Sponsored Posts Vs Affiliate Marketing

Sponsored Posts and Affiliate Marketing both are good ways for bloggers to earn quite higher. There’s no straight answer to which method will work for whom. Writing sponsored post returns warranted immediate payment for active work. As the interaction is between the blogger and the client, it is more personal and there is a space for negotiation. Most brands and media companies will want influencers or websites that have a lot of valuable readers and, of course, a decent SEO performance.

Affiliate Marketing is the Best for Promoting Certain Things

If in one article we discuss some SEO tools and use an affiliate link, like that from Semrush, it will make some money. For this discussion, let us imagine that the article’s suitable name found “How is Semrush”. How much money “How is Semrush” will make that depends upon how many peoples are reading the particular article. To improve the authority, SERP of the particular article, one has to invest a good amount of money even after good keyword research. Affiliate marketing requires a quite good effort to generate handsome money. Your investment behind an article optimized for affiliate earnings are :

1. Keyword research
2. Time investment behind writing the article
3. Analysis of the competitors
4. Backlinking, paid ad etc
5. Continuous monitoring

These factors severely limit the possibility of becoming a successful affiliate of everything. We have provided an example with Semrush so that you can study. Web hosting is also a good example of where affiliates can make good money. When an affiliate is offering $200 per sale, the expenses are included within the $200 fees.
Of course, one can put some banners to promote a product (which will not need content creation). But, putting a banner ad in the proper place does need some measurement.

Too low-cost products usually will not return a huge amount. Furthermore, physical products have a great geographical limitation (dropshipping model circumvents it).

These factors make affiliate marketing a jackpot just for few bloggers – 10% makes millions and 90% makes too low. In simple language – becoming an affiliate of certain digital services makes money. Making money becoming an affiliate of WordPress Themes, Paid SEO tools, Web Hosting does not require exceptional marketing skills.

Sponsored Posts is the Best for the Vertical Blogs

If most of the content of the website appeals to certain business niches, various companies will approach a website for sponsored posts. With professional management and honest service delivery, the domain will gain popularity among the media companies resulting in a steady earning. A sponsored post co-shares a certain resemblance with an article with an affiliate link but the primary goal of a sponsored post is brand awareness (maybe SEO value is also a factor). The area of sponsored posts need self-assessment, the chance of getting fooled is quite higher. It is generally agreed that a sponsored post at least should return $250 to the content creator. Unlike an article designed to make money with affiliate links, a sponsored article tends towards a natural tone and requires lesser investment behind keyword research, analysis of the competitors, backlinking etc. A sponsored blog post can also put an affiliate link of the same brand.

Which is Better?

In the case of affiliate marketing, one or few brands pays higher to a person and in the case of a sponsored post, many brands pay lower to a person.

There is no better or worse. Usually, affiliate marketing knocks out from creating evergreen content. The themes which were great in 2007 are no longer relevant in 2021. Either the old article requires periodic updates or a new article is required to be published. Sponsored posts, on the other hand, is towards “do and forget”. The opportunity for sponsored posts is unlimited with the growing number of websites and products. A good quality website (and thereby the content creator) should actively try both ways of money-making. If you lean towards sponsored posts more then you have to create a bunch of valuable articles to attract the segment.

All you need is a monetization strategy that works. I guess that the concept of affiliate marketing has gotten a bad reputation in the certain segment over the years. Yet, affiliate marketing is one of the effective ways to monetize a blog. Sponsored posts, usually force to meet certain criteria by the advertisers.