What Affiliate marketing scams

What affiliate marketing scams ( you should avoid)

This short post is about what affiliate marketing scams (you should avoid) I wrote this so that you would be able to recognise the four major ways that unscrupulous online fake companies use to lure people into their programs and rip them off!!

Trust me I have been ripped off by scammers in the past I would rather not see the same happening to you. Here is my story on what affiliate marketing scams (you should avoid)

So many people want to make money in the affiliate marketing space, it ain’t easy more than 95% of people who start learning to do affiliate marketing actually fail, these figures are provided by warrior forum the online forum for marketeers.

I’m asking the question why do so many fail? Is it because they have been caught by an affiliate marketing scam? Did they get the wrong training, did the 95% think affiliate marketing was going to be easy? Did they give up too soon thinking that success was going to happen within a few months?

The answer to why so many people fail at affiliate marketing lies somewhere within those answers, for today I want to concentrate on what affiliate marketing scams  (you should avoid) and why.

Introduction to affiliate marketing

Affiliate marketing is an extra form of online marketing whereby companies are looking to use affiliate marketers to generate extra traffic to their websites in the hope of increasing sales and revenue. For their part the affiliate marketer creates unique content that attracts people to their blog or website, within their blogs or websites are strategically placed affiliate links and banners.

Basically what happens is if a visitor to the affiliates blog or site clicks on a banner or affiliate link purchases a product the revenue is shared between the company and the affiliate. Affiliate marketing is a legitimate and in some cases a very profitable way to make money online.

Affiliate marketing scams

Unfortunately affiliate marketing scams are all too common these days the people behind these scams are so clever in the methods that they use, at first glance the program that you see looks legit and professional.

These these unscrupulous people use all sorts of tricks to make you believe that everything is kosher including false customer testimonials, trust me I have fallen for this trick once or twice, so beware don’t be gullible and trusting like I was

Do your research on trusted website like mine or warrior forum before jumping in.

These are four scammy methods to watch out for, bogus marketing, get rich fast ads, paid membership programs or the sale of a false/ fake service or product. Let’s take a look at each one in detail

1. Bogus marketing

Watch out for bogus marketing it is one of the top affiliate marketing scams where a bogus training or course is marketed to give online companies an edge on their competitors during advertising, marketing, telemarketing or social media ads.

They are clever and offer such courses or training in different forms for example “Get rich in 30 days” in DVD, CD, seminar, webinar or downloadable pdf, these courses/training usually have a very long sales page with the promise that the buyer will become super rich in no time at all, there is usually a time limit ” get it now before the price goes up”

If you find yourself reading an ad like this stop and think “is it possible to get rich in 30 days”  the answer is always the same if it sounds too good to be true it is too goof to be true.

2. Get rich fast ads

A get rich fast affiliate marketing scam is somewhat similar to bogus marketing, the difference is that in this case a guy will appear in a video with usually a very large expensive car in the background

The guy is a fast talker and wants to give the impression that if you follow his example you will get rich fast. All you have to do is hand over a few hundred bucks and your in!!

Don’t fall for fast talking flashy guys that promise you the sun, moon and stars as long as you hand over $200, $300, or thousands of your hard earned dollars. It’s easy to fall into the trap of saying to yourself ” that looks easy” or  I can do that ” be honest if it was that easy to make money online everyone would be doing it.

3.  Paid membership programs

I can see the appeal for the company setting up a paid membership program, when people join these programs they are asked to pay a monthly or yearly price to be part of an exclusive members platform, that is every online companies priority to have monthly recurring revenue.

If you are thinking of joining a membership site please do your research check them out, what are they offering, how good is their service, what are others saying about the platform, can you cancel at any time.

Most paid membership sites won’t ask you for money until you have had time to evaluate whether their service is suitable for you or not, that could be in the form of a free 30 day trial or you can access the service but you won’t have access to all of it’s features.

4. False product or service

In the affiliate marketing world we make money by marketing products and services from larger companies to our target audience, most are legit but some use false products or service based on the good name and trust of a major brand.

These scoundrels go to a lot of bother to make their product look exactly like the legitimate brand, they use fancy graphics and fake customer testimonials to lure affiliate marketers by offering the so called legit product or service for a fraction of the normal price.

The advertising that they use is so good that many hundreds of marketers part with their money, then a short time later the whole charade falls apart. I hope that you have enjoyed my post on what affiliate marketing scams (you should avoid) just be careful before parting with money until you are 100% satisfied that the affiliate marketing program is right for you.

What about a legit affiliate marketing opportunity?

I can say this without fear of contradiction the Wealthy affiliate platform and affiliate program is to my mind and two million others one of if not the best place for affiliate marketer beginners to learn how to be an affiliate marketer.

The Wealthy affiliate platform was set up over 13 years ago by two friends in college, Kyle Loudon and Carson Lim, what can I say the picture explains the history of this amazing platform for beginners to experienced affiliate marketers.

History if Wealthy affiliate
Courtesy of jvanderlaan.com

From looking over the history of Wealthy Affiliate and from my own personal experience of using the platform to build my affiliate marketing business it’s obvious that Wealthy Affiliate was developed by affiliate marketers for affiliate marketers. To find out more about Wealthy Affiliate go to this page.

 

 

References

https://www.warriorforum.com/main-internet-marketing-discussion-forum/274986-95-internet-marketers-affiliate-marketers-fail.html



8 thoughts on “What Affiliate marketing scams

  1. Your detailed guide is very helpful for me to understand wealthy affiliate in better way. I join few months ago and completing my training. Now I know that Affiliate marketing is an extra form of online marketing whereby companies are looking to use affiliate marketers to generate extra traffic to their websites in the hope of increasing sales and revenue. Now I am very excited about wealthy affiliate. I will share it with my friends too.

  2. I totally agree with you that affiliate marketing scams are the reason nobody is safe and directly investing their money without making a proper research first. This is a great offer here and I’m delighted you have shared this out here. In all truth, I’m a big time fan of affiliate marketing and the tips you have highlighted could not be more better when looking out for scams. Thanks

  3. I must say this is one of the most refreshing articles I have come across relating to affiliate marketing training. I do recall the time it took me to find the appropriate training platform. I had almost given up moving from post to pillar, trying to find accurate information relating to the training. Luckily, I didn’t fall into any of the traps you have mentioned. I found Wealthy Affiliate, the affiliate marketing training platform you recommend, truly by accident as I was looking for information relating to eCommerce when I did. Since then, It has proved and continues to be an excellent deal platform for me. I consider myself lucky to have escaped all the black holes you mentioned as some may appear like great deals until you fall to the trap. Thanks for highlighting them.  

  4. Another form of affiliate marketing opportunities to avoid is the one that overlaps with network marketing tactics. You may join the company to promote products as an affiliate, but at the end of the scheme, you’re still expected to recruit new ‘affiliates’ in the form of leads. This can be very confusing for some people but the two models don’t work the same way in my opinion. 

    1. Hi Cathy,

                 I tried network marketing, it didn’t work for me, I believe that affiliate marketing is a much better business model.

      Thank you,

      Fintan

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