How to Write an Affiliate Product Review That Drives Sales

Considering these three factors, you’re essentially figuring out your specific niche and what exactly fits into this niche. We’ve discussed signing up to an affiliate network or an affiliate program and evaluating its performance here.

The following essential elements will help you write an excellent thought for any product:

3. Essentials of affiliate product reviews

3.0 Follow Google Recommendations about product reviews

To help shoppers discover your product reviews in search, the Google team has created a checklist of things your product reviews should match. You can access it here but I’ve also pasted it for an easier read. Follow these best practices to ensure your reviews will rank high in Google and you will also avoid getting your website penalized by algorithms updates like the Google Product Review Update which will happen in December 2021.

3.1 The Headline

When writing reviews, think from the perspective of your customer and write the headline accordingly. No one is going to read your review if the title does not attract them. The title should not only force customers to read the full article, but the search engines should also love it.

There is no point in writing a heading when you know the search engines will not pick them up, or it will be displayed on the tenth of the eleventh page in Google search.

An example of a bad headline is “A cream that works”; this title is too general, and it will not draw customers. There is no information about shaving cream, scar removal cream, or acne-reducing cream.

The same title can be rephrased as “A scar removal cream that works.” This headline is precise, contains your keyword, and tells the customer that the review is about a scar removal cream.

3.2 Introduction and Honest Opinion

Describe the product’s usefulness as if you have used the product and you are posting an honest review of it. In the introduction section, mention what the product is about and what it does. The article’s body mentions how, as a user, you found the product helpful and why you are recommending it to other customers.

It is always best to use the product before writing because there is no substitute for an experience. It will also help you connect more with the readers.

3.3 PROs and CONs of the Product

Sales pitch product reviews are a strict NO. The readers can sense the authenticity of such reviews, and they might choose some other product. You have to avoid the ‘Buy-me-message’ tone, and the best way to prevent flair in writing is by mentioning both the pros and cons of the product you are an affiliate with.

However, you have to remember that your job is not to degrade the product but to mention its drawbacks too subtly. People know that no product is perfect – Keep that in mind. So write the cons of the product, but cleverly.

For example, one “con” of a scar removal cream can be – “The scar removal process works brilliantly, but it takes its due time. The user needs to be patient”. This is not considered a negative comment because none of the scar removal creams available today can immediately diminish the scar.

Check below the PROs and CONs section of the SEMrush review I did a while ago. I’ve balanced the PROs and CONs to see exactly what they should expect from the product.

3.4 Product Features and Benefits

Irrespective of whether the feature is good or bad, it is essential you highlight every aspect and feature of the product. When the tangible and intangible points of the product are covered, users are in a better position to make a decision, and they develop trust in your product review, thereby indirectly increasing your sale. Mention the price and any other information you feel will help build trust and make the readers comfortable.

3.5 Links, Photos, and Videos of the Product

It is best to post your pictures, highlighting the usefulness of the product you are marketing, to lend credibility, and make the readers believe your review. It gives the reason for the reader actually to listen to what you have to say.

Moreover, adding links to the product will give your customers a chance to have a glance at the product, and they can decide whether the product is valuable or not. Personalizing the product will add value and build trust among the readers. Also, add pictures of the affiliate product in your review.

Google, too, likes links and photos on web pages, which automatically improves your chance to rank better.

Creating a short video review of the product will add significant credibility to the review and increase your sales. Also, you can post that video on youtube for more traffic and sales. Check our Affiliate Marketing Guide for Youtube.

3.6 Product Comparison Table

Everyone loves healthy competition, and including product comparison in your review will help you gain credibility.

Again, avoid degrading the other product and give honest opinions on why your product is better and why the readers should choose it over similar things present in the market today.

Compare the effectiveness of products, primarily cosmetic or medicinal, without over-praising your affiliate product. The image above gives you an idea of comparing two products without damaging the other product’s image.

