Have you ever wondered how to get started with affiliate marketing with no money? The good news is that you can start an affiliate marketing business with little to no money.
How to start affiliate marketing with zero money and start earning money right away.
You can either let a lack of funds hold you back and prevent you from moving forward. Or you can let it motivate you and serve as a catalyst to show everyone who says it can’t be done that you can. Here’s how to get started with affiliate marketing right away with no money!
How To Start Affiliate Marketing With No Money
Unlike most businesses, affiliate marketing does not necessitate a financial investment. There is no upper limit to how much you can earn, and it is completely free.
Many successful business owners, including professional affiliate marketers, began with nothing. And the main reason they were successful was that they didn’t see a lack of money as an impediment – they simply found a way to do it for free.
Becoming an affiliate marketer is in many ways the perfect business model. It’s a way to earn money online, while you sleep, without even having to build a product!
You may be wondering if this is all too good to be true. Can you really earn that much money while you sleep? By selling someone else’s product? If that’s true, then why aren’t more people online billionaires?
Here’s the truth: it absolutely possible to earn a huge amount of money online as an affiliate marketer. Plenty of people genuinely have made a huge amount of money by selling affiliate products online. The problem? The methods that they share very often don’t reflect the best strategies that you should employ.
WHAT EXACTLY IS AFFILIATE MARKETING?
Affiliate marketing is an advertising model in which a company compensates third-party publishers to generate traffic or leads to the company’s products and services. The third-party publishers are affiliates, and the commission fee incentivizes them to find ways to promote the company.
Here are the basic steps that explain affiliate marketing.
- You sign up with an affiliate network or as an affiliate for a product you love.
- A unique affiliate link is given to you which tracks any clicks.
- You promote the product via your chosen channels eg; social, email, a blog, in person.
- When someone buys after clicking on your link, you get a commission.
- Win/win situation for you and the product owner!.
Here is a book affiliate marketing crash course if you want to really dig your teeth in! Affiliate marketing needs a lot of work upfront when you start promoting a product.
But, after you gain more authority in a niche, you can make passive income even when you sleep.
THE BENEFITS OF STARTING AN AFFILIATE MARKETING BUSINESS
Affiliate marketing may be a great side hustle or even a full-time rewarding business provided you have the perseverance to remain with it and complete the necessary steps.
Some high-ticket affiliate schemes pay you between 50 and 80 percent of the sale, and some of them are recurring.
You may establish a healthy, repeatable, and scalable income after you set up your affiliate marketing firm and start promoting a proven product to the correct niche.
- It can be lucrative and scalable.
- You can start for a minimal cost or even zero cost.
- No expertise is required, you can be the relatable beginner sharing your journey.
- Once you do the work upfront, you can make commissions even while you sleep.
- It gives you an independent, flexible work-life
- You don’t even need to create your own product to make money.
- Promotion of your chosen product can be done on free social media sites.
WHY IS AFFILIATE MARKETING A GREAT BUSINESS MODEL?
There are multiple reasons why it’s a great business model. One of the biggest reasons is you can start affiliate marketing with no money and earn 100% profits!
Other reasons are!
- Profits can become passive and are hugely scalable.
- You can promote products in any niche that suits you.
- It’s possible to start making commissions without a website.
- You can run your affiliate marketing business from anywhere.
- It’s beginner-friendly and simple to start in a few hours.
It’s a good idea to conduct some study and strategy before you start affiliate marketing with no money. This article will go over the items you should think about in the order they should be considered.
It’s important to keep in mind that affiliate marketing is not a get-rich-quick scam.
Many people on the internet may tell you it’s simple and advocate quick fixes, but these are usually people trying to sell you something without genuinely providing in-depth training or resources.
You have to treat affiliate marketing like a proper business and build healthy foundations. If you have setbacks, just learn from them and move on – do not give up.
The thing is, if you want to start affiliate marketing and get to this stage, it’s not actually as easy as some make out. My success with affiliate marketing is something that has grown over many years.
I didn’t go from $0 to a million instantly. As always, I want to be real with you, as I think a lot of people online are not.
Some people promote affiliate marketing as a ‘get rich quick’ type of thing, as if you can be financially free in a matter of months.
Truthfully, affiliate marketing is one of the best ways to make money online for anyone, but it does take hard work, dedication and a never-give-up attitude.
