Improving your efficiency with Affiliate Automation and AI tools

Everyone has been talking about Affiliate Automation and AI recently and many have been thinking about how this might affect their jobs in future.

Let's face it, we all want to work smarter, not harder.?

That's why I'm sharing my journey into automating my work with AI tools and trust me, it's been a real eye-opener.

The more you delve into getting efficient, the more you run deeper into rabbit holes, but for now - I’m sharing some of my top tips about leveraging Automation tasks and AI tools to help your affiliate program grow.

I hope you find this useful....

Why Automating tasks is a good idea

Before we dive in, let's talk about why automation is a game change for affiliate program marketers

1. It saves time (hello to an extra hour for you in your day!)
2. It reduces errors (goodbye, human mistakes!)
3. It allows you to scale your business (Growth = More $$!)
4. It frees you up for creative work (You can do more of the fun stuff!)

Now, let's explore some ways you can start automating your affiliate marketing tasks and take a look at a few of the tools I’ve been using.

Email marketing automation

Email is still king in affiliate marketing. Manually crafting emails and ad copy is something of the past so here's what I did:

1. Set up welcome sequences for new subscribers
2. Created automated follow-up emails based on user actions
3. Segmented my email list for more targeted campaigns

Pro Tip >> You can set up sequences and funnels and still hyper personalize them. Some of the big CRM tools like Hubspot, Convertkit and others all enable this with relative ease. I have also been using various prompting scenarios to create email copy using Chat GPT teams, and Google Bard to test content outcomes and quality. You really should give it a go and try it but always make sure you’re fact checking and editing content properly before using it.?

Social Media scheduling

Everyone should be leveraging social media to build brand awareness and engagement. It doesn’t have to be complex though. There are a number of tools you can use to automate your social media so that it still reflects your thoughts and idea’s authentically. Here are some of the tools I’ve looked at recently:?

1. Use tools like Buffer or Hootsuite to schedule posts across all platforms, in fact there are so many tools available you should investigate the right one for your business and look for evergreen features as well as platform integrations.
2. Create your content in batches and schedule them for the entire month so you don’t have to wake up and get writer's block thinking about what you want to say each week.
3. Set up automated responses for common repetitive questions like - “how do I sign up to join the vCommission network” , “where do I get my affiliate links” - things like this should? not take human hours to respond to as they are standardized responses and can be automated very easily.

Trust me, your social media community will thank you when they’re getting instant access to questions being answered!

Content curation and sharing

Staying on top of industry news and sharing valuable content is crucial if you want affiliates to notice you or advertisers to work with you. But, I know -? it can be time-consuming.?

Here's my solution:

1. Use Feedly or Readwise Reader to aggregate relevant content
2. Connect your tools for automatic sharing using tools like IFTTT (If This Then That) or Zapier.
3. Set up IFTTT applets or Zapier tasks to share content based on specific triggers

You can also ask ChatGPT - I have a paid subscription to ChatGPT (Teams) to quickly summarize all the latest affiliate marketing news and you'll be kept right up to date.?

Here’s what my ChatGPT teams result was -? for last week:

Here is a summary of the latest trends and developments in the affiliate marketing industry from last week and where these stories hailed from:

1. Unified Partnerships:
2. Influencer Integration:
3. Consumer Behavior Shifts:

You’d be surprised by some of the information that get’s returned and that you can learn from in doing this.?

Affiliate link management

Tracking and updating affiliate links manually? ? Let's automate that:

1. Use a link management tool like Geniuslink or ThirstyAffiliates
2. Set up automatic link rotations for split testing
3. Create shortened, branded links automatically

Link management on autopilot??

Yes, please!

Reporting and analytics

Data is gold in affiliate marketing. But compiling reports? Not so much fun. Here's how I automated it:

1. Set up Google Analytics dashboards for quick insights
2. Use tools like Databox to create automated reports
3. Schedule regular email summaries of key metrics

Now I always know where I stand, without the headache.

The human touch

Now, I know what you're thinking. "But Parul, won't all this automation make my marketing feel... robotic?"

Great question! Here's the secret: automation handles the repetitive stuff, freeing you up to add that personal touch where it really counts.

Use your extra time to:

• Engage personally with your top followers
• Create more valuable, in-depth content
• Strategise and plan your next big move

Remember, we're automating tasks, not relationships!

Getting started

Feeling overwhelmed? Don't worry, I've been there. Start small:

1. Pick one area to automate (I suggest email or social media)
2. Research tools that fit your budget and needs
3. Implement and test
4. Gradually expand to other areas

Before you know it, you'll have a well-oiled affiliate marketing machine!

Remember, the goal of automation isn't to remove you from your business. It's to give you more time to focus on what you do best - being the awesome affiliate marketer you are!

The Road Ahead

Automation in affiliate marketing is always evolving. Stay curious and keep learning. Who knows what amazing tools and techniques we'll have in a year's time?

I'd love to hear about your automation journey. What's working for you? What challenges are you facing? Drop me a line and let's chat!

Here's to working smarter, not harder. You've got this!

Here’s to a successful start to H2 and on with the week ahead!