Would you like to make money with affiliate marketing but don’t have a website? Well, keep reading! We have easy ways you can make money with affiliate marketing; no blog or website is needed.
There are a lot of ways to make money online. You can start a blog, open an Etsy shop, participate in Amazon FBA, or even create and sell information products like eBooks or courses. Or, you can sell services as a freelancer or use popular sites to earn extra money each month as a usability tester, search engine evaluator, or survey taker. When you think about it, there are many ways to make an online income each month.
But, perhaps one of the most popular and sought-after ways of earning an online income is through an affiliate marketing business.
What Is Affiliate Marketing, Exactly?
Affiliate marketing gives you a chance to make money by promoting other people’s products and services. When you refer a person to a site, you may get a commission if they purchase something or perform an action, like signing up for a trial or clicking on a link.
And this is becoming a favorite online marketing method for both advertisers and affiliates. Why? The seller makes a sale they otherwise may not have received, and you get a piece of the earnings – win, win.
Who Can Make Money With Affiliate Marketing?
Many bloggers, publishers, and business owners use affiliate marketing to make passive income. Some even take home more than $50,000 each month from affiliate sales alone. These bloggers typically have a large and loyal audience – something that can take a lot of time, energy, and effort to build.
But what if you’re not interested in starting a blog or maintaining your own website? Does this mean you can’t get a slice of the affiliate marketing pie? Absolutely not! In fact, there are plenty of ways to earn money online with affiliate marketing without a website or blog.
1. Social Media
Instead of using affiliate links in your blog posts or on your website, you can monetize your online presence on social media. Many social networking sites allow users to place affiliate links within their own posts, profiles, groups, and updates. This means you can use online communities with millions of active users on them to promote products as an affiliate.
Facebook Groups and Business Pages
Facebook is the largest social media platform, with over 3.05 billion users. If you already have a personal profile on Facebook, you can start a Facebook business page or group to begin promoting affiliate products.
Your page can be about any subject you are interested in, but the most profitable niches involve topics like health, relationships, and money. Choose a topic you enjoy and start building an active and engaged audience by sharing high-quality information people will love. Once your popularity grows, consider using an affiliate program, like the Amazon Influencer Program, to start promoting products you know your audience will enjoy.
Let’s say you started a Facebook page devoted to all things yoga. You could use the Amazon Influencer Program to recommend yoga mats and blocks, clothes, or books that people would genuinely like and benefit from using.
Side note: Make sure you comply with Facebook’s Branded Content Policies and the FTC’s guidelines for disclosure.
Other Social Media Sites
Facebook isn’t the only social media site that allows affiliate links. You share content with affiliate links on Pinterest, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, LinkedIn, and more! But remember, since you don’t own your social media accounts, you need to follow each site’s rules regarding affiliate links. And, as a general rule, you shouldn’t only be posting, pinning, or tweeting affiliate links alone. Instead, focus on the quality of content first and only include affiliate offers when they add value to the information you’re sharing.
With sites like Instagram and TikTok, you’re not able to post an affiliate link to your individual updates. So you may want to set up a free landing page with Linktree. A Linktree landing page gives you the ability to post multiple links on one page, so your followers can easily find the product you were talking about in your social media update.
2. HubPages
HubPages is a popular revenue-sharing site. Users create hubs that are filled with useful content, videos, polls, and other category-focused information. There are hundreds of topics to choose from, ranging from art and design to weather, making HubPages a great option to try your hand at affiliate marketing in a subject you’re familiar with.
On top of flexibility in sharing, HubPages has affiliate programs built right into its platform. As a ‘Hubber,’ you can easily take part in the HubPages Amazon Program and their eBay Program, too. This means you can create hubs that are almost instantly set up to be monetized!
Remember, HubPages is built on user-generated content. So, the better the content you create, the better your chances of attracting an audience. And as you grow an audience, you’ll stand a greater chance of making money as an affiliate if you share genuinely helpful content that links to products readers will like.
If you’re looking for more places to promote your affiliate links without a website, check out Medium or Vocal.