(If you don’t have a website or blog yet, then you need to Take this free course It shows you every step you need so you can set up your website or blog.)
HERE ARE YOUR STEPS TO STARTING AFFILIATE MARKETING WITH NO MONEY!
1. DECIDE ON A NICHE THAT INTERESTS YOU
When you first begin affiliate marketing, you must choose a niche in which to advertise products.
Because you’ll be spending a lot of time talking about this topic, be sure you know anything about it or that it interests you. Consider what you enjoy doing, your hobbies, and the types of items you purchase. What are some of the goods you’ve used in the past that you believe are fantastic?
Do you have any special abilities, such as in fitness, finance, relationships, animal care, or nutrition? Have you ever conquered a significant challenge?
Some examples are;
- Losing a lot of weight
- Clearing yourself out of debt
- Broke free from a job you hated
- Worked out how to travel on a budget
- Taught yourself the piano in 30 days
There are so many ideas for affiliate marketing niches. Some of the most profitable niches are; health, wealth and relationships.
This is because everyone wants to be healthy/look good, we all want to be wealthy and everyone wants a good relationship. Once you’ve decided on your niche, narrow it down into a sub-niche.
Affiliate marketing works best when you choose one area to work in and position yourself as an expert.
2. FIND AN AFFILIATE PROGRAM
The majority of affiliate programs are free to join, and there are numerous options.
You can join affiliate networks and look over their items to see which ones will appeal to your target market.
However, I prefer to make things simple for you. As a result, I’ve compiled a massive database of high-paying affiliate programs! Look through them all and apply to all of the ones that interest you!
Recommended Books:
Affiliate Marketing School
Blogging For Maximum Profits
Affiliate Marketing Crash Course
Affiliate Marketing For Newbies
Another way to find affiliate products to promote is by searching Google. Type in your keyword + (affiliate program). Examples would be weight loss + affiliate program or drone + affiliate program.
Some will allow anyone to sign up to their affiliate program but some may require you to have an active website.
Note: You should have a website no matter what. Here’s how to start your website or blog step by step.
Most established businesses these days have an affiliate program for their product as they know how powerful it is.
3. CHOOSE A TRAFFIC SOURCE
The good thing is, it’s not essential to have a website to start affiliate marketing.
However, having one will make it easier! Starting a specialty blog is a terrific idea, and Namecheap can help you get started for only $1.00 per month.

If you don’t want to start a blog, there are plenty of alternative free options.
You can use your social media accounts to build up a following and connect with potential customers. Choose 1-2 accounts you are most prevalent on and focus on carving out your brand message.
The best social media accounts to build your affiliate business on for free are:
Facebook. This giant is still one of the most popular out there and is a great way to connect with potential customers and build your own brand page and group. You will find most niches in a group somewhere on Facebook and by connecting and providing value to them, you can potentially get them interested in what you’re selling.
YouTube. Video content is fast overtaking the written word and is going to continue to grow in popularity. Starting a niche channel around your product is a great way to go. Over 5 billion videos are watched a day on YouTube alone!
Instagram. This platform is another way to connect with customers in your niche. Work on building up your following here with great images, interesting text, stories and funnel people through the link in your bio to your product.
Twitter. Another big player in the social media game, Twitter is a great way to show off what you do/what you’re selling. Post valuable and inspiring content and chat to potential customers.
Other platforms to consider using; LinkedIn, TikTok, Quora, Pinterest, SnapChat and Reddit depending on your target demographic.
On free social media networks, it is entirely possible to begin affiliate marketing with zero capital. Reorganize your accounts so they connect to your niche rather than just spamming your links everywhere. In your bio, tell individuals how you can help them, and offer useful stuff on a daily basis.
4. BUILD YOUR AUTHORITY DAILY
People buy from people they know, like and trust. This will not happen immediately and you need to spend time building your authority in your chosen niche.
Show your ideal audience you have the answers to their problems. This can be done by posting relevant content on your social media. Go into Facebook groups and answer questions!
You can also answer questions on sites like Quora and Reddit as well, which have huge audiences looking for their problems to be solved.
5. INVEST IN YOUR KNOWLEDGE
Passion Will Get You Far But Training Will Get You Further. It’s entirely possible to start making money with affiliate marketing, without any training. Many people do it this way but often don’t talk about the huge learning curve they go through.
