Being an affiliate marketer is great and there’s a ton of money to be made of course… But at the end of the day, we still live on a day to day and paycheck to paycheck basis. At any point in time, revenue can fade to nothingness and that’s the end of that story…

I’ve been stressing a ton about this to be honest. It sucks. We’re at the bottom, the front lines… So volatile, so easy to lose it all, so little time left. I don’t mean to scare the living shit out of you guys haha… Just something to think about if you want to stabilize in this industry.

There are several options that I see that are all logical steps for an affiliate depending on what he/she wants to achieve.

So where do I go now…

1. Affiliate Network

This is probably one of the most common ways to go. If you’re an affiliate you should be able to run an affiliate network just fine.

Pros:
- You already know how to pull traffic and should already have a system in place so running your own offers in house should not be a problem.

- If you have a good reputation and solid relationships (no not rss readers) with a lot of affiliates, then you’ve already got a good foundation.

- Your margins are way bigger, this also gives you an advantage on the field with other affiliates and of course more profits in general.

Cons:
- Payment terms will be ridiculous. We’re talking net 30, net 45 here… Be ready to float a !shit load! of money.

- In addition to floating money because you don’t get paid by the advertiers… If you have affiliates, be ready to start paying weeklies - even more floating of a shit ton of money.

- You’ll need a good amount of resources, a sales team to start bringing in offers for the best you can get. A design team to make creatives and landing pages. And if you’re bringing in a lot of affiliates you’ll need managers. All this means training.

- Everyone is starting an affiliate network. There’s a billion already out there. It’s hard to break in unless you have something unique to offer and even then it would have to be pretty amazing.

2. Advertising Network

Again, very logical step. You have some big niches as an affiliate? Well find the traffic sources and start making media buys - nothing to lose.

Pros:
- When your network gets fairly big you will be cranking a ton of leads/sales for yourself or for advertisers. Traffic is money and you control it.

- You take the advertiser’s money and pay the publishers with it and then take your cut :).

Cons:
- You need a pretty good media buying team to be making deals as fast as possible and with the best terms. This is going to take a big dedication and a lot of time to get going - 1 url per day (hopefully)?

- Contact info for webmasters is honestly a pain in the ass to find. 80% of it will be obsolete or blocked. Have fun?

3. Expand Your Affiliate Model

You don’t necessarily have to start something new. You can always refine your affiliate model to something more streamlined, more automated, quicker, faster, better, more intelligent etc etc. Whether this is hiring employees or building scripts/programs.

Pros:
- You don’t have to deal with all the other crap the affiliate networks do (mostly payment terms).

- If you plan and restructure to the best of your ability… Hopefully you’ll be able to be cranking out full blown campaigns within a few days (not half assed lazy campaigns). Testing campaigns will be cake and hopefully you’ll find stability with 20-30 solid niches.

- You can start expanding in more ways traffic wise: PPC, SEO, media buying, email marketing.

- You can start expanding your margins by going direct with the advertisers.

Cons:
- It still sucks at the bottom. You have to comply to policies which seem to come every week.

- The margins still suck and it basically niches will go on a downhill slope sooner than later.

- You have to worry about quality or you’ll get cut.

- On top of all this, you have to do the affiliate work with 100% commitment and effort even knowing that the affiliate networks are sitting there banking on you (for the time you’re with the network)… And the advertisers are sipping pina coladas ballllllllllllllering it up thanks to your leads/sales.

4. Be the Advertiser

This is a bigger step. It’ll take quite a bit of networking, business skills to get deals and the “inside” scoop on things. This will require the most finances, a TON of it too. But in the long term, you could be bankrolling Lamborghini’s for fun.

Pros:
- You’ll need connections. Big connections depending on what you want to do. This isn’t a couple months type thing… This is more like 6+ months for 1 product/service.

- Payment terms are ridiculous.

- You likely won’t see any profits until 5+ months after taking your leads.

Cons:
- At the end, you will have so much money you won’t know what the hell to do.

- Don’t be surprised if you receive emails from some higher beings in the legal system ;).

- Customer support anyone? That’ll be like a daily migraine.

- You definitely need an idea. One that is flawless in theory to compensate for what crap might come in the future.

- If you’re just hopping in the same niche, expect some tough competition… They already have a big start on you… You’ll need to be different some how.

Ending thoughts

You can always do a little bit of everything… But imagine how much of a clusterfuck that will be.

At the end of the day what is your goal? For me, I want a big sale… The one that puts millions in the bank so I can retire anytime.  I hate living paycheck to paycheck, the idea just drips insecurity.

So what will it be for you? I’m honestly still trying to figure it out and it always seems like there’s a clock ticking next to me when I think about it.

