Prior to pursuing a career path, it’s always recommended to research the field to see if it’s a good fit for the individual. Therefore, I would like to share with you some information about affiliate marketing that will save you months of research and will help you answer is affiliate marketing worth it?The answer to this question may differ from one person to another because many big factors play a role in the success of an affiliate marketer. I also believe that many beginners who get into affiliate marketing have high expectations due to the misleading information that’s provided in social media by these so called affiliate marketing mentors. So here are 6 Major facts and tips on affiliate marketing that you should know about before starting in order to make the right decision and determine is affiliate marketing worth it for YOU?
1: Free Affiliate Marketing Strategies
You will NEVER see any success with affiliate marketing for free. I’ve always noticed those sneaky super affiliate marketers promoting the free traffic generation methods …that’s a pure WASTE OF TIME! If you actually believe that sharing your affiliate links or websites on social media and forums will make you some cash every month than I’m sorry to say this but you got fooled. Let me explain to you what they mean by free affiliate marketing strategies so you can understand the concept properly. There is a possibility that you can get one or two commissions after posting your links all over the internet for two months but this method won’t make you an income or even pocket money. And let’s assume you start a YouTube channel or a blog and work hard at it, you may see results for free over the long run (1 or 2 years later) but you’re going to barely earn anything in the short term. If you’re planning to start affiliate marketing and see results faster, be prepared to spend money on domains, web hosting, paid advertising and maybe some marketing tools (if you can’t find the tools you need for free). Even if you’re running a blog and you’re fully relying on SEO organic traffic, you’ll eventually need some SEO help, backlinks, technical support for website issues, graphic designers, etc.
2: ClickBank Affiliate Marketing
If you’re a beginner or just started researching affiliate marketing then I’m 100% sure that you came across or maybe even joined clickbank…do you know how I know this? It’s because clickbank is the ONLY affiliate program that automatically accepts ANYONE (No websites or credentials required) and all the affiliate marketing gurus constantly recommended this affiliate program to you. They tell newbies to join clickbank so the newbies can run inside and grab links to promote their affiliate/internet marketing courses. I’m not going to say that there is anything wrong with that but the truth is…Most of the digital products sold on clickbank are junk and very hard to sell. Clickbank’s offers (only the good ones) are easy to sell by someone who’s established in the affiliate marketing space but for a newbie, it’ll be difficult. Plus I believe that clickbank affiliate program is designed to take advantage of the newbies and scam them for their hard earned money. To get the first pay check, an affiliate must make 5 sales and each sale must be purchased using a different method (such a sneaky policy). Also, if it takes an affiliate a while to complete the payment threshold (which will happen because most newbies are still learning) then they will deduct a fee on a weekly basis from their earnings. So if you earned $200, by the time you get paid it’ll be $10 or even $0. In my personal opinion, anyone who joins clickbank from the start will hate affiliate marketing and will think that the affiliate marketing industry is a scam. If you truly decide to get into affiliate marketing then I highly recommend you to learn about the different types of affiliate marketing programs and networks available out there and HOW to select the ones that’ll give you the BEST RESULTS
3: Competition in Affiliate Marketing
There is no denial that the affiliate marketing space is currently very competitive. Many offers that newbies try to promote will have many other affiliates promoting it as well. The major two issues in my opinion are: 1) affiliate managers and gurus always recommend affiliates to promote popular offers that are converting well so their affiliate networks can make more revenue, and 2) there are many spy tools and methods available to the public where online marketers can easily discover the hottest converting offers in the market and copy these campaigns to get a piece of the pie. This is a reality that every affiliate will face but there are some strategies that can minimize the competition:
1) Avoid selecting offers from popular and competitive niches like get rich quick, make money online, weight loss, diets, health & beauty, dating, sweepstakes, etc. There are thousands of alternative so be creative and find something new.
2) Try and test other traffic sources (besides the popular ones that everyone uses like Facebook ads, YouTube ads, Google ads, social media, etc.). This will give you the chance to display your advertisements to newer audience and targeted traffic.
3) If you find one or two products that you’re confident that you can sell, go and join the partnership/affiliate program of the company DIRECTLY (if they have one) instead of promoting the same product through an affiliate network.
4) Start with affiliate marketing by creating an informational website or a blog that will attract an audience and benefit them. Learn how to create your own WordPress Website in 9 steps >>>
What I’m trying to say is stop following the crowd and DON’T BE A SHEEP!
