How to Create a Gift Guide Your Audience Will Love Teacher Blog Academy by Side Hustle Teachers

With the holidays approaching, you may find yourself noticing lots of posts popping up with gift recommendations and wondered if they really boost revenue (they do!) and how you can make one for your own blog.
A well done gift guide can be a fantastic way to increase your affiliate income. But a poorly done gift guide can actually damage the trust you’ve built up with your audience.
So before you go on your virtual shopping spree and start seeing dollar signs in your eyes, let’s talk about the right way to put together a gift guide.
Before You Start Know Your Audience Creating a gift guide that actually generates income depends on your understanding of your audience and what they need. So before you start, make sure you have a clear picture of who they are and why they’re coming to your blog.
Their preferences are going to play into every decision you make, from which stores you feature to the price range of the items you select.
Consider the following questions:
How would you describe your ideal audience in 1 sentence? What is this group looking for help with? What’s their budget? It’s okay if there’s a wide range here, just be sure to select gifts at all levels to appeal to everyone. Where do they already shop? If you want to introduce new stores, that’s great, but keep in mind that many people will spend their money at places they already know and trust over someplace new. Choose a Theme When thinking about your audience, there could be a million things they might want or need. Choose a specific theme to narrow your focus and create a through-line for all your recommendations.
Don’t worry if your theme isn’t a typical one. When my daughter was young I would have been thrilled to find a guide called, “Perfect Gifts for Little Girls Whose Moms Need to Get Work Done and Need Said Little Girl to Play Quietly By Herself.”
Sadly, I never found such a guide…
For this part, focus particularly on why your audience comes to you. 
Are you providing gift suggestions that your readers might want (and can forward on to their family and friends), or gifts that they can purchase for others? 
Is this guide meant to help them discover new, creative gifts? 
Or find bargains or tried and true classics? 
Or make gifts themselves with recommendations of where to buy materials and tools?
Note: If you’re having trouble with this at the start, put a pin in it and come back to this once you’ve found a few products to recommend. You might find a natural theme, or one may come to you as you’re doing your research.
Gather Your Affiliate Links If you’ve dabbled in affiliate marketing, you already have relationships with some stores or brands. Now is the time to review your links and apply to any other programs with products or services you want to recommend.
Also take time to review the terms of service that are in place with each company so that you don’t violate your agreement and lose your affiliate status. For example, Amazon does not allow offline promotion, so if you create a downloadable PDF of your guide, you must link back to your gift guide post for Amazon products (rather than the item itself).
If you’re going to use affiliate marketing in your everyday blogger life - and why wouldn’t you? - I suggest creating a spreadsheet with all of your common affiliate links in it. It will really streamline the recommendation process and make your life easier.
Crafting Your Gift Guide Select Your Products This is the fun part. It’s time to go shopping!
When choosing what to include and what to leave off your list, be selective. A list of 10 great, spot-on, you-read-my-mind gift suggestions is better than one of 50 generic ideas.
When you are curating your picks, always go back to your theme. If it doesn’t fit with your theme, or you have to do some mental gymnastics to try to justify how it fits, leave it off.
Consider why each individual item should be included and remember the go