Expenses only arise when you earn income

Marketing can be really pricey. But there are also some marketing measures that are quite easy to plan, such as affiliate marketing. What does this mean exactly? And who is it suitable for?

For a month now, Laura has been an affiliate partner with ArtNight Switzerland. She is one of over 20 partners working with the company in this sector. Specifically, “affiliate” marketing is a supplementary marketing measure, and generally involves a partnership between companies and customers.

Laura is a freelance graphic designer who has her own creative blog. In her free time, she likes making greeting cards, tying macramé knots and cooking international dishes. With her guides and recipe ideas, she has built up an impressive social media following in recent years on platforms such as Instagram, Facebook and Pinterest. Laura herself is a regular ArtNight customer, and her own blog is aimed at a similar target group. This is why she decided to apply to be an affiliate partner with the company. She thought it would suit her perfectly, as she could combine her interests and earn a bit of extra money on the side without much effort.

The core idea behind affiliate marketing is essentially this: happy customers become ambassadors for companies. They recommend products using their own networks and, in return, receive a pre-determined share of the revenue when new customers make a purchase. Affiliate marketing is also appealing to companies with a small marketing budget: you can get started with little effort and it is quite easy to budget for compared to many other marketing measures. Indeed, expenses only arise when you start earning income. What’s more, affiliate partners are easy to acquire, for instance from your existing customer base.

Let’s assume Laura posts a painting of hers on Instagram with the caption: “I recently attended an ArtNight and was able to really let my creativity shine. If you guys feel like painting something yourself, you can use my voucher code XXX, which will give you a 10 percent discount on your first ArtNight”. Her post attracts attention and the algorithm also displays her content to Maurizia. She is following Laura on Instagram, has never been to an ArtNight and is really enthusiastic about the idea of doing something creative herself. So she takes the opportunity and redeems Laura’s code straight away on the ArtNight website to get her hands on a ticket.

This is where the affiliate programme comes in: the new customer gets a discounted ticket, Laura receives a share of the profits for recommending Maurizia, and ArtNight acquires a new customer.