352 Referrals In 2023 to 0 Referrals In 2024!
I was just checking out my referrals on Wealthy Affiliate, as I used to receive quite a few referrals. I never really knew where the referrals came from and was always surprised by how many referrals I received.
I’ve just checked my stats for 2023, which were 352 referrals and for 2024 I have zero referrals! My last referral was on December 22nd, 2023. Many of the referrals that I received had usernames that did not come over as genuine, such as names like gyFCDljRDe, which never came over as very genuine. However, some of the names do appear to be genuine signups for a free account.
So, what changed after December 22nd, 2023? As far as I know, nothing has changed from my end.
It will be interesting to hear if other members have experienced something similar.
Thank you for reading.
Roy
Recent Comments
65
I have no answer for you, Roy. I don't get many referrals mostly just free ones after I show someone Wealthy Affiliate but I haven't had any of those referrals either for a long time —over a year.
Hope you get it sorted out. That is such a huge difference. There must be some explanation.
Karin
Good morning Karin,
That's interesting, Karin, it appears that many people have experienced the same. It also appears that members are saying it's due to bot filtering and Google updates, which sounds feasible.
Have a great Sunday.
Roy
This is a pretty drastic change. I do receive referrals that are basically fake from people that encounter my website or facebook page. I don't understand why they make fake referrals. There certainly aren't as many as you have. Have any of those converted to a WA account set up?
Jim
I have had some genuine referrals, Jim, but not many, as I'm not actively promoting Wealthy Affiliate. I'm guessing that Wealthy Affiliate has changed the bot settings, which is good, and many people are saying it could have to do with the Google updates.
I appreciate your input.
Roy
I'm still receiving between 5 and 10 every day. It is such a pain, and although Carson made some updates to the system to prevent this, I am still getting them. Even though I know they are not valid, I still have to open each one and unfollow so they are not in my network.
That's interesting Jenni, that's a lot 5 to 10 every day! That's interesting that some people are getting these spam type referrals and others are not. An interesting subject. I appreciate you commenting.
All the best.
Roy
I have had one referral this year and many many last year. The difference was my paid ad campaigns. I did over spend and had to stop those for at least this year. Learned a lot. Conversions were a small number for me. Using you tube this time around. Gettin clicks and views but need to tweak to get referrals. Best of luck to you!
Anne
Thank you for your reply, Anne, it's appreciated.
It's interesting that you tried a Google ads campaign, I always think it's quite a fine line with Google ads and there is also quite a learning curve. I use Google ads for my offline business, but I haven't tried for Wealthy Affiliate as yet.
I'm glad you're trying YouTube, Anne, as I know you have experience with YouTube. Have you tried promoting any of those videos with paid ads?
All the best.
Roy
Thanks Roy! I have not done any ads for YouTube as of yet. I’ve been thinking about it. I’m not yet monitized and need the view hours to come organically I believe for them to count towards by 4K. Will report
Anne
I understand where you're coming from, Anne.
I'm going back quite a few years, but I'm used to know of a lady who used to promote products through YouTube paid ads. She found that it was considerably cheaper to promote a YouTube video than it was to promote a webpage.
Once again, this was probably around five years ago, so things may have changed.
A very happy Sunday to you.
Roy
See more comments
There's a few simple questions to ask here: Is all your content that was converting for you last year ranking the same, or is it no longer ranking and dropped off the map? Are you creating content this year at the same pace as you were last year? How is that new content doing? Is the new content ranking? Or has your traffic dropped?
Great questions to ask.
Karin
Hi Eric,
It isnt any of the obvious things, I get about 20 clicks a day on my referral links and no sign ups, that is very unusual for me and it looks like everybody else is having the same issues.
Maybe you are dominating the sign ups for Wealthy Affiliate?
Regards
Brian
Well how do we know it's none of those things? I was asking Roy specifically because he mentioned his numbers from last year, so those questions for him are really relevant to figuring out the change in his specific situation.
But, with your separate situation, let's think about this logically, if you're getting 20 clicks a day on your links, this would be beyond great, right? It would mean the articles those links are in like your WA review, etc., are all getting anywhere from 150-200 visits a day to have that many click throughs, maybe even more. With that kind of activity on your site you'd expect lots of organic comments, engagement, etc., and those articles would be on page 1 getting solid traffic daily which is great. However, if that content isn't on page 1 getting all that traffic and you're not seeing engagement or comments but the stats still show affiliate links getting 20 clicks a day, then you'd start to lean toward this would be bot behavior because the number of clicks don't add up to the lack of activity.
That's where diversifying your approach can help, using your site, maybe social media, YouTube, etc., so your clicks are coming from lots of different spaces and a hit on one doesn't bottom you out as much 👍🏼
Thank you for commenting, Eric; it's appreciated.
I don't feel like I'm doing anything different, but I appreciate your wise advice, as it makes a lot of sense and is something that I need to do. I need to check Google Analytics and Google Search Console.
Have a great week.
Roy
Thank you, Eric. Your last paragraph sounds like a very wise move! The importance of having traffic from different sources.
Have a great day.
Roy
Hi Eric,
My traffic come's from everywhere:
Twitter/X, my website, google ads, Facebook, YouTube, Pinterest and lastly organic traffic.
Regards
Brian