Automate Traffic + Sales with YouTube Shopping Affiliates

Automate Traffic + Sales with YouTube Shopping Affiliates

October 30, 2024

Author: Joe

Shopify Expert, store owner for 7 years, developer, former eCommerce marketer and consultant

The affiliate model is a great way to generate free traffic and positive ROI for online stores. When I owned a brand (7 years on Shopify) we had success building a squadron of affiliates primarily on Instagram.

These partners (affiliates) generated a steady stream of:

  • New customers from their audience
  • Traffic to our website
  • Sometimes backlinks (if they had a blog or YouTube channel)
  • Content to use on our site, social media, and marketing campaigns (product photos + videos)

Open 7 Shopify Automation Tips to Level Up Your Store in a new tab and checkout Tip #2 and #6 to see the tools we used for that strategy.

New automated sales tactic

YouTube announced that they're expanding their partnership with Shopify to allow Shopify stores to easily join the YouTube Shopping affiliate program and manage it with the Google & YouTube app.

👉 Summary: Easy way to get free traffic, brand exposure, and automatic sales at your desired commission rate. Nice!

What's the YouTube Shopping Affiliate Program?

YouTube creators can tag products and make them available in their videos, shorts, and live streams.

When a viewer buys the product, the YouTube creator gets a commission, the brand gets a new customer.

There's even a Chrome extension creators use to see if products on the site they're browsing are eligible.

Imagine this flow:

  1. YouTuber is browsing your site and likes the products
  2. They see that you have available YouTube affiliate products (via their Chrome extension)
  3. They think your awesome products are a good match for their audience
  4. They buy something and include it in their next video
  5. Viewers buy the product
  6. You get a new customer, they get a commissions
  7. The incentive spawns the idea to do a whole video guide just on your product
  8. Boom, automatic sales and new channel for customers to your store

According to their getting started guide, "We are working on expanding eligibility to the program in the future.", but there are restrictions: Shopify Advanced or Plus plan, Google Merchant Center account set to USA, and some others (see that getting started guide for details).

Why are affiliate programs awesome?

I've been both an affiliate and a brand working with affiliates, it's a win-win relationship. The brand gets free traffic and a guaranteed positive ROI marketing cost, the affiliate earns income by promoting products they trust and believe in.

When I was growing my Shopify store we had to do a lot of manual work, reaching out to prospects and sites we thought would be a good fit. The YouTube affiliate program automates that and exposes to a large audience... huge audiences.

I haven't used YouTube Shopping affiliates but as a former brand owner I can see the value: big upside, minimal value, and at least some free traffic.

Affiliate bonus highlights:

  • Free traffic and links to your site
  • You set the commission rate, guaranteeing a positive ROI
  • Potential for viral sharing
  • Your brand gains credibility and social proof, being recommended by people
  • Opens the door for additional partnerships

Final thoughts

I don't currently own an eCommerce brand but if I did I would 100% be signing us up for YouTube Shopping affiliates.

It was always cool trying new marketing channels and hitting a win (and of course suffering through the duds 😄). I think it's worth a shot to at least give it a go.

Here's the setup guide if you want to check it out: Get started with the YouTube Shopping affiliate program (for Shopify merchants).

I hope this little nug of a post helps your store get a new flood of automatic traffic and sales. ✊

🧙‍♂️ If you liked this post please check out our apps Order Automator and Product Automator.

✅ We've built a suite of tools to automate tasks and extend Shopify functionality. Our mission is to help Shopify stores and the people that work in them save time and money.

About the Author: Joe

Joe's a 10+ years Shopify partner, certified Shopify Expert, 7 year Shopify store owner, former Shopify optimization agency owner, creator of Order Automator and co-creator of Product Automator. Outside of tech he's into nature adventures, travel, trees, music, books, and art. 🏕🌎🌞

Some of our blog posts contain affiliate links, meaning Automator Apps could receive a commission if you sign up for an app or service using those links. We only recommend things we believe in, and there is no additional cost to you, we're just recommending trusted partners.

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About Us

We make Shopify apps, custom plugins, and automated solutions.

We also have years of experience working with and managing Shopify stores.

Our goal is to help Shopify stores be more efficient and more successful with smart solutions.

Contact us if you need a technological solution for your business.


⚙️ Automation Apps for Shopify Stores

Use Order Automator to automate routine Shopify tasks, connect your store to 3rd party marketplaces (Amazon, TikTok, etc), and save you time and money.

It's customizable too, so you can request specific functionality for your store.


Product Automator has a suite of features to help organize your products and collections, increase your conversion rate, and get operational notifications.

It's a newer app so we're adding new functionality every week. Try it now and contact us to make a request or custom tailor a feature to your store.


🚚 Recommended Fulfillment Solutions for eCommerce Stores

ShipBob is a 3rd party fulfillment service that connects easily with Shopify, ships worldwide, and has no minimum requirements.

Connect ShipBob to your Shopify store, send inventory, then your orders will get automatically fulfilled.

Available in the US, UK, Canada, Europe, and Australia


Use Amazon FBA to automatically fulfill your Shopify store orders domestically and internationally.

See How to Automate Shopify Order Fulfillment with Amazon MCF / FBA to learn how to set it up.

Using the Order Automator app connected to your Amazon Seller Central account, you can do things like:

  • Automatically sync inventory between Amazon and Shopify
  • Automatically fulfill Shopify orders using Amazon FBA inventory
  • Route Shopify orders to Amazon marketplaces around the world, handling international fulfillment

Fulfilling off-Amazon orders with your Amazon inventory is called MCF. Learn more about Amazon MCF here.


🤖 Cool AI Apps for Shopify Stores

Zipchat is an AI chatbot that automates sales and support. Visitors can ask questions on your site and get instant answers based on information from your site + additional details you feed it.

We tested it and instantly found a few use cases to automatically answer common questions, like shipping and product recommendations.

Highlights

  • Give instant answers and cut down on support inquiries
  • Increase AOV by recommending cross-sell products
  • Provide order updates and tracking links

Bonus: The team is knowledgable and active in the eCommerce community. Ask them about their newsletter.


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