All right, hello again guys. Today we’re gonna be talking about credibility in affiliate marketing, How To Build Trust Online In Affiliate Marketing, and how you can establish trust with your readers in order to drive more sales.
So the things that we’re gonna look at today are specifically Credibility indicators. Now, this is specific to your affiliate site as well as the companies that you’re promoting.
And I wanna make a quick differentiator here. So I’m not necessarily talking about EAT signals, so Expertise Authority Trust in terms of doing that for Google, today we’re talking specifically about building credibility for your readers.
How To Build Trust Online In Affiliate Marketing?
So how you can establish more trust with your readers in order to make them feel more comfortable and likely to buy?
So on that note, we’re gonna talk about how trust is gained and lost in affiliate marketing and how you can use that credibility that you’ve gained in order to drive more sales.
Your Job Is To Maintain Inherent Trust
So the more credibility that you have as an affiliate, the easier it’s gonna be to sell. Now as an affiliate, unlike something like an e-commerce site, or somebody who’s trying to sell somebody something, you don’t necessarily have to gain trust as an affiliate somebody who’s promoting somebody else’s products, you just don’t have to lose trust.
So again, as an affiliate, you’re the third-party proof of somebody else’s product so there’s gonna be an inherent trust there. So people are looking to review sites like affiliate sites in order to validate their purchase somewhere else.
So because of that, people already go into this, reading your review thinking that they’re gonna trust the source, they don’t have their guard up in the same way that they would because they’re not necessarily thinking that they’re gonna be sold right there on the page.
So readers are gonna have an inherent trust in you as an affiliate so your job is just to keep it that way.
Because when we readers trust you,
- they’re gonna do things like believe your promises,
- they’re gonna take your advice,
- and they’re also gonna be likely to buy what it is that you’re suggesting in your review.
So all that’s a good reason why you just need to basically not lose trust, like don’t be sloppy with your work.
Be Wary Of This Mistakes
So the ways that you can lose trust as an affiliate, some super, super simple mistakes that I see all the time is, first, when you have some sort of buyer’s guide saying that every single product is the best.
So yeah, your posts may be about the top 10 best products for X, Y, and Z, but still, it’s gonna be a list of 10 products.
All 10 of them can’t be the same amount of amazing, otherwise, people are gonna think that you’re just saying that everything is the best and this particular product that you wanna promote above everything else, it’s not any better than any of these other products.
So you’re gonna have something in there that may not necessarily be the top of the top option, maybe it’s something like the cheaper option or the budget option or something like that.
You wanna avoid contradictions. So, does your review say the same thing or have the same facts that other reviews have? Does what your review says line up with what the manufacturer’s website says about that product?
So you wanna make sure there are no contradictions in your content versus other people’s content and also what the manufacturer says about their product or service.
You also wanna avoid things like typos, like super, super stupid mistakes that people say, “Hey I never make a typo.”
Go ahead and read over some of your content, I’m sure that you’re going to find typos. I even find them from time to time so just go ahead and double-check that and make sure you don’t have any.
When you’re writing content or having somebody else write it, try to avoid using words like, in my opinion. Instead, use things that are backed by facts so stuff that’s either backed by some sort of expert in the industry or maybe a particular test that you’ve done on a product or service.
Trust + Expertise = Credibility
So jumping into credibility indicators of your site: So at its core, the idea of credibility, it’s a combination of trust and expertise. So you can’t be seen as credible if you’re not seen as trustworthy and you also can’t be seen as credible if you’re not seen as an expert on something.
So credibility is the combination of those two ideas coming into one. So, some ways that you can build your credibility on the site, are super simple. The first thing is your design. So having a custom logo, something that’s not just WordPress text and the customizer is gonna go a long way.
On that same note, having some sort of thoughtful design- and there’s no shame in looking at what your competitors are doing, to see kind of what design elements they have.
If you’re doing reviews or buyer’s guides, make sure that there’s a good headline and a featured image so people know that they’re in the right…
right places are gonna establish trust again. If you have them, custom discount codes are gonna give the reader basically the idea that the manufacturer knows that you exist, you’re a trustworthy source and Hey, I get a discount on top of it.
So going, getting into expertise here: So some things that not all affiliate sites have, if you have them, they’re gonna make you look great. So job offerings, or like featured in, in the Navbar, stuff like that and not necessarily has to be real, like, say you’re hiring a specific content writer for your site.
