Top 3 Reasons Why Fitness Professionals Should be Affiliate Marketing
If you’re a good fitness professional, you’re probably sharing lots of useful fitness information every single day. Affiliate marketing could turn that information into passive income to fuel your passion for helping people get into shape.
What is Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate Marketing may sound like a fancy term, but the entire concept is extremely simple. You send a business a visitor, if that visitor buys the company’s product you get a commission. Pretty simple!
The only thing you need to do in affiliate marketing is post a link to a company’s website or product. Commissions for the sales range from 3% to 50% depending on the company and product.
Imagine you sent one of your visitors to a website selling a kettlebell that costs $100. If they have a 25% commission rate, you just made yourself $25. All you have to do is get the traffic (which you may be getting already) and post a link.
Essentially you become a sales representative for the company selling the product. Now, before you start getting dollar signs in your eyes, it is very important to acknowledge the points I make below. Take them to heart and you may be able to turn your zero-income website/blog into something that makes you consistent, passive income.
Affiliate Marketing is Perfect for Fitness Professionals
Anyone in any market can use affiliate marketing to make passive income, however, there are many key advantages to doing it in fitness. Here are a few of the reasons why you should start affiliate marketing if you are a trainer, coach, or fitness blogger.
#1: You Have Limitless Information to Share
Fitness is a very wide field with lots of opportunities for content generation. On a daily basis a personal trainer may be providing people with workouts, exercise instructions, motivation, nutrition tips, diets, and general fitness advice. You are probably producing pages upon pages of information everyday without even realizing it. If you just took the time to write it down, take a picture, or share it on social media networks, you could be generating traffic to your website which in turn could lead to affiliate sales. Take a second and just write the stuff down on a blog!
#2: People Trust You & Want Your Suggestions
The people you train came to you for a reason; they believe that you can get them where they want to go with their fitness goals. If you tell them they need to do something to achieve their results, they will do it if they trust you. Chances are that you are already suggesting products because you believe in them without any motivation for financial gain. This is the same approach you can take with affiliate marketing, but now you gain a benefit that was only had by the company selling the product before. I do not suggest that you promote anything you don’t believe in 100%. Only promote products you would use yourself or still suggest even if you didn’t make a commission.
#3: You’re Already Doing the Work
If you use the internet (website or social media networks) to gain new clients, you are already doing the work necessary to make money at affiliate marketing. Most trainers are getting traffic to their website and the only thing they can gain by it is a new client. Problem is that the majority of the people on the planet do not live within driving distance of your services! Why not take all that extra, un-monetized traffic and make a couple bucks? You’re providing them with free information already and if you’re promoting products you believe in, then you’re doing them another service! They were probably going to buy the product anyways, and the fact that they didn’t have your advice in the matter may mean that they’re buying something inferior.
Frequently Asked Questions about Affiliate Marketing
I work with a lot of fitness professionals and fitness business owners and I get a lot of questions about affiliate marketing in fitness. Here are some of them and the common answers I provide.
How to I avoid coming off as a self-serving salesman?
You don’t have to worry about people thinking that you’re a scammy salesman if you do affiliate marketing correctly. Just put yourself in your visitor’s shoes. When you go to a website, do you like to see a hundred flashy banners in your face? Do you like when your facebook friend blatantly promotes a commercial without their personal reason for doing it? No! Do what you do with your clients. Only suggest products that you use yourself and really believe in.
I don’t know how to add banners to my website, can I still do affiliate marketing?
The funny thing about banners is that they aren’t very effective unless you’re generating thousands or hundreds of thousands of hits. What is effective is adding hyperlinks to existing content that mentions the product you’re trying to promote or something close to it. Let’s say that you have a kettlebell workout on your website. You probably mention the word “kettlebell” in the description. One way to use affiliate marketing is by hyperlinking that word to a vendor that sells kettlebells! Easy peasy. Another effective way is by doing the same thing in your email marketing campaigns. Finally, you could always just mention it on your social media platforms (just keep the answer to the next question in mind when you do that).
How do I mention the product without making it seem like an advertisement?