3. YouTube
If creating written content isn’t your strong suit, consider starting a YouTube channel you can use as an affiliate marketing platform. Some of the most successful YouTubers earn millions each year using a combination of sponsored videos, affiliate sales, and advertisements.
But when you’re starting out, you won’t have as big of a following as these users. So, you’ll need to focus on providing genuinely useful content that will help build an engaged community. After all, there’s no point in creating videos that people won’t watch.
One of the most natural ways to include affiliate links on YouTube is to do honest product reviews. Let’s say you start a YouTube Channel focused on fitness. You could create videos reviewing products like Fitbit, exercise equipment, and other gear people who work out would find useful. Then you could link to the product on Amazon and potentially earn a commission if someone makes a purchase.
4. Email Newsletters
With affiliate marketing, you want to drive traffic back to your affiliate links so you can generate more sales. The best way to do that is by using multiple platforms and marketing techniques. One of the most effective ways to connect with your audience is through email marketing.
With email marketing, you’ll sign up for an email marketing service like Constant Contact or ConvertKit. You’ll then add links to your social media pages and accounts so that people can sign up for your email list. By sending out emails to subscribers on your list, you can let them know about sales, discounts, and promotions, which will help increase your traffic to your affiliate links, all without a website! All three email marketing platforms mentioned above have free trials. You can read more about each of them here to see which one best suits your needs.
5. Buying Ads
Another way to drive traffic back to your affiliate links is by purchasing PPC (pay-per-click) ads on Google Ads or one of the many social media sites. With this method, sometimes called affiliate arbitrage, you’ll need to be strategic because you don’t want to waste money on ads that aren’t converting onlookers to action-takers. The basis behind this idea is you buy ads for a small cost, and then you make back the cost of your advertising plus more by driving traffic to high-converting offers and blog posts.
If you’re going to use this method, be sure to educate yourself on copywriting, your target audience, and measuring ROI. To increase your chances of success, take a training course on the ad platform you’re going to use; Google has free courses, as does Facebook, for learning the ins and outs of running ads on their platforms.
Should You Post Affiliate Links on Forums or Blogs?
There are some people that will tell you that you should post your affiliate links on online forums like Reddit and Quora. From what I’ve read, placing promotional links on these sites is against their terms of service.
Other people may advocate placing affiliate links in blog post comments, but I can tell you that this is considered spammy. The blog’s publisher either has a spam-filtering plugin that will automatically delete your comment or they will manually remove it, so don’t waste your time with these techniques.
It’s best to build up your own email list and social media accounts or start a website of your own. I know this article is about how to do affiliate marketing without a website. But there are free website options that allow you to monetize with affiliate links (just be sure to read the terms of service before choosing a platform).
To make the most of free website options, be sure to write high-quality blog posts that target both short-tail and long-tail keywords for the topic you’re writing about. Once your article is published, you can promote it on your social media platforms and in your newsletter, driving more potential customers back to your affiliate website.
Affiliate Marketing Networks
There are many different affiliate marketplaces out there, like Commission Junction, Amazon Associates, Shareasale, and Rakuten. These marketplaces bring together advertisers with affiliate programs and publishers like you who are looking for products to promote.
To join these platforms, you’ll need to meet certain criteria first and often must apply to specific affiliate programs before you can start promoting products. Sometimes, an advertiser may not approve your application if you don’t have enough content, the things you’re sharing aren’t relevant, or you’re just not fully established yet on your chosen platform. You may want to wait to apply to these programs until you’ve been up and running for a while and can demonstrate you’ve built a spam-free, quality resource from which advertisers will benefit.
Go to this post for a big list of possible affiliate marketing networks you can join.
Amazon Influencer Program
A more beginner-friendly option to earn money with affiliate marketing without a website or blog is through Amazon. With the Amazon Influencer Program, you get a personalized storefront, and it works with many non-blogging platforms. Plus, their tools make it easy to integrate your unique Amazon affiliate links into the content you share, whether you’re making a YouTube video or posting a social media update.
