How to Choose an Affiliate Program - What I Do

byboomergp08

31.1K followers

5 years ago

If you have wondered how to choose an affiliate program, you are not alone. Many members immediately choose Amazon, and there is nothing wrong with that. But it also is a good idea to do a little research on Google, especially for companies that specialize in your niche.

WHAT I DO WHEN CHOOSING A NICHE

I use Google in two ways: 1 to find the companies with affiliate programs, and 2 to see how popular their brand is. Depending on the niche, sometimes hype about a company or product can be misleading. I will give you an example below on what I did.

My latest niche is on the many health benefits of CBD Hemp Oil. This industry is exploding but because there are hundreds of clinical studies showing the medicinal benefits from an all natural plant, dozens of CBD oil companies are coming to life.

The hype on CBD is justified but not all the CBD companies have quality products, with some containing very little of CBD. Too many people jumping on the bandwagon to get in on the money making aspect while ripping off their consumers. So research is needed.

I USE GOOGLE TRENDS TO HELP DECIDE

After doing a Google search for CBD Hemp Oil Affiliate Programs and choosing my two favorites, I put the company brand names into Google Trends to see how popular they are, see above image. NOTE: I included a third company, which I explain why below.

Both Elixinol and PureKana offer a higher quality product and more information about how they extract the CBD from the hemp and where their GMO-Free Organic Industrial Hemp is grown. Many of the other companies lack in this information in part or in whole.

WHY I INCLUDED A 3RD COMPANY

Though CBD has been around and used for decades, it really didn't burst onto the mainstream until a CNN Special called Weed hosted by Dr. Sanjay Gupta aired back in 2013. It featured a girl by the name of Charlotte and a group of 7 brothers growing medicinal marijuana.

Charlotte suffered from a rare form of epilepsy known as Dravet Syndrome. She was having seizures every 15 to 30 minutes. Nothing the doctors gave her worked and some of the powerful pharmaceuticals nearly killed her twice putting her into a brief coma.

Long story short, the Stanley Brothers were growing a special breed of medicinal marijuana with higher levels of CBD and really low levels of THC. It was close to impossible to get high from smoking it. Then Charlotte's mom contacted them after researching CBD.

The brothers produced CBD oil from their specially grown plant and without her doctors knowing Charlotte's mom gave her a little of the oil and her seizures stopped. Charlotte went from daily seizures every 15-30 minutes down to one seizure every week.

When the Stanley Brothers heard what happened, they knew their original instincts to grow weed higher in CBD would be extremely medicinal. They just didn't realize how much. So they named their special breed Charlotte's Web and have gone on to help other kids with epilepsy.

At the time I did my research into CBD Hemp Oil Affiliate Programs, the Stanley Brothers did not have an affiliate program. And though they do now, both Elixinol (which I am an affiliate of) and PureKana are more popular and trending higher according to Google Trends.

GOOGLE TRENDS IS GOOD FOR AFFILIATE MARKETING

In the above Google Trends graph I did a comparison between three popular Affiliate Marketing Networks; Rakuten Marketing, Commission Junction, and Shareasale. As you can see, Shareasale has remained the most popular network worldwide.

I am not going to go into all the great aspects (brand popularity, trending related keywords, popular niches) Google Trends can help you with your Niche or Bootcamp websites. If you would like to learn more about how easy it is to use Google Trends, read my training below.

HOW TO USE GOOGLE TRENDS & ITS BENEFITS

You can take practically any niche, product, company brand, experience or personality and put it into Google Trends to see its popularity any place in the world. This can help you decide which way to go. So why did I choose Elixinol over PureKana?

I chose Elixinol because of its longevity. They have been in business for more than 15 years, whereas PureKana has only been in business a few years. Elixinol also shows pictures and gives the names of the owner and key executives, PureKana does not.

This is why research is important in knowing how to choose an affiliate program. Google Trends can help you to determine which program, network or company to join, or which niche and product is popular. Do you use Google Trends? If not, how do you choose and affiliate program?