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The fragility of Affiliate Marketing

by cjshu99
5 replies
I've recently had a few merchants of mine drop me or just close their program altogether. These were merchants I was dedicating complete websites for their offer. Not really sure what I did to get dropped by them. They haven't responded to my emails - and probably won't.

Now 80% of my income comes from 1 merchant. Makes me a little nervous.

I know many people say "create your own product" but I don't really feel I have the ability, expertise or skills for this.

So I am now looking into ecommerce and dropshipping real products. More work, yes but I feel it will probably be more sustainable over the long haul.
#affiliate #fragility #marketing
  • Profile picture of the author Alexa Smith
    Banned
    Originally Posted by cjshu99 View Post

    I've recently had a few merchants of mine drop me or just close their program altogether.
    It seems to me that that demonstrates the fragility of being a vendor much more than the fragility of affiliate marketing?! :confused:

    The great advantage, for affiliates, is that we have all the security, reliability and flexibility of being able to change products, relatively easily, whenever we want/need to.

    We can build up gradually appreciating asset-based businesses without our long-term success and survival being tied to the fortunes of any individual product at all.

    And we can select our niches to make sure there'll always be a wide range of different products available, to spread the risk.

    If a vendor gets into trouble and his product disappears, for any reason, we affiliates still have all our assets (niche websites and lists), and can pretty easily promote something else instead/as well. Problem solved.

    Producing your own product(s) is surely far more "fragile" an undertaking than being an affiliate.
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    • Profile picture of the author jamesutterson
      I agree with Alexa that being an affiliate is normally more secure than being a vendor, although I do believe that creating your own products is always a good thing too.

      If you have had success in affiliate marketing why not teach others to succeed as you have by creating an ebook, an audio or even a video then putting them for sale as a WSO. There are loads of Warriors who'd love to learn more about affiliate marketing

      Moving forward I would look to diversify the scope and number of vendor that you promote.

      80% focus on just 1 vendor means that your is almost wholly reliant on this one product provider. Seems risky to me
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  • Profile picture of the author WebPen
    If you want to get on the product creation side, you don't have to do everything yourself- that's the magic of outsourcing.

    I'm not saying you should get into it- I'm just saying there is a way.

    Good luck with getting into physical products though!
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  • Profile picture of the author JKflipflop
    As far as comparison between product creation and affiliate marketing goes, I would say that both are queally lucrative if done with a specific working plan. It also greatly depends on your target market, competition and moreover in case of product creation, availability of similar options to your prospects.

    However, as some one rightly pointed out above, the fact that 80% of your focus is on just 1 vendor, is not something which is devoid of risk. So try and broaden your vendor portfolio as an affiliate.
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  • Profile picture of the author JimWaller
    Here is the beauty of affiliate marketing, you can take those "complete websites for their offer" and rework them for a similar competitor's product.

    Unless you're in a niche that only has 1 vendor, which I think is highly unlikely, it should be pretty easy to find something similar.

    Additionally, you can use your knowledge of the original product to help you compare/ contrast the new one. It can actually add to your credibility that you know about the old one. There is probably something you can make sound positive about the new product like price or simplicity or benefits. Get creative.

    If you're building a list, you should ask them what they are looking for and see if you can find an affiliate product that matches. Whatever you choose yo do, I hope it works for you. Good luck!

    Jim
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