Maybe you’re going on Upwork or asking your friend or something, go ahead and put a job posting in the Menu bar of your affiliate site, it’s just gonna show the reader that, “Hey, you’re more than just this slapped together a website, you actually have people that are working for you.”
And if you have featured in like, this is a credible source, this is an expert source that some big company has featured this website on. Another important thing is how we choose the products or in some cases services are gonna show the reader why they should trust what it is that you’re promoting
This is gonna show that you’re an expert because you’ve tested these products. And especially if you’re in anything like your money, or your life, make sure you cite your sources.
Establishing Credibility For Another Company
Now, jumping into credibility indicators of what you’re promoting: So these are the companies that they’re not you, they’re what you’re making your affiliate commissions on.
So building the credibility of who you promote, the biggest thing again is that consistency that I was talking about before, avoiding contradictions.
So make sure that your analysis and other reviews that are out their online show consistent feedback, you don’t wanna mix up the facts, people aren’t gonna buy if they aren’t sure what to believe.
And make sure when you’re reviewing products, that you’re also providing insight into the customer experience.
So do they have a good overall reputation? Do they have chat on the website? Do they have shipping and returns, trials, and stuff like that?
If they have any awards or accomplishments, go ahead and highlight that, if on their website they have trust marks like, BBB accredited or PayPal safe or McAfee scanned or whatever that is, go ahead and include those logos, it’s gonna just make the person think that who they’re buying from is more trustworthy. And then also again like I was saying, stuff like returns, trials, and warranty.
All right. So I wanted to give you guys a quick couple of examples of what these credibility indicators might look like on a live website so you can see how they help readers feel a little bit warm and fuzzy and trust the source that they’re getting their information from and ultimately feel more comfortable going through and making a purchase based on a specific review of a website.
So here is a website in the CBD niche, leafreport.com. It’s an article about the best CBD oil to buy in 2021. So what I liked about this site is they highlight over here in the Sidebar, why you should trust them. So they detail how we choose these products, and how we rate the products and brands.
So if somebody wasn’t sure whether or not they can trust the source, they can go ahead and they can click this link here and get an entire article about how Leafreport goes about their review process, how they pick these products so that they know they’re not just picking products that they’re going to make a lot of money on, they’re picking products that are tested based on whatever criteria they outline here.
So the next up is dailycbd.com. again in the CBD niche. What I liked about this website, it’s another buyer’s guide type of post, this site has a specific discount code for the website. So dailycbd.com is promoting Royal CBD oil, and they have a custom discount code.
So what this shows, the reader is not only they’re gonna be able to get a discount by going through and listening to the reviews that daily CBD has to say, but it also shows them that Royal CBD kind of knows that Daily CBD exists, like it’s an approved review source, it’s not somebody who’s just writing some review that just made their website yesterday.
So it’s one of those trust indicators. And keeping cruise in here, is herbornaut, another CBD niche site. So although clinical evidence is limited, various studies have shown that CBD may act as a natural aid to relieve anxiety and depression.
Now, are you just supposed to take aeronaut words for that? No. In this case, they’ve done a great job of including references here. So, if you wanna basically fact-check what this website is saying, making sure that what they’re saying is accurate especially when you’re doing something health-related, they have a bunch of great sources that they use to create this article listed right here.
And the last one is this website called Canine Journal. It looks like it’s a site mostly about pet stuff but they have an article on CBD.
So good stuff. What the site does that I really liked is this up here in the header, Featured in, so People, Forbes, Washington Post, Entrepreneur or Huff Post, like maybe these were just like a link, like help or a reporter out here or a link or something like that, who knows?
But if you get a link like that you’re able to basically say you’ve been featured on these websites. So this drives a big credibility indicator for readers because it shows that you’re a website that has, you’re trusted enough that these websites that people know about so People, Forbes, Washington Post, they trust you enough in order to refer you on their website. So it’s a big trust indicator on expertise indicator.
Credibility + objectivity = Sales
Now that we know some of those credibility indicators you can have on our website and some examples of what they’re gonna look like, it’s time to talk about how you can use that credibility in order to drive more sales because if somebody trusts you greatly, but at the end of the day, as an affiliate marketer, you wanna drive more sales.
So the name of the game with that is Objectivity. So being objective essentially means you’re eliminating a perceived bias. So, if somebody thinks you’re a credible source, they think you’re an expert and they think you’re trustworthy, what’s gonna drive home that sale is them not thinking that you have a bias towards one particular product.
