Being an affiliate marketer is super challenging. The competition gets hotter by the day. Meanwhile, google core updates are becoming harder and harder to hack. That’s why you need all the help you can get. And there’s no better place to start than adding the right affiliate marketing tools to your arsenal.

So in this quick review, I will share with you seven types of affiliate marketing tools that every marketer needs. Let’s get right into it:

1. Tracking Tools

As the name suggests, tracking tools help you keep track of the performance of your campaigns; ad campaigns to be precise. They track metrics such as traffic, clicks, sessions, and conversions.

A tracking tool like WeCanTrack also aggregates the data from different affiliate networks and presents it on one affiliate dashboard. That means you don’t have to log into all your affiliate network accounts to compile the data manually.

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In summary, tracking software gives you tons of data on your campaigns. You can also get deeper insights into each campaign. You could, for instance, evaluate the performance of your campaigns by country or region. 

That makes it so much easier to identify what’s working and what isn’t.

2. SEO Tools

Most experts argue that these are the most important tools for any affiliate marketer. Why? Because they help you drive organic traffic to your website. As you know, without traffic, your affiliate links won’t get any clicks. Zero clicks mean zero sales and zero commissions. Your campaign fails.

To avoid this, you have to boost your SEO strategy. And this is where SEO tools come in. 

Use SEO tools for auditing your website. They will analyze how optimized your site is and compare it against the top-performing websites in the same niche.

You could also use the tools to plan your campaign. A software like Ahrefs, for example, allows you to analyze your competitors' websites. It shows you which keywords they are ranking for, the backlinks pointing to the website, and lots of other insights. You can then use this data to reverse engineer their content marketing strategy for your own website.

Just navigate to the site explorer, enter the competitor domain, and you will get an extensive report like this:

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The report looks a bit overwhelming, but there are plenty of learning materials to get you started.

SEO tools can also help you optimize your content for better rankings in the SERPs. SurferSEO, for instance, analyzes your piece of content against the top-ranking blog posts targeting the same keyword. It then provides a content score and highlights the gaps you need to fill.

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Optimizing these keywords gives your content a fighting chance against the pages ranking at the top. Not only that, but it also aligns your blog posts with user intent data. Addressing user intent can boost your ranking and conversion rates.

Here is a quick checklist of what SEO tools can do for you.

• Keyword research
• Onpage SEO
• Site speed optimization
• Backlinks analysis
• Traffic analysis
• Decision-making analytics

SEO tools come with different capabilities such as automated SEO reporting. Ahrefs, for example, has tons of features. But the price tag can be a bit steep for beginners. If that's the case, consider using free SEO tools like SEOptimer. These are not as feature-rich, but they will help you nail your website’s SEO for the time being.

Next, let’s see how to boost affiliate income with chatbots.

3. Chatbot

According to a report by Intercom, chatbots increase sales by around 67%. Up to 26% of these sales are initiated through a chatbot. These messaging bots can also boost customer engagements. 

It’s, therefore, clear that your website needs chatbots. But how can you incorporate them on an affiliate site?

One way to do it is through Q&As. Think about your website visitors; what are they interested in? What problems are they trying to solve? Create several Q&As that address these problems. Then include your affiliate links in the answers.

Your Q&As could look something like this:

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Chatbots are also pretty effective at lead generation. The bots can be used to collect data like customer email addresses. Think of it as a pop-up opt-in form. Except bots are more engaging.

Once you get the visitor’s email, initiate an email marketing campaign. 

The beauty of email marketing is it provides a channel to nurture your leads. So even if the prospects are not willing to buy now, you can guide them through your marketing funnel with several email sequences. It may sound like a lot of work, but believe me, it’s worth it.  Plus, you can automate the campaign using email marketing software which we will discuss next.

Lastly, you can use chatbots to lower your bounce rate. 

Sometimes users have a hard time finding the products they need from a website. They would bounce between several pages without spending much time on each page.

