Why Your Best Affiliates May Already Be Customers with Nicholas Raschella

Host 00:00

In order for an affiliate offer to work, you have to have a proven offer yourself.

Host1 00:03

Generating a million dollars of affiliate revenue, it's like, man, man, man, that's amazing. The door's in front of us, but we have to walk through it. Your mentors enough money that they want to meet you is an interesting philosophy.

Host 00:13

Ideally, you'd love for it to self-liquidate, same with ads, same with anything else, but can you afford to take a loss?

Host1 00:18

How do you take the results you're getting and really maximize them?

Host 00:22

I don't think you should ever look at an affiliate relationship as a short-term financial shot in the arm to get some money.

Host1 00:27

What's up, everybody? Grant Wise here. Welcome back to the Partner Profit Podcast. Excited for my conversation today with a man named Nicholas Raschella. He's going to teach you how to turn your relationships into revenue. And this is the guy to do just that. He has managed affiliate programs for some of the world's, not just industries, world's largest and most successful brands. And I am pumped to have him unpack what he does today here on the podcast. What's up, Nicholas, man? Thanks for being here.

Host 00:56

Hey, man. Thanks for having me. And I appreciate the kind introduction.

Host1 01:00

Yes, of course, of course. For the people that are listening to this and maybe don't know much about you, give us a bit of the backstory. How'd you get to where you are today?

Host 01:06

Yeah, so I'd be happy to do that. So I actually started out, this kind of gives me a unique perspective. I started out as an affiliate. So I stumbled into affiliate marketing about seven years ago through Tony Robbins and Dean Graziosi. They had uh I'd bought into one of their programs. And the year after that, they'd sent an email out to everyone that said, Hey, if you know anybody that's interested, that know, likes, and trusts you and us, maybe you could tell them about our program. And I texted a couple of friends that I knew were kind of were into that, and one of them bought and I made my first online sale. Now, this is kind of cool. And then I saw there were prizes, and I thought, hey, I've always wanted to meet Tony Robbins. And what would be really cool is if I got paid to do it. So I went all in and learned about email marketing, about copywriting. And each year I got a little closer, a little closer, a little closer. And then after about uh three years of trying, I finally was able to make it into that uh top 10 prize and was able to have my time with Tony all through affiliate marketing and got paid to meet my mentors.

Host1 02:04

That is awesome. That is awesome. I've always wondered what it would be like to meet Tony. What what was that like? Because it's gotta be a little surreal. If you're like me, I've been listening to Tony talk for 15 years, like and I'm sure, you know, obviously you're a little older than I am, but not much. And so I'm sure you've been doing the same thing. What is it like to meet somebody like that?

Host 02:23

It was really, really cool because it was a it was truly a surreal moment because it was a goal I sat for myself. It was 25 years before that. I went to my very first Tony event, I think it was 1999, I think is when it was, and I thought, you know what, I want to meet him one of these days because I went to a UPW. But what I can say is Tony is the same in a room with 20 people as he is in a room of 20,000. So you can imagine taking all the energy you see in a in a theater with Tony, with him jumping up and down and doing his thing on stage in a small room where there were only 20 of us. It was a top 10 and a guest. And it, I mean, he brought the energy. And what was really, really cool was another a friend of mine that was there, another one of my top 10 folks that uh was there, he was trying to get him to break through to the next level. So turn the music up, they're dancing, throwing the arms up in the air, saying yes, doing all those things. And then he comes over to me and he really did. I mean, what was truly cool about this, not just meeting Tony and getting a picture, I talked with Tony for 30 minutes. Like we had a one-on-one chat for 30 minutes, and he helped me through something that was holding me back, what I thought might be holding me back. I submitted a question for him, and he went from jumping up and down to this really emotional. He was teary-eyed and the room was crying, uh, interchanging uh interchange with me. Like we did this role-playing thing, and it was it was incredible. Like, truly, truly incredible.

Host1 03:44

That sounds like an amazing experience, and it's something that you know it comes and goes. Tony, they don't do that, I don't think, anymore, as far as like some of the prizes where you get to interact and meet with Tony like that. And so you you certainly caught like a moment in time where you know you could go and do something like that. It's absolutely incredible.

