Is Affiliate Marketing Dead In 2024?

byPaulWatson

3.8K followers

3 weeks ago

Hey WA'ers,

And welcome to the land of doom and gloom... where everything is crumbling around us and the big bad behemoth called Google lauds over us like the eye of Sauron! Affiliate marketing is dead! You cannot make money with affiliate marketing any more! The glory days are done!

Well, at least that is what I am hearing and reading... Facebook, YouTube, Podcasts and so on... it's all the same - Google has ruined everything and it is just too hard...

Is it though? Is it really?

Elephant in the room - Google and AI

So let's start here... and I will keep this brief (we can dissect it more in the comments below if you like). As we know, in the last 12 months or so, AI generative software programs such as ChatGPT and Koala etc. have emerged making it easy for us affiliate marketers to pump out loads of content like never before.

Now I am not here to discuss the pros and cons and effective uses of AI however at the time Google said - "as long as it is helpful - go for it! We won't punish you". To which a lot of us (me included - and I will get to that) were pumping out 100 or so posts a month - and rankings rose nicely!

But then Google struck a problem - whilst our intentions might have been pure - many were not and the inundation began. I mean I have heard stories of website owners having their sitemaps scraped and replacement posts popping up on other sites in a matter of hours - 1000s of posts uploaded in under an hour - all written entirely with AI.

What did this mean for Google? So much content that it couldn't possibly rank it all.

So it tried to fix it with EEAT... Again, I will let you be the judge on how effective (baby? bathwater?) that was.

E.E.A.T

So, Lord Sauron (sorry Google - can you tell I just re-watched LOTR?) came up with this new edict by which all websites (unless you are Forbes, Quora or reddit for some reason) will behave. This has been covered here ad-nauseum at WA but in a nutshell - here it is:

1. Experience: This refers to the practical knowledge or firsthand experience the content creator has on the topic. Google looks for content that is informed by personal experience or demonstrates a depth of understanding of the subject. For example, a review written by someone who has actually used the product is valued for its experiential insights.
2. Expertise: Expertise assesses the formal knowledge or skill level of the content creator in the relevant field. A content creator doesn’t always need formal qualifications; what matters is that they are knowledgeable and can provide helpful, accurate information on the topic. For instance, a skilled hobbyist or enthusiast could be considered an expert in their area of interest.
3. Authoritativeness: This measures the credibility of the website, the content, and the content creator within their field. Authoritativeness is established through the reputation among peers, recognition by authoritative figures in the field, and evidence of thought leadership or acknowledgment in the form of awards, testimonials, or references.
4. Trustworthiness: Trustworthiness evaluates the reliability and truthfulness of the content, the content creator, and the website. It includes considerations like the accuracy of the content, transparency about authorship and the site’s purpose, clear distinction between ads and content, and the presence of legitimate contact information. Trust is also built through secure and private handling of user data and transactions.

Now that was AI written - could you tell?

So, Does this really mean the end of Affiliate Marketing?

Personally, I don't believe so. I don't even think it is a little harder - you just maybe have to do things a little (or a lot) differently. But dead? No.

And here's why.

There is a saying that has been around for years in affiliate marketing - in fact it is one of the first things I remember reading when I joined WA what seems like 200 years ago - CONTENT IS KING!

I have seen much debate on this sentence but in my humble opinion - apart from the minor fact that content, regardless of type, the is the only way someone is going to come across an affiliate link - it is still king.

Furthermore, my take on the whole EEAT thing makes this even more true. Google is telling us that if our content meets these criteria - it will rank it (maybe, if you ask nicely and write it on a Tuesday between 3 and 4:15am whilst wearing a black T-shirt).

My experience

Ok, so all I have to go on here is my own experience. You see, along with many of you, when Lord Google smite us down with its mighty algorithmic sword (seriously Paul - stop watching fantasy television), my sites got absolutely smashed. Over 80% of traffic goneski across two sites literally overnight.

Then it rose a bit - then the second swipe hit and they now lay on a stretcher awaiting the stitches and amputations.

And in all seriousness, I took my bat and ball, turned on the XBox, built medieval villages for a week and took my anger out on the game AI that was trying to so the same.

All the while calling Google every name I could think of - after-all, and I still feel this, they literally punished 1000s of us for something they were telling us to do up until a week before - no warning, no "we are going to do this so you have a month to get things in shape", just BANG!

I was done!

Site breakdown

Once the haze cleared and I felt a little calmer, I did some research and checked out my sites. Here is what I discovered:

Site 1: MMO - lost around 80% of traffic but stabilized. Nearly no AI writing but a lot ( and I mean over 200 posts) of old software reviews and how tos that had not been looked at for years. The site was old and needed a lift.

Site 2: Travel site - written based on my own travel experience but almost entirely AI based. It got smashed from around 2000 impressions and 150 clicks a day to 15 impressions and 1 click in the last week.

Site 3: A brand new site on BBQ - narrow niche - minimal AI (I mean how am i going to write a recipe any differently to AI) and lot's of my own photos and videos. It was brand new when the algorithm hit but has been rising steadily with 2.1k impressions and 14 organic clicks (much more via socials) after only 1 month.

So what does this prove?

What I take from this is that whilst Google has moved the goal posts in perhaps a fashion that is less than favorable, it has in fact taught us (well me at least) to take more care in what I do. So, this is what I have done with each site since:

Site 1: MMO - I have decided to narrow this site back to purely affiliate marketing so I have gone hard here and deleted any old review post. Over 200 posts gone. Next I have no-indexed all of my MLM reviews - these were good for traffic in the past but did not lead to sales. I will update them in time and run a video on YouTube to see if I can drive traffic back to them in other ways - Medium might work here too.

I am now working through each affiliate marketing post and refreshing - removing bad content and making the whole thing a little simpler.

Results: This site has seen a 5% increase in impressions and traffic in the last two weeks - Google is still updating as far as I know so time will tell here.

Site 2: To be honest, I haven't touched this one as yet. But I will go back and start re-writing posts in my own words and removing anything that is not adding value to the site.

Results: --------------------------------------------------

Site 3: This is my litmus test. I am working on this one more and more ensuring I stick to EEAT philosophies and keeping my content simple and succinct. I am also not trying to post 100s of posts per week - rather taking a more organic growth approach.

I have also worked social media a lot more here - Constantly updating my socials with photos, memes (these work really well on FaceBook) and videos.

Results: To be honest, this site is growing as fast as any other has in my time with what seems to be a little less content input. I have stuck to the narrow niche - a particular brand pellet smoker - kept the content simple and used other avenues. In fact, social media makes up for around 40% of my traffic now.

So, Is Affiliate Marketing Dead?

Based on my work recently, not at all!

Is it harder? Not really!

You just have to work it a little differently. Content is still king, however you may need to adjust how you deliver it is all.

Thoughts?

Paul