If I Had To Start Affiliate Marketing In 2024, I’d Do This

What would I do differently if I had to start affiliate marketing all over again right now?

I started affiliate marketing ten years ago, still living at my mum’s house in a sleepy village in the north of England and working a crappy call centre job dreaming about a better life.

Since then I’ve built multiple six and seven-figure online businesses, moved to a beautiful condo in the heart of Bangkok in Thailand and now enjoy total time and location freedom.

What I can tell you is starting affiliate marketing in [current_year] is a whole different beast compared to how it was back in 2014. The amount of software, tools and information we have now is nothing short of staggering.

Some say it’s more competitive but I’d say – with the right know-how – it’s actually never been easier.

Hey, I’m Simon and if you’re new here, welcome. In this article, I’m going to share what I’d do differently if I had to learn everything from scratch in [current_year].

And if you’re here it’s probably because you want to start affiliate marketing. You’ll want to check out Wealthy Affiliate – it’s the single best platform to get started.

Here’s my full Wealthy Affiliate review.

You get an AI-built affiliate website with AI content creators, keyword tools, affiliate program search, step-by-step training and direct access to me – everything you need to start making money.

Click here and take your FREE test drive.

Tip 1: Set Some Money Aside

So the first thing you have to do when starting your affiliate marketing business is set some money aside. No surprise here, there are startup costs to starting an online business.

And yes, there are tons of videos out there saying start affiliate marketing for $0 and it is possible to do this, just know it’s just going to be a little more challenging and take you longer to get results.

The good news is starting affiliate marketing doesn’t cost nearly as much as you think…

Affiliate marketing isn’t like dropshipping where you have to pay $3,500+ a year for a Shopify store plus ad costs and everything else.

Upgrade your free Wealthy Affiliate account to Premium or Premium Plus+ it’s like $499 a year – that’s $1.30 a day – and that gives you everything you could ever need to start a six-figure business.

Now, I get it. Some of you may still be thinking:

“Simon that’s still a big chunk of money and I can barely pay my rent right now.”

Think about it this way:

$1.30 a day means you don’t buy that daily Starbucks, you skip going out and clubbing at the weekend to avoid $100, and you definitely don’t buy any designer clothes or anything like that and just waste your money.

So just save up a little money for a month or two and you’ll soon reach your savings goal.

And it’s worth it because honestly, following their structured course with the right support and tools is going to cut your learning curve in half and help you see success a lot quicker. You’ll know what’s working now, what mistakes to avoid and what not to avoid.

There’s a psychological reason behind this as well.

Once you’ve gone yearly, that’s you deciding that you’re really going to make this happen and you’re going to stick to it.

Plus you’re giving yourself and your business a full year to grow and develop and that’s going to skyrocket your chances of success.

Tip 2: Pick A Niche You Like

If I could turn back time and talk to my beginner self a decade ago, I’d say pick a niche that you actually like.

I’ve coached hundreds of newbie affiliate marketers and I see them get really caught up on this niche selection process and overthinking it way too much.

An affiliate marketing niche is a specific group of people with unique interests, needs and wants.

Your job as an affiliate is to choose a target audience, figure out what they want and give it to them.

And the better you get at giving people what they want, the more successful you’re going to be.

It’s that simple!

Choosing a niche you enjoy will mean you don’t hop from one topic to another, to another, to another.

You see, you need to stick with a niche long enough to figure out exactly what your audience wants, what their goals and aspirations are, what their biggest frustrations and struggles are and what they’re buying online.

You need to stick with a niche long enough to learn how to speak their language and how to connect with them, see what’s going on in that niche and who your competitors are.

So if you’re jumping from say, beginner tennis to pet hamster care or whatever else it may be, you’re never going to break through. All you’re doing is bouncing around.

And the reason so many beginner affiliate marketers bounce around is because they never choose a niche they actually like. Maybe they dive headfirst into a niche because someone told them that’s where all the money is or they think it’s an untapped, low-competition opportunity.

Whatever it is, they’re not going to stick with it in the long run. If you truly want to succeed in this space, you have to pick a niche or a topic you’re interested in and have experience in.

Like, if you’re a golfer and you love golf, go into the golf niche.

If you sit knitting scarves all day, go into the knitting niche.

If you’re obsessed with bodybuilding, go into the bodybuilding niche.

It just makes sense.

And every niche has products and services you can make money with so don’t worry about that.

