How to Start Affiliate Marketing as a Dog Mom: A No-BS Beginner Guide
Last summer, a friend texted me: "What harness do you use for Jennie? I've tried three and nothing fits her right."
I wrote back a full paragraph. Ruffwear Front Range. Explained the chest clip. Told her where I got it on sale. She bought it that week.
She didn't know I had an affiliate link in my back pocket. I'd been sitting on it for months, not sure if it was "real" enough to share, not sure if I had enough of an audience to make it worth mentioning.
That text should have been a commission.
This is what affiliate marketing actually looks like for dog moms. Not a viral reel. Not a perfectly curated feed. Just you — answering a real question, recommending something that works, and getting a small cut when someone you helped decides to buy it. That's the whole game.
What Affiliate Marketing Actually Is (Plain English)
Affiliate marketing is a way to earn a commission by recommending products to people who trust your opinion.
When you share a link and someone buys through it, the company pays you a percentage of the sale — usually 3% to 10%, depending on the product category. Amazon Associates, which is where most beginners start, typically pays 3-5% on most pet items.
The link tracks that the sale came from you. You don't handle inventory, you don't deal with shipping, you don't take on any risk. You just point people toward things that genuinely help them, and you get a little credit when they do.
It's not a get-rich-quick scheme. It's also not a scam. It's a legitimate income channel that happens to work perfectly for anyone who already talks about dog products — which is basically every dog mom I know.
Why Dog Moms Are Actually Really Good at This
Here's what I didn't realize for a long time: you are already doing the hardest part of affiliate marketing. You are already a trusted voice in your circle of other dog moms. You are already the person people text when their dog is acting weird or they need a recommendation for a new leash.
The skill that makes someone good at this isn't marketing know-how. It's product knowledge. It's the fact that you've actually tried things, you know what works, and you have strong opinions grounded in real experience.
That's rare and valuable. Most people buy things based on reviews from strangers on the internet. When someone gets a recommendation from you — someone who has actually used it on their own dog — that carries weight.
Dog moms also have a built-in content engine: their own dogs. Posting about what you and your dogs are actually using — the treats that work, the gear that lasts, the food that solved a real problem — that's content. And it's content that converts, because it's not performance. It's just life.
How to Get Started — The Short Version
You don't need a website to start. You don't need a huge following. You can build this slowly and grow it over time. But here's how to actually get moving:
Step 1: Join Amazon Associates (or a Similar Program)
Amazon Associates is the most accessible starting point. Almost every dog product you can think of is in Amazon's catalog, and the affiliate links work across the entire site.
Go to affiliate-program.amazon.com and apply. It takes about a day to get approved. You do need a website, blog, or social media presence — but it can be as simple as a free website or even a strong Instagram or TikTok account. They want to see that you have a genuine platform, not necessarily a massive one.
Once approved, you can generate affiliate links for any product on Amazon. When someone clicks your link and buys anything within 24 hours, you earn a commission on their entire order — not just the product you linked.
Step 2: Pick Your Content Format
Affiliate income comes from recommending products in contexts where people are actually looking for help. The formats that work best for dog moms:
- Blog posts — Deep, honest reviews and comparisons. This is what we're doing here at Jennie & Baxley. It takes longer to build, but blog posts are the most reliable long-term traffic source because they rank in Google searches for years after you publish them.
- Instagram and TikTok — Short videos showing products in use. "What I actually use every day with my dogs" performs well. Keep it real, show the actual product, and include the link in your bio.
- Email list — A small, engaged list beats a large, disengaged one every time. Even 100 subscribers who trust you is more valuable than 5,000 followers who scroll past your posts.
Step 3: Recommend Things You Actually Believe In
This is not optional: your affiliate income depends on people trusting your recommendations enough to actually click and buy. If you recommend things that don't work, you'll lose that trust permanently.
I only link to products I have used. Products my own dogs use. Things I've bought with my own money and can speak to honestly. That constraint means I recommend fewer things — but the ones I do recommend get taken seriously.
This is actually a competitive advantage. A lot of affiliate content is thin, generic, and written purely to rank in search engines. Real, first-person experience is hard to fake. Lean into that.
Step 4: Track What Works and Double Down
Once you start sharing links, pay attention to what people actually click on and buy. Amazon's Associates dashboard shows you which links are converting and which aren't. That data tells you what your audience actually needs from you — and that's where you write more content.
My Honest Numbers After Two Years
I want to be real with you here, because that's the only way this is useful.
After two years of consistently writing about dog products and sharing affiliate links, the income started adding up. Not overnight. Not in a way that felt exciting at first. But month by month, it grew.
The first year was mostly learning: what content worked, what people actually wanted, which products I could genuinely vouch for. The second year, I started writing with more confidence and more focus. The pieces that performed best were the ones where I had strong, specific opinions grounded in real experience.
I don't share exact numbers publicly, but I will say this: it now covers the cost of the premium dog food for both dogs every month, with a little left over. That's not retirement money. It's also not nothing — and it came from building something I would have been doing anyway (talking about what works for my dogs).
The Step-by-Step Guide I Wish I Had at the Start
When I was starting out, I wanted a single place that walked me through the actual mechanics — not vague advice, but the specific steps: how to set up Amazon Associates correctly, how to structure a blog post so it actually ranks in Google, how to write captions that don't feel like sales pitches, how to build an email list even with zero technical skills.
That's why I put together the Affiliate Marketing Starter Guide for Dog Moms. It's a 13-page guide covering everything from picking your niche to setting up your first affiliate links to understanding what actually drives conversions in this space.
It covers: how to choose a niche that won't feel like a grind, the exact Amazon Associates setup (including the parts they don't explain well), five content formats that actually earn commissions, basic SEO so your posts show up in Google searches, and a roadmap for going from zero to your first $1,000.
It's $19, one-time payment, and you can find it at jennie-and-baxley.polsia.app/shop/affiliate-marketing-guide.
If you're already the dog mom everyone texts for recommendations, you already have the hardest part. You just need a way to turn that knowledge into a link — and a few pointers on what actually works. That's it. The rest is just showing up consistently.
Start with one post. Write about something you know well — something you've actually bought and used. Put an affiliate link in it, even if it's just one. See what happens. Iterate from there.
Jennie and Baxley are already the product experts in your life. The only thing that changes is that next time someone asks, you have a link ready — and someone pays you for the recommendation you were going to make anyway.
"You don't need to be an influencer. You just need to be the friend who actually knows what she's talking about."
This post contains affiliate links. If you purchase the Affiliate Marketing Starter Guide, I earn a commission at no additional cost to you. I only recommend things I have used and genuinely believe in.