Your affiliates can also use Instagram posts and stories to promote your product. They can use all Instagram features in conjunction with one another. For example, if an influencer releases a new reel, they can promote it through posts and stories.

Likewise, you can promote your affiliates’ content through your own channels. This strategy can be compelling if you work with a well-known influencer. Create a post or story letting your followers know about your partnership with the influencer and their new content.

9. Optimize Your Affiliate Landing Page for Conversion

Now that affiliate marketing is so popular, you may not necessarily have a line of successful affiliates waiting to partner with your brand. The best affiliates tend to be more discerning, and they have a set of criteria they’re considering before joining a brand. 

Your landing page should be well-designed and clearly state why affiliates will want to work with you. Be clear about the benefits of your program, such as a tiered program that allows them to earn more as they sell more. Be sure to include your affiliate commissions. 

Remember to keep your landing page simple and concise. It is not advisable to give potential affiliates too much information. A landing page is meant to have a singular focus to make a conversion. Use SEO optimization best practices to ensure that affiliates will find you through Google search.

Image source: MarketSplash

10. Create Sponsored Ads

In addition to SEO, you should use sponsored ads to help potential affiliates find you. Influencers interested in finding brands to partner with will usually turn to Google to see which brands have affiliate programs. 

While SEO can get you to the top of the SERPs, it can take time. Sponsored ads will guarantee you a top spot on a briefer timeline.

You can also create sponsored ads on Instagram. After all, if you’re looking for Instagram influencers to serve as your affiliate marketers, where better to find them than where they already are?

11. Keep Track Of Your Affiliates

Whether you have one affiliate or over 100, you’ll need to keep track of them. You’ll want an affiliate tracking platform to help you in most cases. Many programs, such as WeCanTrack, Tapfiliate, and AnyTrack.io, will help you assign and monitor links for your affiliates.

• WeCanTrack overs you an all-in-one affiliate dashboard that keeps track of your conversion data for all your affiliate networks and partnerships. All you have to do is connect your website and WeCanTrack will begin collecting, processing, attributing, and creating reports for all the data that comes in.  

• Tapfiliate is an affiliate marketing tool that makes it easy to start, recruit,  track, improve and increase your affiliate network. Over and above affiliate marketing, Tapfiliate also has the functionality for handling referral marketing and influencer marketing. Don’t believe us? Why not try out their 14-day free trial.

Although AnyTrack.io is not specifically an affiliate tracking tool, it tracks and attributes website conversions of any kind which could also include affiliate conversions. Affiliate marketers, ad agencies, and eCommerce websites can all benefit from using this tool.

You especially want a program to help you with analytics. A good analytics program will let you see which affiliate products and influencers are converting and help you find areas that need work.

You should also share this information with your affiliates. It can help them figure out the best types of content they can create to get conversions. Improvements will benefit you both.

12. Share Good Quality Content With Your Affiliates

If you plan to provide your affiliates with content, be sure it is of the highest quality. Influencers won’t be willing to share content that’s less than stellar. If they feel it’s not up to the standards of what they usually post, they won’t want it on their channel.

High-quality content always makes sense. You and the influencers you work with have the same goal: sell affiliate products. Low-quality content will rarely achieve that goal. Another tip is to always include your brand name or distinctive logo so that no matter where your content is being viewed, people know who it belongs to.

13. Have Clear Expectations & Prerequisites For Your Affiliate Program

Different brands have different approaches to running affiliate programs. Many brands feel that since affiliate marketing programs have fewer upfront costs than other marketing strategies, it’s good to let anyone into their program. 

After all, the more affiliates you have, the more sales you’ll get, right?

There are a few good reasons to have requirements and expectations in place. First, when you let anyone join your program, you have less control over what’s being said about your brand. The influencer may not represent your brand the way you want it to. Secondly, you can clarify what exactly you are expecting from all your affiliates and what they can expect from you.

14. Create Incentives For People To Join Your Affiliate Program

If you want to attract the best affiliate marketers, you need to be prepared to wow them. Influencers with a lot of followers and high engagement rates get many offers. As their brands grow, they have to get picky about who they work with.

Incentives can be a great way to attract affiliates. Start by offering competitive commission rates. Use a tier program. Work to ensure them that you’re a great brand to partner with.

If you offer specific influencers exclusive affiliate promotions for your brand, they can share these promotions with their customers. Make the promotions unique by using their name in the offer code. Influencers love to share exclusive deals with followers.

15. Be Aware Of The Relevant Legal Requirements

The FTC has cracked down on affiliate marketing in the past few years. There is a worry that users will think that an influencer is giving an unbiased opinion of a product, thus leading them to buy something the influencer recommends.

The FTC now requires all affiliate marketers to be upfront with their followers about any compensation they receive, including affiliate commissions, sponsorships, and goods. It must be clearly stated or printed on the post. 

Parting Thoughts

Instagram affiliate marketing can be a great way to make some sales while also increasing your brand awareness, especially since Instagram has several ways that affiliate creators can share their content with others.

With an excellent affiliate program in place and the right Instagram users, your Instagram affiliate marketing strategy will be ready to take off. 

Just make sure that you follow the best practices and methods we outlined above so that you are maximizing your potential Instagram affiliate marketing returns.

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