How to earn big with affiliate email marketing

Maybe it’s because you haven’t built a product yet, or you don’t know how to set up brand deals. Whatever the reason, affiliate email marketing is an accessible way to earn your first dollars from your engaged audience.

The concept is straightforward: You recommend products, share a unique tracking link, and earn a commission when your audience clicks and makes a purchase. 

And once you’ve started, the high earning potential of affiliate marketing means you can go way beyond your first dollars and scale up into a high-earning business. Read on to find out how!

You can promote affiliate offers on social media or your website, so why use email? Well, your email list has several characteristics that make it the perfect channel for affiliate offers:

• Your audience is tuned in: Subscribers are engaged and ready to listen to your recommendations

• Links aren’t penalized: Unlike many social media sites that suppress posts with links, you can include multiple links in an email without it impacting your reach (our research says emails with 2 to 5 links perform best)

• You own the audience: When you send a newsletter, it goes straight to your audience’s inbox. There’s no algorithm deciding who to show the content to

• Promote until the sale: Low send costs mean you can send multiple promotions until a subscriber is ready to purchase

• Laser-focused targeting: Use segmentation to send hyper-relevant offers to the people who have shown interest in that exact topic, dramatically boosting your sales

You can also use your email list to promote affiliate offers alongside other channels, such as social and your website. 

We've broken the process of starting affiliate email marketing into 4 steps: from choosing the right products for your audience, to effectively promoting them in your emails.

Not all affiliate programs offer equal value. You need to choose a product that your audience is likely to buy and has a high enough commission to make it worth your while. 

Here are 6 main factors to consider when deciding which products to promote:

1. Product: Choose a product that your customers value and has a website that effectively converts visitors.

2. Price point: You can earn more from high-priced products, but only if your audience can afford them.

3. Commission percentage: The percentage of the sale price you receive when someone you refer buys.

4. Cookie duration: The window of time that you remain eligible for a commission after a subscriber clicks your email link.

5. Whether commissions are recurring or one-time: Whether you earn on every subscription fee paid to the business, or only the first.

6. Whether you earn on all products or only specific items: Do you only earn from the item you promote, or from any item in the store.

Here are some high-value programs to consider.

MailerLite’s email marketing affiliate program

MailerLite scores highly on all the points mentioned: We’re a trusted email marketing software tool that converts hundreds of new users every day. Plus, every business owner, creator and entrepreneur (even affiliate marketers ;)) can benefit from email marketing tools. 

We also offer an exceptional 30% recurring commission for the lifetime of referred subscriptions. 

This means you continue earning month after month. If you refer someone who maintains a $50 a month subscription for three years, you earn $540 total from that one referral. 

And if they start at $50 per month but grow their list and start paying $200 per month, you earn 30% of the increased amount!

Our cookie lasts for 45 days, so if someone you refer buys within this time period, you earn, even if they interact with our own marketing messages, such as blogs, emails or ads.  

Click here to find out more and join the MailerLite affiliate program, or read this for tips about promoting MailerLite as an affiliate.

Amazon Associates

Amazon Associates is one of the biggest affiliate programs and, in great news for email marketers, it recently changed its terms to explicitly allow newsletter promotion. 

While commissions are relatively low (1-10% depending on category) and the cookie window is only 24 hours, you earn from any purchase the customer makes during that window.

You might recommend a $25 book, but if someone also adds a $300 air purifier to their cart, you earn commissions on all of it. In fact, you earn even if the person doesn’t buy the product you recommend.

Plus, Amazon's trusted brand name is a huge help when it comes to conversions. Many of your subscribers already have Amazon accounts with their payments saved.

Affiliate networks

Another good option is to join affiliate marketing networks like Skimlinks or Sovrn. These give you instant access to affiliate programs at many retailers, so you can promote a variety of products without having to join each program independently. 

The exact commission structure and cookie duration will depend on the products you choose, but if you want a lot of product options, affiliate networks provide them. 

Niche-specific programs

Tons of businesses have affiliate programs; you just need to choose the best ones for you. 

New, digital-first businesses that are building their brand will often offer higher commissions and be more open to who joins. Search for "[your niche] affiliate programs" to discover opportunities or ask an AI tool. 

Another option is to look at the tools you already use and recommend to people informally. Joining their affiliate programs ensures that your recommendations are authentic.

For more guidance on finding programs that match your audience, check out our comprehensive guide to finding affiliate programs.

Once you’ve chosen an offer, you need to choose an email tool. We believe that MailerLite is the best email platform for affiliate marketers because our intuitive tools make it possible for both beginners and pros to create impactful email marketing strategies fast!

