If you're an affiliate for a product that uses ThriveCart for it's checkout pages, I'm about to show you a tactic that can easily 2X your affiliate commissions.
ThriveCart has a featured that allows affiliates to instantly deliver digital bonuses to customers who purchase through their affiliate links.
In this article (and video) I'll show you how to add affiliate bonuses to your ThriveCart hosted affiliate offers and then I'll explain why this method works so well and how to get the most out of it.
Tutorial: Adding Instant Affiliate Bonuses with ThriveCart
This process is relatively straightforward.
It does require that a couple of things are met...
#1 The company that you're promoting needs to have the "allow affiliates to add bonuses" option turned on. If they don't have it turned on, email them and ask them why the hell not. I'm sure they will add it if you bring it up.
#2 Your bonuses need to be formatted in a way that they can be delivered digitally. Fortunately, with some creativity, this is always possible.
Step #1 Prepare Your Bonus offer and Make it Digital
I explain later in this article more on what makes an affiliate bonus offer work well, so you can jump to that part if you'd like and come back. Assuming you already have the bonus decided, find a way to make it redeemable via one URL.
Here are some tips...
Tip #1 If you're offering multiple bonuses, create a bonus thank you page that includes information on how to redeem.
Tip #2 If you're offering coaching or something that involves 1 on 1 connection, use a tool like YouCanBook.me to create a scheduling calendar. This link will be the redemption URL.
My Youcanbook.me calendar for ThriveCart affiliate purchases.
Tip #3 If your bonus requires the user to provide additional information such as shipping addresses, use a tool like Typeform to collect it A free alternative like Google Forms will work as well.
Tip #4 If you have a WordPress site and you're delivering something simple like a PDF, you can create a downloadable URL simply by uploading the PDF into your media library. Click here to learn how to do that quickly.
Step #2 Log in the the Affiliate Dashboard of the Product You Want to Promote and Navigate to "Bonus Delivery"
Step #3 Insert Your Bonus Delivery URL and Customer Support Email
This part is self explanatory. Enter that information and save and your affiliate links will all automatically include this bonus!
Why Affiliate Bonuses Work
This is one of my all time favorite pieces of affiliate marketing advice. I highly recommend that you implement the methods I'm going to teach you as soon as possible.
They are applicable to anyone selling just about anything.
This method can change EVERYTHING for affiliate marketers.
Although the idea of giving in order to get can seem like common sense, common sense is becoming less and less common.
As marketers we can give our audience more and grow our businesses at the same time.
This means happier customers and more sales.
Making Your Affiliate Advantage
Most affiliate offers are very competitive.
Even if you have a large audience, have established credibility and built goodwill with your followers, some affiliate products are destined to underperform. That is of course assuming you do nothing to give yourself a competitive advantage.
The advantage is this: bring something MORE to the offer than just the affiliate product.
When I started affiliate marketing I wanted to compete with the big boys right out of the gate.
I wanted to sell the "core tools" like BlueHost hosting to my readers.
I saw guys like Pat Flynn who had similar audiences (although his was and is bigger) absolutely CRUSHING it selling BlueHost. It was simple and not a hard sell at all (almost everyone who does internet business needs hosting).
Pat Flynn's Bluehost commissions from a random month I pulled form his site (Decembet 2016). This was a "slow month" for him!
My logic was that if Pat was making 100s of thousands a month selling these products with about 20x my audience, I should be able to sell at least 5% of that with mine. That would equate to $5k-$15k/month!
Well, it didn't. It was more like $50-$150/month.
Why though? I realized there were a lot of factors at play but the big one was this...
Pat Flynn has so much more goodwill built up than me. He has been doing this for longer than me and at a the highest level. I am honestly just starting to "hit my stride" and creating goodwill that comes anywhere close to his.
Goodwill takes time to build. To make sales now though, I needed to do something different.
I would continue to build goodwill and do it at the highest levels I knew how, but to make sales in the (then) here-and-now, I needed to sell better offers than my competitors on the same products.
What?
How could I make something that was better when we were selling the same products?
BONUSES!
Most affiliate terms of service have no problem with you incentivizing people to use your affiliate links. The best programs actually encourage it.
With one affiliate in mind that you want to sell more of, ask yourself the following questions.
- What is the ROI on an affiliate sale?
- What ROI would you accept?
With affiliate products, the ROI is generally very high.
Unless you are spending a fortune on paid ads your affiliate ROI is measured relative to the time and energy you put into creating content to push the affiliate organically.
Why Do Bonuses Work?
Anything you're promoting should be able to sell without bonuses of course, but adding bonuses will blow up the conversion rates for a few reasons.
- It pushes people on the edge. Most people are on the verge of buying (but never do). Most affiliates ignore these people. You and I will use them as our core audience!
- It instills a FOMO within your audience. Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) is an important part of marketing. It is important that we give our buyers a reason to buy now. Don't guilt yourself over this. If you're selling something worth buying, there is nothing wrong with giving users an extra nudge to stop dragging their feet. Your true fans will appreciate this.
- It improves on the product. Good bonus packages should increase the chances of success and decrease the risk of failure when using the item you're promoting.
When Should You Use Bonuses
Whenever your margins are enough that you can afford to give more in exchange for more sales.
Now, it's important to note that you can't use the bonus method so much that the prices of your products become permanently hindered.
If every single time you promote an affiliate product you offer the same bonuses at the same massive discounts, your loyal followers will start to catch on to this and will think your prices are artificially inflated since you love giving them away so often.
What Should You Give
There are a few keys to a good bonus offer.
- Make it relevant to the affiliate you're selling.
- Give it a monetary value.
Now, the best way to create bonus offers is by throwing in your own products.
- Digital products
- Courses and trainings
- Discounts on your products
If you don't have products, that is ok, there are other options.
- One on one training
- Purchase other products for them
- Partner with another product creator
How Much Should You Give?
Give enough to offset the potential lost sales from bonuses + some. As long as you are making more money, adding bonuses means happier customers (they are getting more bang for their buck) and you are coming out on top.
If you are part of a massive affiliate launch and there are a number of other affiliates also offering bonuses, you need to make yours stick out. In cases where commissions are huge ($1,000+) throwing in "everything but the kitchen sink," might be necessary to compete.
If you need to give too much to get a sale and compete, bow out. Don't lose money just for the sake of "beating" other affiliates.
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