Title option: “Double Your Holiday Sales: Check-Out These Personalized Gift Guides Packed with Exclusive Discounts”
Gift Guides: The Perfect Tool for Affiliate Marketing This Holiday Season
As we enter the festive season, retail sales are projected to reach a monumental $1.317 trillion in 2020. Much like in past years, various publications, from Goop and The New York Times to TikTok creators, are releasing gift guides to capture their share of the holiday sales pie.
However, what sets this year apart from the rest? The abundance of highly specific, ultra-specific gift guides, from ones for cooks and kids to ones tailored to those that are always cold. The secret behind this sudden surge of uber-specific guides is they make excellent affiliate marketing tools.
Why? Because readers are not only looking for gift guides for recommendations or inspiration, but something more. Once they find a product they like, they can be linked to it via a customized URL, which makes is easy for brands to monitor what consumers are clicking on and for partners to earn commission from specific products.
Moreover, iconic publications don’t need to work as hard to win over customers with their suggested products as they’ve already established consumer trust.
Affiliate Marketing: A Small Yet Growing Channel
Worldwide spending on affiliate marketing is estimated to be around $14 billion, yet almost half of (marketing experts (48.9%) said they would be increasing their spending on the channel in 2020, as revealed by Martech Record data.
According to a June 2023 Gen3 Market data, US marketers are using affiliate marketing throughout the entire purchase journey. This ranges from awareness (56%), consideration (58%) and conversion (50%).
Plus: As consumers remain cautious about where and how they spend their money, creating ultra-specific gift guides could convince them to make a purchase.
Pro tip: To make your gift guide stand out, include exclusive discounts which can only be found in your guide. Integral Ad Science data has showed that digital shoppers often pay attention to deals over other product promotions, with over half of consumers (51%) showing interest in ads for products on sale compared to ads outlining best-selling products (44%) and “may also like” suggestions (41%).
The power of affiliate marketing lies in its ability to help marketers capture a larger portion of the holiday sales pie. So give yourself a head start now and use these personalized gift guides to your advantage.