Last week I received a reply to my newsletter asking what the difference is between Affiliates and Influencers.
This is actually a question I get fairly often, so I thought I would write a quick blog post sharing the difference between the two.
With affiliates, you are giving them a link to promote your products and in return, they receive a commission for anything they sell. You are only paying them if they refer a sale, and you aren’t giving them free products in order for them to promote.
With influencers, you are giving them free product and paying them a fee to promote your products – regardless of if they make a sale or not through their affiliate links or promo code.
What I like about working with influencers is that even if they don’t refer sales to you, they can provide you with user generated content and help get your business name out there further. And sometimes if you work with influencers who have a following of 5k to 25k (this is a sweet spot, in my experience), they won’t require a huge fee, and are sometimes happy to work in exchange for free product. They will also still generate sales because their audience is more engaged than people who have massive audiences and are posting all sorts of products all the time.
If you are a small product based businesses wanting more sales, I recommend starting your affiliate program first and inviting your existing customers to become your affiliates (there’s a way to incentivize them to join your program and give them affiliate perks without giving them free products) and then once you have that going, start layering in influencer marketing.
Having your current/past customers become your affiliates is the “easiest” path to more sales because they already are loving your products and if they can earn a little extra moolah for sharing it with their friends and family, that’s just the icing on the cake!
If you are wanting more user generated content regardless of if any sales are made, working with influencers might be the route to go first instead of working with affiliates.
If you’d like some support setting up your affiliate program, I’d love to have you join me in the next round of the Make More Together ~ 4- Week Affiliate Program Intensive for Product Sellers in March. Registration will open in February, and there will a bonus call all about working with influencers.