Is affiliate marketing worth it, or should you focus on other ways to make money?
It’s enough to make you go crazy with all the myths, bad news, good news, and sometimes outright lies. In reality, only you can decide if affiliate marketing is a good business model for you and your company.
You’re going to have to ask yourself some tough questions, and the only way to find the answers is to do some research and snoop around.
What are you really trying to find?
This article will teach you more about that.
You’ll learn how to decide if it’s worth it to be an affiliate marketer in general and if affiliate sales are worth it for a certain product or service.
Let’s jump in.
When Is Affiliate Marketing Worth Doing?
Despite some claims to the contrary, affiliate marketing still generates thousands of dollars each month for marketers and bloggers.
It’s sometimes a good idea to become an affiliate partner. Let’s look at why and when it’s a good idea to be an affiliate marketer.
When You Have Personal Experience With The Product
Even though it’s not necessary, if you’ve used the product you’re promoting as an affiliate, it will help you in the following ways:
- You know how good the product or service is because you bought it or got a free copy to review.
- When you own the product, you don’t have to look up what other people think about it. You can give your own opinion and list the pros and cons.
- It’s a good way to market yourself and makes you look more trustworthy.
- You can put the product through a case study and write down what you find.
- You can make unboxing videos so that your reviews are more accurate.
- If you own the product or have access to it, you can talk to the owner and ask them questions about specific problems.
- When you buy a product, you often get access to a private Facebook group with hundreds of other people who have also bought the product. This lets you see what other real users think about the product, which gives you even more information about it.
You Have Experience With Affiliate Marketing
Having experience with affiliate marketing will help you start campaigns that do well and put you in a good position to make money from promoting the product.
If you’re new to being an affiliate, you’ll need to learn the basics and figure out what works. If you don’t, you’ll probably fail.
It’s not too hard to understand, but it does take time. You should ask yourself if you have the time to learn the strategies because many people are too busy.
As an affiliate marketer, going all out with no experience is a surefire way to lose money and fail.
When You Have Good Traffic Numbers
This one is pretty clear. If you want to make money with your affiliate links, the more traffic you get or the bigger your audience, the easier it will be.
If you have a steady flow of traffic, it will be easier for you to start an affiliate marketing business that does well. If you don’t, you’ll have to use other methods, which usually take time and money, to get people to see your affiliate offers.
Affiliate marketing can be very profitable and is often worth doing if you get a lot of traffic or have an active following on social media.
When You Have An Email List
You may have heard the saying, “The money is in the email list.” Even though it’s been said a lot, it’s still 100% true today.
If you have an active and responsive email list, you’re in a great position to sell affiliate products to your email subscribers. Email marketing is a good way for affiliates to earn commission.
HubSpot says that email engagement has gone up by 78% in the last year for marketers.
Email is still alive and well!
Complimenting Your Own Product With The Product You’re Promoting
When you sell your own products or services, it can be very profitable to use affiliate products that go well with what you’re selling.
Affiliate marketing is almost always a good idea if you can find a product that is similar to yours but still different.
Just make sure that the product you’re selling will help the people you want to reach.
High Earnings Per Click
Earnings per click (EPC) is an important piece of information that can help you decide if it’s worth it for your affiliate marketing business to promote a certain product.
This metric tells you how much you can make on average every time someone clicks on your affiliate link. It’s a very important number for affiliate marketing campaigns that use paid traffic methods like Facebook ads.
To figure out EPC, you divide the commission you get from a product by the number of times your affiliate link was clicked on.
Usually (but not always), the higher the EPC, the more you should think about promoting the product.Â
When Is Affiliate Marketing Not Worth It?
Affiliate marketing isn’t always a good idea, and figuring out when it isn’t can save you time and money.
Here are some reasons why it’s not worth it to be an affiliate marketer in general or for a certain product or service.
AdsEmpire
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AdsEmpire’s Benefits
Marketers have a lot to gain by using AdsEmpire because of its various benefits. Affiliate managers are seasoned dating industry professionals who can advise you on how to get the most out of your campaigns and ensure you receive the highest possible fees and earnings per click (EPCs). In addition, you may begin earning money right now thanks to their $250 weekly/monthly rewards program. You may utilize AdsEmpire no matter where you are thanks to the company’s support for more than 50 countries, with a primary emphasis on Tier 1 and European nations.
Finally, you may get paid promptly and safely using AdsEmpire because we accept Wire Transfers, PayPal, Paxum, Bitcoin Paysera, and Genome.
Ads Empire also hosts a number of conferences and events for marketers each year, providing excellent opportunities to learn from industry leaders and make valuable connections. Marketers may benefit from this by learning proven methods and fresh approaches to include into their marketing. AdsEmpire also offers training resources like webinars and blogs to assist marketers expand their expertise and professional development.
AdsEmpire stands out as a fantastic alternative for ad buyers looking to increase their ROI. There is no doubt why this platform is worth considering for anyone seeking success in digital marketing; it features exclusive dating offers from direct advertisers, Smartlink Technology that monetizes 100% of visitors, various compensation types (CPL (SOI/DOI), PPS & RevShare), and rewarding programs like $250 weekly/monthly rewards.
