network marketing vs affiliate marketing: Why affiliate marketing is much better

If you want to know why I came to wealthy affiliate, it was because I wanted to learn how to build a business and make passive income. My first foray into this new venture was through network marketing. I did not make a single dime from it whatsoever and wanted to try a different strategy. That was when I thought about doing affiliate marketing and learning from the Wealthy Affiliate platform. So with my experience in both the network marketing realm and the affiliate marketing realm, I want to go over the differences.

So Network Marketing vs. Affilate Marketing: What is the difference?

Network marketing: The business model is based on signing up and paying to be a part of a business opportunity. After paying the sign up fee, you then are able to sell the company's products. This will vary based on the products they are offering and the type of company they are. Some companies fall into the health and fitness, others financial, others cosmetics, etc. The other way to make money within these companies is to recruit other members into the system to sell the products. This is called your "downline". You make money every time they sell the product to other people or whenever their "downlines" sell a product. This is where the residuals come it.

Affiliate marketing: Affiliate marketing on the other hand is free to sign up to a company's affiliate program. Said another way, affiliate marketing has NO SIGN UP FEES! All you need to do is fill out a form and grab your affiliate links. The only cost in affiliate marketing are a website domain and a hosting platform. The money is made in affiliate marketing when a visitor of your blog clicks on a link and buys a product from the company. For example, I recommend a product someone can get on amazon, they click the link, they buy the product from amazon, amazon pays me.

So which model do I like better and why?

With Network Marketing, I loved the idea of recruiting new people into my "business" with the attempt to make residual income from them but hated the actual recruiting part and getting shut down with "pyramid scheme" and understandably so. On top of that, I started to feel equally as sleazy about asking personal friends and family to help me out under the false pretense of "helping me get training". It just didn't feel as authentic to me.

With Affiliate Marketing, I love that I can recommend products that I truly enjoy and I love the fact that I can recommend the Wealthy Affiliate Course to people who are looking to start a passion related niche blog with the idea of making money in it. I have seen so many websites here at Wealthy Affiliate in many different topics. Fitness, Drone Flying, Stock Trading, Metal Detecting, Dog Training, etc. There is no bounds to what niches you want to pursue. The fact that I can help someone learn how to make money in their passion drives me to continue recommending this course. I feel less sleazy recommending this wonderful community because I believe now that this place is all about helping each other and I know that this course can help anyone with making money from whatever type of blog they want to start.

What is your experience in both Network Marketing and Affiliate Marketing if you have had an experience in them? Are you indifferent? Do you like one over the other?