The application process is quick and easy (they do check your follower count and engagement rates), and unlike the other affiliate sites, you don’t have to apply to any third-party offers. Once you’re accepted as an Amazon Influencer, you can start promoting the millions of products sold on the world’s largest online store, which includes everything from ebooks and electronics to home appliances, pet supplies, and everything in between.
Referral Links
Even though you may have a large social media following or email list, some affiliate networks won’t allow you to join without a blog or website. If you run into this problem, look into referral link programs. These are small referral programs through individual companies where they’ll give you a referral link to share with your audience. If someone makes a purchase or signs up for a trial through your link, you’ll earn store credit, free swag, or sometimes even cash!
One popular referral program is Rakuten (formerly Ebates). With this program, you sign up for an account and share your referral link with friends and family. If someone signs up and makes a qualified purchase through your referral link, you’ll earn $30 in cash per referral.
There are tons of companies that offer referral link programs; here is a list of ways to make money with referral links.
Final Words on Affiliate Marketing Without a Website
No matter where you decide to promote affiliate links, you should always do so with best practices in mind. This means providing valuable content first and foremost and only including affiliate links when it makes sense. It’s also a good idea to use affiliate links on occasion – not everything you create should be for the sole purpose of making a sale.
Remember, even if you choose not to start a blog or website, you’ll still be building an audience as an affiliate marketer. This means you’ll need to follow Federal Trade Commission (FTC) rules that specify when you need to inform your readers that you have an affiliate relationship with particular advertisers.
By following the FTC guidelines and sharing high-quality content with your audience, you’ll be able to gain trust and credibility. And when you develop a reputation for being a reliable source of relevant information, your audience will naturally value your opinion and take notice when you recommend products to them.
Do you participate in affiliate marketing without a website? What strategies and techniques are working for you? Drop us a note; we’d love to hear from you!
Originally published on July 12, 2016. Content updated April 2023.
Hi Ashlee, this article is actually very helpful for people starting out, and it’s interesting to me because it brings back memories. I started out with no website, not knowing what WordPress was or that I can setup free blogs on the website. I was introduced to PLR ebooks, and had an idea. Why not edit the ebooks, add my affiliate links in them in a helpful manner, and give them away on forums and social media for free. Generally people love freebies. And it helped me get enough commission to purchase my first hosting account. So affiliate marketing with no website is definitely possible, you just need to be creative, and perhaps add bonuses to your offers because like I said, people love freebies! Awesome post, keep it up!
Glad you enjoyed the article, Matthew!
Yes, placing affiliates links in a freebie is a great idea for earning money. I always try to provide lots of value to the reader when I’m using affiliate links.
Thanks for stopping by!
Thanks a lot! Great stuff! Tried affiliate on and off but now I am going all in! You have so many ideas on your blog! And it is a great checklist! So many things to remember and check up on!
Glad you enjoyed the post, David.
Great share Ashlee!
A lot of people are under always under the impression that a blog is the only way you make money but it requires a lot of time writing high quality articles. Social media is sooo much easier in my opinion. I’ve made a bit of coin advertising products on Instagram.
Looking forward to your next post!
Please how can I begin making money, how can I start affiliate marketing
The best place to begin is Clickbank to gain experience & knowledge, also it’s free to set up as an affiliate
You choose your I.D which is the way the link is identified as coming from you and when a sale is made you get paid the commission
Best to learn about cloaking your link, save other highjacking your efforts
Hey, Am in Africa”Namibia” do you perhaps have a affiliate links I can work with. Any advice or information you can share with me will really be appreciated. Thanks
Hi Constantia,
Our information is geared for US residents. I’m not sure what’s available in Africa.
However, the gal that wrote this blog post: https://www.theworkathomewoman.com/wah-transcriptionist/ She’s from Kenya, perhaps she can assist you with some remote job leads in Africa.
Good luck!
Thanks so much Holly for your prompt reply!:)
Is there any fees incurred in promoting affiliate links on Facebook?
Once again, thanks a lot for the info given and i appreciate it.
