Affiliate Marketing is one of the popular ways to make money online.
But there are so many alternatives to affiliate marketing that can help you make money online faster and easier.
The saddest truth is that more than half of active affiliate marketers out there are struggling to make money.
I’ve seen smart, resourceful, and funded affiliate marketers struggle to make a living, even after putting their soul into marketing great products.
Reasons why Affiliate Marketers are Struggling to Make Money
So, who’s fault is it? What’s actually the cause of many affiliate marketers struggling out there?
There are many reasons, but I’ll list a few:
Poor Affiliate Products
The truth is that many affiliate marketing programs are filled with poor products that nobody wants to buy.
You’ll have to spend a huge budget and write so many great sales pages just to make a few sales.
These affiliate marketing programs with poor products are usually disguised as network marketing platforms and exclusive platforms where you’ll have to pay to even see the product you’ll be marketing.
And once you’re in, you’ll have no choice but to spend your hard-earned money marketing their shitty products.
Poor Marketing Systems
Most of the big affiliate marketing programs today are not designed for beginners or part-time business people. They are designed for expert digital marketers.
This means that most newbie affiliate marketers often struggle to attract buyers or even make any money.
Their marketing systems are either too complicated, too poor, or too fragmented to make sense to most affiliate marketers.
Unless you are pro, you’ll always struggle to make any headway.
Low Affiliate Commissions
There’s a hidden memo in the affiliate marketing world that goes thus: high commission for low-demand products, low commission for high-demand products.
So, what does this mean?
If you sell the popular products, you’ll earn less in commissions.
If you want to make more money, then you’ll be forced to sell products that are not in demand; and there is no guarantee that you’ll make any sale.
This often represents a catch-22 situation for many affiliate marketers, so they mostly go with products that are guaranteed to sell, which often means that they need to sell thousands of products to make a reasonable income.
Imagine having to work your ass off and risk your hard-earned money just to make a meagre 0.1% affiliate commission.
Hey?! (Hands on head).
Dubious Affiliate Marketing Programs
Most so-called experts will not tell you, but the truth is that there are many dubious affiliate marketing programs out there.
They are mostly designed with underhand tactics to frustrate your marketing efforts and steal from you.
This is akin to the popular Nigerian saying; “monkey dey work, baboon dey chop.“
You’ll keep working harder to make more money, while the affiliate marketing platform keeps feeding fat off your efforts.
In the real sense, these platforms are just scams using affiliate marketing business to disguise their operations.
Affiliate Marketing Alternatives
If you want to take charge of your online income and start making money selling great products, then you need to look out for alternatives.
The most important thing is to know how to find great products that people want to pay for.
Let me give you an example.
I was just strolling on Facebook when I saw a notification that a friend has liked a particular trending post.
This particular Facebook post was about hair loss for women, and it had thousands of comments inquiring about how to purchase it.
Note that this post was trending organically without any paid or sponsored advertising, and people were willing to pay for the product.
I also observed that the original poster was struggling to keep up with the comments and orders for the products.
So, what did I do?
Instead of letting this person continue to struggle and having many customers not able to get a product they like, I offered my solution.
I simply contacted this poster and offered a partnership business.
I would be making a batch order from her and selling on a landing page with a payment processor.
All she had to do was tell her audience to order from her by phone or go to my page to order online.
Any one of her potential customers could go to my page at any time, pay the cost, and make an order for the product.
Now, I make money round the clock from that sales page, even while I sleep.
I do not own the product, but I have total control of the marketing system and a clear account of every single sale I make.
In my opinion, this is a great alternative to affiliate marketing.
Here are some other ideas:
Create your own Product
This is the hardest route to go in terms of finding alternatives for affiliate marketing.
But if you have a great product idea, then it may be worth the trial.
You’ll have to do a lot of market testing and tweaking to make sure that you have the right product-fit for your customers.
Most of the information marketers in Nigeria take this route.
They simply package a profitable idea which was gotten from their personal experience from solving a problem or filling a need.
And that information product may just help other people in similar situations to make headway.
Buy a PLR Product
This is one of the fastest ways to make money selling other people’s products, especially in the digital space.
It is the digital equivalent of a business franchise.
All you have to do is buy an unbranded digital product that is in high demand, create a new brand design for your target audience and slap it onto the product, then you start selling.
Most PLR products can be expensive, but they are worth it if you find the right audience to match the right product.
Hire a Product Person
If done right, this is one of the best alternatives to affiliate marketing.
You simply design the product from scratch in response to market demand.
Nothing could ever beat responding to a market demand with a right-fit product.
So, all you have to do is find a hungry market looking for products to solve a problem or fill a need.
Engage that audience through surveys, incentivized interactions, and paid beta testers.
Hire a product person to design that product for you and offer it to a small group of your audience to test and provide feedback.
Improve on the product based on the feedback until you have a right-fit.
Design a brand and start selling right from your closed group of buyers.
If the product is right and does what it says it would do, your first customers would become advocates of the product through word-of-mouth marketing, and you’ll grow from there.
Conclusion
Despite the fact that I’ve suggested alternatives to affiliate marketing in this article, it doesn’t mean that affiliate marketing is bad.
If you find a good affiliate marketing platform that is genuine with its products and commissions, then you should give it a try.
The truth is that going your own way to create a new product or finding a PLR or partnership product is harder than just sticking to an affiliate marketing program.
For the majority of people out there, a genuine affiliate marketing program may just be the most convenient way to earn money online.