Host 04:00

I did, I did. It was such a blessing. And being a Christian, I believe that God opens doors for us and we have to take those moments. And the door's in front of us, but we have to walk through it. And ever since that moment, that because I had some serious imposter syndrome going to this event that I had no idea. This was a mastermind event where I'd won this prize to go to about being one of the top affiliates. And in my mind, I was thinking, how in the world am I gonna go into a room with nine other of the best marketers in the world, including Dean Graziosi, in a room with Tony and teach them anything? Because everybody had their moment to teach something. And I thought, what am I gonna teach them? And prayed about it. And my wife and I talked about it, and as you know from where we've met before, came up with my the protocol that I live by, which is the 4F protocol, which is faith, family, fitness, and freedom, taught that to them, and had people come to me and say, Nick, that's that was one of the best things we got out of this. I didn't know I was gonna be able to help my marriage or be a better dad out of out of these out of coming to this event, and it shocked me. And and since I've been able to teach that on several stages since uh since you saw it at the event we were at together. So it's been been quite a blessing.

Host1 05:04

That is amazing. Okay, so you've gone on to you know do affiliate management work and and other things for some of the most influential people in the world, Tony Robbins and Dean Graziosi and others. I think a lot of people are like, How the heck do you get into how on earth do I get in and build a relationship with those guys so that I can help, you know, do anything, not necessarily just affiliates. That's the that was the the door that you walk through. But just kind of walk us through that. Like, how do you get into those type of situations where you can say like, oh yeah, I did this for Tony Robbins? Like, that's a pretty incredible thing to be able to say.

Host 05:40

Oh no, no, it's it I have this saying that if you want to meet your mentors, if you make enough money for them, eventually they'll want to meet you. And that's kind of how this all came about. Was I got halfway decent in affiliate marketing and showed up on leaderboards, and people started coming to me saying, Nick, can you help me with my affiliate program? Because it's not performing, it's not doing what I need to do, or it's my my affiliates are are not doing what I'm needing to do. I've got rule breakers, I've got all these things happening and they're not converting. Can you take a look at it? And I did this for friends. I just went in and looked and gave them some ideas, and then that turned into a business. And I happened to see Dean talking about something. He was talking about his affiliate program on a call, and I just shot him a text, which was another still can't believe I'm able to say that that I'm able to say I texted Dean that I could do that because I wasn't able to do that because of affiliate marketing. And I'm like, hey man, if you need some help, I'm I'm here for you. And he sent me a message right back, said, dude, I think you'd be perfect for that. So Dean was my very first client. And then when you get somebody like Dean as a client, you know, Dean and Tony as partners, that opens up even more doors. People are like, well, if Dean and Tony hired him, he must know what he's doing. So then that led into all these other big names that have came through and products that would have been able to help them with their partner programs.

Host1 06:53

That is just awesome. Make money, make your mentors enough money that they want to meet you is an interesting philosophy. That's a good one.

Host 07:01

It truly worked. Uh, I had my mentor trifecta that year. I was able to meet uh Tony, I was able to hang out and with Dean, and I got to meet Russell Brunson. So all three people that I looked up to that I saw on stages all within a year, I was able to hang out with, hang out with them. And I know you know how that feels as well. Oh, yeah. That's to hang out with some some of your mentors. We've been blessed to be able to be on some of the same stages over the years and in the same events, and you know, I've seen it happen for you as well.

Host1 07:27

It is a cool experience, you know. I remember because I got to speak for Dean, uh the Edge Mastermind, where we were, and um, it's a different kind of a feeling when you're you know talking about marketing and then you look back, and Dean Graciosi's watching your presentation, and yeah, you know, you go out and spoke with Russell, obviously, and Boise, and you look over and he's sitting there and fully engaged watching you talk for the whole time there. It's it's um those are cool things that you get to put in the story bank that not everybody gets to do. And I'm certainly blessed to be able to know you are too. How do you go about you know finding the right people to partner with to drive affiliate sales? Because affiliates, it's it's it's all relationships, right? It's it's and and and as is co-marketing, we talk about this a lot, we've we've connected on this a lot. It's it's this transference of trust. Because if Nicholas says that Grant's cool, it's the third-party validation. The grant must be cool. And whatever Grant has, if Nick says it's good and I need it, cool, I'll buy it. Affiliate marketing is very much that way. I've done a lot, I've had a lot of success through affiliates over the course of the last several years and quite a few of the things that we do. But you know, how do you know, like, how do you find the people to partner with that want to go out there and share what it is that you're doing? Because it's not necessarily easy. I know it's not necessarily hard either, but you know, what have been some of your strategies for finding and putting great partnerships together?

