The Best Product For Bloggers to Promote? Their Wordpress Themes, Duh!

As a blogger, the first thing you may ask when deciding to make money on your blog via affiliate marketing is, “what do I promote?” You may start with related products, services, and offers but forget about the goldmine right under your nose. Your Wordpress blog theme!

Every blog has a theme or design and whether you like it or not, you’re promoting the one on your site right now regardless of what niche you’re in. So why not cash in on it? The Wordpress blog theme market is huge right now and there’s a ton of money to be made – especially because everyone and their moms now have blogs.

Late last year I switched from a free customized theme to Brian Gardner’s Revolution Theme. Sure, it cost me $79 to buy it, but I’ve made a lot more in commissions promoting it and featuring it on my blog. Buy a premium Wordpress theme and start using it. It could easily become the biggest money maker on your blog.

As you can see here, I use the Revolution Theme, but other bloggers have had a lot of success with some of the others – including the Thesis Theme by DIY Themes, Citrus by Unique Blog Designs, and Arthemia by Colorlabs Project. For example, Sugarrae has made a killing promoting the new Thesis Theme and outlines how she made it work.

In this post, I’m going to explain to you how you can make the most of your Wordpress blog theme and maximize affiliate commissions using a few key strategies.

1. Use the theme yourself

You can praise a theme and say great things about it all you want, but the biggest endorsement you can give it is actually using it for yourself. Your true motivations will be revealed to all of your readers. Are you promoting something just to make money or are you doing it because you actually believe in it? By using the theme you promote, you “walk the talk” and people are much more likely to trust you and act upon your recommendations.

Let’s use the example of Lebron James (superstar NBA basketball player) and Nike. Lebron endorses Nike and only wears Nike shoes on the court. If you were looking to buy a pair for yourself, how would you feel if all of a sudden Lebron switched to Adidas? Would you begin to question the Nikes and the validity of Lebron’s endorsement? I know I would.

Use the blog theme that you’re promoting and stick with it for as long as you endorse it. This applies to all products, not just themes.

2. Add credit links and banners

Once you settle on a blog theme and have it installed, you need to actually let people know what it is. Some people hide this information because they don’t want too many people using the same theme, but these fears are unfounded. I don’t think this is the right approach to take and these people are leaving a lot of money on the table. First of all, you should be customizing your theme enough so that it represents your brand and is completely unique from the default. That’s a given. Next, people can easily figure out what theme you’re using regardless of whether or not you choose to display the credit link. You might as well proudly display the theme name so that everyone wins out – you (commission), your referral (new theme), the designer (more sales), and the community (more people means better support).

Don’t be afraid to promote your blog theme and make some money. Change your credit link in the footer to an affiliate link and add banners throughout your site. Again, Sugarrae is a perfect example of someone who truly “gets it” in promoting her Thesis blog theme. Take a look at her blog to see what I mean.

3. Write a review of your new blog theme

Regardless of what you blog about, you can always fit in a post that reviews the blog theme of your choice. In other words, you don’t have to be an Internet marketing blogger to make money referring people to buy your blog theme. Since a redesign of your site affects all of your readers, review the new features and explain why you made the switch. Tell them about all of the benefits and ask for opinions. Also, relate the theme to your particular niche. There are bound to be other interested bloggers reading your review and considering a switch. I did something similar when I blogged about the Revolution Theme and explained the benefits.

Once you write your review, work to get as many eyeballs on it as possible. Promote it on social media, optimize the page for the search engines (e.g. include “theme name + review” in the title), and get links from forums and other related sites. If your review is exceptional you might even be able to get the designer feature it on the official site as a testimonial. Just ask and see what happens.

4. Customize your theme and make it unique

If you’re working with a popular blog theme you’re inevitably going to have a lot of bloggers competing for affiliate sales. How do you end up on top? The first step is to customize your blog theme to meet your branding requirements. No one takes a cookie cutter site seriously, even if it’s a premium theme, so you want to make sure that you add your own color scheme, logo, and features. Customization will also show your readers what’s possible with the theme. If they like the changes that you made, they’ll be drawn to your site and likely buy through your affiliate link. Finally, making changes to your theme gives you the opportunity to come up with unique material for tutorials described in the next section. Read on.

5. Write tutorials for your theme

If you follow tip #4 and heavily customize your theme, there will be other bloggers who want to follow your lead and do the same. You basically show them first hand what’s possible and then detail the necessary steps using tutorials and guides. For example, Sugarrae has a tutorial for the Thesis Theme that shows how you can customize the 404 error page.

By creating useful tutorials for add-ons and plugins for your theme, you further convince people to buy (using your link of course). Not only that but you also establish yourself as a “guru” and spokesperson for the theme – which will increase your affiliate sales significantly. This works even better if you can get the support of the theme designer.

Think of creative ways to customize your blog theme and get the process documented in how-to type blog posts. You can also submit to tutorial sites and ask to be featured in the the support section of the theme website.

6. Hold blog theme promotions

If you’re serious about affiliate marketing with your blog theme, hold various promotions for your readers to encourage sales. For example, ask the designers for an exclusive coupon code, hold a contest for best add-on or customization, or give away awards and prizes to bloggers who use the theme. Be creative and you’ll do very well.

Are you making money promoting your Wordpress blog theme? What are some of the other strategies you use on your blog to increase affiliate commissions. Let us know in a comment below.

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