How Course Creators Can Improve Their Affiliate Marketing Programs w/ Dustin Howes - Ep. 235 LMScast

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Expert affiliate marketing manager Dustin Howes shares insights and strategies for online course creators on how to build strong affiliate armies with Chris Badgett in this episode of the LMScast. Dustin shares his background in affiliate management, and he and Chris go over some great ideas as to what you want to keep in mind when building an affiliate program for your course or membership.

Chris and Dustin discuss the different types of affiliate programs. There are managed platforms such as ShareASale, Commission Junction, and Impact. Managed platforms offer advantages such as collecting W9 forms and making sure everyone is paid, whereas a plugin like AffiliateWP does allow you to manage your own program, but there are more responsibilities that come along with that.

Recruiting affiliates is another challenge website owners face. Dustin recommends using a CRM dedicated to affiliate management, such as BuzzStream. The idea behind this CRM is to manage your relationships in the marketing realm separate from the CRM, such as MailChimp, ConvertKit, or ActiveCampaign, that you use for leads.

Affiliate armies are not built overnight. You have to think in the long term when creating an affiliate program, because your affiliates may not create their first piece of content for a few weeks after joining your program. And then it will take time for their content to start ranking in search engines.

Dustin recommends sending out two newsletters a month to your affiliates. One will outline the promotions and coupons you will be having for the month, so they can get prepared by creating content. The second newsletter will cover strategies they can implement to grow their business as an affiliate.

You can find Dustin Howes at and on LinkedIn. Thanks for joining us!

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