Affiliate Marketing During Covid-19

If you live in a country that has had little impact from the virus, consider yourself fortunate.

Millions of people are out of work, and those who aren’t are likely working from home under mandatory quarantine until its safe to go back.

With all of this disruption going on in the world, the affiliate marketing business model (and ecommerce as a whole) is actually thriving. Because of the closure of so many retail businesses, many consumers are turning to online buying. Even those who never shopped online before the crisis began.

In short, consumer buying behavior is changing.

Online sales are skyrocketing. And it’s not just toilet paper, face masks and hand sanitizers.

If you are making money online with affiliate marketing today, now is the time to step on the gas and scale your business. If you’re just considering getting started in affiliate marketing, I can’t think of a better opportunity to do so than right now.

14 Affiliate Markets Most Impacted By Covid-19

When we examine the winners and losers in the many affiliate vertical markets during the Covid-19 crisis, it’s a mixed bag. Some markets are getting ravaged while others are experiencing record growth and profits.

Below are fourteen markets that have been impacted most by this crisis: 

Many people are scared right now. Stress and anxiety is causing a positive boost in entertainment, health-related products and online alcohol sales.

The quarantine and subsequent business closures are negatively impacting the travel business, real estate sales (especially commercial real estate) and the legal profession.

*The Amazon Associates situation, which Amazon claims was due to Covid-19, was self-inflicted.

A few weeks ago, Amazon dropped a bomb on their huge affiliate base by slashing their commission rates by up to 80%. The commission rates for home improvement, furniture, lawn and garden, and pet products dropped from 8 percent per sale drop down to just 3 percent. For headphones, beauty products, and musical instruments, commission rates went from 6 percent down to 3 percent. Many other categories — including grocery, sports, baby products, and outdoors and tools all dropped down to a small 1 percent.

The Amazon affiliates who experienced the most pain from this commission reduction were the ones who promoted Amazon almost exclusively. This serves as a great lesson on why you should never put all your eggs in one basket.

Affiliate Marketing After Covid-19

Like other historical pandemics and widespread animal-borne diseases, Covid-19 represents a Black Swan Event. A Black Swan Event is an occurrence which is defined as “an unpredictable event that is beyond what is normally expected of a situation and has potentially severe consequences. Black swan events are characterized by their extreme rarity, their severe impact, and the widespread insistence they were obvious in hindsight.”**

Many entrepreneurial-minded and forward-thinking people through history have gotten very wealthy following a Black Swan Event by predicting new market demands and filling those needs before anyone else does.  

Short-Term Crisis, Long-Term Opportunity

This principal applies to investing too. The infographic below shows a summary of Black Swan Events in the past and the opportunitiies created.

Below the infographic, I will give you a few examples of potential affiliate marketing opportunities that may be waiting for you after Covid-19.

Marketing Opportunities To Look For Online After Covid-19

If you want to identify hidden opportunities to boost your income online after Coronavirus, you need to follow both the data and the trends to find out what markets and demand are growing and where unmet opportunities lie.

Start to think about the solutions to problems that were caused by the Covid-19 outbreak. Believe me, there are some very smart people working on the solutions to these problems right now.

Since I don’t have a crystal ball, I really can’t tell you how this may all play out. Your guess is as good as mine. But some things seem to follow simple logic.

Here are a few examples to help get your wheels turning…

These three examples are just some musings being put forth. I’m sure if you put some thought and research into it, you can come up with many more ideas that can explode your online sales and income after Covid-19.

You don’t have to invent a new product or service to spark innovation. Sometimes just changing the way we do things now to meet our new reality is enough to create opportunity and massive profits. Make no mistake about it, the world is going to be different once this crisis is behind us.

If you can position yourself in front of what’s coming our way online, you will have the opportunity to make life-changing money.