Best regards,
Cheryl
No, you can start a Facebook Business Page for free.
Hi,
First of all, would like to commend that you have a great blog post, Ahslee!
May i ask if it is possible to monetise my affiliate marketing business through Facebook for free?
In fact, i also have another option to create a free Weebly website using it’s subdomain and was also wondering if i could monetise the free Weebly website?
Shall await for your kind and early favourable reply.
Thank you & best regards,
Cheryl
Hi Cheryl,
Glad you enjoyed Ashlee’s article!
Yes, you can promote affiliate links on Facebook.
I’m not sure about Weebly. You’ll need to research their TOS to see if affiliate links are allowed.
Good luck on your journey!
Hello,
very useful information.
Actually I’m making good amount of money with Amazon and now I want to use Ebay Affilaite links also. Do you have any article about that or any idea please?
Thanks.
Here are a couple of articles that you may find helpful:
https://www.theworkathomewoman.com/make-500-month-selling-ebay/
https://www.theworkathomewoman.com/etsy-ebay-reselling/
I seriously need help linking things together. Can someone pls help lol. Im new to all of this and really desire to change my financial situation. Thanks
What’s your question, Angie?
When I logged out to amazon affiliates they ask to mention my website or mobile app there is a confusion to me that what URL link I should mention without a website
Thanks for this, great article! I was just wondering though – I’m signed up to the Amazon affiliate program and for some items I can just copy and paste a link, while for others the only option seems to be code to paste into a website. It’s mostly books that I’m linking to at the moment, so not sure why there is a difference? Also, is there any way to use the pastable code if you don’t have a blog or website? Thanks!
Hi Laura,
When you’re logged into your account — there’s a toolbar across the top of the page that says: Get Link: Text, Image, and Text + Image — you should be able to pull what you need from there.
You can share your affiliate links on social media. Be sure to read through Amazon’s TOS because they have places that you’re not able to share affiliate links, like email.
Thanks for this post. I was a bit confused because I don’t have the website… so now you give me the information of other channels.
Glad you enjoyed the article!
Thank you so much for this great article. Please help me with sites that allows one to become an affiliate marketer from anywhere around the world, being it African, American etc
The Work at Home Woman is geared toward U.S. residents.
Please check out this post for international listings:
https://www.theworkathomewoman.com/worldwide-work-from-home-jobs/
Good luck!
I really enjoyed the article, It’s have given me some great tips, I didn’t believe it was possible to make money online without a website until after reading your article.
Glad you enjoyed the article, Anthony.
Making money online without a website is very possible. One thing many people don’t know is YouTube is a great platform to get your feet wet in terms of gaining valuable experience in video marketing and writing content on Medium.com. Doing so gets you in the positive mindset of relying on freelancing as a means of putting yourself in a future position to earn a 100% living online.
Thanks for the suggestions! Mindset is so important to one’s success.
Great article. My Amazon affiliate application recently got rejected twice though I have a blog and Youtube channel. and made 20 sales in two days. HOw can you become an affiliate and be a non blogger?
Hello Ashlee ,
Thanks for your insight regarding starting an affiliate Program even if we are not having a blog or website as there are other options available for people who want to be a part of affiliate network , I think Facebook and Youtube are the most popular One’s and the most convenient one’s as well .
Glad you enjoyed Ashlee’s post!
Wish me so that I can start and earn affiliate marketing successfully, following your suggestions. Anyway Nice, rather Nice and helpful article.
Thanks and Regards,
Elina
Glad you enjoyed the tips, Elina.
You are a big help to me. I just made my blog and started doing affiliate marketing however I am struggling on the next step. I don’t know how will make people buy through my blog. It’s frustrating you know. What you said lifted up my spirit and I wish I can see sales next month or so. Cheers!
Hi Ashlee,
Have you seen Mavenx.com yet? It might be a good addition to your story above. This allows users (not just bloggers) to create boards of products from over 3,000 merchants and each product is armed with affiliate links that pay from 2-25%. The system allows users to share their boards and products to Blogs, Pinterest, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Email. Users do not need a blog, they really only need a willingness to share. Payment comes monthly when an account reaches over $20. It is VERY easy to use – and fun!
