In short, YES. Yes, it is a scam.

That’s the right answer to this fun question from my Quora feed…

     “Is affiliate marketing a scam? It seems like everything I read on affiliate marketing has a tinge of scam to it.”

As you can expect, everyone responding was definitely an internet marketer. All agreed, “it’s like, sooo legit, like to’ally.”

Obviously, they’re wrong.

While i realise there’s a distinct possibility i just stepped on your mum’s tail, i’d love to kiss it better if you bear with me while i explain.

Companies that use affiliates to market their products, including Amazon are tricky sons of bitches. They set a trap for affilites so they can rape them, very roughly.

You’re EXPECTED to fail or get frustrated and quit, leaving behind the referrals you made, the content you produced, and the endorsements you gave. They keep making money from your efforts and your failure is the most beneficial part.

Plus, they have all kinds of tricks like….

…last-touch re-tagging,
…expiring referral cookies that default to the publisher,
…paying only on the front-end while collecting the customer lead for upsells and future sales
….minimum payout requirements
….re-tagging non-buying leads to the publisher

The list goes on.

Case in point, my friend was doing 6-figures monthly in affiliate commissions with Amazon a few years ago. In their most recent change up, her commissions dwindled to almost non-existent.

There are countless services that grew on the backs of affiliates only to close or minimise their referral programs when they became sufficiently big.

If you don’t see why any of this is an issue…

Suppose, over time, you published a lot of content promoting a company’s products in exchange for commissions. Later, they shut down their referral program or changed terms so they pay less. Your affiliate links are still working to drive organic traffic to them. They’re still making money from your links, your content, and your endorsements and testimonials…

…but you make NOTHING.

It IS a scam and they’re all in on it.

Yet, you can’t deny, there’s a certain appeal to the idea of making money from the sale of products…

…without creating or importing anything
…without fulfilling, packing, or shipping anything
…without handling transaction and refund processing
…without programming a shopping cart
…without supporting anyone

Yeah, i can see why no one wants it called a scam. It sounds like a fun business.

The good news is, you can still have all these wonderful attractions of affiliate marketing and not get raped by product publishers.

Here’s the solution to all the problems above…

You start a free email newsletter and then you monetise it using affiliate products.

Consider your relationship with affiliate programs as TEMPORARY and their products as replaceable and disposable.

They serve an important function in that they help you to monetize your email content by paying for the readers you refer to their products…but that is the full extent of your association.

That’s how you flip the script.

Now affiliate programs can’t screw you out of your commissions. ALL your investment of time and money goes into growing your own newsletter asset. And if the affiliate program you’ve been endorsing changes their terms of compensation and you’re not happy, you can quickly and easily replace them.

They no longer benefit from your endorsement but you do.

So that’s how you outscam the scammers in affiliate marketing.

And it’s what i show you how to masterfully do, step by step in the Super Traffic Machine.

You should visit the link below and read all about it…

What i teach in this training program is the ONLY way anyone makes any seriously consistent money with affiliate marketing. You hold all the cards. Affiliate programs will give you special, more favourable terms, bonuses, and extra commissions just for your endorsement.

Get your Super Traffic Machine DIY Kit and let’s kick some affiliate ass.

~jim