Running a blog that actually makes money always raises three questions — questions that absolutely everyone asks when they find out our blog generates income.
- Question one: Wait, you can actually make a living writing a blog?
- Question two: How on earth do you do it?
- Question three: How do I get started?
Yes, you can earn money from a blog. Yes, you can even make a living from it. And how do we do it? We break down our blog’s income every month on our Patreon. Over 80% of our income comes from various forms of affiliate marketing — and that’s exactly what we’re diving into today.
What Is Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing is simply a fancy term for recommending products and services in exchange for a commission (whenever your reader makes a purchase or signs up with a partner company).
You’ve certainly come across websites packed with reviews and ratings for all sorts of apps, gadgets, bank accounts… they all earn their money through affiliate marketing.
How Affiliate Marketing Works
It’s straightforward: you place a link on your website that leads to, say, an online shop. If your reader clicks through and makes a purchase (having arrived via your link), you earn a commission. These typically range from around 3% to 30%.
Depending on your niche, there are plenty of companies that manufacture or offer something relevant to your topic. We’ll break it down using the travel niche, which is what we know best.
If you write about travel, obvious affiliate marketing examples include:
- Insurance companies offering travel insurance
- Online shops selling travel gear
- Accommodation booking websites
- Apps for currency exchange and payments abroad
- Language learning apps
In each of these categories, you’ll find at least five companies that would be happy to offer you a commission for recommending their products. But how do you actually find them?
Finding and Choosing an Affiliate Program
Before we go any further, here’s a quick glossary of affiliate marketing jargon that pops up across the industry — and that we’ll be using throughout this guide:
- Advertiser = a company looking for partners to promote its services
- Programme = a specific offer from an advertiser
- Publisher = the person doing the promoting, e.g. a blog owner — that’s you
- Affiliate partner = Publisher = you and us
There are two ways to connect with an advertiser. Either directly (a direct partnership), or through an affiliate network (an indirect partnership).
Direct Partnerships
If you arrange a deal directly with an advertiser, they’ll typically register you in their own system (such as their proprietary affiliate platform), from which you’ll receive your tracking links. The advantage is sometimes higher commissions and a closer working relationship, while the downside is payout thresholds.
It’s not uncommon for advertisers to set minimum payout thresholds as high as €200. That means you won’t receive any payment until your accumulated commissions hit that mark. And when you’re just starting out, reaching that threshold can take several months.
Partnerships Through an Affiliate Network
Affiliate networks are platforms that specialise in connecting advertisers with publishers. The downside can be tougher entry requirements for publishers and slightly lower commissions (the network takes a cut from the advertiser, and the advertiser often passes that cost on to the publisher).
The big advantage, however, is a shared payout threshold. If you sign up with five different advertisers through a single affiliate network, you’ll reach the minimum payout much faster and get paid more frequently.
How to Find the Right Affiliate Programme
When going direct, you usually already know what you want to promote. If you’re planning to promote accommodation listings on Booking.com, a quick Google search will reveal that Booking has its own affiliate programme. And if Google doesn’t give you the answer, the best bet is simply to contact their support team.
On closer inspection, you’ll find that Booking is also registered with several affiliate networks — but the best terms are available directly. Affiliate networks typically offer around 4% of each booking made through your link, whereas Booking itself is willing to share 20–40% of its own commission from each property. In practice, that often works out to significantly more than a flat 4% of the total booking value.
In the UK, many companies run their own affiliate programmes through platforms like Awin, Partnerize, or Impact. Each platform usually displays a contact person right on the dashboard — so you simply reach out to them to get started.
If you don’t have a clear idea of which programme you’re looking for (maybe you just want an online shop that sells travel products), or the company you had in mind doesn’t run its own affiliate programme, there’s a good chance that an affiliate network manages it on their behalf.
Several major affiliate networks operate in the UK and internationally:
- Awin – one of the largest networks globally, with thousands of programmes from major brands and retailers
- ShareASale – now part of Awin, popular with bloggers, huge catalogue of programmes
- CJ Affiliate (Commission Junction) – one of the biggest international networks with a massive range of programmes
- Amazon Associates – Amazon’s own affiliate marketing programme, great for product-based content
- Impact – growing network with premium brands and excellent reporting tools
- Partnerize – focused on enterprise-level brands, strong in travel and finance
Every network has a catalogue of campaigns on its website. Browse through them to find what suits you best. And remember — nobody’s stopping you from signing up with multiple networks at once.