PS (Thanks Max)

Also consider that if you’re an affiliate… You’re not very sellable. You sell your skills/talent. If youre a network, an advertiser or an advertising network you can easily sell.

Hat tip to my boys Ken, Dan, Cyrus, Max and Dave for some of the ideas in this post.

Until next time…

There’s almost always a gray area there… Go make money.

(yes I know I haven’t posted in a century, will try to more often.)

Bad Idea: Start a ridiculous service - good post and discussion on nicky’s blog.

Good Idea: Find a niche that does well on a network and do some heavy research on how it’s being promoted, that’s the key to profits.

Bad Idea: Instant message people asking “what niches do you do?” or “what niches are profitable?”.

Good Idea: Blog if you have unique ideas and value to add to the industry and post only when you do.

Bad Idea: Don’t blog if you haven’t been in the industry for more than 3 years, please. It’s just an ego inflater and you will get torn up by the real experienced people who can pick out your bullshit.

Cool!

First of all, I seriously just like to thank everybody for following this blog even though I rarely post nowadays. Things have gotten pretty busy, days have gotten longer (but shorter time wise), free time isn’t so easy to come by any more. I know I’m not always able to respond to everybody’s comments, but I do appreciate any feedback and input you guys have!

Now, the celebration today is for 40 readers that follow this blog. You’re thinking in sarcasm: “wow 40 readers, you rock”.

You don’t have to have thousands of readers to have a good blog. You just want the handful of people that matter, your industry buddies and/or the people that know what the hell is going on and obviously know that you’re authentic. These 40 are way more difficult to come by than 500 random people that found your blog on the internet through one of your bait posts.

Some Popular Questions

Many people question why I never post on my blog about affiliate marketing strategies or just internet marketing in general.

There’s really only one reason why, it’s not worth it. I mean it’s not worth it to give an awesome strategy to the public because 99% of them wouldn’t know what to do with it, don’t know who the hell you are and are  probably just looking for “how to become rich overnight” posts.

I’d much rather you find me at a conference, introduce yourself and then ask me things in person.

I’d also much rather see my tips, advice and strategies that I give to people have a direct influence toward their success. I’m not sure about you guys but I’d be way more happier to see people I know make thousands off of my idea, than some random reader making hundreds (no offense to the random readers). I’m just more personal like that.

High level discussions, advanced strategies etc.

This kind of goes with my last paragraph. If I discuss some advanced strategies publically, I would get little to no feedback from the general audience (I’m talking about real feedback). However I’d love to sit down in person with a handful of solid affiliates and toss up a topic for discussion. Instant feedback from competent people who’ve already put in the work it takes to get where they are today.

This Damn Cutthroat Industry

This is industry is such a “cut throat” industry for one reason - greed. People can never be satisfied with what they have even though a year ago they were working a dead beat full time job that they hated waking up every morning for and today they work at home, when they want, how they want and still make more money. That’s why people are so secretive about their stuff and some even lie.

I can honestly say, that I’m satisfied with what I have right now. My goal coming into this industry was to be able to pay the bills and have a little more money for the nicer things in life. As long as I can maintain this, I’m perfectly happy.

Don’t get greed mixed in with passion though. Just like myself, I know a lot of affiliates have learned to love and appreciate this industry, especially the ones that have gone through rough times and have been in the industry trying to make money for years. And it does piss me (and them) off when people take this industry for granted; lie, cheat, steal just for the money. Oh yeah and ego is never respected.

But for us, it’s simple, the money just comes with the work that we love to do.

The Future

I think 2008 has by far been the biggest “affiliate” boom. There are so many more affiliates in the industry now. It’ll only get more difficult though. After this year, it’ll cost more to break into the industry in both capital and real knowledge which seems to be harder and harder to find as the industry grows older. Especially now with 100 “super affiliate” blogs and everybody posting their checks for referrals, faking rss readers, etc. etc.

I think 2009 will be the true breaking point. Which affiliates stepped it up into the next level of affiliate marketing? Which affiliates are authentic? Which affiliates got cut? Which affiliates made the right choices? Which affiliate strategies worked? Next year, these questions and many more will be answered.

A Farewell for Now

For those who consider themselves successful, cheers. Wake up every morning with a smile on your face because you make more money than most full time careers, you work your own hours, you are your own boss and hopefully you are truly passionate about this industry.

For those who are still trying and things aren’t quite working out yet… Take a new strategy. Work smarter. I’ve reflected  upon this quote so many times since it was given to me by someone who has helped me and who I contribute a lot of my success to.

“Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” - Einstein

To everyone, the best of luck and cheers to your future success.

