Most newbies think affiliate marketing is all about sharing affiliate links here and there, gaining commissions, making money, getting paid and smiling all the way to the bank every day.
They see only upsides and no downsides, because they’re too busy thinking about how much money they’ll make. And so, most just rush in and spend so much time, promoting other people’s products and maybe making some money.
What they don’t know is that there are a lot of drawbacks to being an affiliate marketer. Yes, you do make money, and you smile all the way to the bank, if you know what you’re doing. But everything is not all cool and rosy when you become an affiliate marketer.
In fact, being an affiliate marketer sucks, and I’m here to give you 6 good reasons why I say that.
Requires steep learning curve
The concept of affiliate marketing in itself is pretty simple and straightforward but the execution is not that straightforward. It requires skill and time to really make money as an affiliate marketer.
You shouldn’t let anyone deceive you by telling you that you can make money overnight. That will never happen unless you have hundreds, maybe thousands of dollars to spend on advertising.
If not, then you need time, and you need to sharpen your skills to really be a successful affiliate marketer that makes a lot of money through it.
Affiliate programs cookie discrepancies
Affiliate programs can be dishonest with their cookies. Cookies are what helps these programs count a sale or attribute a sale to you and give you the commissions when a customer clicks through your affiliate links and buys a product from them.
The truth is some programs can be dishonest with their cookies, or their cookies may not function well at times. That means when someone buys a product from them through your link, the sale may not be attributed to you, and there’s nothing you can do about it, because you may not even know if you’ve made a sale, unless they tell you.
I’m not saying all affiliate programs are dishonest with their cookies, but I’m telling you that some are dishonest.
About a few years ago, I was working with a certain affiliate program and I noticed something about my stats on their platform. I noticed that even though my traffic was increasing, I was having less sales on the platform. That means I was making less money.
I compared the same period in that particular year to the same period in the previous year, and I noticed that even though my blog traffic to those pages where I have their link have increased considerably (about 50 percent more), my stats on the affiliate program was just showing lower numbers. It showed I was sending less people to their website, I was making less sales, and I was making less money overall.
I had to reach out to them, and they told me, it’s the season, that’s why my sales are low. But I told them, it’s literally the same season I’m comparing for both years. It’s like I’m comparing stats for September and October this year to that of last year, and I discovered that my stats for this year are considerably lower, even though my traffic for this year have increased.
After notifying them about it, it took about a week or 2, and my sales started coming back to normal, and started going up again and increasing with my traffic.
That’s when I realized that this people can deliberately program their cookies to record less sales for you even though you’re sending them more customers.
So, this is one of the reasons why being an affiliate marketer sucks. This people literally controls the whole backend. They program their cookies, and they get to decide whether you sent them a customer or not, even though you did.
Yes, I still make a lot of money through affiliate marketing right now, but I’ve actually reduced my focused towards it in recent years, and instead I’m focusing on making and selling my own products.
When you sell your own products, the sales comes directly to you. So no one gets to decide whether you made a sale or not.
You can make more money by selling your own products
This is another reason why being an affiliate marketer sucks. When you sell affiliate products, you only get a piece of the profit.
You get paid a commission, while the product owner keeps the rest of the profit. While that is totally understandable, you have to know that in most cases, you just keep a small part of the overall profit, and it’s more advisable for you to start selling your own products.
If you can sell products for other people, you can definitely sell your own products, and make more money.
You’re just an employee
It’s not as if there’s anything wrong with being an employee. But you should know, if you run a strictly affiliate marketing business online, you have no business.
You’re just an employee. And they could terminate your participation with the program at any time.
That’s one thing every affiliate marketer knows. When you signup with any affiliate program, they reserve the right to terminate their partnership with you at any moment they choose. It’s in the fine prints of their terms of service that you agree to when you register in their program.
So, you’re not running your own business when you sign up as an affiliate marketer. Nope. You’re helping that program build a business which you’re not a part of. If they believe you’ve breached their terms of service or their rules in any way, they can terminate your partnership with them, and there’s nothing you can do about it than to just move on with your life.
The customers are not yours
One more important reason why being an affiliate marketer sucks is that all the customers you refer to these programs are not yours.
You send them customers, and these customers start doing business with them, and you get no more piece of all that business apart from the initial commissions you were paid.
Yes, I know some affiliate programs offer recurring commissions when you refer a customer to them. That means, if it’s a subscription, every time that customer renews their subscription, you also get a piece of it. You also get paid a commission.
Only a few programs offer that. And even if that’s the case, you have to know that the customer is still theirs, and like I mentioned earlier, you’re just an employee. It’s not your business. Your partnership can be terminated at any time.
Affiliate programs get discontinued
Businesses create affiliate programs for themselves so publishers and creators like you and I can help them promote their business through the program.
They offer you incentives like the commission that you’re paid to help them promote and build their business for them.
What you have to know however is that these businesses are not obligated in any way to continue their affiliate programs forever.
They can discontinue it whenever they want, or when they feel they’ve achieved their aim of starting it.
Take the Amazon associates program for instance. When they started, they had higher commission rates for promoting their products than they have now.
Slowly but steadily over the years, they’ve reduced the commission rates by a very large gap. Why do they reduce their commission rates? Because Amazon knows they can do without their affiliate program. They know if they reduce their commission rates, they already have the customers.
They’re no longer trying to get people to know their business. Everybody with access to the internet already knows Amazon.com is the biggest marketplace online.
So, they don’t see any more reasons to offer high commission rates for publishers to promote their products.
That is why they’ve reduced their commission rates by a very large gap over the years.
And the way I see it, they might eventually end the program in the future. I say that because of their history of cutting down their commission rates. That is a sign that this program has served its purpose, and they want to move on.
So, you don’t want to build your online business around promoting affiliate programs. These programs can be discontinued at any time. And when you build your whole business and source of income around promoting a certain affiliate program, and they certainly decide to close shop or terminate your partnership with them, what do you do?
Or rather, what can you do? The answer is nothing.
So, be wise. Focus on building your own business where you sell your own products, instead of laying all your eggs in the basket of affiliate marketing.
Rounding up
This is not to say that I’m against affiliate marketing and being an affiliate marketer. Not at all. I’m still an affiliate marketer till date, and I still promote affiliate programs and products on my blogs.
I’m writing this to show you a clear picture of what it means when you become an affiliate marketer. To help you set your priorities straight, and to help you build a real business for yourself in the long run, instead of focusing on promoting affiliate programs that you’re just a small disposable piece of.