Personally, we don’t choose a network based solely on what it offers, but mainly on how it treats its publishers. For example, CJ Affiliate is somewhat notorious for sudden changes in programmes (such as commission cuts) without giving publishers fair warning. Sure, the advertiser requests the change, but it’s the network’s job to communicate that properly to publishers like us.
After signing up with an affiliate network, you can browse and apply to programmes as you please — but bear in mind that advertisers often need to approve new publishers, which can take a day or two.
Affiliate Programme Terms and Conditions
What you really need to examine closely are the terms and conditions of each programme. These are set by the advertisers themselves, and they can sometimes be so poor that it doesn’t make sense to promote the programme at all.
Why would you promote cameras for one retailer at 2% commission when another retailer offers up to 5% for the exact same product? On items costing hundreds of pounds, that’s a massive difference.
Networks want you to be able to make informed choices, so they provide useful statistics to help with your decision-making:
For instance, the “approval rate” statistic tells you what percentage of conversions the advertiser typically approves. In the example above, the rate is just 53%. That means roughly half of all conversions get rejected for various reasons.
Conversion rejection is frustrating, but it’s justifiable — and the rate varies significantly depending on the type of product or service. It tends to be much higher for clothing or for services that need to be consumed. For example, with Booking.com, a reservation counts as a conversion, but you only get paid once the guest actually shows up and pays.
That said, don’t overthink your choices. When starting out, we always recommend picking one or two affiliate networks (or up to five direct partnerships) and just getting started. Once you see what your readers are most interested in — what they click on and where they convert — you can start shopping around for better offers with higher commissions or better service.
Here are the affiliate marketing programmes we use in the travel niche:
- SafetyWing (direct partnership) – travel insurance for nomads, with partner discounts for readers
- Skyscanner (via CJ Affiliate) – for finding flights
- Rentalcars (via CJ Affiliate) – car hire
- Booking.com (direct partnership) – accommodation
- 12go.asia (direct partnership) – transport tickets across Asia
- GetYourGuide (direct partnership) – tickets and tours worldwide
- SafetyWing (direct partnership) – insurance for digital nomads
- Truetraveller (direct partnership) – travel insurance for long-term travellers
TIP: A successful online business also calls for a fast, reliable internet connection. Make sure you’ve got a solid broadband setup to keep everything running smoothly.
How to Start Affiliate Marketing
You’ve chosen your programmes, signed up, and been approved as a publisher. What comes next?
First, you need to grab your tracking links from the affiliate programme, along with any promotional materials the advertisers provide. These usually include banners, bestseller lists, and similar resources.
For example, a well-run affiliate programme might provide publishers with:
- Banners in various sizes
- Lists of top-selling products in each category
- Descriptions of the shop’s unique selling points and products
- Featured products worth highlighting
- XML product feeds
- And much more
Your affiliate link is the most important thing. It’s the only way to track that a customer came from your website after clicking through. These links typically look something like this:
Many affiliate programmes offer a whole range of pre-made links you can use for different landing pages, promotions, or product categories:
If you’re promoting an online shop, they’ll usually have a link generator built into their programme. Just paste the URL of the product you want to promote, and the system automatically generates a unique tracking link for you to use.
Types of Blog Promotion
You’ve gone through the advertiser’s materials and your links are ready. Now comes the second word in “affiliate marketing” — the marketing part.
When it comes to promotion, there’s no limit to creativity, but the core methods include:
- Adding links to existing content
- Writing detailed reviews
- Publishing interviews
- Banner ads on your website
- Email marketing
- Social media promotion
- Facebook groups
- Website footer links
- PPC advertising
- And a gazillion other options
Adding links to existing content
This is the quickest way to get started with promotion. If you write about travel, you’ve likely already written about various destinations. Check your analytics to see which pages get the most traffic and start with those.
