People often wonder what is required to run an affiliate marketing business. Are you one of those people who buy into all of that “lazy late start mornings with a laid back breakfast, switch on the computer and check how much money rolled into your bank account whilst you slept?” It’s time to wake up and smell the coffee because the reality is nothing like that.
Now let’s not get off on the wrong foot, affiliate marketing does not have to be difficult or onerous but it does require input, commonly known as work. The work involved however can be very interesting, somewhat tedious at times but certainly one hundred times better than being in a job.
So let’s see exactly how our working day, as an affiliate marketer, should be.
Well the first part is as the guru’s say, you get up and have a leisurely breakfast, after all it’s your business and you are the boss. This, however, is not a justification for rising late and slouching about in your pajamas or nightie and waiting for a kettle or coffee pot to boil.
Try to rise as early as possible, preferably no later than 7am. and get dressed, have breakfast etc. and be ready to get on with the business of the day.
Virtually all highly successful business people, whether online or offline, tend to rise early so they can clear their personal requirements quickly and be able to get on with the business of the day.
As an affiliate marketer you will need to first:
- Log on.
- Quickly check business emails (note: – not personal emails)
- Check web stats i.e. sales, promos, queries etc.
- Attend to any admin such as banking, emails etc.
Once all the basics have been done, which can usually take up an hour or two, it’s time to move onto the real business of the day, which is getting more business.
It’s common knowledge, amongst the gurus, that virtually all of your time and energy should be spent focusing on bringing in new clients to your funnel either by providing new products, mailing lists, banners, advertising etc.
This means that the rest of your working day will be spent on marketing tasks. How long you spend on these activities is entirely at your discretion, after all it’s your business and you are the boss. Do remember, whilst you may be the boss, there are no real employees and the buck really does stop with you, even if you do use outsource sections of your business.
This is not the best place to go into the nitty-gritty of particular tasks that are required to be done. Needless to say the more skilled you are at a particular task then the less time it will take. All tasks require a certain amount of time and effort and as an affiliate marketer it is up to you to choose the amount of time and effort you want to spend on your business.
The rest of your working day could in theory just be a case of say, updating your blog, chasing affiliate payments or, on the other hand, it could involve numerous hours.
How many hours?
Well, to be perfectly truthful you could be sitting at your computer until the wee small hours and you will find that many a successful online marketer puts in that level of effort. It all depends on how badly you want to succeed.
Suddenly that lazy day lifestyle you were sold is nothing but a fantasy, you may well end up working harder and longer than you did when you had a job.
What’s the solution?
In a simple one-word answer, it’s PLANNING.
Plan your day and stick to it rigidly. Stick to it rigidly at first and then when you are comfortable with the routine you can start to ease back. By now you will know what works best for you, where you are able to make the most profit and more essentially you will know how much time and effort you are prepared to put into your business.
Now I bet when you read the title of this article and you started to read it you thought you were going to see a list of specific tasks that you would need to tick off in order to complete your daily effort. If you did then this is the old job mindset kicking in.
Now that you are an entrepreneur, boss or whatever titles you may want to give yourself, you have to think differently. Everything you do in YOUR BUSINESS reflects on your lifestyle, big time. So if you want to have that laid back dream of getting up late, slouching around and checking your bank account then you are going to have to either win the lotto or work hard to set it up.
I hope this article has helped you to understand that running a business, even an affiliate marketing business, requires a new paradigm. To quote a very famous saying which is so relevant, “When you change the way you think you will be able to change your world.”
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