Sometimes it’s best to let the readers of your blog recommend affiliate products instead of doing it yourself.
As much as I often talk about blogs being a great way to build credibility and trust with your readers and how that credibility and trust can lead to nice returns when you recommend affiliate products – sometimes a stranger’s recommendation can carry a lot of weight.
Let me explain with a short story.
Since starting Digital Photography School I’ve recommended one digital photography book more than any other (The Digital Photography Book by Scott Kelby – aff). I’ve talked about this book on a number of occasions in different posts and in different ways and as a result have seen a reasonable number affiliate sales for it at Amazon.
However this week I published a reader review of the same book. The review was originally posted in the DPS forums and I simply republished it on the blog where it would get a little more attention.
The review was written by a junior member of the forum (‘ny156uk’ – they’ve posted 28 times) and not from someone with any real profile or credibility (I don’t even know if they’re male or female).
However despite their anonymity their review sold triple the number of copies of the book that I’ve managed to sell over a 12 month period.
While I topped and tailed the review with my own very brief recommendation – it was the relatively anonymous review of a reader (as well as some positive supportive comments from other readers in the comments section) that seems to have struck a chord and generated some nice result.