You can:

• Connect your domain automatically to start sending today

• Create beautiful marketing assets with templates for landing pages and emails

• Quickly enable sales boosting automations with drag-and-drop tools

• Start for free for up to 500 subscribers, then grow with very competitive pricing

• Add forms and pop-ups to your websites

• Benefit from high deliverability to ensure your emails get seen and avoid spam

• Track and optimize everything with reporting and A/B tests

• Access 24/7 support from real humans who are ready to help

Plus, you can get a free trial of all our advanced features. Click below to start!

Before you can profit from affiliate marketing, you need subscribers. The most effective way to grow your list is to create a lead magnet that your audience can receive in exchange for their email address. 

A good lead magnet is usually:

• Specific: Solves a clear problem for the lead

• Instant: Delivered immediately and contains information that signups can use right away

• High value: Effective lead magnets solve high-value problems that the subscriber needs to fix

• Tied to a product: The more closely related the lead magnet is to the affiliate offer you plan to promote, the more likely it will be to generate sales 

Imagine you’re a running influencer: A good lead magnet could be to offer a free training plan to anyone who joins your list. You could then promote app subscriptions, nutrition products, or running apparel via affiliate links. 

Check out this article for more lead magnet examples for industries like fitness, e-commerce, business, fashion and more.

How to promote your lead magnet

Once you've created your lead magnet, promote it to your audience to turn followers into email list subscribers. 

Share on social media

Promoting your lead magnet on social media can be super effective if you’ve already built an audience on platforms like X, LinkedIn or Instagram. 

Add a link to the lead magnet sign-up page in your bio and then direct people to the link. Use a dedicated link-in-bio page, like the free ones offered by MailerLite, to include multiple lead magnets as well as links to your website or other social channels.  

Get started with one of our free templates below.

Another way to grow your list on social media is with a comment-to-get strategy. Instead of including a link to the resource in the post caption, you ask followers to leave a specific comment to signal that they want to receive the lead magnet. 

You then send a link to the offer’s sign-up page via DM, where the person who commented can enter their email to receive the resource.

This is an effective strategy since your followers don’t have to navigate to another page to get the lead magnet. Plus, it boosts post engagement, which can lead the algorithm to show it to more people. 

To make this work, you’ll need to create a landing page to promote the lead magnet that you send to people who comment. 

Include:

• A headline with the main offer

• Multiple types of landing page social proof

• A signup form

• Quick information about how the lead magnet helps 

You can start quickly with one of these MailerLite templates.

Add forms and pop-ups to your website 

If you have a website that generates traffic organically, perhaps you’re a blogger or run an affiliate website but have yet to create your email list, add forms and pop-ups to convert visitors into engaged subscribers. 

MailerLite's forms and pop-ups builder gives you tons of design flexibility to create forms that match your brand. And you can add multiple fields, images, and more.

Plus, our pop-up builder has plenty of trigger options to show the right message to the right audience. See some of our top pop-up templates below.

Once you’ve created a way to start attracting subscribers, you can start with the fun part: Generating sales and revenue! 

Here are 6 strategies to successfully promote affiliate offers to your audience. 

Add offers to your signup confirmation pages

Consider adding products to your email signup thank you page. These pages appear as soon as someone joins your list, a time when they are extremely engaged with your brand. 

You can also tailor the affiliate offers you promote to the lead magnet. Someone who just signed up for your lead magnet about productivity is in a prime mindset to purchase the productivity tool you recommend.

To set this up, you just need to edit your landing page’s confirmation page by switching to the confirmation page view in MailerLite. 

Then use the drag-and-drop builder to create a section to promote your offer, just like you would on any other page. 

See an example of how the funnel could work in the image below. Right-click the image and open it in a new tab to see the image in its full size.

Include promotions in your welcome series automation 

Your welcome sequence is a series of emails that goes out automatically when someone joins your list. 

Use it to introduce your brand, build trust, deliver your lead magnet, and send useful content. You can also add relevant affiliate recommendations to start earning on autopilot.

Include the offers naturally within the emails. For example, a productivity expert could:

• Write a guide about how to use the planner lead magnet, and then encourage people to sign up for the tool to use it 

• Send a list of their favorite productivity hacks and then link to products when relevant

• Send dedicated emails promoting a particular tool or product

Your welcome sequence is a great place to add these offers since they typically have very high engagement. 

Just make sure that you don’t overwhelm new subscribers with affiliate offers. Include more non-promotional content than promotional content to keep people reading.  

Create your welcome sequence in MailerLite by triggering it to go out whenever someone joins the group associated with your lead magnet form. 

You can then easily drag in emails, delays and even condition steps to adjust the emails someone receives based on how they interact with your emails. Get started in a flash with the welcome email template below. 

