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The internet can be a great place to make a living, and affiliate marketing can be a great way to do it.
Unfortunately there are many reasons why affiliate marketers should be living in fear. Here’s five.
1. For every original idea there are at least 100 copycats
Competitions on the internet is inevitable. If you come up with a new concept or idea, expect it to be copied with in a few months, if not weeks.
Suggestion: When you launch a website that you believe to be the greatest thing since sliced bread, get the word out quick. It’s a lot easier for a site to get buzz and inbound links when it’s the only one of it’s kind. Make sure the world knows that your site was the first. It won’t be the last.
2. Somebody who is more passionate, has more money and better SEO chops may soon enter your market
Expect new competition to start competing in your niche for your keywords. Also expect them to have more money and better SEO. Throw in more passion and better ideas and you could be in trouble.
Suggestion: Always be on your toes. Never stop improving your sites, and always always know your competition inside out.
3. You don’t make profits until well after you do the hard work, and it’s not guaranteed to come
Sweat equity is when you work very hard, for very little or nothing at all, in hopes that some day what you are working on will pay off big. Unfortunately the paying off big doesn’t always happen. Double unfortunate is that most opportunities on the web are in the sweat equity vein.
Suggestion: Don’t quit your day job until your sweat equity has turned into solid returns.
4. Your biggest advertiser or source of income can disappear in the blink of an eye
Advertisers are always making decisions that affect internet marketers profits. Everyday, companies decide that the affiliate program they had been running for years is no longer in their business plan. Others decide that they don’t want you in their program.
Suggestion: Don’t rely on one main source of income for your website. Try to have no one advertiser bringing in more than 20% of all your income. And always have a back up plan for when an advertiser walks away.
5. What Google giveth, Google can taketh away
Most affiliate websites are a financial success because of their rankings in Google, which makes the greatest fear of all for affiliate marketers, a Google penalty. Anybody that buys links should fear the almighty Google, and also fear that their competition doesn’t rat on them for doing so.
Suggestion: It’s good to have multiple sites that generate money. If one gets penalized, it’s not the end of the world because you have other sources of income.
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