An overview of Affiliate Marketing: what it is, how it works and the history and advice of one of the greatest Italian experts, Dario Vignali.
Examples are Affiliate Marketing and its main "standard bearer" in Italy, Dario Vignali . A 29 year old boy, who in 3 years has been able to build a real business. Starting with a free blog on WordPress .
What is Affiliate Marketing
A company uses Affiliate Marketing when it decides to sell its products through special intermediaries , called "affiliates" . The latter are individuals or other companies that market the affiliate company's products in exchange for a sales commission.
Affiliate Marketing is generally carried out through the web and social networks. An activity that wants to increase online sales, can rely on affiliates who have their own (strong) following on the web. Payment methods can be different. Typically, there are those who pay sales commissions, but you can also get paid for the leads generated.
The main goal for a company that uses this channel is to reach untapped markets, niches and consumers.
The advertiser , who is the producer, the commercial entity that wants to sell a product / service to a specific market niche. As we have mentioned, it offers a percentage on sales (CPS, Cost Per Sale ), or on a specific user action (CPA, Cost Per Action ), which for example is led to subscribe to a newsletter (and therefore becomes a lead for the company). There are also CPI ( Cost Per Install ) campaigns , where the affiliate is paid for installing an app.
The second subject is the Publisher or Affiliate . He is the one who tries to "place" the products that the Advertiser offers, especially through the web. The main channels of diffusion are generally blogs and social networks. A publisher builds its following over time (through the creation of content), and then "sell" products, services, apps, to its followers.
In the middle, between the two, there is the Network . It acts as an intermediary between Advertiser and Publisher. The former offer a series of campaigns, with certain commissions. The latter choose, among the available campaigns, those that most fall within their own expertise and market niche, with an eye obviously on the percentages offered and the market potential. Among the best known networking services in Affiliate Marketing is Amazon Associates .
Affiliate Marketing: risks and problems
As Steve Olenski explains on Forbes , an affiliate program " can open up a new source of income for a company, without the problems associated with a marketing campaign from scratch ". However, you need to know the limits of the tool, to be able to make the most of it, without illusions.
For example, Olenski recalls that affiliate programs are not simple to manage, nor quick : it requires a lot of work and energy. And in many sectors there is strong competition . It is therefore not a magic formula to sell more.
Affiliate programs are not for everyone. Affiliate Marketing works well for very popular and highly lucrative market niches . Although this does not mean, Olenski explains, that new paths cannot be tried: the effort, however, will be even greater in this case.
One of the myths to dispel, then, is that quantity wins over quality: placing a link to a product on as many websites as possible is not enough. You need to choose reliable publishers who know how to work. The 80/20 rule also applies in this sector: most of the earnings (80%) will be generated by a small part of affiliates (20%).
As a study in the Journal of Marketing by Benjamin Edelman (Harvard) and Wesley Brandi (iPensatori) points out, there is the risk that some Publishers implement policies for the dissemination of the borderline message , in clear violation of the law, or simply of netiquette. This type of activity can damage the original brand , resulting in damage to its image. Here too, the selection of affiliates is of paramount importance.
3 tips from Dario Vignali (the youngest in Italy)
The best known Affiliate Marketing expert in Italy is probably Dario Vignali , a 29 year old boy who in his career has already worked with big brands such as Coca Cola, Pirelli, Warner and Kinder . He defines himself as a blogger, internet marketer, business designer. In his bio on his blog he says he never worked one day. He never submitted a resume and "I never will ." In his spare time he travels the world.
His career in digital marketing started in 2013, when he activated a free account on WordPress: dariovignali.net was born . A platform where it offers advice, explains strategies, sells courses, offers ebooks to those who want to make money on the web.
« Dariovignali.net was successful and collected excellent feedback immediately. For those who start on the web without a budget to dedicate to advertising, obtaining success "right away" is certainly not a simple thing, no blog among those I had created previously had generated such results. I was the only blogger in Italy to write such long, informative and passionate posts on digital marketing. Readers came by word of mouth and my newsletter grew by a few thousand users every month. I had found what we marketers call 'free niche': an area of interest that is poorly treated (or poorly studied) but with a potential interested public , "said Dario in an interview .
According to a recent evaluation by a foreign company (requested by Vignali himself), the blog is now worth around € 300 thousand . Dario does not declare the exact figure, but explains that in the last 12 months, his turnover thanks to the blog has reached " hundreds of thousands of euros a year ".
Here are the 3 tips to make it on the web according to Dario (and not just for Affiliate Marketing).
Be transversal
« To do it we need transversal skills and a holistic approach. Copywriting, graphics, math, advertising and more , "he explained to Wired .
And therefore it is necessary to study, always . Update yourself with news, read books, register on blogs of marketing experts. And above all actively participate in online communities in the sector you have chosen.
" If you don't apply it, you won't get anywhere ."
Be unique
To get a following on the Internet, you have to be different . Talk about what nobody talks about. Or do it differently from others.
« We must learn to look ELSEWHERE », sums up Dario. « If you keep watching and doing what everyone does, you can only keep getting what everyone gets. Which is usually too little. You just have to go to the newsstand and buy any edition of Millionaire magazine to realize how, most of those who are having success, have embarked on alternative entrepreneurial paths or atypical professional specializations ».
Set yourself a goal
Set a long-term goal and a (flexible) strategy to achieve it. This is what distinguishes Dario's story from the others:
« At 13, I started working on my projects and I never stopped. I've always had my goals clear and I never threw in the towel, even when the results were slow in coming. I repeat it often ... On the web, the best strategy that can be adopted is a long-term strategy. No matter where you want to go, the important thing is to remain constant and faithful to your goals. Resilience, first of all », he says.