Got an article about London but no list of recommended accommodation? Or worse — you have a list but no clickable links?! Time to add affiliate links via the Booking.com affiliate programme:
Add links everywhere it makes sense. After a few months, your Booking affiliate dashboard might look something like this:
Writing Detailed Reviews
If you’re playing the SEO game and aiming for organic traffic from search engines, you’ve probably already written a review or two. A simple keyword analysis (using tools like Ahrefs or SEMrush) can reveal how many people are searching for a brand name combined with terms like “review,” “experience,” or “is it worth it.”
If you spot a brand that’s getting decent search volume, write a comprehensive review. That’s exactly what we did with all the financial apps we use. Have a look at our DEGIRO review for an example.
During the pandemic, when interest in investing skyrocketed, several of our investment app reviews earned us well over €4,000.
Interviews
Interviews with founders or senior figures at the companies you promote are an excellent form of content marketing. If you work directly with a company, they’ll often suggest an interview themselves.
Just off the top of our heads — Fumbi and Bondster both offered us interviews unprompted in the past six months. Interviews are a brilliant complement to reviews because they add unique content that other writers simply don’t have — and both search engines and readers love that.
Banner Advertising on Your Website
While the golden age of banner ads may be behind us, they can still be a solid supplement to your affiliate marketing strategy. For about seven years, we ran a sidebar banner promoting a 50% discount on travel insurance. It generated a steady, reliable income the entire time.
These days, we only use banners to promote our own projects:
Email Marketing
If you collect your readers’ email addresses, weave affiliate links into your emails. Clicks from emails absolutely count.
It’s particularly effective to include affiliate links in automated email sequences (such as those triggered when someone downloads your free PDF guide).
Ideally, tie everything together: send an email about your latest review, include a link to the review itself, but also a direct affiliate link to the product being reviewed.
What’s more, email click-throughs predominantly happen on desktop rather than mobile. And desktop traffic almost always converts better for affiliate marketing (this is down to cookie-based tracking technology used in browsers).
Social Media Sharing
You can share your affiliate links on social media, though the results tend to be mediocre. A far more effective approach is to share links to valuable content that already contains your affiliate links.
It’s also well worth creating a Facebook group around your niche. Every group we’ve ever created still attracts new members organically to this day. For example, our VIP Group Loudavým krokem now has over 2,600 members. We leverage group ownership by regularly sharing our content there 😎
Adding Links to Your Website Footer
Your website footer, much like the navigation menu, gets clicked more often than you might think. We recommend placing links to your best-performing content with affiliate links — or the affiliate links themselves — right in your footer.
Track Your Results
Don’t forget to create a tidy spreadsheet where you can track the performance of each campaign. Over time, you’ll notice that some campaigns outperform others. It might look something like this:
You’ll also eventually figure out which types of promotion work best for your site and which aren’t worth the effort. Every website and author is different, and there’s no universal formula for what will work for you.
Your niche plays a huge role too. 😊 And it probably goes without saying — only promote products and services you genuinely believe in or have personally tested.
Tips and Tricks for Your Vacation
Don’t Overpay for Flights
Search for flights on Kayak. It’s our favorite search engine because it scans the websites of all airlines and always finds the cheapest connection.
Book Your Accommodation Smartly
The best experiences we’ve had when looking for accommodation (from Alaska to Morocco) are with Booking.com, where hotels, apartments, and entire houses are usually the cheapest and most widely available.
Don’t Forget Travel Insurance
Good travel insurance will protect you against illness, accidents, theft, or flight cancellations. We’ve had a few hospital visits abroad, so we know how important it is to have proper insurance arranged.
Where we insure ourselves: SafetyWing (best for everyone) and TrueTraveller (for extra-long trips).
Why don’t we recommend any Czech insurance company? Because they have too many restrictions. They set limits on the number of days abroad, travel insurance via a credit card often requires you to pay medical expenses only with that card, and they frequently limit the number of returns to the Czech Republic.
Find the Best Experiences
Get Your Guide is a huge online marketplace where you can book guided walks, trips, skip-the-line tickets, tours, and much more. We always find some extra fun there!
