I had a reader ask me a question that I don’t think I know the answer to anymore.
They asked me if a lot of domain investors also partake in affiliate marketing?
Years ago I knew quite a few people that were using affiliate programs with some of their domain names.
Today I really haven’t had much discussion, it seems some of the people I knew into affiliate marketing, haven’t communicated much over the last year.
So do you do any affiliate marketing?
Here are some articles that might be helpful to those looking to start.
Stopped years ago, I thought the merchants were skimming.
I believe CJ.com was skimming as well.
I refuse to do all that work to get a whopping 5% from Amazon ….
I stopped Tuesday. I was selling a financial product for about $1k and up, nothing below $1k. I was only paid .75 cent per lead, recently CJ.com increase the pay to $1.25.
I refuse to do all the hard work and getting paid peanuts. Started lead generation.
To all, test Pay Per Call –
If anyone has domains with traffic and need help getting into the affiliate networks, or just want ot get a primer on the space, let me know. Have been working in that industry for 8+ years, and do domaining on the side. Happy to help.
contact AT shaimedia DOT com
It is a lot harder than it used to be, more competition and the web is more developed.
If anyone ever said the Internet is a great big “wild west,” that’s what it still is for affiliate marketers. They have no protection, no regulation, no access to data unless it is given, which usually is somewhere between “very little” and “not nearly enough,” and practically speaking no rights at all. All the power is on the other side. It is one of the most lopsided commercial relationships you could possibly imagine. Virtually all the risk of loss is on your side as the affiliate, however.
The ways in which you can be totally robbed are numerous and go well beyond whether or not the merchant itself is the one who is being honest. All it takes is one rogue insider with access to cost you all your time, money and effort even if the merchant intended to do the right thing, among other ways.
Well frankly, I guess you could say the same for PPC too.
I still do affiliate marketing for the time being, but I have no illusions at all about being able to rely on it or trust it. The status quo is actually sad in my view, but I suspect there will probably never be any significant changes to that.
As a past affiliate network manager – skimming is a bad practice that seems to have become very rampant plus if there is 1 thing they find you did in the TOS wrong, you will lose your hard work all together.
Thanks for sharing that.
Affiliate marketing is a profitable online business if you know the tricks, you need to build your list that you can always market to, i have been dong affiliate marketing for years alongside domaining, it has been profitable,but my success did not start overnight, it requires some learning and patience to find what works and scale from there.
Do you know about Binfer’s affiliate program? Details here: See http://www.binfer.com/affiliates.
Affiliate marketing only works in one direction so we don’t do that anymore.
Used to be much better at it before all the Google updates. Seems the only way to to do affiliate marketing properly is to build an authority niche website.
That takes a lot of time and effort though.
Affiliate marketing has been a total scam. I have been screwed for tens of thousands of dollars for doing too much business.
CJ always sides with the merchants no matter what proof you have. They could care less. Which makes them part of the problem. And part of the scam. They could care less. Which makes them part of the problem. And part of the scam
They question the traffic even though they get the business. I have been screwed for tens of thousands of dollars or more for doing too much business by multiple merchants. They question the traffic even though they get the business. They do everything in their power not to pay you and there’s absolutely no recourse.
I Stopped sending CJ traffic about 15 YEARS AGO. Only for rookies and people with no traffic that can’t make any money anyhow.
I have got paid every month from CJ for 12 years, but it’s from developed sites. And yep I can imagine they would not pay you for sending traffic solely from your high quality domains. Every couple years they send me an email saying I have to prove my traffic sources of they will stop paying me. It’s super annoying , I feel like they interrogate me.
From the domain king himself, my exact point on TOS. Know exactly what you are agreeing to in that long document. Most affiliates just agree because of eagerness to get in platforms to try to start earning. I got out in 2005. In 2014 I gave it another run building out a decent large site promosdeals.com, spent $2500 on the build plus another 2k in traffic over a 4 months. I know sales were happening but not $1 made on that site. I wouldn’t try again without the authority site with a 5k or better rank on alexa. I don’t really blog or make videos, but have bumped out over 2k sites since 1999, so I am not a newbie plus had a top 30k site in past. Just my pained experience, sell your skills to make it online.
I wanted to add some perspective from the other side: “merchant”
Often the “merchant” had only one affiliate manager trying to make decisions based on incorrect or incomplete data, with upper management who don’t view affiliates very highly because the incremental revenue gains came from affiliates are just so small.