3.7 The alternatives

Want to build trust with your blog audience? Show them alternatives while writing product reviews. The key here is to recommend those products mainly similar to the main product you’re promoting.

So how many alternatives can you recommend?

It depends on what type of content you are creating. If you’re making a list post, you can recommend the top 5 alternatives, or you can simply create product comparison posts by recommending two or three products at once. Or you can show a couple of other options at the end of your product reviews so your audience can decide what’s best for them.

3.8 The FAQ section

FAQ section (Frequently Asked Questions) is a must. Not only does it help you list down all the relevant questions that your audience may have in their minds, but it also helps with SEO.

How?

You can find and add relevant long-tail keywords or question-based keywords (for example, “how much does SEMrush cost?”) in your FAQ section to get more traffic from search engines. Use a keyword research tool like SEMrush [SEMrush review][SEMrush discount], Ahrefs, NeilPatel’s App, Answer The Public.com

3.9 The Review Conclusion

The conclusion is an essential aspect of any product review. It is a summary of what you have written in your review. To make the conclusion perfect, you can give a rating of 7 or 10 to the product under consideration.

Furthermore, never give full marks to any product you’re an affiliate with because no product is perfect and has positive and negative aspects. And you can validate the rating by giving appropriate arguments. Mention how the product has helped you, is it worth the money you have spent, and done the product fulfills all its promises.

Don’t forget to add a strong CTA that will encourage the users to check the product. Pay attention not to purchase but to review the product. If you are using Amazon Associates or any major affiliate network, you will still get credit if they visit the page and purchase later. So a CTA like “Check the price of the product on Amazon” may perform better than “Purchase the product on Amazon.”

3.10. Affiliate Links Placement

Now that you wrote the review, you will need to place your affiliate links within the content to get people to buy the products. The best methods of doing so will vary on the type of site you want to have. If you are doing a strict sales site with reviews of your niche products, it is pretty simple.

You can link the names of the products to Amazon or other sites you use for sales, add clickable images within the articles, lead to the product buy page, and set up a special call to action button or text that will entice people buy the product.

If your content is more general or “quality” content, meaning it gives people more than just an idea of what to buy, then your marketing will usually need to be subtler. You could be talking about a general topic and name a few products to help a particular problem within that topic.

Additionally, setting images that link to Amazon on the content’s sides, above or below the content, or within the content’s body can also lead to direct and indirect sales.

4. How to write affiliate programs reviews

Most people fail to make even one sale from their product reviews. Do you know why? They usually brag about the product to increase sales. They don’t talk about the limitations.

What happens when you talk only about good things about a product? You’ll not only mislead your target audience, but they can easily smell that you’re hard-selling to generate a commission. So they don’t buy it.

So it would help if you learned the art of writing helpful product reviews that help your audience.

So make sure to find what type of product reviews work best for you. No one can tell you what works best for your website. So try it out by yourself. Experiment. Track your results.

That’s how you can quickly figure out what type of content works well for you to generate more affiliate sales (without selling your soul).

4.1 Start with keyword research

The first thing you will need to do is make sure you use keywords that people search for a lot. There are online keyword research tools that allow you to do just this. Researching your niche for particular keywords people look for will let you know what keywords you should use in your posts to satisfy your customers’ needs.

Finding the RIGHT keywords is the key to generating more search traffic and sales. So if you’re new to keyword research, my #1 suggestion is to start using free keyword research tools so you’ll know the whole process of finding better keywords.

Once you get comfortable with keyword research using free tools, you can start trying premium SEO tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, etc., to find hidden and profitable keywords in any niche.

We’ll now pick one tool to begin our keyword research. Are you ready?Here’s how you can do keyword research using a freemium tool like Ubersuggest.

Step 1: Go to Ubersuggest

Enter any keyword of your choice. Let’s take an example keyword, “WordPress SEO plugin.” Here’s how it looks like;

Step 2:

Hit the Search button to continue. Click on the “Keyword Ideas” tab, and it will immediately start showing a ton of keyword variations for our example keyword.