It’s also possible for a website visitor to lose interest within seconds of landing on your page.

Chatbots can salvage both scenarios. Use the bots to initiate an interaction before visitors leave your site. That should give you a few seconds to engage the user and collect their email address or help them find what they are looking for.

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4. Email Marketing Software

Email marketing has one of the best ROI of any digital marketing channel. A report released by Litmus showed that, on average, email marketing could generate $36 for every $1 spent.

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The figures are staggering but remember that the exact ROI ultimately depends on how good your campaign is. That’s why you need the best tools for the job.

The good news is there is no shortage of email marketing software. They’re also available at different prices, so all marketers should be able to get the right software for their budget.

But there are a few things you need to keep in mind when acquiring email marketing software. One is the ability to segment your email list. Segmentation allows you to personalize your campaigns for the different people on your list. Personalized campaigns generate better engagements and conversions.

You also want a tool with automation features. A tool that can initiate a unique email sequence based on specific triggers. 

Let’s say you have an authority affiliate website that covers multiple niches. But a visitor opts in to your email list on a page within the fitness category. Instead of sending the prospect emails about all the products on your blog, you can narrow it down to the items within the fitness niche. Doing this manually with every new lead is hectic. But an email autoresponder automates the whole process.

Other features worth looking for in an email marketing tool are ease of use, number and type of email templates, drag and drop email editors, list management capabilities, and analytics.

5. Analytics Software

You need a powerful tool that monitors the performance of your affiliate network. A software with extensive analytics showing the worst and best-performing links. One that creates insightful reports to support your decision-making.

One of the easiest ways to monitor your earnings is through a WordPress affiliate plugin. A light plugin can track the performance of your affiliate links without affecting load times or overall website performance.

You can also use a tool like Affjet. The platform allows you to monitor different affiliate networks from one place.

6. Landing Page Builders

Creating the perfect landing page has never been easier than it is today. With AI-powered tools, you can now create high-converting landing pages with simple drag and drop functions. That means you don’t need any coding skills.

But landing page builders are not all equal. So you need to shop around and find the best builder. Something that provides extensive capabilities. 

The software Unbounce, for example, allows you to create different variants of the same landing page. You can alter items like call-to-action buttons, headlines, and even the landing page design. Plus, the AI gives you suggestions on what’s likely to produce the best results for you.

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The software then uses Smart Traffic technology to analyze your traffic and direct them to the landing page variant that’s likely to produce the best results. 

It’s also good to invest in a landing page builder that supports A/B testing. These tests eliminate lost opportunities by showing you the LP that generates the most sales.

Put simply, the best landing page builders help create gorgeous and high-converting pages, which is just what your business needs.

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7. Spying Software

Spying tools are super useful when you want to eliminate guesswork from your campaigns. With these tools, you can easily spy on your competitors to see what’s working for them.

You could, for instance, check the best-performing ad campaigns. You can also filter performance based on countries, devices, etc. 

A spying software like Adbeat generates and presents all this data in a simple-to-understand visual.

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Use this data to improve upon your competitor’s strategy and launch an even better campaign for your own business.

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Bottomline

Affiliate marketing is a great option for anyone who’s looking for passive income.  But don’t interpret that to mean it’s easy money. The industry is anything but easy. 

Luckily, you can tip the odds in your favor by developing a super effective strategy. And the only way to do that is by scaling your digital marketing efforts with the right tools.

Now, there are plenty of tools out there, but you don’t really need all of them. That’s why we saved you the hassle by shortlisting the seven most important tools for all affiliate marketers. 

You will need software for tracking ad performance, search engine optimization, chatbots, an email marketing platform, and a landing page builder. You also want to spy on your competitors and monitor how well your affiliate links are performing. So get those tools as well.

In closing, I’d suggest you start with powerful SEO software for keyword research. Use the data to create and optimize your content, then introduce the other tools to scale your affiliate business.