Neil Patel’s proven strategies for affiliate marketing success

In a recent Freshworks webinar, Abhishek GP (senior director of revenue growth at Freshworks) interviewed Neil Patel (bestselling author and digital marketing expert) about the world of affiliate marketing, including long-term benefits of affiliate programs and innovative strategies to maximize revenue.

Below are several key takeaways, edited lightly for clarity:

Focus relentlessly on your ideal customer

Many marketers distribute their efforts across multiple channels like SEO, social media, email marketing, and paid ads—only to question why it doesn’t translate into revenue. The answer often lies in not knowing their target audience well enough, Patel said.

“Marketers do a lot of different campaigns. And then they wonder why they got a lot of traction, all of these likes and shares, but they’re not generating revenue. A lot of it starts with the ideal customer profile. If you don’t know who you’re selling to, then how do you know how to create the right content, the right marketing message, the right collateral to convert them from a visitor to a customer? You have to look at not only who’s your customer, but who’s your ideal customer. …

“A lot of what marketers and affiliates struggle with is ego. They want to reach everyone. But your goal as a marketer is not to reach everyone. Your goal is only to reach your ideal customers and, ideally, no one other than that because you’re wasting money by reaching non-ideal customers.” 

Embrace a contrarian (and lo-fi) approach to marketing

Patel also emphasized the effectiveness of using a contrarian approach or fresh viewpoint in marketing strategies.  

“You’re competing in a sea of noise—and it’s difficult to stand out. If your content isn’t unique, or if you’re saying the same thing as everybody else, it likely won’t do well. 

“Lo-fi content—recording myself and putting it out on the internet, for example—can seem more authentic. Real people can relate to it easier, whereas highly produced content might be seen like a TV ad. We analyzed 3,000 business profiles on TikTok and Instagram and found that the lo-fi content had, on average, 18.5 likes and 3.2 comments per page, whereas the hi-fi content had, on average, 12.2 likes and 2.6 comments per post.”

Human-crafted content generally outperforms AI-generated content

AI is a powerful tool in the marketing toolkit, Patel said, but it’s no replacement for a marketer’s human touch. 

“People are overestimating what AI can do for them in the short run, but they're underestimating what it can do for them in the long run. AI is not perfect—far from it—but it can help with tasks like research ideation, creating variations of existing content, and even data analysis.” 

Affiliate marketing goes live 

Asked to name an exciting trend beyond AI that will shake up affiliate marketing, Patel was quick to name the power of live, direct connections.

“I see live doing well. You can now go live to your audience and sell them right there via a link to purchase. It’s a huge opportunity, but not enough affiliates do it. Those live interactions also tend to be authentic and less polished.” 

Tips and tricks are great, but Patel emphasized that there’s no secret sauce to growing affiliate revenue. Success results from showing up, making incremental changes, and keeping at it. 

To view the full interview, click here.