Is Working Online from Home in Affiliate Marketing a Cottage Industry?

byKezqb

370 followers

Updated 6 years ago

"Can you really earn money working from home online?" asked my friend as we debated on my full-time work from home online status and especially him labeling online entrepreneurship in affiliate marketing as "minial cottage industry".

I came out with guns blazing, determined not to let him win with the "minial cottage industry" statement. Subtracting the "minial" word, it got me thinking whether online affiliate marketing is really a Cottage Industry and why?

Is Online Affiliate Marketing A Cottage Industry?

First, the Merriam Webster Dictionary defines cottage industry as

• an industry whose labor force consists of family units or individuals working at home with their own equipment;
  
• a small and often informally organized industry; and
  
• a limited but enthusiastically pursued activity or subject.
  

The main characteristics of a traditional cottage industry is:

• specialized form of activity that is basically unorganized in nature and come under small scale industry.
  
• work done from home with family members supplying labor.
  
• low capital costs for startup and maintaining the business.
  
• production of simple products using simple equipment owned by the owner.
  
• use of indigenous technology producing basic consumable goods.
  
• not a mass producers of commodities.
  

My friend argued that business is about "volume" and cottage industries do not produce volume nor are there enough customers because prices are normally high. Big companies who mass-produce sell at lower costs, and prices determines people's spending patterns.

So which of the features of a cottage industry does internet affiliate marketing differs from traditional cottage industry?

• 100% use of high technology (internet technology)
  
• Do not deal with the production of physical goods
  
• Biggest volume of customers ever at 3.5 billion people and counting
  
• The internet is a big and ever-changing industry with unlimited business opportunities
  

So is home-based online affiliate marketing a cottage industry? YES and NO!

Tell me your thoughts by leaving a comment below.

Earn Money Working From Home Online

Working from home in your own business in internet affiliate marketing ticks the box for some characteristics of cottage industry. But my view is that it is not cottage industry. It may be called an hybrid sort of thing.

The use of internet technology takes away all the barriers of time, space and limited customers that a traditional cottage industry is faced with. It puts one in front of 3.5 billion people who are potential customers.

You don't even have to produce your own goods. But you can produce information products and refer people to someone from anywhere in the world who is producing the goods and you earn money in the process.

Here at Wealthy Affiliate, you get all the training, resources and the platform to do that.

Economic Empowerment of Women in Cottage Industry

Studies have found that Cottage Industry has given economic independence to the women in the developing as well as developed countries.

If that is the case for traditional Cottage Industry, image the potential for more women to excel in an online business that they can work from home.