Why you shouldn't quit.

I started doing affiliate marketing near 15 years ago. The first five years I don't think I made very much.

The last 8 years I've made over $1.2 million. I'd say near $300,000 of that has been towards traffic, hosting, etc..

I don't think you need to make over $100,000 a year Internet marketing to make sense out of it being full-time work. Though, most of our friends working in finance in New York and lawyers in California are easily bringing in $250k+ a year and friends in biotech in San Fran seeing $250-$500k a year salary.

Many of you guys are shooting for the millions and you haven't even realize what the $&@? affiliate marketing is. Most new guys that do make up something cool and make a bunch of money don't file taxes and can't ever actually buy anything. Also don't let anybody tell you going out and buying a BMW after you make your first box is a bad plan because it gives you something to work towards that you have a responsibility over.

In between those 8 years of doing well I've had about three years where we barely made a dime because of changes in the industry.

We've made about $100,000 flipping houses cash in pocket. We bought two properties and they're worth about $850,000 combined. Only about $400k in debt between the two. Interest rates under 3%

I'm only bringing in between $75,000-$100,000 a year now a days but I'm pretty much retired at this point.

The big thing a lot of you guys aren't going to realize is you don't keep reinvesting your profits in your internet marketing. Just don't do it.

You buy real estate and pay off your debt and get settled first. Pay your car off. Etc.

I've met too many people in this industry that the hit 1 million mark and don't have anything to show for it and I've met too many people in this industry that are making well over 1 million a year without a hitch.

After all the affiliate summits and after all of the networking and tradeshows I've done along with the hundreds of companies I've worked with over the past eight years. Meeting advertisers and affiliate from around the world. I've come to realize that everybody finds something unique and sticks with it and just doesn't talk about it or share it.

Most everything you're going to find on this board is half truths and misses the secret sauce.

There really is no secret guide to affiliate marketing it's either you figure it out and you're good at it or you don't figure it out you don't make money.

My best advice is go get a job as an affiliate manager at a CPA network or go get a job being an advertising account manager somewhere and just listen and listen and listen and ask and ask and absorb everything.

There's no secret software that's gonna make you rich and automate all your marketing. There's no secret software that's going to get you higher conversions. There's no secret anything.

My next biggest advice being in affiliate marketing is to be full stack. Learn to program, learn to write copy, learn to manage affiliates, learn how to manage advertisers. If you don't do it yourself understand what you're hiring people for and understand the work that you're hiring for.

My next fixed advice is don't use credit cards. We started our business on credit cards but I've seen too many people screw up going this path. Eventually you'll have credit with networks you work with but even then.

So I guess what I'm trying to say is learn with somebody else thats already doing it that is successful. Learn by watching and being associated with them. Dont pay them anything. Go get a job somewhere or befriend somebody in the industry that knows what they're doing.

Affiliate marketing isn't a space that you just figure out. All of us have been shown something that helped us come up with our own ideas and those people that showed us those things were already in the industry doing well.

Know that affiliate networks might pay you and they may not pay you. You could make $30,000 with the network and one day they'll decide not to pay you last thousand bucks they owe you.

This is just a rant I hope somebody got something out of it.