There's Too Many Wealthy Affiliate Exclusive Sites!
I've been working in the SiteComments, giving SiteFeedback, and mingling with others here are the Wealthy Affiliate Community and THERE'S WAY TOO MANY WA ONLY SITES THAT ARE NOT ENTIRELY RELEVANT!
While I love WA, and their Affiliate Program is AMAZING, I'd be very upset to come to some people's sites looking for how to solve a problem and get plugged WA as the only solution. Some of us are not being realistic by posting WA as the only solution to the many problems that the headlines are suggesting that they solve. If you pose a questionable solution (ie. WA when there are more solutions), then it damages your credibility as a blogger.
Kyle talks about this in the Internet Marketing Training Certification Level 3 Lesson 2 and going forward. He introduces everyone to how to choose relevant affiliate programs for their niche. He also uses his site Lose Belly Fat Today as an example, and he says "I would not post WA as a promotion on this page because it is not relevant". If the founder would think outside of the box, not promote his own product and service in order to consider the customer first, why wouldn't we follow that example?
Some calls to action are more than 75% of the content! WTHeck! I read them and I'm mad and Im a stark WAer. Come on, Guys!
Give value, make a 2-5% (I'm making this percentage up) of the content CTA and give loads of value! Look at successful bloggers, their CTA's are not monopolizing their content like that. I'm not in that crowd yet, but I'm just saying.
Let's not get too stuck on getting our commissions from WA that we don't thoroughly brainstorm and investigate all of the possible solutions to our target audience's problems. There are other amazing affiliate programs out there that you can plug into and present that are actual realistic solutions.
One of my niche sites is on Entrepreneurship. WA is hugely relevant to a portion of my target audience, but what about the others? What about the brick and mortar guy who just wants to incorporate? Should I miss out on plugging Rocket Lawyers amazing affiliate program or Incorporate.com's amazing affiliate program because I'm too laser focused on WA? Absolutely not. WA is amazing so people will come but not everybody. That's life.
Should you limit your reach because everybody is not a WA fit? Are you trying to get a sales job for one company or are you trying to be an affiliate marketer? What are your thoughts?
The money will come with lesser traffic if you have more conversion opportunities. You'll need much more traffic to get conversions with one opportunity (especially if it's not laser focused relevant). Let's open our minds so we can make some real money.
Recent Comments
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Totally agree with you. Some websites are crazy hardcore about this.
There are others that are still focused on WA but they are doing it in the most intelligent way without looking spammy or losing any credibility whatsoever.
Probably that's why it took me too long to start promoting WA and even now I am trying my best to diversify and offer other options too (still have to search for quality programs as I don't want to recommend shitty ones too).
Have you seen Kyle's recommended way to find affiliate programs. I pretty much did that. Im not sure what you niche is but the Internet Marketing Training Level 3 Lesson 2 talks about finding affiliate programs other than WA
Believe it or not but I didn't manage to finish the bootcamp yet. Trying to keep up with the SA challenge. Thanks for pointing me the direction where to look.
Also, check out my message below under Jim's message - I am curious to hear your opinion.
Not Bootcamp. The Internet Marketing Certification. Bootcamp is only about promoting WA pretty much. The other course is broader.
Ah, you meant the online entrepreneur certification course - that's why I misunderstood, my bad!
When I am crossing a one way street i look the other way to. So we can used different Affiliate program to help.
Heya Tiffany, I hear you and have noticed this too. Those entrepreneur Affiliate programs sound fascinating.
Very well said! I've seen them as a problem too. Some people can't wait to start making money, so they are cutting corners in the sites they create.
It's very tempting so I understand. It's one of my favorite affiliate programs. It's an amazing combination of products and services so I love promoting it. It just is not relevant to everyone, and when we paint it that way, it looks like what turns many people off of network marketing.
I think you make an extremely important point. I think this also points to some starting bootcamp before doing certification and trying to sell WA before they know what direction to go and how to build a site. I know it's an option for all premium members, but I do think it's important to know a large part of the craft before trying to sell the platform. If you can't make money doing this yet, why promote it? That's my take on things anyway. I do have a WA focused site that I'm working on expanding to cover a lot of other work at home opportunities. WA is still my feature and my favorite thing to promote, but it's not the only focus, by far. Thanks for this!
Thanks for stopping by Preshuslove! I love your sites! Your doing a great job whenever I see a post. Keep it up!
Good insight, Tiffany!
I agree with you and Tony. With so many people promoting WA - many of them with totally unrelated niches - I have to wonder how much confidence they have in their ability to be successful within their own niche.
I know that if I go to a website looking for an expert on - say - camping equipment - I don't want to see advertisements promoting "How To Make Money With An Online Business" - I want to see great camping equipment.
If I see articles or advertisements that are NOT relevant to their website, I will instantly leave and find another website that gives me more confidence in their niche expertise.
I would not even think about promoting WA on my gardening website. If I'm going to do that, I will start a new website on "How To Make Money With An Online Business" and include a goodly number of possibilities in addition to WA - with Pros and Cons for each!
Jim
Good to see you Jim! You are definitely an expert in your field! No doubts about that.
Service before self is what I learned in the Air Force. When you put the customer first, and present solutions with integrity, they will magnetize to you. Most people don't do it on purpose. However, we are all looking to make money online and do it by following our interests. I'm okay with a little sprinkle of WA (small CTAs here and there) on a website that's not in the niche, but some people are going overboard. You can do it here and there. Many DIY bloggers are plugging Bluehost and their blogging techniques and it jives with some people in the audience so I understand that a sprinkle of it can work. Just not overboard.