Plus, AdsEmpire’s knowledgeable affiliate managers will advise you on how to make the most of their services, and you can learn as much as you want through their webinars and blogs. Check out Ads Empire now!
You Have No Desire Or Passion For The Product
Some people will disagree with the “passion” part because you can promote a product and do well even if you don’t like it, but in general, you’ll do better if you’re interested in the product you’re promoting.
As for desire, you need it in any business to be successful, and affiliate marketing is no exception.
If you are passionate about the market and want to work hard, you will write better reviews and ads and seem more knowledgeable about the product or service.
If you don’t have either of these, you might want to think twice about becoming an affiliate. If you don’t have either of these, you might want to avoid the idea altogether.
You Want To Make Money Overnight
If you think that writing a Google ad or putting up a social media post will make you money overnight, you should think again.
Affiliate marketers need to work hard, know how to build brand awareness, and have a good marketing plan to be successful. This isn’t something that will make you rich overnight.
There are many successful marketers in the affiliate marketing industry, and almost all of them will tell you that it takes time to make money.
You won’t become rich overnight, so if that’s what you want, you might want to find a different way to run your business.
The Product Has Poor Reviews
Even if a product looks great and has a great sales page, you shouldn’t just jump in and start promoting it because the sales page is good.
If the product is bad, you could tell your audience about it and lose their trust for good.
Because of this, it’s a good idea to use the product yourself.
If you can’t get a copy for yourself, you’ll have to look for reviews on different websites. If a lot of people have bad things to say about the product, don’t buy it.
Poor Past Or Checked History Of The Website Owner
Check out the owner of the product or service you want to promote. If a lot of people have called him a scammer or con artist in the past, you might want to think again.
Look up the person’s name on Google to find out what you can about them. It’s easy to find bad news about someone; all you have to do is look online and on social media.
If there are more bad reviews or comments than positive times, you should think twice about promoting theiraffiliate program
The vendor does not use recognized affiliate software
There are, unfortunately, a lot of scammers out there, and they are giving the affiliate marketing industry a bad name.
If the person you want to promote isn’t using a well-known affiliate software platform, you should look for other reasons to promote him.
Be careful, because there are a lot of stories online about marketers who didn’t get paid their affiliate commission.
Below are a few of the good affiliate platforms:
- Clickbank
- JVzoo
- Share A Sale
- Amazon Associates
- Warrior Plus
- Rakuten Advertising
- Awin
- CJ Affiliate
- eBay Partner Service
- Avangate
- Avanlink
Disclaimers And Disclosures Are Not Displayed By The Vendor
If the affiliate vendor doesn’t have the right disclaimers and disclosures on their websites, the affiliate platforms could shut them down. This would mean that you wouldn’t get paid.
Disclosures of affiliate links are important and required by law from the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Affiliates and vendors risk fines if they fail to disclose certain disclaimers.
When these FTC rules came out in 2009, the main affiliate platforms had to rewrite the terms of their websites. So, if you didn’t follow the new terms and rules, you lost your account.
Check the product owner’s website to make sure that all the necessary FTC and affiliate disclaimers are there. If they aren’t, you need to worry.
Pros And Cons Of Affiliate Marketing
Taking a closer look at affiliate marketing’s pros and cons will help you determine whether it’s worth starting an affiliate marketing business.
Pros
- There is no need to create a product or course: Putting together a product takes time. It can take anywhere from 30 days to 2 years. A lot of work also goes on behind the scenes, and the fact that affiliates don’t have to do it themselves is a big plus.
- Returns And Customer Service Are Managed By The Product Owner: Customer service and processing returns are full-time jobs that cost the Vendor extra money. If the product is good, they might get a lot of questions every day. As an affiliate, you’ll never have to worry about customer service, since that’s the job of the product owner, not you.
- The best way to make your website more profitable: Affiliate marketing is still a legal way to make money from your website, and it can be very profitable. It’s a great way to make money as long as you sell the right things and follow the rules.
- Low-cost Start-up: Affiliate marketing is an easy and cheap way for people to make money online. If you already have a following, it may be the best way to reach more people. At the very least, you need a domain name, hosting, an email autoresponder, and the will to succeed. If you pay for traffic, these costs could go up, but you could get started for less than ten dollars. You can do affiliate marketing even if you don’t have a website
- Convenience: This is similar to the first two pros, but it’s important to say more about how easy it is. It’s a very convenient way to run a business because you don’t have to make a product or deal with customer service. You can find affiliate products quickly, and when your website or email list focuses on a new topic, you can look for a new (and relevant) affiliate product to promote. With all the affiliate platforms out there, it’s easy to find a new affiliate partner, and the software handles getting paid on its own. In effect, you send your audience to their sales page, and the rest of the money you make comes in on its own.