Host 08:43

Yeah. So for me, and and I I can speak to this on both sides as an affiliate and as a partner manager, as an affiliate, I only promote products that I believe in. And that comes through and that conveys through your messaging is that, hey, I know Grant and I know co-marketing's solid because Grant is solid. So I can easily say, definitely go you go get an affiliate link and promote co-marketing. That's it's an easy thing for me. Same with my other friends. When I I promote Tony and Dean, I've been consuming their products for years and now they're friends, uh, other uh Jim Quick, other people that I've been able to work with and promote their products, I know them and I know that's solid. So that's that is one area, and we look for partners on the on the agency side, we're looking for the same thing. Our first and your lowest hanging fruit in any affiliate program are your current customers, people that already, I use this term, know, like, and trust. You know, that that's kind of that trilogy there. That they know, like, and trust you. It's easy for them. They've already purchased the product, they believe in you because they purchased the product from you. They're your best evangelists to go out and talk about, talk about your product. But I've also learned there are different types of affiliates out there as well. That's your traditional affiliate model, is somebody who has a community, has a following, has an email list that they built. That's the traditional model. But there's also traffic affiliates. And they're really just looking at, okay, can I convert this? Can I, do you have an offer that converts well, that if I run enough traffic to your site, then they'll get conversion. So I didn't realize there were different types. My my little mind and my little brain thought that everybody was an affiliate like we are, like kind of like, hey, I have a community and a list that I've built. But the first year I went to affiliate world in Dubai, I it opened up my mind to a whole different side of the affiliate world, and that is the performance affiliates that are based on traffic. So it really depends on what you're looking for. I, all the partners that I have, we really look for the trust type of affiliates that are you're going to promote your products that know you, they like you, they trust you, and they're going to promote it for you because of that. They're they're evangelists for the cause, more than just the financial side, because I think the partnerships, an affiliate partnership's the long game. I don't think you should ever look at an affiliate relationship as a short-term financial shot in the arm to get some money. I think it's uh it's a give and take on both ends that you treat your affiliates truly as they're they're your commission only salespeople, is how I think you should treat your affiliates. So they're like on staff, but not. At the same time, you want to make sure that they're your internal customer, that you're taking wonderful care of them. And I think you should pay your affiliate as much as you possibly can because that helps them promote. It's not all about the monetary side of things, but at the same time, you have to make it worth their while. If you're gonna spend $50 in ads to drive a lead, you should at least pay your affiliate $50 for that lead as well if you're spending them on ads. That's how I view it.

Host1 11:21

I couldn't agree more. And I guess I probably should have asked this question first. But let's say I'm listening to this and I've got a business and I won't, you know, I'm liking what you're saying, and I'm like, okay, how do I grow through affiliates? What would be some advice that you would give quickly on, you know, how how so somebody can grow a business? Most people that listen to this have something to sell. Yeah. And so, like, how can I get more sales through relationships, through affiliates like you're talking about?

Host 11:46

Yeah, yeah. I'm gonna go right back to in order for an affiliate offer to work, you have to have a proven offer yourself. So you need to be able to over-deliver on what your product is, and you have to have an offer that already converts. It's uh I've learned really fast in some of my training. Sometimes people want to install an affiliate program right out of the gate. And I think everybody could have an affiliate program, but to get one that works and works well and makes sales while you sleep, your offer already needs to be converting. So you've you've tried it, you've tested it, you've got a you've got a fantastic product or service out there. So you have to have that in place, number one. And then you're gonna go through in an affiliate program. I think some people overcomplicate it. It's no more than a referral program. Sometimes people get excited about the word affiliate and overcomplicate it, but really it's no more than just you're referring, you know, Grant is referring me to something because he knows me and my product is good, and I'm referring Grant because I know his product is good. So you think about that, say, okay, I've got a current customer base, I have a hundred customers, and I want to create an affiliate program. And in this, you're gonna need a few things. You're gonna need to have a way to track that, which Grant already has that available that you can track anything inside of co-marketing that I sent with Grant the lead, or Grant sent me the lead. So you have to have some sort of tracking software in place to track where your leads came from. And then from there, you're also gonna want to have some assets available. So if you're using emails or if you're using social media, you have graphics, you want to make sure you have those in a nice, neat, tidy place in a Google Drive that they can easily go in and access the email swipes, the pictures, and use those to be able to promote your offer. So I think those are the two things that are important is to have your tracking up and ready. Use uh use co-marketing, use a software that that works. Sometimes your CRM might have some tracking and available inside of it. It's not stellar, but it might work to get started and then have assets available and then teach your affiliates, make a quick video that says this is this is what my affiliate program is all about. I sell a hundred dollar product and I'm willing to pay you this percentage for every hundred dollar product you bring in. And this is how you do it. This is where you find your assets, this is how you get your affiliate link. And it's truly as simple as that. Just those having those few things in place right out of the gate, you can be up and running in pretty pr pretty quick time.

