Product Listicles: Listicle As An Affiliate Content Type To Rank And Convert

Product Listicles

If you do affiliate marketing and want to generate conversions, one of the most effective strategies is to create quality content about the products you wish to promote so that users find them when researching a related need.

If we combine this with a high viral content format, the product lists will help you attract new customers and generate conversions through product comparisons. Read on to find out what they are, how to write them, and the best tricks to converting more with them.

What Are Product Lists?

A listicle is simply an article that contains a list, for example, “10 reasons to travel to New York in the fall”. The format was popularized thanks to Buzzfeed, and today, we can find it applied to all kinds of brands. There’s also a lot of variability in the depth of content, from lists that only contain one GIF per section to in-depth analytics that helps understand complicated topics.

Within affiliate marketing, articles with product lists are beneficial to compare different solutions to the same problem, for example, “10 French press coffee machines for less than 50 euros” or “7 comprehensive B2B software solutions for logistics companies “. The list format allows us to present different options, including one or several promoted products, accompanied by a link to the product’s purchase page to generate conversions.

Product lists are handy for users, and the titles tell them what they can expect from the article. They are easy to read diagonally to get the information they need, and they help analyze different alternatives in detail. Of course, it is a format that has been repeated ad nauseam and is often associated with clickbait, so taking care of quality is essential.

How To Write A Product Listing In 10 Steps

1. Choose The Theme

Logically, the topic of your article should be related to the products you promote through affiliate marketing. But to increase the chances of conversion and position better than the competition, it is preferable to write several articles focused on different niches instead of one general one.

For example, if you want to promote equipment to do sports at home, do not limit yourself to an article such as “The 10 best products to train at home”. Instead, you can think of things like “Top 5 home workout products for cardio addicts”, “3 things you need to work out without breaking out of your pajamas”, or “12 home workout solutions for busy parents”.

2. Research your keywords

The idea is that users find your article with a product list when researching a related need. To achieve this, you must focus your writing on SEO from the beginning, researching keywords related to the products and locating terms with a high number of monthly searches and without excessive competition.

3. Do On-Page SEO

Choosing the right keywords is just the beginning. For your article to have a good chance of ranking among the first results of Google, you will have to pay attention to aspects such as the meta description, the heading structure or the alternative text of the images.

It is also interesting to optimize your content to appear in the featured snippet or position zero of Google. In addition to paragraphs of text, lists and tables can also occur in this position. To increase the chances that Google will choose your content as featured, try posing your product listings to answer questions.

4. Make a list of products

For your list to make sense, the number of products should be proportional to the breadth of the content and the product category. If you’re targeting a super-specific niche, you might be able to make a list with as few as 3 intensely scrutinized products. You may be interested in offering as many solutions as possible and creating a macro article with as many products as possible for more general topics.

In any case, the focus must be on responding appropriately to the user’s query and offering various solutions appropriate to their needs. In case of doubt, 10 and 7 are numbers that usually work very well in marketing.

5. Research

Think about the essential characteristics of the products on your list: price, size, colour, material, features, extras, subscriptions. Then, look for up-to-date sources to collect and order all this information.

In this step, you should also look for additional material on each analyzed product, such as good quality images or videos of people using it.

6. Avoid “Clickbait” Titles.

Listicles are one of the most effective content formats to attract visits and conversions, but at this point, they are also one of the most hackneyed and abused. We have all clicked on a list whose content did not live up to its promises, and we tend to run away from them.

To prevent this from happening to you, you need to balance creating a compelling title with not making unrealistic promises.

7. Be Specific

Users arrive at a list of products hoping to solve a specific need and find content that helps them achieve it. It’s okay to have a long article if you’re looking at each product in-depth, but avoid “filler” at all costs and remove anything that doesn’t add value. Before clicking “Publish”, I advise you to review it one last time to ensure that you have been as concise and precise as possible.

8. Do Not Focus On Finding “The Best.”

If there are many similar product options, chances are there isn’t one that is “the best” for all potential customers.

Instead of focusing on a single criterion, think that the people who come to your article probably have slightly different needs. For example, there will be someone interested in solving their problem for the lowest possible price, while other people do not mind paying more for quality. It is also likely that users value other criteria, such as the size or autonomy of the battery in technological products. For your article to add value, analyze the pros and cons of each product from different points of view.

9. Include Links Where Necessary

If you do affiliate marketing, you want to create different types of content for your products and link them together. For example, you can write an in-depth article or make a video review for each of the products in your list and include links to them in the list.

10. Do Link Building Towards Your Article.

Optimizing your product listicle for SEO is a must, but it’s only half the job. If you want it to occupy a good position in search results to attract conversions and visits, you will also have to work on off-page SEO.

Google’s algorithm increasingly penalizes link exchange and “artificial” link generation techniques in general. Therefore, your campaign link building should focus on explaining the value of your article to sites that might be interested in linking to you to address the needs of their visitors.

8 Tips To Generate Conversions With Your Product Listicles

• To get listicle ideas that are highly likely to convert, start by researching keywords with high purchase intent related to your affiliate marketing products. This way, you will ensure that the users who reach your article with a list of products are receptive to converting.

• In addition to the main keyword, add the current year to the title of your product list. This way, users will know that your article is up to date.

• When laying out the structure of your article, try to make it easy to understand with a glance for those short on time, but compare products in-depth for those who prefer a more detailed analysis.

• Include a notice explaining that the content includes sponsored links, but make it clear to users that they will not pay any commission.

• Put your promoted products first. According to Nielsen Norman Group, 74% of website visitors’ time is spent viewing the first two scrolls. Therefore, placing the recommended product links at the beginning will help you get more clicks.

• Reinforce the product’s strengths you want to promote, but be objective. It includes verifiable data about all the products in the comparison, such as the price, the score on review sites or the functionalities.

• Include an introduction explaining the criteria you have followed to compare the different products and a conclusion explaining the best option for different needs.

• Add visual elements to make your content more attractive. At a minimum, your article should include an image of each product on the list.

Also Read: SEO Trends For 2022 That Will Optimize Your Web Positioning