4: Make $10,000 per Month with Affiliate Marketing
Super affiliates and marketing experts all over the internet keep on pushing this DREAM idea of making $10,000 a month or $1,000,000 a year because they DID IT. The chances of a newbie to achieve this in a couple of years is 5% or less. I know that I’m sounding like a pessimist but I’m just giving affiliate marketing beginners a reality check. Established affiliate marketers always reveal their incomes and statistics but they never mention HOW MUCH they’ve spent to earn that amount. There are many costs involved to earning that kind of money which includes high advertising spending, domains, web hosting, funnels, auto responders, freelancers, and even hiring a team (5-10 people working for them for an annual salary). So let’s assume an affiliate claims that his/her Monthly ROI (Return on Investment) is 50%. This means that he/she has spent at least $20,000 a month to make $10,000 of pure profit. They also don’t tell you that they have other sources of income other than affiliate marketing to achieve their profits like online e-commerce stores/products, YouTube channels, Blogs, Paid trainings/courses, etc. I’m not trying to de-motivate you but I’m just saying to MAKE REALISTIC GOALS. Don’t concentrate a lot on how much you’ll make per month but rather on the right marketing strategies that will help to scale up your affiliate marketing business every month.
5: Affiliate Links & Payments Threshold
When new affiliates join an affiliate network or program, I HIGHLY suggest that they put two factors into consideration:
Affiliate Link Cookie Duration
When a user clicks on an affiliate link, a piece of code containing the unique affiliate information gets dropped on the user’s browser. This is called a “Cookie” and it determines which affiliate will receive the referral credit once the user makes the purchase. This cookie has an expiration date and it’s different for every affiliate network or program. Some have 10 days cookie duration, some have 30 days, and some even have 3 months or more. The issue here is that most of the online shoppers don’t buy on the same day and most likely will return later to complete the purchase. So if the cookie expires fast (before the purchase is made), the affiliate won’t get any commission. I don’t recommend new affiliates to join affiliate programs or networks that have short cookie durations in their unique affiliate links (ex. Amazon affiliate links expire in 24 hours).
Affiliate Payments Threshold
An affiliate marketing beginner should be aware that he/she will not get ANY commission earnings right away. Every affiliate network or program has a different policy on how and when they’ll pay an affiliate. For example, an affiliate will not get paid until he/she makes a balance of $50 or $100. Once the threshold requirements are met, the affiliate network or program sends out the payments (1st, 15th, or 30th of the following month). So make sure that you read the policies of every affiliate network or program before signing up to ensure that it’s suitable for you.
6: Affiliate Marketing Scams
There are some DIRTY people, programs, and agencies that ruin the reputation of affiliate marketing and make it appear as a scam even though affiliate marketing is LEGIT. New affiliate marketers will face affiliate marketing scams in the early stages of their learning cycle but it’s not a big deal as long as they’re being cautious. From my own personal experience, there are two main types of affiliate marketing scams that MAJORITY of beginners will run into:
Affiliate Marketing Courses & Trainings
Sooner or later, you’ll need to purchase some affiliate marketing course to enhance your knowledge & technical skills and there’s nothing wrong with that. The only thing is you need to be careful who you buy the training from. Some unexperienced individuals create and sell an affiliate marketing course that has no REAL value and same information can be found on YouTube for free. And some experienced super affiliates will sell a course that doesn’t meet the expectations and the training’s main purpose is to sell you more courses and tools (upsells). My only recommendations about affiliate marketing courses is to buy from someone who’s currently active in the affiliate marketing space and who’s well aware of the current trends & affiliate marketing strategies.
Paid Traffic Sources
If you decide to specialize in some of the popular niches like online business opportunities, make money online, weight loss, etc…you’ll eventually run into a paid traffic method called SOLO ADS. Solo ads sellers have HUGE email lists (in specific niches) and they send emails to their lists on your behalf in exchange for a fee. I personally had purchased traffic from solo ads sellers and I’ve seen some good results BUT I’ve also noticed that a few of these sellers sending fake (bots or server generated) traffic or just buying traffic from other sources and sending it to my website as if it’s their own (traffic arbitrage). Also, you’ll run into many paid traffic and marketing agencies that sell packages with UNBELIEVABLE pricings such as “20,000 visitors for $25” or “100 guaranteed signups for $20”. Sellers who make such a claim will send either tier 3 countries bad quality traffic or bot/server generated traffic. I’m not saying that they’re all scammers but I’m just warning you so you can be extra cautious. I think its okay to try and test out traffic sources as it’ll enhance your marketing experience but I also recommend that you concentrate more on the well-known paid advertising methods like PPC, PPV, Native Ads, Social Media, etc. Learn more about the website traffic sellers that you should AVOID
Conclusion: Is Affiliate Marketing Worth It?
Now that I’ve explained the major hidden aspects and misconceptions of affiliate marketing, it should be clear to you that affiliate marketing is not easy as it seems. Starting up a website and relying on affiliate marketing commissions as the only source of income will lead to a major disappointment. An established blogger or social media influencer with thousands of monthly followers can generate a good income from affiliate commissions but you as a beginner will have to wait a long time until you receive that first affiliate pay. Therefore, I want to share with you a better way to make money online that will include affiliate marketing but it won’t depend on it as the only stream of income. If you’re interested to learn more about this internet marketing strategy then make sure to check out my complete guide ABSOLUTELY FREE…