Beginner Affiliate Thoughts: Things I Have Learned After (roughly) One Month
I had to check my subscription start date when my wife mentioned that I have been working on my affiliate sites for a little over a month. Well, its true - and that means that it is time for some reflection! I thought I would share my thoughts with the community in case they are helpful to anyone.
- It's not a race
When I started I had this sensation that any time that my site was not up and running was time that a sale could be lost. While you could argue that this is actually true, I think it is more important, potentially more honest, (and less stressful) to have a plan for building your buisness up to the level you want to maintain rather than rushing in to a market with a half baked plan.
- It takes time, planning, and effort
This is an actual business and should be treated as such. You need to spend dedicated time working on your business. You should have a plan with some achievable goals, and you will need to spend actual effort on building your business and planning. You also need downtime! Even if something is super fun - you can get burned out on it.
- Quality in quantity, not just quantity
With the tools that WA provides, it is easy to generate a lot of content very quickly. It is probably tempting to blast a site full of content the first day you set it up. Maybe that will work for some business models, but I think it is more worthwhile to slowly build your content and community. Sites that go for quantity are easily identified and that can break trust.
- Start slow
I was so excited about the opportunity that I took a personal day from my career job to research and build my site. Then I had an idea for anotehr site - so I started building that one too. This repeated a couple of times and I ended up working on 5 sites. This is unsustainable for me and I found that as i added on more sites and more work, the fun decreased and the quality across the sites decreased as well.
- Dont get stuck in ideation
Hot on the heels of starting slow, I had (and continue to have) ideas that sound absolutely amazing. Its really easy for me to get stuck on this point in the process and fail to launch anything at all. At some point you need to just get going and do the dang thing. :)
- You may not need all of those tools
I am a firm believer that there are times when you need to spend money. This is dangerous because people will try to sell you anything and everything nowadays. To make things more complicated, advertising and the fear of missing out is so tuned that you can be convinced that the super keyboard 1k is ESSENTIAL to getting more sales.
- You (probably) wont make a thousand dollars in your first week
I get so many suggestions in all of my feeds for proven methods to make thousands and millions of dollars. Im sure we all get these. Sure, there may be some people who have hit the jackpot quickly, somehow, but I honestly feel like a lot of these things are the same information you can find for free (or common sense things you already know) wrapped up in a colorful package. At worse they are literal scams.
Anyhoo - just thought I would share some of the things I picked up over the last 40 odd days. Hope everyone is having a k
Recent Comments
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Some really great insights here after you first month, you are learning lots and you are getting a sound understanding of how your work flow is going to work, what to focus on, and what to prioritize.
Success doesn't happen overnight as you say. It can and will happen though if you give yourself adequate time, and if you give yourself adequate time you are outlasting immediately 90% of people that are only willing to work for short periods of time (usually a few months or less) to create success. You have a real competitive advantage if you understand this early on. :)
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Hi Jeramy!
Congratulations on your one‑month milestone...that’s a huge first accomplishment 🎉.
I really appreciate how you’re treating this like a real business: planning ahead, pacing yourself, and staying intentional.
Your point about quality in quantity really hit home! It’s so tempting to churn out content fast, but your approach of building trust and sustainable momentum is clearly the smarter path
A couple of things resonated with me deeply:
- “It’s not a race” >>> that mindset shift relieves so much pressure.
- Downtime matters >>> even the most exciting projects need breath.
- Avoiding idea paralysis >>>you go in with both eyes open, even investing when it counts instead of waiting for some mythical perfect moment.
I’m curious... what’s been your most helpful planning tool or strategy for mapping out content and growth over the last month? Also, how do you unwind to avoid burnout? Any rituals or routines worth sharing?
Keep sharing these insights...they’re gold for anyone just getting started!
🙌
Appreciate the kind words Fleeky.
Even though I have a consistent schedule with posting, I feel like I am still trying to find my workflow. At the moment I usually brainstorm and jot down ideas in Notion (https://www.notion.com) and then create a chunk of content at once so I have a few posts ready for posting days.
For burnout, I think that the secret is developing an internal meter that allows you to understand how 'worked' you are feeling. Ive done quite a bit of thought on burnout and imposter syndrome - maybe that should be a new post!
Did you try the hubs content creator?
I did use the content creator when I first started but i fell out of the habit - I think because I loaded up so many bits of content in there that I got overwhelmed :). I'll have to give it another look.
Ok...
let us know how it goes
👍