Host1 13:51

Yeah. I I um I love it. When I had an affiliate program, I I had an affiliate program for a previous company, and then for co-marketing.com, you know, shameless plug, we have a three-tiered RevShare program, which is an essentially affiliate program that's extremely lucrative. So I know it works very successfully. I uh we did uh over a million dollars in affiliate sales through a previous company, and we paid out 30% of that revenue back to our affiliate partners. And this current program we have, we pay up to 40% of our revenue through a three-tiered system, so it's even more lucrative. You know, affiliate programs can be lucrative. Uh, some people do 10% of sales, some people do 50%, you know, Russell Brunson, 50% of everything. But how do you sometimes it doesn't seem like money is enough to get people to actually go out there and promote? And I know for a fact you've experienced this because every every person in affiliate marketing has experienced this. If somebody signs up for my affiliate program, what is my work after they're on? Like, how do I get them to actually go out there and promote the thing that they said they were promote or refer me so that the business can grow?

Host 14:51

Yeah, no, that's a great, that's a great point. So sometimes money isn't the I think we both mentioned this now, money isn't always the thing that drives people to do it. Sometimes it's maybe access. So some of my clients, I encourage we have sprints or challenges or a launch that maybe we're doing. And we have a short window of time, say, okay, in the next 30 days, my top five people that bring the most sales in get this prize. Maybe it's proximity to the person, maybe it's a mastermind, maybe it's a phone call, maybe it's a coaching thing, maybe for physical products, you get X amount of physical products for free if you sell these things. You want to have minimums, of course, to make sure you don't lose, lose your shirt. And let me back up too, real quick, Grant, because we we talked about that. I didn't touch on this, but you mentioned the money side of things. You really have to also know the lifetime value of your client to really put together a solid percentage on what, yeah, that's critical to know your numbers. I'll tell a quick story that I have a client that I work with that was losing $500. He was selling a $1,000 ticket and paying $1,500 to acquire his customer. Sounds insane on the front end. Sounds absolutely insane, but he's willing to lose $500 to get people to attend to an event. And he would sell 100 of these tickets every month and he would lose $500 off every person. But he knew the percentage that he could sell over 20% of those people in that room to his $40,000 mastermind. So he knew the lifetime value of that particular client. So he was willing to pay out more than what the ticket price was. So that's where it's critical that you absolutely have to know your numbers and the lifetime value of your client. And you mentioned some of the things like some of the creative things Russell's done. $100 ticket to an event, they he paid out 100%, gave $100 to the affiliate to come to the event. Reason being, on the back end, he was selling a $10,000 coaching program. And he knows that X amount of percent that come to the event, he will be able to convert them to buy the program. So these are things you've got to keep in mind when you're creating your affiliate program. How much can I afford to pay on the front end? And ideally you'd love for it to self-liquidate, same with ads, same with anything else. But can you afford to take a loss if there is one to be able to make it up on the back end? And sometimes that back end might be a month or two down the road. Other clients uh get people in on a $1,000 offer. They may break even or lose a little bit on that $1,000 offer, but then have another event a few months later where they're pitching a higher end offer and then make it up because they're not paying any affiliate commissions on the higher end. So there's a lot of really, really unique ways that you can craft this. And that's the fun part. I I enjoy being able to be the architect of these affiliate type of offers and programs.

Host1 17:19

It is fun. It it really is. And it when it works, it's one of the more exciting things because I kind of think that way. You know, people, I don't get excited about much, but like when you release a new offer and it converts, and then you get your first affiliate sale or your first sale from ads or your first sale from co-marketing, it's like, yes, this is it's like it worked. Okay, now can I do it a second time and a third time and a fourth time? And like I said, generating a million dollars in affiliate revenue, it's like man, man, man, man, that's amazing. It's a good feeling. To that end, when you find something that works, like affiliate marketing, and you find people that are promoting it and you're having success, what should you do as a business owner, you know, doubling down, tripling down on what? Like, how do you take the results you're getting and really maximize them so that things just continue to go crazy from an affiliate standpoint?

