Publishers have two main goals: to provide great content and monetize traffic while maintaining the user experience. Banners and other traditional formats aren’t new, but they don’t always improve the content of your site or encourage users explore more pages. Content commerce allows publishers to integrate their affiliate monetization strategies into their content production processes.
Lemonads’ primary goal is to help publishers identify the best monetization strategies and find the best advertisers. We know the advantages and requirements of content commerce, as many of our partners use it as one of their top revenue streams.
This article will discuss the benefits of content commerce and what you should know about this monetization strategy.
What is Content Commerce?
Content commerce is a marketing strategy that promotes products and services through articles, web pages and infographics.
This approach is also known as content marketing, content-led commerce or editorial content. It doesn’t work the same way as direct advertising. Instead, content developers create materials that can be used in different stages of the funnel to educate, inform, and eventually convert readers into paying customers or leads.
Advertisers are companies who want to promote their products when it comes to affiliate marketing. Affiliate publishers are content developers who distribute videos and blogs through various platforms. Publishers need to change the way they search and create promotional content in order to succeed.
Focusing on content commerce has many benefits
Each publishing platform has its own unique elements. Despite this, it can sometimes be difficult to identify an affiliate platform due to the limited content.
Content commerce is not about monetizing every area of your platform. Instead, it leverages the power and beauty of written words, images and other elements of your website or app. Content commerce helps you to be a leader in your field and influence the decisions of your readers.
Focusing on content commerce has many benefits. The first is that your platform will be noticed. This monetization method tends to produce content that is longer and more detailed than average affiliate articles. Users are more likely to trust content designed for content commerce than an advertisement when they read it.
These are just a few of the many benefits of content commerce.
Engagement
Direct advertising is not only less effective, but also more persuasive than content commerce. Instead of selling products to people who aren’t interested in buying, content marketing materials answer the questions users are searching for. This combination often yields better results than in-content links or other types of CTAs.
Reach
It is no secret that most product searches are conducted online. Online users tend to be very selective about the content they consume, and avoid being influenced too much by advertisements.
Content marketing techniques can help you connect with more users and increase your reach without the need to boost traffic.
Profitability and cost reduction
Advertising through content marketing is one of the most lucrative online promotion methods. Online users are more likely to trust comparison articles and reviews than direct sales approaches.
Simplicity
As we have said, publishers should focus on creating quality content. Implementing content commerce should therefore be easy. Instead of creating engaging content, publishers should research their audience and determine which industries are a good fit for their content.
Publishers must also find advertisers in these niches. Once this step is completed, affiliates can simply follow the same content creation process as publishers and include affiliate links within their materials.
Low-Risk Levels
Content marketing is a significant investment of time and effort. You must create quality content that users enjoy reading and holds value in order to be successful. This requires a lot research and time. You’ll also need to search for non-affiliate hyperlinks to support any claims you might make.
Content commerce isn’t a risky option because it doesn’t compromise the user experience, performance or other ad formats. You only need to create additional pages for the content, which can result in higher impressions and conversions than other ads.
What does Content Commerce mean for your Affiliate Platform?
Although content commerce isn’t new, it can be difficult for affiliates to move from an informational approach to content commerce.
Let’s look at the role of content commerce in your affiliate platform, and how to incorporate it.
Supporting the customer journey using content commerce
Conversions are the most important outcome. However, the best way for users to become customers or leads is to support their buyer’s journey. This content is more effective when it is tailored to different stages of the buyer’s journey.
The top of the funnel materials must be informative and should also move users to the latter stages. You can use a commercial tone for middle and lower funnel content, but it is important to remain objective and avoid aggressive CTAs.
Synchronize across the Marketing and Sales Departments
The sales and marketing departments must work in perfect sync when marketing and sales are involved in content marketing. The sales department is not usually under the control of the publisher, so content developers must work closely with advertisers to create campaigns.
This is a huge benefit as it takes time to build long relationships. Advertisers are open to working with affiliates even in low seasons.
Encourage positive relationships with visitors
Content marketing is all about user experience. Your credibility will be damaged if your website has too many popups, annoying banners, and slow loading times. This strategy will not work if you don’t prioritize your relationships with visitors. You must ensure that every element contributes to a great user experience, including the marketing content.
Tips for Building the Best Content Commerce Campaigns
It takes a lot of planning and hours to develop a content marketing campaign.
These are some tips that will help you increase your chances for success.
Be consistent with branding and messaging
You must be in constant communication with your advertiser partners as a way to ensure that the content produced is consistent with their brand. The landing page should be consistent with the advertiser’s branding, as well as the rest of their site. This includes color scheme, tone, voice and logo.
As personal as possible, customize content
Personalization of content requires more than just research. It also involves the use of technology elements such as web cookies or location identifiers. Online users love personalized experiences. Therefore, tailoring your commerce content can increase the performance of your materials.
Target Creative Markets
Advertisers are prone to overlook certain markets because they don’t know the best ways to reach these segments. Publishers have the opportunity to capitalize on these markets and target creative markets. This assumes that these users are able to be engaged via articles, videos or similar content.
Why is Commerce Content a good idea for publishers?
Although content commerce can deliver amazing results, it is not the right monetization strategy for every platform. You may not be able, for example, to integrate content commerce into a mobile game or other publishing platform without major changes.
You may not only be compatible with your existing platform but there are other signs that content commerce might be a good idea.
You already have a customer management system
Content marketing is more than just adding code to your website that displays different ads. You need to plan and organize your content marketing strategy. It will be easier to implement the changes if you have multiple teams working together using a customer management or CMS.
Regularly update content
Although content marketing materials can be removed at will, they won’t disappear once they’ve been posted. They don’t need to be updated to stay visible. However, consumer preferences and desires, as well as consumer interests, can change.
This is why your content won’t perform well for long periods of time if it doesn’t reflect the values you hold. This requirement is not a problem if you are already working on improving your evergreen content on an ongoing basis.
Campaigns must be scaled quickly
Content commerce is a strategy that allows you to quickly scale up your campaigns. Consumers in Tier-1 areas are less likely to respond to traditional advertising forms. If you have a lot of traffic to these areas, content marketing can be used to scale your campaigns, and increase conversions.
Examples of Advertisers Using Content Commerce Strategies
Even though we all have read content marketing materials, many of us didn’t know they were promotional materials. This is precisely what the point is.
Major publications use this method to publish promotional content alongside their informational articles. These platforms offer affiliate links and a disclaimer for users to inform them, but they don’t sacrifice their content to meet the advertisers’ goals.
These are just three examples of great affiliate programs, along with the content they promote.
PCMag Best Laptops 2022 Review–Dell Technologies Reseller Program, and othersSFGate Coolest Music Gifts – Amazon Associates Program, and othersCorporette printed WiFi Sign Piece – Etsy’s Affiliate Program
Are you looking for the best content commerce programs? Lemonads is the best content commerce program.
It is an exciting experience to join an affiliate program through a content commerce advertiser. Publishers need to be able to identify and evaluate potential partners to get the best affiliate programs. Lemonads is a content marketing agency that helps publishers find top content commerce advertisers within their niches. Get in touch today to learn more and get help from our team.