You can find a lot of information by reading about affiliate marketing all over the internet. But, getting some quality training from someone who’s achieved the results you want is invaluable.
I cannot stress enough how much difference it makes when you actually invest your cold, hard cash on a mentor or course. The learning curve can be long and steep when starting an affiliate marketing business.
Learning from a mentor who has made all the mistakes and got the exact blueprint to get where you want to be will shorten the time it takes you to get to success.
Free information can often be outdated and made by someone who hasn’t actually had the success they make out.
Check out this Affiliate Marketing School
This will take you through a simple steps to make your first affiliate commissions.
6. CONNECT WITH YOUR AUDIENCE AND HAVE REAL CONVERSATIONS
I can’t stress more how important this is. Many affiliate marketers just sell, sell, sell and turn people off them. No one likes to be sold to constantly and just seen as a cash machine right?
On your chosen social media accounts, spend time actually connecting to people like humans.
Don’t start a conversation with ‘’do you want to buy this….’’ Begin with ‘’Hi, how are you? I see you are in to in x,y,z… me too!’’ Over the next few weeks have normal conversations, ask questions, find out about their hopes, dreams and struggles. Answer questions if you can.
Only after you’ve built up a rapport should you even mention your product. Once you become proficient with affiliate marketing on your social media, you won’t even have to mention your product.
People will eventually start asking you about what you do. Never be desperate or chase the money. People will smell this a mile off and you will lose a lot of opportunities.
After creating your content, you should be promoting it on your social media channels. This should get people to follow you naturally if your content is excellent. Also, you can go into other groups in your niche on Facebook and Reddit to be helpful and engage.
Post informative posts, answer questions and talk to people. If you help people, they will check out your profile and want to know more. People buy from people so show them you’re human!
Strive to actually help people out without just trying to sell to them, and they will eventually see you as the answer to their problems and ask you what you have to offer. Other ways you can connect with your audience are;
Writing on high-traffic sites like Medium. This platform gets over 60 billion unique views a month! If you start to write informative content on here regularly, you will be able to connect with more people in your niche.
Answering questions on sites like Quora. Reportedly, around 3,000-5,000 questions get asked on this site daily. Look up questions in your niche and show what you know! Afterward, you can point people to your product or social media with a link at the end of a post or on your bio.
Run a challenge or promotion. Who doesn’t like a challenge and if you’re in an industry where you are helping people in some way like wealth building, people need to be pushed to take action sometimes. Good ideas are; a 7-day live video challenge, connect with 20 new people a day challenge or make your first sale in 30 days – all ways to push people out of their comfort zone which is what they might not do on their own.
Send out emails regularly. Email marketing isn’t dead, it’s still an important part of running and building a business. Your email list is the only online asset you actually really own. As social media accounts and blogs can inadvertently get shut down, with no explanation – and all your hard work and leads would lost!
7. CREATE FREE LEAD MAGNETS TO BUILD AN EMAIL LIST
Giving away helpful, easy-to-consume content for free will engage your audience and build your authority. It allows you to follow up with contacts when they don’t buy straight away.
Only a very small percentage of your audience will buy from you immediately. Building email sequences allows you to take a subscriber on a journey from cold lead right up to hot lead, where they can’t wait to buy what you offer.
Some good ideas for free lead magnets are;
- A short EBook that solves a problem or answers a question.
- A cheat sheet showing how to do something faster, easier, more affordably.
- Mini video series.
- Free templates or printables.
Focus on leveraging the spare hours you have in-between your other commitments to do up to three main tasks for your new affiliate marketing business.
CONCLUSION
I hope you can see that starting affiliate marketing with no money is entirely possible. We are fortunate to live in an era of free social media platforms with large niche audiences ready to be tapped.
Spend time engaging with your audience and developing your message on the platforms you’ve chosen. Persistence, energy, and effort are required, but if you can stick with it, you will be rewarded in the end.
When you start making commissions, I highly recommend investing in a website and a mentor to help you advance. In order to keep your business growing in the long run, you must invest in it.
It can be started for free, but creating a profitable online business takes time and effort.
You must lay the groundwork for your affiliate marketing business, continue to build your digital assets (content) brick by brick, engage and provide value to others, and NEVER GIVE UP!
I hope you found this article useful. Please let me know what you think in the comment box below and like and follow my Facebook page.
Regards for reading…..