Host 18:11

Yeah, but I think is you treat your affiliate like people. Like that's and that sounds insane that you actually take the time and thank them. If you've got some top-performing affiliates, there's nothing more than picking up the phone and calling them, shooting them, even shooting them a text saying how grateful you are. And if you have a small enough program, even after they make their first sale, if they got a call from you or a text or even an email or saying, hey, I'm grateful for you, that'll get people to do more than the money side at any point. It makes people feel like they're part of the team and part of something bigger than themselves. So I that is truly what has worked gangbusters, especially for these bigger names of people. You know, I I know we've done some, I've done some things for some really big names, and they went through and thanked everybody for signing up to be an affiliate. That got people excited. Was hey, I see you sign, hey, Nick got you to sign up as an affiliate. I'm just glad you're here and we'll let you know we're gonna take great care of you and look forward to this launch. Those kind of things, those small things that you get you you do for your affiliates go a long, long way. Way more than the money side of it. And then the long game, which is what the affiliate game is, it's multi-year that you really need to be focused on this. You better be willing to settle in for the long haul because it does take a little time to get the momentum. But once you have it dialed in, it's just like you mentioned, it's just like ads. It's a cash machine that or an ATM machine that you and then you put so much in, you'll get so much more back out once it's dialed in. It doesn't take an army of affiliates to do it. You only have to have a handful of people that are evangelists for your cause. I use that term a lot because I think that they truly are. They they love what you do and they want to help you. If you just have a handful of those that are promoting you, that can help offset. You know, a lot of people think that affiliates may replace ads, but I don't think that's the case. I think it's just another spoke in the wheel that you, if you have your ads dialed in, that's awesome. Keep going. If you've got it, but you know what, have this other uh thing because that's rented space, your ads, same as social media or anything else. You know, your email list, your affiliates, those kind of people, that's that's things that you have direct control over, over those things. Your relationships you've built to have people to promote you, those are all things that you can control, same as building a list that you control. So I think that I look at that, I look at that as borrowed space and owned space.

Host1 20:17

Well, it's as simple as you know, legs, legs in a chair. You try to sit down on a chair that has one leg, it's not so easy to stay balanced. And the same is true in business. You just have one way that you get customers sometimes, it's not so hard to balance because sometimes it's consistent and sometimes it's not. And then you get a second revenue stream or a customer stream, client stream of new customers. And it's like, okay, now it's a little easier to balance. Then you get a third leg and you're feeling really good about yourself because it's a lot easier. And like you said, you just keep adding, you know, legs to the chair or uh spokes to the hub, and you've got this incredibly stable means of growing your business through a number of things. And sometimes my it's just like investing. Sometimes this stock's not gonna do well, and this one's doing better, and sometimes this affiliate's gonna do good, and this this strategy's not gonna do as good. And so it's a great way to think about it. And a little bit you said about this just like the simplistic nature of it, it really isn't that hard, right? You just show appreciation for the people that are working with you, and recognition is another big one, you know, pub being able to publicly recognize people that are doing a good job. There's an old saying about recognition, it is the babies cry for it and grown men die for it. And so if you can recognize the people that are doing well for you and you can put them in positions to constantly get praise, you know, that's another amazing way to uh to grow and nurture those relationships. This has been an awesome conversation, man.

Host 21:38

I uh I really, really enjoyed it, and it is old school. I I go back to old school business 101 is just you know take care of your people and show them you show them you care. So you're right.

Host1 21:48

100%. 100%. I always like to ask this last question is how can the listeners of the podcast partner with you? What's important to you right now? How can we help you grow?

Host 21:56

Yeah, so I just actually just launched a community where I'm teaching people how to install affiliate programs in their business. So it's uh like brand, you're the first person I've talked to about it. I've been working at it on the back end. You're like the first podcast that I've uh been able to get on and actually talk about it. So I'm I'm pretty excited about it. I've been able to take the years of experience I've had as an affiliate and managing programs for some of the biggest names in the industry and kind of show you do if you have a program that's not performing or you haven't started one at all, we're gonna talk about it. We're gonna break things down, have hot seats, and it's gonna be a good time. I'm looking for really looking forward to getting some folks in the community.

Host1 22:31

That's awesome. We'll make sure that we link that up when you have it ready so that way the people that are listening can can check the show notes and and go connect with you there. I appreciate you a ton, man. Thanks so much for spending some time with me today talking through affiliates. It's a powerful, powerful way to grow relationships. Obviously, there's enormous energy between affiliate marketing and co-marketing. And so I'm a big fan, a big fan of you and and just appreciate you a ton.

Host 22:53

Yeah, I appreciate you too, brother. Thank you.

Host1 22:55

Yeah, of course. And thank you guys for continuing to listen to the Partner Profit Podcast, another epic conversation on how to turn your relationships into revenue. I'll see you on the next one. Peace.