Where are all the Affiliate Experts?

I can't believe no one here has told you about shareasale.com

Go check them out. I am not sure if your content breaks any TOS since it's adult related. With SAS it's just a couple hundred to join and they really do take care of the rest.

If you want a forums that talks a lot about affiliate programs try abestweb.com

 

I live in Scottsdale Arizona.. Probably one of the "higher" priced places in the country (at least in the state of Arizona). And high priced food here is often well worth it . It's the CRAZY prices on homes that makes my jaw drop. My parents house doubled its value (to over $350,000) in under 4 years. . We're going to end up like California, where a "standard" sized house costs a fortune.

I can't speak for the majority, but there is a LOT of very good SEO affiliates already in the adult industry, and they spend a large amount of money to get the good rankings they have. I don't have $50,000/month to drop on advertising and links to rank for such keywords

I just added a new addition to my small family. It's now me and my puppy Mini Pinscher (top left of the site in my sig).

 

I'm one of SAS's biggest fans, but FYI they don't do everything for you. They are the tracking solution but there is still a TON of talent and effort that needs to go into setting up and running a successful program. You still need to recruit, motivate, create banners and other selling tools and do a ton of other things on a regular basis to have a successful, thriving program.

There are a lot of analogies and comparisons I could give between SEO and affiliate programs. One is - remember when people used to think "I got a host and put up a web page - now traffic will come and people will buy." Well same thing with thinking - if I sign up with SAS or CJ or anyone else - affiliates will join and I'll make more sales.

There is a whole series of strategies, activities and a ton of ongoing work that needs to be done to grow a successful program because you are competing with thousands of other affiliate programs. I helped take one affiliate program from $500,000 per month to over $3.2 million a month in affiliates sales. Granted that was a big program that is on a whole different level than what we are talking about here - but the point is you don't become successful in this type of very competitive industry unless you commit time, resources and money to do it right.

Truly skilled AMS are in high demand and low supply. Just like back when getting to the top in the search engines required a pro and there weren't very many good ones - they were in high demand and charged premium rates.

I agree there should be some companies or consultants geared to help smaller affiliate programs get started. I have to turn away a ton of leads that need that type of support. I just dont know anyone that does it at a low cost.

 

The hard part of offering low cost services (for any industry) is that you then need an extremely large volume of clientele to survive. More clients means hiring staff to help them because one person can only do so much...and then of course more staff means more expenses...and so on.

And of course, if you were to pay a company even just $100 you'd want someone experienced to handle your project. That means they'd be paying fairly large salaries to their "expert" employees.

Experienced people who work freelance can't do budget projects because they can only take in so much work. Taking time and business expenses into consideration means they need to charge a fairly high fee to make a decent living. A person who makes $20 an hour at a job, needs to charge triple that just to survive as a freelancer.

This is why people who are really good at what they do charge a lot, because it costs THEM a lot of money to work for themselves. It's also why hiring folks that can learn on the job will really cost you much more money down the road...because as soon as they actually get it, they'll find a better paying gig. Then you have to start all over again...worse yet you pay for their mistakes which might not surface until after their long gone. It's essentially a trade off between paying that money now and seeing results as quickly as possible, or paying it later on due to the learning curve of trying to find the best techniques on your own (with the potential risk of sales taking so long to come in that the business doesn't survive the lack of cash flow).


The company that can invest $2000 in hiring a reputable expert will ALWAYS get much more than the company that cuts corners and pays $200.

 

and then some.....

I tried to throw money at alot of people I knew were making good money with affiliates *COUGH* SHAWN *COUGH*.

Everyone I asked said they didnt do it (even though I was offering an unlimited budget) but to read these forums at digitalpoint.

The thing is the experts are making thousands a day... why would they want to come work for you and train you how to do it for a small fraction of what they are making.

From your escort service experience I am sure you understand how time is money.

I would be really leary of people that have FANTSATIC DEALS FOR LITTLE PRICE!!!!

 

from your sites you obviously have drive and dedication. I think you definatly offer a service or product that is not available elsewhere easily.

Are you looking for affiliate help with selling your product or do you want to sell others and get a cut? It seems like you are doing both. It also seems like people are giving you advice for both.

I can tell you there are alot of people here that are as expert as it comes with affiliate programs and if you ask very detailed and specific questions its likely you will get a free answer.