Just don’t go into the beauty and skincare niche because you saw that person made X amount. You have to find the niche that’s right for you.

And if you’d like me to write an article where I walk you through the exact process I follow to find profitable niches, let me know in the comments and I’ll do that.

For now, take a look at my top 10 affiliate marketing niche ideas for 2024:

Tip 3: Give Yourself Time

The next thing I wish I knew before starting affiliate marketing is the importance of giving yourself enough time and not worrying about the money.

I know this is a weird thing to say because money is exactly the reason why most of us get into this in the first place and yes, of course, you can make a heck of a lot of money with affiliate marketing and you can do it from anywhere in the world.

What I mean is that it’s really easy to watch those flashy “day in the life of an internet millionaire” type videos and expect to get the keys to the Lambo by this time next week.

Those Instagram or YouTube videos are essentially highlight reels. They showcase the glitz and glamour but very rarely show you the behind-the-scenes struggles and the actual process these influencers had to go through before something clicked.

It’s all made out to seem way easier than it actually is and it sets unrealistic expectations and it’s these unrealistic expectations that set so many beginners up for failure.

Don’t get me wrong, affiliate marketing is easy in that you don’t have to study for years at university like if you wanted to become a brain surgeon or a lawyer or some other traditional job like that, but it’s not easy in that you do have to put in a lot of work especially in the beginning to get your business off the ground.

And success takes time. You’re not going to make $10k overnight, it’s just not how business works.

Affiliate marketing is a set of skills and it takes time and practice to actually get good at it.

So, be patient and don’t try to rush the process.

Tip 4: Dream Big, Start Small

You want to set big, scary goals for yourself.

Whether you want to replace your income or go for $100,000 a month, aim high and don’t hold back.

I did exactly that. Take a look at the goals I set for myself when I started out:

And you know what? I went on to smash these goals and make millions in affiliate commissions.

My secret?

I dreamed big but stayed laser-focused on the small, daily tasks that paved the way for turning those dreams into reality.

For example, my to-do list for today might be:

Find a higher-paying affiliate program
Research 5 keywords for the week
Hit publish on a post
Reply to comments

And consistency is the name of the game here. It’s really the only difference between someone who throws in the towel and someone who makes it all the way to the finishing line.

That’s because you don’t get to where you want to be in one giant leap, you achieve success by taking a series of small, cumulative and daily steps.

And by breaking down your goals into these smaller action steps makes it seem more achievable and helps (me at least) with motivation.

I’m not successful in affiliate marketing because I’m any smarter than you. I never went to Oxford or Cambridge and I had no background in website design or online marketing or anything like that.

The only thing separating me and some other person that failed is that I kept going.

I learned. I applied.

So focus on the daily action steps that’ll get you to where you want to be.

Go through the Wealthy Affiliate training, take it one lesson at a time and don’t move on until you’ve completed the assigned tasks.

Focus on putting in the work and the results will always take care of themselves.

Tip 5: Never Stop Growing

The next thing I would tell myself early on if I was relearning affiliate marketing all over again is to never stop growing.

That means with every blog post, focusing on at least one thing you can do better…

You can always get better at finding keywords, crafting post titles, writing compelling intros or giving effective calls to action.

Once you’ve got that down, you can start with building an email list and running effective email marketing campaigns.

After that, you could try your hand at YouTube and focus on getting better at presenting yourself to the camera, at video editing and making scroll-stopping thumbnails.

And don’t stop there. Maybe then you can dive into TikTok or Pinterest or paid ads or whatever it is.

And this is why I love Wealthy Affiliate Classes.

Beyond the core training, there are expert classes on a wide variety of affiliate marketing and online business topics released every week, so you’re always upping your game.

And with each new skill you master, you open yourself up to a higher earning potential and take your business to the next level.

So never stop growing and getting better – it’s the key to long-term affiliate marketing success.

The Bottom Line

So those are the biggest things I wish I learned earlier or that someone had told me when I was starting affilate marketing.

I know some of these tips are pretty general and you might not have even started a website yet, but just keep these in the back of your mind and I’m telling you, they’ll help you a lot.

My hope is that, in a year or two from now, once you’ve achieved massive affiliate marketing success, you’ll look back fondly and remember some of the stuff I said here.

And if you’re ready to get started, I’ve got some other great beginner guides and tutorials like:

So be sure to check those out and remember – you got this!

Simon