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war against affiliates? (10)

08-19-2012 06:46 AM #1 aquasun (Member)
war against affiliates?

Been into affiliate marketing for a few months. Got up to 1k+ a day in profit. Now many ads from facebook / adcenter / adwords has been banned. Nothing sketchy just duplicate ads that have already pounded the network already.

Gets me thinking, every day it gets harder for affiliates to make money. Facebook down right hates affiliates, with adcenter seeming to be a close second. I guess this trend has been going on for a while and I partly understand it. These companies want direct.

Anyone else notice that it seems in the last 1-3 years it getting more and more difficult?

08-19-2012 07:09 AM #2 mamu (Member)

Yes Affiliate marketing is a long term business for product owners & networks, but definitely not for affiliates. If you're an affiliate its more king of a lottery - you throw campaigns here & there hoping something sticks & when it does you make great moolah out of it & then hop on to the next best thing.

But looking at the positive side affiliate marketing has the lowest barriers for entry as an affiliate. You can't 'own' a product or a network right away but you can definitely throw some time for SEOing your affiliate sites or throw some money on paid traffic & generate business instantly.

This is strictly my personal opinion but I don't see myself as just another affiliate in the coming years. For me affiliate marketing is just a step I'm following to generate 'instant' money which I'll later invest in OTHER things like real estate or buying established online websites likes forums/blogs/ecommerce sites etc. Now THAT is long term.

In simple words - I consider being an affiliate as just a step towards my end goals.

Hope it helps

08-19-2012 07:33 AM #3 abundance (Member)

Very well said mamu.

Aff marketing is good but you should always have end result in your mind. Its a great way to build up some cash fast, but you should be careful enough to not blow this cash on expensive toys but rather spend it wisely or should I say invest it wisely.

08-19-2012 07:41 AM #4 aquasun (Member)

with todays many popular traffic sources, I believe its even harder to build up that initial cash. I've been working full time for 9 years so my savings is what I was using.

but today, with all the big self serve and even larger networks against he idea of affiliates, its tough!

08-19-2012 05:49 PM #5 Smaxor (Veteran Member)

Being an affiliate is all about learning to be flexible and building skills..

It's an amazing opportunity because you can make money and learn to market without having to run a real business.

Think about that for a second....

A real business is SUPER complicated and has tons of moving parts in the backend.

Being an affiliate really teaches you how to become a great marketer. At first most affiliates run shady stuff but then as time moves on most that are of decent size realize that's a crappy long term strategy so then have to learn to be a real marketer vs. just a scammer.

Once you learn to be a real marketer now you're ready to go learn other parts of the business.... Where you can make real money.

Learn to market and sell first then build a clean business behind what's working.

08-19-2012 05:54 PM #6 vipinext (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by Smaxor View Post
Being an affiliate is all about learning to be flexible and building skills..

It's an amazing opportunity because you can make money and learn to market without having to run a real business.

Think about that for a second....

A real business is SUPER complicated and has tons of moving parts in the backend.

Being an affiliate really teaches you how to become a great marketer. At first most affiliates run shady stuff but then as time moves on most that are of decent size realize that's a crappy long term strategy so then have to learn to be a real marketer vs. just a scammer.

Once you learn to be a real marketer now you're ready to go learn other parts of the business.... Where you can make real money.

Learn to market and sell first then build a clean business behind what's working.
Well said man, this is what my plan is actually

08-19-2012 09:55 PM #7 dusklife (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by Smaxor View Post
Being an affiliate is all about learning to be flexible and building skills..

It's an amazing opportunity because you can make money and learn to market without having to run a real business.

Think about that for a second....

A real business is SUPER complicated and has tons of moving parts in the backend.

Being an affiliate really teaches you how to become a great marketer. At first most affiliates run shady stuff but then as time moves on most that are of decent size realize that's a crappy long term strategy so then have to learn to be a real marketer vs. just a scammer.

Once you learn to be a real marketer now you're ready to go learn other parts of the business.... Where you can make real money.

Learn to market and sell first then build a clean business behind what's working.
Very nice take on things!

Quote Originally Posted by mamu View Post
Yes Affiliate marketing is a long term business for product owners & networks, but definitely not for affiliates.
Re: networks - try telling that to Azoogle, Adteractive, Copeac, and the boatloads of other networks that have faded over the years.

Product owners? Depends on the product, but product owners constantly have to come out with new stuff just as affiliates continue to have to adapt. A few big products are definitely not long term.

Forums/blogs/ecommerce are definitely not long term either - I can't even begin with the amount of forums I've seen open and close over the years.

I'm not posting this to promote affiliate marketing over anything else by any means - I just think that there is an extremely small number of true 'long-term' internet gigs out there where you can sit back and reap in profits for years and years. That's not to say you can't make something long term by working at it, changing, growing, etc. - but this goes for everything.

08-20-2012 12:17 AM #8 phoenix (Member)

there will always be buyers and sellers

08-24-2012 06:52 PM #9 tormedia (Member)

I think affiliate marketing is a long term business concept, however an affiliate is the bottom of the food chain unfortunately.

08-25-2012 11:09 AM #10 maxanter (Member)

Being affiliate really means to be n top of the things each time. All advertisers (and we too) don't like having many middlemen between us an traffic. But sometimes, like now, when we are inexperienced in mobile marketing, affiliates and CPA networks brings a lot of value for us. Affiliate will be always successful if he works with traffic better than product owner. And usually its not hard to be better in converting than average manager at big internet product company.

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