- Scalable: Affiliate marketing is more versatile than you might think. You can make more money by promoting products with upsells, and once you start making money, you can build a team to focus on keywords related to the product. If you have a blog, having a team of people who writes articles will help with SEO. If you make money from affiliates, you could use that money to build affiliate funnels and use paid traffic. You could also make many campaigns for many different products and have more than one way to make money from each. Once the work of affiliate marketing is done, these will, in a sense, make money on their own.
Cons
- Inside Of Your Own Business, You’re Effectively Building Another One: All the work you do to promote and grow the email list of another business works well. When you promote an affiliate product, that’s the whole story. You can still build your email list before sending traffic to another site, but you are still sending traffic to another site, which could become your subscribers’ favorite site in the future.
- No Control Over The Product: You could be promoting the product, but the owner could change or add parts that you disagree with or don’t think are appropriate. You have no control over this. The owner could also just take the product off the market at any time. They could decide they no longer want to run the business, change the affiliate platform, or never update the content.
- Competition Could Overtake: You might have to compete with a big name in your industry. It will be harder for you to be successful and make a good profit. For example, you might be doing well advertising a certain product on Facebook ads, and your affiliate funnel might be going great. Then, all of a sudden, another marketer with more money starts to outbid you for keywords and spend more on ads than you do. Your income will drop overnight, and you usually can’t do anything about it.
- Trust Issues: Scammers have given affiliate marketers a bad name, so many people don’t trust them. Things are getting better, but sometimes software companies won’t let you use their software if you advertise an affiliate link. Most companies that make email autoresponder software won’t let you put affiliate links in your emails unless you first link to your blog. Some, on the other hand, will only let them be used in certain industries and niche markets.
What Is The Success Rate Of Affiliate Marketing?
Affiliate marketing is a great way to run a business, but you have to do it right. It is estimated that 5% of affiliate marketing campaigns are successful, according to Entrepreneurs Unstuck. Consequently, 95% of affiliate programs fail.
Don’t let this stop you, though, because many of the reasons why they failed were because they did things wrong or didn’t have a good plan.
Affiliate Marketing Statistics
Before we wrap up, I want to share a few interesting stats about affiliate marketing.
Here they are:
- In the US, 80 percent of brands have affiliate programs. (Source: Mediakix.)
- Affiliate programs in the fashion industry account for 18.7% of all affiliate programs. (Source: AM Navigator.)
- It is estimated that 85% of online shoppers read reviews on Google before making a purchase. (Source: Kenshoo.)
- It is predicted that affiliate products will generate 8.6 billion dollars by 2022. (Source: Statista.)
- In terms of affiliate marketing, 40% of marketers feel it is a crucial skill. (Source: Bloggingx)
- Approximately 5 billion dollars are estimated to be generated by affiliate marketing in the US. (Source: Call Hippo)
- Over 100,000 marketers and sellers are partnered with Clickbank. (Source: Clickbank.)
- Over 5 billion affiliate commissions have been paid out by Clickbank. (Source: Clickbank)
- CJ Affiliates and other affiliate marketplaces outperform each other by double-digits. (Source: CJ.com.)
- There is a commission rate of 1-10% for Amazon Associates. (Source: Amazon.)
Is Affiliate Marketing Better Than Direct Advertising? (Which One Should I Choose?)
Affiliate marketing is a way to promote other people’s products through a unique link. Direct advertising is another way to make money from a blog.
You sign up with an ad network like Ezoic or Google Adsense, and they put ads on your blog. When people click on the ads, they get paid (CPC).
With affiliate marketing, you choose products to sell and promote them through affiliate marketplaces or the website of a vendor.
Which is better?
It depends on the content you have and how many people visit your site. If you have a website with a lot of traffic in a niche market that doesn’t have many (or any) products, it would make sense to use advertising.
You let the advertising company place the ads, and you focus on adding content and building up your website.
It is possible to make a living through affiliate marketing if your blog is in a niche with a lot of products and courses.
Quick Links:
- What is Affiliate Marketing? What exactly does an affiliate marketer do?
- Affiliate Marketing Lessons I Should Have Learnt Earlier
- Best Affiliate Marketing Forums On The Internet To JoinÂ
- Affiliate Marketing What do you want to Know
- Top High Ticket Affiliate Programs: What Is High Ticket Affiliate Marketing?
Conclusion: Is Affiliate Marketing Worth It 2024
If you’ve read this article, you should have a better idea of whether or not affiliate marketing and the money you spend on it are worth it.
You should also know what the pros and cons of becoming an affiliate are and why you shouldn’t do it.
In the end, it’s up to you.
As an affiliate, you can sometimes make a lot of money, but you need to make sure your heart is in it and that the products or services you promote are helpful and right for your audience.
If you can answer these questions, you might do well.
It won’t be easy or too hard, but you do need to set up your campaigns correctly and take your time.
When you next wonder, “Is affiliate marketing worth it?”
Also, think about whether or not you can offer your audience products that will really help them.
If you can, then almost certainly, affiliate marketing is something you should do
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