What Does It Take to Be an Affiliate Marketer?

Affiliate marketing (successful affiliate marketing that is) requires three basic components; time, effort, and money. Sure there is a lot more to it than that but prepare to spend some time working, putting a lot of effort in, and putting up some money.

But the "gurus" say I can make money tomorrow?

Quite frankly, that is just a statement to get you to buy their products. Period. I would venture to say that most if not all new affiliate marketers will not make a dime their first day. In fact, probably not the first week or first month. Afiiliate marketing takes time to get going. As the saying goes, "Rome was not built in a day." Don't expect to make money right away. Now, you might get lucky and present the right offer to the right person right out of the gate. And some have done that. But those results are not typical and really was luck more than anything.

But Jason, I hear you only have to put an hour a day in to make money?

Again, a common scheme used to lure you in to buy the product. Anyone who has been doing affiliate marketing long enough knows that it requires more time than that. Sure, once you get everything set up, you might able to get away with an hour a day but just starting out, no way. Affiliate marketing takes effort, and a lot of it to be successful. If you worked an hour a day at your job, how much do you think it would accomplish? How much would you make? Would the company beneift from your work? The concept of little time for a lot of gain just doesn't make sense and is unrealistic.

Affiliate marketing programs are expensive!

Yes, believe it or not, affiliate marketing will require you to spend some money. Probably more than you are comfortable with at first. That is the harsh reality. Not only do you have the program cost, but the cost of the opt-in pages, emails, autorepsonder, traffic, etc. If you treat affiliate marketing like a business, these are just the expenses it takes to get started. Again, once everything is set up, you can sit back and watch it develop, but that will require some good spending up front, as well as time and effort.

Why do people do it then?

Affiliate marketing is all about the long game. Your job as a good affiliate marketer is to build a relationship with people who trust you, so they are more likely to buy what you have to sell. Building those relationships will take time, effort, and money. A lot of the work will happen up front but the long term benefits can be great. There are a lot of successful affiliate marketers out there that can attest to this.

Play the long game and you will be on your way!

To your success,
Jason