I'm always on the lookout for new but simple ways of making a side income for myself and my family.
More specifically, I search for mini- businesses that can be set up with little to no investment, can be run from home, and require as little time as possible to set up and manage (1-2 hours daily max).
It was with this in mind that I stumbled upon an excellent article by a guy called John Crestani, where he discusses a novel way of making money online.
John's story is unusual - at the age of 21 he dropped out of college and ended up bumming on a beach in Thailand, living off a small loan from his parents.
While there he had a simple, but powerful epiphany and upon his return he built a business with sales of $250K per month.
His business is based on a simple but effective idea that is being used by some of the world’s largest corporations.
To save you from having to read the entire article - I will summarize the main points for you below.
The "Sharing and Caring" Business model
Unless you've been living under a rock for the last few years, you couldn't help but have noticed the inexorable rise of what's known as the "sharing economy".
This is another name for organisations that have amassed billions in value through making a connection between sellers and buyers.
Take Expedia for example.
They find hotels, flights, car rental and holidays for those searching for their next getaway.
In 2017 the company had revenues of over $10 billion
despite the fact that it doesn't own any hotels, aeroplanes or cars.
They make money by making a connection between those who are searching for these services, and those who provide them - taking a cut in the process.
Airbnb makes a connection between those who have rental space to let, and those who are looking to rent.
The same is true for Uber and eBay, as well as countless other organisations of varying sizes. It is a business model that has made a lot of people very rich.
Until recently, it was impossible for the "little guy" to enter this industry - unless they were a computer geek, or had a lot of money behind them.
The names mentioned above are huge companies... is it possible to do what they do?
Before the onset of the internet, making a connection between sellers and buyers was really hard.
If Joe wanted to send visitors to an offer for which he would make commissions - he would have needed to spend money on newspaper, TV or radio ads.
He could purchase a list of people interested in his product, hire a company to drop leaflets, or pay for telemarketers to call around.
He could invest in a direct mail campaign to people's homes.
None of these options are easy to set up.
They aren't cheap either.
It gets worse
Joe would have needed to contact the company and ask to become their distributer. This takes time and resources, as well as verification and red tape.
Back then there were no marketplaces that would make the connection between Joe and the company looking to hire him as a distributor.
There wasn't a marketplace that would display the various offers and arrange immediate payment upon making a sale.
Making commission sales is as old as the hills. But it used to be a long hard slog, reserved for those who had the drive and grit to follow through and make it happen.
How things have changed
According to John Crestani the internet has changed things by tipping the scales in favour of the small guy, who can now enter the commissions industry with ease.
There are large marketplaces that make the entire process easy and transparent.
Sites such as Click Bank, Commission Junction, JV Zoo, among others allow sellers (also known as "affiliates") to choose from a wide range of offers.
The process is straightforward -
- The affiliate will log into his dashboard and will see what offers are available.
- Upon choosing one, he will be issued with a link which he presents to his buyers.
- When buyers click on the link and make a purchase, they will be directed to a secure checkout.
- Upon making a purchase, the affiliate will be paid a commission – which is in some cases 100% of the entire sales price (more on this below).
This is how John Crestani earns $250K per month – he makes the connection between sellers and buyers and collects commissions in the process.
I will share John's top tips just below
This is a small selection of my favourite tips from John's books, videos and courses.
Tip #1 - Choose the right offers
When starting out as an affiliate it is easy to get overwhelmed by the number of available offers.
One of the best ways to choose is by promoting something which you are passionate about.
For example if you love dogs, you can choose offers that connect dog lovers with tutorials about topics such as "Healthy Cooking for Dogs", "Natural Healing for Dogs", and even "Building Dog Houses"!
The screenshot below shows options on one of the largest affiliate marketplaces - Clickbank.
Another way to ensure that your offer is profitable is by seeing what else sells well on affiliate marketplaces.
If we stick with Clickbank, we'll see that an offer about "Flat Belly" is their current best seller.
This is an indication that a lot of people are making good money with this offer...
We can either promote this offer, or others like it.
All we need to do is key in "flat belly" into the search bar and see what comes up. It is very likely that this is a topic that is ripe for making good affiliate commissions.
Tip #2 Drive Free Traffic
Driving traffic to our offers is one of the most important things we can do to start earning immediately.
John Crestani recommends that we drive free, instead of paid traffic.
Not only is this less risky, but also free traffic has a higher trust factor than paid ads.
John recommends to post videos about your offer – in YouTube and or Facebook.
Videos are very effective in converting visitors to purchasers, and product owners (also known as "merchants") are often highly skilled in creating offers that convert well.
By using the same keywords in your video's title as the ones in the tried and tested offer, and posting the videos on YouTube and Facebook, we will receive traffic from visitors searching for these popular keywords.
When they see our videos they will click on our links, and a percentage of them will purchase the product, thereby netting us affiliate commissions.
These aren't the only techniques which John recommends for driving traffic, but they are two of the main ones he uses himself.
Tip #3 Earn commissions without your customers making a purchase!
This is a super cool technique which I love.
John teaches how we can earn affiliate commissions– without having to wait for our customers to purchase a product! How cool is this?
It's called Cost Per Action (CPA), and it is based around merchants who pay for marketing related actions such as submitting a phone number, entering an email address or joining a free trial.
The below offer from Scribd pays $9 for every trial that is taken through your affiliate link.
There are plenty more tips and hacks which John teaches in his courses and books, but I do hope that this brief introduction has given you the incentive to become an affiliate marketer and build a 2nd income for yourself and your loved ones.
This is fast moving industry and there is a window of opportunity to get in on the action today. So don't hesitate - I look forward to hearing your success story.