So one of the best ways you can do that, it’s pretty obvious, but just having pros and cons for product reviews because highlighting those negatives, gives more truth to the positives.
So if you’re saying that one product is absolutely off the wall, amazing, incredible, all these wonderful things but there’s nothing bad about it, that’s a little suspicious and it’s going to take away from all of those positives.
So by highlighting the negatives and if they make sense, if they’re honest, you’re going to also basically be driving home the fact that the positives are honest as well.
And by having those pros and cons really highlighted, you’re giving the reader kind of an envision of what it’s gonna be like to own that product or try that service.
So they know what’s gonna be good about it, they know what’s gonna be bad about it. So they can kind of put themselves in the shoes of having already purchased that product or service and kind of know what it’s like.
And by doing that, you’re also lowering the chance of returns. So, talking about the CBD industry again, let’s say you’re talking about the best CBD for anxiety. Let’s say you have this awesome product that has great benefits for anxiety but one of the negatives is it tastes like garbage.
So if somebody reads your review and that negative says, “Hey, it doesn’t taste great at all.” Guess what? When they get that product, they’re not expecting it to taste great, they’re not gonna send it back because it tastes bad.
So you’re not gonna have to give a commission back because a product doesn’t taste good. So by giving the reader an honest view of what it’s gonna look like, you’re able to help with sales.
Promoting Profitable products
So when you’re creating buyer’s guide type of content, you still wanna be objective, you don’t wanna appear to have bias.
So one of the ways that you can do that is by creating a section to highlight the “best for”. Let’s say we’re talking about CBD again, we’re talking about the best CBD 2021.
So let’s say you wanna highlight 20 different products, which is awesome CBD in general but then at the top you have three products that you make a great commission on, you can say, “Hey, this product is best for anxiety, this one is best for energy, this one is best for sleep.”
So by having those categories at the top, you don’t necessarily have to say that one particular product is the absolute best, you’re able to say that these three products are best in their own lane, they’re best for a specific use.
So that’s gonna show that you’re not really heavily promoting one single product and you also get the opportunity to promote multiple companies that you may make a great commission on so you’re not really limited to one.
So again, you wanna also include honest pros and cons. Again, this is gonna give the reader an idea of what it’s like to have that product and it’s going to make the pros kind of highlight them because there are cons.
And as a good rule of thumb, when you have a buyer’s guide type of list, there should always be one option that is absolutely not the best, an option that is for the cheapos of the world, an option that’s for somebody on a budget.
So you can say, “Hey, this CBD is really, really cheap but maybe it gives you a stomach ache” or something like that. So this is an option that’s going to make the ones that you’ve said are the best look even better. Yes, they’re gonna be more expensive but they’re more expensive for a reason.
But if you don’t have a lot of money to spend, you can also get this product. So not only are you making the best products look better, but you’re also kind of appearing more objective because you’re including a product that isn’t necessarily the best but it is for somebody with a lower budget.
So in general, you wanna avoid terms like amazing or awesome so these terms, they’re very generic and they’re subjective.
So what you can do is instead just provide more detail to convince them, the reader. So don’t say, “This CBD is the absolute most amazing thing I’ve ever tried”, giving them the facts, say, “This CBD is high quality because of the percentage of XYZ in it” or “The, quality of it is higher” or something like that.
Like hit them with facts, don’t hit them with anything that is subjective. So anything opinion-based because your opinion is gonna be different than theirs. So make sure that what you’re saying isn’t like something subjective.
key takeaways
So, the key takeaway of this is: As an affiliate, you have inherent trust. People are gonna trust you more than they’re gonna trust the manufacturer.
They’re going to you for a reason in order to be a third-party review for a product that they’re considering. So as an affiliate, it’s your job to maintain that trust and establish expertise in order to build credibility to help you with sales.
Conclusion
So make sure when you’re doing that, you’re building credibility not only with your affiliate site but also with the products that you promote.
And when you’re writing content, make sure that you’re objective in order to not have that perceived bias so that people not only trust you as a source, they trust what you have to say and they’re gonna be more likely to buy.
So hopefully you guys got something out of this blog I just share. If you have any questions related to ‘’How To Build Trust Online In Affiliate Marketing’’, I’m here to help you out on Instagram.