Include affiliate offers as regular ad spots

Many newsletters monetize with ads, but when you’re starting, it’s not easy to get people to sponsor your newsletter. An easy way around this is to include affiliate offers as ads within your newsletter.  

Frame these as "Recommended Tools" or "This Week's Pick" to clearly differentiate them from your main email content. 

See an example of how it could look below.

Add links to product reviews and recommendations

As well as ads, you can add affiliate links to your emails via content like reviews and recommendations.  

This works if you can include this type of content in your emails without it seeming promotional. For example, a marketing newsletter could share tips and then link to the tools that help, a fitness newsletter could link to the products they use for workouts, or a fashion newsletter could link to new clothes they like.

Don't just write positive reviews, though. Writing honest assessments, including limitations and alternatives, increases your credibility. 

Send targeted offers with segmentation

Instead of sending every affiliate promotion to your entire list, segment subscribers based on their behavior and preferences to send hyper-relevant offers. 

Create segments based on lead magnet downloads, content engagement, or their location.

You could also include surveys in your emails that specifically ask subscribers about their biggest challenges. Use the replies to segment your subscribers into different target audiences based on interests and then send relevant offers. 

For example, depending on how the subscriber replies to the survey below, a productivity expert could recommend software, gadgets and tools, online courses and communities, or productivity templates.

Sending more relevant content can have a big impact on engagement. Our e-commerce email data shows that campaigns sent using subscriber filters get average open and click-through rates that are 36.69% and 267.21% higher than non-targeted campaigns. 

Create automated sequences based on interests

We spoke about welcome sequences above, but that’s not the only kind of automated sequence you can create. 

MailerLite has plenty of triggers you can use to create automated emails that go out to the ideal subscriber at the perfect time. 

For example, you could use the Clicks a link trigger to send emails to people based on the content or offers they click on. 

Or you could use the Joins a segment trigger to send emails when subscribers join a segment, such as one for your most engaged subscribers. 

Setting this up ensures you're promoting products at exactly the moment someone is thinking about that topic, dramatically improving conversion rates.

Affiliate marketing is an incredibly common form of monetization for pretty much all media organizations, from small newsletters to the New York Times. But it can seem spammy if you do it in the wrong way.

Here are some affiliate email marketing best practices to follow to ensure you’re doing it right. 

Always be transparent

Add a disclosure whenever you use an affiliate link. These disclosures are required by advertising regulations. Plus, subscribers will appreciate the honesty and understand you need to monetize your work.

A simple, natural disclosure works perfectly: "I use and love this product, and if you purchase through my link, I'll earn a small commission at no extra cost to you."

Get permission for dedicated promotional emails

If you're sending an email that's primarily an advertisement rather than your usual newsletter content, make sure you collect permission to send this content when they join your list. 

You could even create two segments within your email marketing service provider (ESP): people who agree to receive your newsletter, and those who also agree to receive advertising.

Balance promotion with value

Don't overwhelm your list with constant sales pitches—maintain a content-to-promotion ratio that keeps your audience engaged. 

Pay attention to your metrics. If your open rates drop significantly after promotional emails, you may be over-promoting, but if engagement stays strong, you might have room to promote more.

Repeat the same offer multiple times

There’s an informal rule of 7 in marketing that says the average buyer sees an offer 7 times before committing to a purchase. And in some B2B industries, it’s even more, with research suggesting an average of 28.9 touchpoints before a sale. 

Whatever the exact number, promoting the same offer multiple times gives it maximum exposure and cements it as a good option in your customers' minds.

To avoid the message sounding stale, find different angles to use when promoting it. You could add the offer as a newsletter ad, review the product, talk about how it helps with different problems, and more.

Test what works

Our final best practice is to test different products, emails, calls to action (CTA), subject lines and offers to see which ones are the most effective. 

Use A/B testing to directly pit 2 different elements against each other to see which one performs better. Or simply use MailerLite’s email analytics to keep track of offers and email performance to see what strategies work best.

For example, if you notice that customers aren’t buying one offer but are buying another, you can focus more on the one that converts while looking for other similar products. 

Likewise, if you notice that some types of email campaigns perform especially well, you can focus your marketing strategy on these campaigns. 

Affiliate marketing is a great monetization strategy as it doesn't require you to create products, manage inventory, or handle customer service. You just need an engaged email list and the willingness to recommend products you genuinely believe will help your audience.

Start with one or two carefully selected programs rather than trying to promote everything at once. Choose products you genuinely use and would recommend even without a commission, while also considering the profitability of the offer. Then use some of the promotional strategies mentioned in this article to start bringing in sales.