How to improve paid conversion of affiliate clicks?

[Lowrider]

I’m struggling to convert affiliate clicks to paid conversions.

Taking one affiliate platform as an example where I promote different brands, I have sent 800 clicks across 9 different affiliate programs.

The result is 2 paid conversions.

All 9 brands are well-known companies in the niche.

Is there anything I can do to increase the conversions rate? Should I write better copy next to the affiliate links to „pre“ sell the product? Or am I just dependent on how well the landing page of the companies is converting?

I’m sending German traffic to English landing pages, if the brand didn’t localize the landing page. But, I thought that the language isn’t a barrier, since my audience is quite young (25-35 y).

It’s a bit frustrating to produce content and send traffic, that isn't converting.

 

[bernard]

What kind of traffic are you sending?

Search, Facebook, TikTok etc?

 

[Lowrider]

What kind of traffic are you sending?

Search, Facebook, TikTok etc?

Only search from pages with high commercial intent: best x for y, x review, x vs. y etc.

 

[Ryuzaki]

Only search from pages with high commercial intent: best x for y, x review, x vs. y etc.

Since you can't change the sales lander, the only thing to do is move up the funnel.

Like you pointed out, you could track clicks and test the calls-to-action (your affiliate links). Increasing all clicks isn't the goal, only increasing converting clicks.

Sounds like you have targeted traffic since you're bidding on the keywords you are. So the issue is either (or a combination of) your micro-copy on the ads or the demographic you're targeting.

You need to burn some cash to collect data by testing a much broader demographic in different campaigns so you can measure who's performing the best. Then you can split test your creatives from there.

You don't want to pick a demographic and ad creative and then hop around from demographic and creative hoping to find the right combo. You want to try all combos and narrow down to the profitable ones, then tweak from there.

 

[bernard]

Only search from pages with high commercial intent: best x for y, x review, x vs. y etc.

You're buying search traffic from Google, Bing etc and sending to your landing page then to offers?

And it's mostly "best x for y" keywords?

In that case, your vendors likely suck and its probably because its not in german.

People don't like to buy from foreign language websites unless they can't get it anywhere else.

 

[Lowrider]

I‘m not buying traffic. I’m using „free“ search traffic from my blog. However, most of the blogpost are content with high commercial intent, it‘s not converting as well as expected. I thought that a common CR across most industries for affiliates is about 1%. Currently, I‘m at 0.25%

 

[janky]

Maybe you could improve your copy to get a better conversion rate?
Take a look at my post here maybe you get 2-3 ideas.

Your biggest issue is probably German traffic to the English salespage. However, I think you could explain in your copy why you do that, so people are not surprised when they see the English page.

 

[bernard]

I‘m not buying traffic. I’m using „free“ search traffic from my blog. However, most of the blogpost are content with high commercial intent, it‘s not converting as well as expected. I thought that a common CR across most industries for affiliates is about 1%. Currently, I‘m at 0.25%

I read it as you were buying traffic, haha. Its the "paid" in the title, that threw me off.

Ok, now I understand, you're talking about organic search traffic from Google and Bing.

First of all, you need to check what kinds of keywords you're getting to your articles. You can do that in Google Search Console. Do you know how to do that?

Because while your posts are about "best x for y", you might find most of your traffic is not that, but some other kind of searches. Maybe an informational search or a "widget x review" type.

This is more typical with relatively new articles, that will get long tail searches before they get the keywords you're targeting.

In my experience, conversions almost always increase with time, as your search traffic gets more relevant.

Second, you need to make sure you're offering value in the buying process.

How are you sending visitors to the webshops? Just a button with "Buy here"?

That's not a lot of value added.

Instead, if you had a table of prices with vendors, then you could show where to get it the cheapest. That increases conversions and also allows you to see which vendors convert better for the same product. This should be an automated or semi-automated thing that runs in the Wordpress backend. There are several plugins for this.

What are you doing with your reviews? Are you going in depth, have you done original research? Gathered sources and did the pros and cons? Have you added reviews from trustworthy consumer magasines and newspapers? Have you seen the products in the store, talked to sales reps, taken some pictures?

If yes to all the above, then it will convert much better, because you will get the fence sitters. If no to all the above, then they will click, but continue looking for a review that will have the above before feeling convinced.

Third, linking to foreign webshops has a much lower conversions than linking to local webshops. People do not like to buy from abroad if they can get it locally. Why are you linking to foreign webshops, are the products not sold in Germany or can't you find them with an affiliate network? Have you checked Awin?

 

[LinkPlate]

Have you checked if the affiliates you are promoting deliver to your users (since there might be a location problem)? There are no checkout barriers (like crazy shipping costs or time)? or any other issues (out of your control) that are stopping them from purchasing when they get to the checkout?

 

[Lowrider]

I read it as you were buying traffic, haha. Its the "paid" in the title, that threw me off.

Ok, now I understand, you're talking about organic search traffic from Google and Bing.

First of all, you need to check what kinds of keywords you're getting to your articles. You can do that in Google Search Console. Do you know how to do that?

Because while your posts are about "best x for y", you might find most of your traffic is not that, but some other kind of searches. Maybe an informational search or a "widget x review" type.

This is more typical with relatively new articles, that will get long tail searches before they get the keywords you're targeting.

In my experience, conversions almost always increase with time, as your search traffic gets more relevant.

Second, you need to make sure you're offering value in the buying process.

How are you sending visitors to the webshops? Just a button with "Buy here"?

That's not a lot of value added.

Instead, if you had a table of prices with vendors, then you could show where to get it the cheapest. That increases conversions and also allows you to see which vendors convert better for the same product. This should be an automated or semi-automated thing that runs in the Wordpress backend. There are several plugins for this.

What are you doing with your reviews? Are you going in depth, have you done original research? Gathered sources and did the pros and cons? Have you added reviews from trustworthy consumer magasines and newspapers? Have you seen the products in the store, talked to sales reps, taken some pictures?

If yes to all the above, then it will convert much better, because you will get the fence sitters. If no to all the above, then they will click, but continue looking for a review that will have the above before feeling convinced.

Third, linking to foreign webshops has a much lower conversions than linking to local webshops. People do not like to buy from abroad if they can get it locally. Why are you linking to foreign webshops, are the products not sold in Germany or can't you find them with an affiliate network? Have you checked Awin?

Thanks for your extensive reply. I'm sorry, the title is a bit misleading. I'm affiliate for software products, that's why I have first a signup phase and afterwards a "paid" conversion.

To analyze the keywords, you are ranking for you are first clicking in GSC on the page and then on the left side the search queries, right?

The reason I'm promoting products from American companies, is that there aren't equivalent solutions from German companies.

I'm testing all the product in my reviews and creating unique screenshots. All my reviews include a pros and cons section. I'm also analyzing what users are writing about the product on Reddit, to have an end-user perspective.

 

[bernard]

Thanks for your extensive reply. I'm sorry, the title is a bit misleading. I'm affiliate for software products, that's why I have first a signup phase and afterwards a "paid" conversion.

To analyze the keywords, you are ranking for you are first clicking in GSC on the page and then on the left side the search queries, right?

The reason I'm promoting products from American companies, is that there aren't equivalent solutions from German companies.

I'm testing all the product in my reviews and creating unique screenshots. All my reviews include a pros and cons section. I'm also analyzing what users are writing about the product on Reddit, to have an end-user perspective.

Maybe software is a tough niche to sell, I don't know.

I could imagine.