The only time you blatantly push a product should be if you have some kind of exclusive, time-sensitive offer for it. This usually requires a more involved relationship with the vendor (for example, here is a 25% discount offer I have with Hylete). An easier, softer approach to directly promote a product is to talk about your personal experience with it. If you’ve used a certain kettlebell and you have some legitimate reasons for liking it, go ahead and talk about it! No harm in reviewing a product then using an affiliate marketing link to promote it.
How much traffic do I need to start making money with affiliate marketing?
This is a tricky question. Like I said, the reason that affiliate marketing works in fitness is because your clients and trainees trust you. For this reason, you may be able to buck the standard statistical trends in affiliate marketing because you can talk directly to your followers. For the standard statistical trend, meaning that you get 100% non-follower traffic to your website or blog, I like to use the standard click through rates for pay-per-click advertising (adwords is the best example of this). An okay click through rate is 2%. An okay conversion (conversion meaning that a visitor turned into a customer) is 2%. So, you can expect 2% of 2% to lead to an affiliate marketing sale. For 1,000 visitors, this means that 20 would click on the ad and only 2% of that amount (this is less than half of one person) would buy. For a sale, you need 2,000 visitors, and that’s if you’re doing a good job. The good news is that you have a following because you are a good trainer! For that reason, you can most likely throw the statistical standards out the window.
Why I NEED You to Do Affiliate Marketing
Listen, being a trainer is hard. The fitness industry is competitive and making a living can be tough for trainers, even if you’re very educated and capable. I’ve seen too many good trainers leave the industry because they had to work too hard for too little money. This is a travesty because there are so many people that need help getting in shape! I want you to use all that knowledge to make enough money to survive and eventually make the money that you deserve to make for your efforts. Affiliate marketing will help you do that. Post that information online, help people reach their goals, and make some money along the way.
Mark’s Choice Affiliate Marketing Programs
If you’re a regular visitor to my website, you may have noticed that I promote some products. I have some shocking news for you… I am an affiliate marketer! GASP! Yes, I promote products in the hope that people will take advantage of the products I create and believe in. I always follow my own suggestions by the way. I truly believe in the products I create and mention on my website. The good news is that you can take advantage of my favorite affiliate programs too! Here are my favorites.
The MegaMad Method of Unconventional Fitness Affiliate Program
It may seem tacky, but my affiliate marketing program kicks ass. I wrote this book following years of using kettlebells, sandbags, and bodyweight training to help get people in shape. I’ve created literally thousands of pieces of content online about these methods and I used that knowledge to write this comprehensive guide. I also offer 40% commission to affiliate marketers. That is a kick ass rate that you can take advantage of. Just sign up for a ClickBank account and look up “megamad5” in the marketplace. Post a link and start making some bucks.
MegaMad Affiliate Marketing Program
Hylete Performance Apparel Affiliate Program
I’ve worked with Hylete for years and I truly believe in their products, especially their workout shorts. I use them every time I train. They move really well, especially for the ballistic kettlebell exercises that I use and advocate. They have an excellent affiliate program that offers up 20% commission. I’ve found them very easy to promote because I wear them so much in my books, articles, videos, and dvds (just look for the H logo!). Click Here to find out more.
Hylete Affiliate Marketing Program
Cyclone Cup Affiliate Program
I met the Cyclone Cup guys at a couple different fitness expos and I’ve always been impressed with both their product and presentation. They are extremely professional and it’s reflected in their affiliate marketing program. They offer 50% commission (this is crazy high by the way) and they support you as much as you ask them to. Their product is fantastic; easily the best shaker cup I’ve used. It’s heavy-duty, it looks cool, and they have tons of different color options to match your company or mood. Just click on the link below and contact them about their affiliate program.
Cyclone Cup Affiliate Marketing
Onnit Affiliate Program
The great thing about the Onnit affiliate program is that they have high quality, holistic supplements that are unique and safe. Unlike a lot of supplements out there, Onnit’s are sourced well and they take great pride in the performance and research put into their ingredients. They also offer 18% commission on their supplements. Just click on the link below and scroll to the bottom of the page to find the “Affiliate Program” link.
