Start An Affiliate Program for Your Online Course
6 min readDeveloping an affiliate program for your online course is a fantastic method to promote it.
It’s a fantastic approach to get your name in front of other people’s eyes. Now, you might be thinking that handing over the money you’ve worked so hard for doesn’t sound very enticing. Why should you split the earnings when you put in all that effort? Because, in the end, the more individuals who complete your course, the more money you’ll make, the more testimonials you’ll receive, and the more people who will refer others to your course down the road. All of this sounds fantastic, right? But how much should affiliates be paid for referrals? According to what I’ve read, the going rate is between 30% and 50%.
Let me show you something if you just coughed on your coffee when I stated 50 percent. She actually went to Marie Forleo’s B school, according to erikafriday.com. Marie Forleo, on the other hand, does work with affiliates.
Marie genuinely chooses her associates from B school by hand. She gives them half the cost of the training in exchange for them sending folks her way. She has a list of different persons who are affiliates for her if you scroll down on her page. Many of these names will be familiar to you.
So when you see someone selling Marie Forleo’s B school, they’re pumped up, and they’re selling it not just because they believe in it, but also because they’re getting paid half the price. Gabby Bernstein, Daniel de Laporte, and even Amy Porterfield are among them. I can’t verify that Marie Forleo gives 50% because this was written by a third party. However, there is one thing I can demonstrate to you.
Amy Porterfield’s website can be found here. You can sign up to be an affiliate for her newest course by joining the waiting list. If you go down, she claims that the Digital Course Academy costs $1, 997 and that affiliate partners earn 50% commission for every successful sale. This is a blatant attack on AmyPorterfield.com. So this is her stating unequivocally that she pays 50%. A lot of prominent course producers discover that partnering with affiliates helps them sell more. Pat Flynn of Smart Passive Income is another example of this.
He now has an Affiliate Resource Center on his website, Smart Passive Income. He doesn’t give his affiliates the money he pays them. This is where you log into your affiliate dashboard and check your affiliate balances. He explains how to log in in great detail.
He explains how to obtain affiliate codes and links, as well as how to create a bespoke promotion. So Pat Flynn is actually preparing his affiliates to sell his stuff extremely well. Now, if you’re planning on using affiliates for a membership site rather than an online course, 30% is higher than average. Your affiliates are aware that as long as the person remains a member of your school, they will receive 30% of the revenue.
It’s easier for them to sell because the prices are cheaper. This also means that you’ll be alive long enough for any material they create featuring your membership site to make revenue for them after it’s launched. Let me show you how the big course creators do it now that you’ve seen how they do it. If you’re selling your course through a platform like Thinkific, you can join their affiliate program.
This blog post on how to start an affiliate program to offer online courses has a wealth of information. According to the cost comparison page on their website. Affiliates are not available on the free plan, but they are available on all other tiers, from basic to premier. Teachable has affiliate marketing built in if you’re creating an online course with them.
If you check for school affiliations in Teachable’s help section, you’ll notice that it’s available on both the professional and commercial plans. They have a whole page on how to do that in Teachable. If you’re using Podio, they also offer an article about affiliates in their help area. It does state that you must be on the Shaker plan to use affiliates, and it provides a small tutorial on how to do so.
Those are the only three learning management systems I endorse. And all three of them allow you to create affiliate accounts. Let’s imagine you’re working on a project that doesn’t have that feature; you won’t be able to set it up in your learning management system. Let me give you a couple more pointers on it.
You might use a website like Tapfiliate to create your own affiliate program. Because this is solely an affiliate site, it includes all of the tools you’ll need to set up and track your affiliates. Tapfiliate has two alternative pricing options: $69 per month or $149 per month. On any of these, there are no transaction fees.
So anything you earn in excess of $69 or $149 is all income for you. They enable you to provide personal referral links and coupons to your affiliates, as well as manage banners and other branded content and create social network postings. Kartra is another firm. Kartra also allows you to build up an affiliate scheme.
It includes a simple dashboard that allows you to keep track of everything. It also provides a variety of features, such as adjustable commissions, payment milestones, and the ability to assess and approve affiliates by having them complete a questionnaire in advance. Kartra is available in a variety of levels.
A starter, silver, gold, and platinum are available. Kartra costs $99 per month and goes up to $499 per month. There are a lot of options here, so you’ll have to sort through them to find which ones are ideal for you. Now, I did say I’d give you three-pointers to help you succeed.
So let’s get started. First and foremost, don’t be stingy. Go ahead and make that 50% offer. This will encourage individuals to sell your course on your behalf.
Consider this: all of the folks that are brought in by your affiliates are unlikely to find your course. So you were going to gain nothing from them. Even if you only get half the price of your course, it’s still more than you would have gotten otherwise. If you hadn’t established an affiliate program at all.
You want to make sure that those individuals are enthusiastic about recommending your course. As a result, rewarding them with 50% is a fantastic idea. Second, carefully select your affiliates. Some companies seek for any affiliates and allow anyone to join.
But I don’t always believe that’s a good idea. You may preserve your brand reputation by vetting who can become an affiliate. You can either choose from students who have completed your course or reach out to folks who have an audience you wish to target. Choose people who are professional and who you believe will best represent your company.
The next tip is to make it simple for your affiliates. You’re safeguarding your brand and making it easy for your affiliates to spread the word without putting in a lot of extra effort by offering a launch calendar, email assistance, and marketing materials. You should offer them with a launch calendar so that they are aware of the exact date on which your course will be live and can plan accordingly. You should give them with email assistance in case they have any questions for which they don’t have an answer, so you can respond quickly and continue assisting them in purchasing your course. You should also provide them with marketing materials.
This saves them time while also safeguarding your brand. You’ll need to give copy, graphics, and video to them. This can be accomplished by creating an affiliate resource center or simply storing everything in a Dropbox or Google Drive folder.