You make a valid point, Jim, one that I agree with...but not entirely.
Who is to say that just because someone has an interest in gardening, that they do not have an interest in making money online also?
It's been a while since I've gone through the Certification, but I'm certain Kyle makes mention of it in the training. There is a tasteful way of being able to present your niche while inviting people to explore options, without them having them feel as if they are being beaten over the head with it.
I agree with what Tiffany said: too often, people just have so many ads that are not relevant to the niche, that just look distasteful and it appears as if the person is trying to hard to "get them". But there have been many times when I was looking for something specific, let's say scholarships, but then found myself reading a blog on how to earn income from home.
We could debate this for hours, but in the end, you need to ask yourself: Is what I'm doing working? If not, then perhaps it's time to change something.
I like that, Tiffany: service before self.
That really should be the foundation of what we do on this platform and on our websites.
Jim, Tiffany, while I agree with what you are saying, I still have to ask - what do you think if a small CTA is at the END of the very useful post?
I built a new technology related website and I talk about let's say 10 best cameras and then in the end I mention that something like:
"now that you have these awesome photos, it's time to create revenue, here is the program that helped me etc".
(I also have a banner on the sidebar saying "make money with photography").
Would you not like that too? I am curious.
Keep in mind that I really do write lengthy useful quality posts and the only CTA is at the end of the post and the sidebar, that's it.
I do the same thing. I wrote a post almost 4000 words about bullet journal ideas for entrepreneurs and I plug "if they're interesting in taking their business online, check this out". That isn't what I was referring to. The most successful millionaire bloggers like Michelle Groeder and Pat Flynn make 1/3 of their incomes from Bluehost (not entirely relevant to everything their sites are about but it works for their audience). Michelle writes on Personal Finance and she makes 30% of her money (1.5 million/month) from Bluehost by plugging if you want to learn blogging in several CTA's and income reports on her site. She writes like 2000+ word posts and has little CTAs here and there.
They don't monopolize the content. Pat Flynn is making 170,000/month (1/3 from Bluehost) writing about passive income and he plugs Bluehost as "If you want to learn online business, this is where you should start". He gives 1 hour podcasts with little CTA sponsor commercials inside. He posts blogs with little CTAs but lots of value. That's how I think it should be done. Value. Value. Value. Value. A Whole lot of value. Trust built. Then CTA. WA CTA's are fine but don't cut the value of your niche topic short for a WA CTA and don't talk about cameras without linking to a single camera and only recommending WA. Do you know what I'm saying?
My plan is to do exactly how the successful bloggers do, but rather than plugging Bluehost, I can plug an even better service.
Regardless of what niche, some people are going to be interested in "how do they get to spend their time at home writing about this while Im working", so it's nice to put it somewhere, but not to monopolize a site in a non-relevant way. Does that answer your question?
You made it perfectly clear for me and thank you for confirming that what I am doing is fine! I didn't pay much attention to their websites when I read their content but now I will look for their CTA and learn how to do it best without "monopolizing" in a non-relevant way as you said.
Appreciate your feedback, Tiffany!
You'll see what I mean. Their not the only ones to look at. Abby Lawson and Ruth Soukup are also bloggers who are making great money. Most post income reports (which get lots of traffic because people want to know how much you're making in the make money niche). Abby's blog is a DIY and organization blog, but her only product is teaching bloggers the framework of a successful blog (not relevant to her niche) but it works. Her primary content is about home organization but at times, she plugs "if you want to know how you can do what I do, then..." I can't say it doesn't work. I can say if she was posting "How to Makeover your kitchen" and she didn't solve that problem before plugging anything about her career choices, it wouldn't work. We just have to be careful that we solve our customers problems and don't get too focused on our own money situations.
Makes sense, that's exactly what I thought! I make sure I answer my visitors' questions as well as I can and if they manage to get to the bottom of the lengthy posts, then good for me/them as they will have additional info to look into.
And I thought the banner on the sidebar will also be relevant because at the moment I am focusing on cameras and the banner is about making money with photography, so I thought it should be fine since it's totally relevant to my niche.
I really don't see anything wrong with a CTA placed inconspicuously in a side bar or at the tail end of an occasional post as long as you don't go overboard with it.
As for me, I plan to keep my website clean and free of non-relevant CTAs - at least until I develop a sizeable readership. Then, and only then, I may consider a small, discreet CTA reference for WA in the sidebar.
Jim
Hi Veronica,
I use relevant "call to actions" in all my product review posts.
But, as I said to Tiffany, an unobtrusive CTA reference to "making money online with WA" can work as a "sidebar note." Just don't turn your "relevant website" into an "irrelevant garbage dump." Or, in my case, a "compost pile." :-)
When I have an established following, I will, most likely consider adding a "WA" CTA sometime down the road.
Jim
Great post. It often bothers me that there are so many WA focused sites as well, offering nothing more than join WA and then promote WA on your site to earn amazing commissions, which really starts to paint WA as nothing more than a pyramid scheme, when it is way more than that. I have promoted WA in one of my sites but only in a way that is relevant to what I was talking about and only as an option among others with the pros and cons of each discussed.
Good to see you Howzat! We're on the same page with this. I promote WA hardcore because many entrepreneurs do want to go online, so it's relevant. I try not to overdo it though. Thanks for chiming in. I didn't know how this post would go over, but I want people to make money and many people are not because of what they're doing.
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Great post! This should be a lesson that all of us take to heart! I will certainly be doing so. Thanks!
I'm glad you enjoyed it Beachwood! It's a reminder for me too.