My room view from the iphone.

AzoogleAds have been asking affiliates to place a pixel on their landing page that looks like this:

img src=”http://i.azjmp.com/XABC” width=”1″ height=”1″

(funny that I wasn’t asked to place one).

Note that this has happened to multiple sources of mine. Their reasoning, from this source is this:

(7:00:45 PM) source: they want to increase their comscore rank and if i place the pixel on my high traffic sites, it’ll appear as tho azoogle is getting the hits and therefore increase their rank.
(7:00:55 PM) source: i asked them why they care if their rank increases and they beat around the bush
(7:01:00 PM) BlueBobbo: LMFAO.
(7:01:03 PM) source: haha
(7:01:06 PM) BlueBobbo: OMG
(7:01:10 PM) BlueBobbo: I want to blog the fuck out of this
(7:01:22 PM) source: other strange thing is… (and u probably know the answer to it cuz ur a coder)….
(7:01:44 PM) source: if they REALLY just wanted to increase comscore ranking, they’d give everyone the same pixel….
(7:01:50 PM) source: at least each affiliate the same pixel…
(7:01:57 PM) BlueBobbo: WOW.
(7:02:03 PM) BlueBobbo: That’s freaken bullshit

Now lets take a quick trip back in the timeline of Azoogle Ads:

1. Azoogle boots nearly a couple dozen employees.
2. Cutting referral commissions.
3. Rebranding to Epic Advertising.
4. Asking affilaites to place pixels.

Hidden agenda possibly? Now the predictions.

1. This one is my prediction: I believe that they are making a last ditch effort to try to collect data before being bought out.
2. Another source prediction: They’re trying to measure their outreach so they know how much to sellout for.
3. Another source prediction: They might be taking data and using it for their search marketing company “Bazaar”.
   1. My addition to the 3rd: With the capital and resources they can basically just roll kids no problem.

So come on now. All this shit sounds like investors behind it. If all of this means absolutely nothing… This industry is officially boooooooooooorrring.

It’s not like decades ago where you can slap up a TV ad blindly and get thousands of sales the next day. That doesn’t work any more. Nor is it like years back when Adwords was new and didn’t care what you bid on and had no real quality score.

Today it’s difficult. Quality data is hard as hell to come by. You have to be smarter, faster, more savvy and more intuitive than your competitors and ignorance is failure. You aren’t likely to succeed otherwise.

Now back to the real topic about data.

As internet marketers, we buy hundreds or thousands of dollars worth of data daily, so that in itself should already show how much data is worth. We gather every piece of information that we can about it: referrer, search engine, keyword, time, date, IP address, geo location, costs, impressions, click through rate. Yet another display of how valuable data is.

So my question is… Why the fuck, would you share it with anyone without a price?

I don’t care if the President wanted to place his pixel on my landing page, I’d say “fuck off.”

This industry is new and it’s flowing with ridiculous amounts of cash. You know what happens when there’s a lot of money to be made? All trust and integrity is left at grandma’s house.

Let me ask you this, would you place my pixel on your landing page?

Then why the fuck would you place a pixel you’re affiliate manager asks you to place? They ask because you have a choice. One of your choices is saying “get the fuck out of here”.

Note: This post was written in good faith and wasn’t meant to offend anyone.

You are what the industry deems you are. I’m talking about the real industry:

• The real affiliates who truly make money and are truly skilled and who are smart enough to not blog about it or get cocky.
• The networks.
• The advertisers.

The term has been so brutally raped it’s literally meaningless now.

So, if someone says they’re a super affiliate, ask them “What the FUCK is a super affiliate?”, make sure you give them the *look at this douchebag* facial expression.

See, the thing with me and cameras is that I fail. I bought a Canon Powershot for Christmas (not an affiliate link), hoping to take pictures at ASW Vegas, but failed to take any.

I didn’t even take it with me to SES, the few pictures I get are the ones I take on my IPHONE - luls.

So here’s a picture taken by a WhatsPoppin.net photographer of me and Danny (AM at Copeac) at a club called Guest House… I look so totally useless:

And one of me and Jeff (AM at Copeac), at the same club by Victory2Multimedia.com, this time I look ok, and Jeff is PHASED. Ok now that I think about it, I still look useless in this one. Give me a break, it was the last night in town and the night before I got wrecked like I did in Vegas:

Next stop is Ad Tech San Francisco… Maybe I’ll actually take pictures there because I’m flying in 3 days early since the boys have some plans.

(”hmm, if I turn it upside down it might help me solve this dumb x and y axis ridonculousness”) 

Hi, Super Affiliate Geometry 101.