In August, iTunes changed affiliate partners to PHG, which means that if you want to provide affiliate links for people to buy your books in the iBookstore, you had to change all your links. Updating has been a breeze and it makes book marketing more efficient.
First, why add links to your website, blog or your social media platforms? The links take readers directly to the iTunes page about your book. Not only does it encourage readers to buy your book for the iBookStore, it also gives you a small commission. I am currently earning about $100/month on this type of affiliate and by adding in the iTunes affiliate, I hope that figure goes up. (Thanks for your support!)
If you just want a link to your book and don’t care about the affiliate links, then use the iTunes Link Maker tool. If you are writing books for children or teens, this is a great time to add these links because more and more schools are adopting iPads in their classroom. For example, the Los Angles School District spent more than $30 million this summer to purchase iPads for every student. Of course, on the iPad, you can choose to read books from the Kindle or Kobo apps; however, the iBookstore is becoming easier and easier and I expect Apple to start pushing it more.
Becoming an iTunes affiliate is now an easy task: simply apply now. It’s free.
After your application is approved and you provide the proper financial information, you just need to snag links to your books. This used to be a cumbersome process and I was lousy at doing it. With the switch to PHG, it’s as simple as any Amazon affiliate links. More on creating affiliate links.
You simply login to your iTunes Affiliate Dashboard and click on the iTunes Link Maker Tool; it will take you directly to the tool, but this time, it will automatically add in your affiliate ID. The resulting links will still take readers to your iBook page, but will also record that they came from your affiliate link.
As always, if you use affiliate links, you should update your privacy policy to let users know what you are doing.
So, here’s the list of my books now available on the iBookStore. For more information on each title, see here.
- Common Core ELA Activities
- Prewriting for the Common Core
- 11 Ways to Ruin a Photograph – Darcy Pattison & Michael Jeter
- Wisdom, the Midway Albatross – Darcy Pattison & Kitty Harvill
- Prairie Storms (English) – Darcy Pattison & Kathleen Rietz
- Las tormentas de la pradera (Prairie Storms in Spanish) – Darcy Pattison & Kathleen Rietz
- Desert Baths – Darcy Pattison & Kathleen Rietz
- Start Your Novel – Darcy Pattison
- How to Write a Children’s Picture Book – Darcy Pattison