This user summed it up pretty well as well as touching on the other ways to monetize the platform. http://simplynaturalmama.com/2017/02/easy-way-monetize-across-social-media-platforms/
Love to hear what you think! I am the CEO so please feel free to ask me questions too!
First of all thanks for the valuable information your website have. I am in the Marketing and sales field of Banking and Pharmaceuticals for about 10 years. I was researching, how should I make money online. I found Affiliate Marketing is a suitable ground for me to play on. Problem is that I am not a techie person, can say I know how to browse internet and how to do emails and how to use facebook etc.
I know how to sell but I am confused how should I start. I know it is not too much difficult as I am seeing but I don’t know how to start and where to start. Can you help me out please.
Thanks and regards,
Khawaja Muhammad Ali
You can start by creating a website or you can use third-party websites to the promote the affiliate products.
Take a look at these two posts they will give you a good place to start:
https://www.theworkathomewoman.com/affiliate-marketing/
https://www.theworkathomewoman.com/setup-blog/
I have clearly understood what an affiliate marketing is but the thing is I would like to start with affiliating products through amazon so how would I start with ????
I just launched my affiliate marketing site and I’m excited to see results after applying what you’ve said. Thank you so much for helping newbies like me.
First to say thanks for sharing this great article. Affiliated marketing is good way to make money online. I am just start my blog and make my first amazon affiliated sale 2 days ago. So it’s nice resource to make money fast. Your article is must helpful for newbie blogger like me.
Congrats on making your first affiliate sale, that’s so exciting! Glad you enjoyed the article!
Hi Ashlee….great blog..well done
I am starting off as an affiliate producing videos on” Freedom” as my main topic…without the use of a website or blog. If you were in my shoes what strategy would you take ? …also what forum sites would you join?
Hi Mark. Thanks for stopping by. If you’re producing videos, YouTube is a great platform. In addition to affiliate marketing, you can monetize your videos easily with AdSense too. You can develop your channel around your niche and promote/review/suggest products that you know your audience will benefit from.
If you haven’t already, it’s always a good idea to set up social media accounts. These are great platforms to promote your content as well as implement an affiliate marketing strategy. This gives you a chance to connect with your audience, share your videos, and promote relevant affiliate products/services.
As for forums, I couldn’t say with certainty what might be best. I’m not well versed in your niche but a Google search would probably yield plenty of results. A great way to select forums is to think of your ideal reader/viewer and where they might “hang out” online.
Good luck with your affiliate marketing endeavor :-)
Happily,
Ashlee
I’m a landscape designer in Phoenix, AZ. I have articles that I’ve written about ecological and sustainable landscape design and installation. I’ve been in business successfully for over 8 years. I would like to find a small group of reliable affiliates to place my articles in social media, etc and pay them a good commission as I make a sale, ( to be discussed with the affiliate) It’s a service and not product per se. Or if they have a suggestion on how they would like to work, I’m open
Frank
Hi Frank,
You can go about this in two different ways. First, you can visit your favoite ecological and landscape design websites and see if they have an affiliate program. Usually this information will be located on the very bottom of their website or on their contact page. The other thing you can do is sign up with some of the bigger affiliate platforms like ShareASale and FlexOffers. Once you’re accepted into the program, you can search their merchants for like-minded companies. You should be able to find some goos partners faily easy. Good luck and keep us posted.
Thanks for mentioning FlexOffers.com! We are an awesome affiliate marketing network with thousands of affiliate programs available. Learn more about us here, and be sure to sign up! https://www.flexoffers.com/publisher-benefits/
You’re welcome!
You still looking for but someone?
First to say thanks for sharing this great article. Affiliated marketing is good way to make money online. I am just start my blog and make good commission. So it’s nice resource to make money fast. Your article is must helpful for newbie blogger like me.
Glad you enjoyed the article, John!