Now you have a list of keywords with details for each one that helps you decide if you should target them and include them in your review.

Step 3: Pick the RIGHT keywords.

There are three crucial things to remember while picking better keywords, which are:

• CPC (CPC, cost per click value should be HIGH)
• Search volume (Search volume of the keyword should be LOW)
• Keyword difficulty (difficulty to rank for any keyword should be LOW)

As a rule of thumb, it’s always better to find keywords below 500 to 1000 monthly searches. Also, the chosen keywords should look natural to write dedicated blog posts or content around.

Make sure also to consider the CPC value (as high as possible), so you can target “easier yet profitable keywords,” which can help you with both search traffic and sales.

4.2 Explore and present the product in detail

Before you start writing a product review, use the product first. You can’t write a genuine product review without using it.

If you’re promoting online products, mostly you’ll get free trials. So you can simply sign up for their free trials, get a feel of the product, take the necessary screenshots, and start reviewing it. You can also approach the product seller and ask them to sponsor you for a review.

Although it might not always work, especially for beginners with zero online reputation, why not give it a try?

As there are still a lot of growing companies that always find new ways to market their products.

The key here is to use the product first. Make sure to spend quality time exploring all the features to provide an in-depth review of the product to your target audience.

4.3 Replicate and improve what top marketers are doing

Affiliate marketing is continuously evolving, and there are many methods discovered every year that work and improve your conversion.

Make sure you stay updated with the big guns’ latest techniques in the affiliate marketing industry. Check these lists made by ninja outreach with the 25 most influential affiliate marketers, learn from them and then implement them on your sites and see what strategy and methods work best for your niche.

Also, do a search on Google for “product + review” to see what your competitors have written about the product. Make a list of the review points, collect impressions, and read the comments to determine what questions users have.

4.4 Be honest and unbiased while writing

Affiliate marketing is all about building trust first, selling later. If you get it wrong, you’ll fail to make more money from affiliate marketing. If you focus on building confidence, your sales will skyrocket.

So be honest and unbiased whenever you’re creating a product review. No matter how much you love a product, make sure to find and list all the drawbacks or limitations of that product. That’s how you win trust.

If possible, you can also give your audience other product recommendations (if they are cheaper). The thing to remember here is, write honest reviews about the products you promote and let your audience decide whether it’s right for them or not.

4.5 Describe a Problem and Show its Solution

If you are an affiliate for a product that helps people get rid of something or solve their problem, you can effectively play with words and build an emotional issue to capture your readers’ attention.

After describing the problem, tell your readers how the given product can effectively eliminate the problem and why it is reliable. It would be best if you gave them real-life examples to build trust. Based on your product, you can highlight issues and create solutions for the same.

4.6 Keep it Simple

Your readers can be a 15-year-old child or a 65-year-old man. Therefore, you have to keep the language simple so that it is easily readable by everyone. There is no point in being a wordsmith while writing product reviews.

The writing should be simple and easily understandable, even for a child. It is best to avoid frills and over convoluted sentences. As a thumb rule, always consider your content to be written for a fifth-grader.

4.7 Check for grammar and spelling.

As an affiliate, you mustn’t let the product down. Bad grammar and unfortunate spelling mistakes make the product review unreadable and attract negative publicity.

“I used product found good and recommending to my friends.” This sentence is a perfect example of an image ruining a product review.

So, double proofread your document before releasing it online. Read the review slowly and carefully to chalk out erroneous content. You can take the help of online grammar checking software.

4.8 Avoid “funky” Names while Posting Reviews.

While posting reviews on the Internet about your affiliate product, always post them under your name or any original name. User names such as ‘King of the world,’ ‘Trust Me,’ ‘Best review,’ or ‘JamesBond007’ speak of an unprofessional and fake review. Use your name while writing product reviews to avoid attracting unhealthy publicity and losing potential clients.