Affiliate marketing is an ideal place for building up brand awareness and, hopefully, revenue. One of the places where you should really be working on your affiliate marketing strategy is social media platforms, such as Instagram. In this article, we will discuss the best Instagram affiliate marketing tips. Learn how to make the most of your marketing plan and find quality affiliates on Instagram.
This one is for both beginners and intermediates – buckle up and let’s get going!
How Does Affiliate Marketing Work on Instagram?
You came across lots of affiliate marketing examples while scrolling through your feed. With over one billion active users, Instagram is the perfect place for influencers to share discount codes with followers. And the links that the influencers use are usually unique, trackable links given to them by the affiliate network. That makes it possible to track how many clicks and sales are made as a result.
Influencers can add trackable links into their bios, IGTV captions, and Instagram stories.
Instagram is suitable for affiliate marketing for multiple reasons: it has both image and video features for showcasing products, it’s free and effective for stimulating engagement and traffic. Moreover, all the most prominent affiliate marketing networks are supported on Instagram – from ShareASale, CJ Affiliate, to Rakuten, and AWIN.
Here is a closer look at the benefits of Instagram affiliate marketing:
Instagram Gives You Better Engagement With Your Brand
When Instagram influencer post or write about a product on the platform, they typically tag the brand in question, along with the link. That means that your brand’s tag and link will be prominent to those scrolling and reading the comments. Potential customers can click on the tag, and they will be redirected to your Instagram page. And if they click on the link to the product, you will get even more traffic. Success!
It Gives You A Revenue Boost
Instagram affiliate marketing mimics word-of-mouth marketing – a tactic that has been popular and effective since the advent of humanity itself. On Instagram, it can lead to a more considerable conversion rate – up to 4.5%, and thus bigger chances of a sale. So Instagram can be a great place to make the most of your marketing budget.
You Create Ongoing Relationships Between the Brand and the Influencer
If something works, why stop? If a partnership between an influencer and a brand generates sales and drives engagement, that is something that both influencers and brands will likely want to continue. Besides, people are less likely to trust brands that seem to want to cater to just about anyone. And the same way, followers won’t respect influencers who jump between different brands all the time. So building steady partnerships is a win-win situation.
How To Find Quality Affiliates on Instagram?
It’s not hard to find influencers on Instagram. But which one of them is helpful to your brand as a quality affiliate? Here are three Instagram affiliate marketing tips.
Pick a Niche and Research Influencers in that Sector
Don’t cast your net too wide. Too many new affiliate marketers fall into that trap. The aim isn’t to have the most significant reach possible – the purpose is to convert as many people as possible. If you pick a niche, it narrows your focus and makes it easier to find suitable Instagram partners.
Don’t know your niche? Hire professional social media analysts to help pinpoint your target audience. If you wish to do so alone, you can use Instagram Insights to learn more about audience demographics, interests, and behaviors.
Once you pinpoint the target audience, you should use a suitable online tool to research potential influencers to recruit as affiliates. Such tools usually have search filters to specify if you wish to study influencers based on engagement rates, location, interests, and more.
Pro tip: Maybe you will do best by focusing on micro-influencers. Although they have a maximum of 10,000 followers, they are great because they have an audience more likely to trust them.
Focus on Quality Engagement
Don’t get too distracted by follower count and likes. Many influencers just inflate those numbers by getting their followers to post lots of comments that use just one emoji. Or you will notice that there is a sharp disproportion between the number of likes and followers.
Search for those content creators with meaningful comments and replies from followers and a realistic proportion of likes and followers.
There are tools out there that can help you find out the engagement quality of possible affiliate partners. Just search for the influencer that interests you to see if their engagement rate is above or under the average engagement rate.
Look For Those Who Have Websites and Blogs
Lots of influencers view their profit from Instagram as passive income. But that means that they are not as motivated to partner up as those who use the platform as their primary income source.
So try searching for those content creators who have an affiliate blog or site. They are probably more experienced with promoting other brands. Moreover, they will promote your products/services on multiple channels, meaning they can spread awareness much better than others.
If they have a website, see if they have linked it into their Instagram bio. And on the website itself, check out their blog style, as well as their affiliate marketing style.
Final Word
To sum up our Instagram affiliate marketing tips, you should partner with those Influencers whose feed stands out and feels authentic and valuable. You want to partner up with those people who have authority. Nurture those partnerships, and you will see their engagement rate rise along with your revenue and conversion rates! Lastly, keep an eye out for changes in the ever-changing landscape of affiliate marketing by reading our blog.
