The appeal of affiliate marketing is hard to resist; who wouldn’t want to earn money while they sleep just by recommending products? However, it’s worth noting that as many as 95% of beginners in this industry end up failing.
Many people dive in with high hopes, only to become discouraged when they don’t see the money rolling in as expected. Based on my own experiences and those of other online entrepreneurs, I can tell you that most failures in this business stem from having the wrong mindset or lacking the necessary skills.
To help you avoid these pitfalls and succeed in affiliate marketing, I’ve compiled a list of the most common reasons why people fail in this business.
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Top Mistakes To Avoid If You’re An Affiliate Marketer
Affiliate marketing spending has been going up in recent years, but there are some key mistakes to watch out for when running affiliate marketing campaigns.
Let’s take a look at the most important ones:
1. Not Providing Exceptional Value
In the crowded field of affiliate marketing, it’s crucial to stand out. This means offering top-notch content that either provides valuable insights or is highly entertaining (or both) to engage your audience.
For example, let’s say you’re promoting a line of fitness supplements. Instead of simply regurgitating the manufacturer’s descriptions, you could create in-depth guides on how to incorporate these supplements into different workout routines. You might also offer personalized tips based on your own experiences or those of satisfied customers.
If you fail to capture your visitors’ attention, they’ll quickly move on and may never return. Simply copying your competitors’ content with minor tweaks to avoid duplication won’t attract anyone to your platform. You must add your own unique value and voice to every topic you cover.
Also, you need to establish your exceptional value through your own online platform, such as a website or blog. Trying to do affiliate marketing without a website or blog is not advisable in the long run.
2. Ignoring the Power of Relationships
In affiliate marketing, you might think you’re off the hook for customer support, but that’s only part of the story. Sure, you don’t have to deal with technical issues, but to really succeed, you need to connect with your audience.
For instance, let’s say you run a blog promoting fitness products. Instead of just posting affiliate links and hoping for the best, you engage with your audience by responding to comments and emails, and you actively participate in fitness forums and social media groups.
If you avoid engaging with your audience, you’ll constantly have to chase after one-time buyers, which is a big headache.
But if you build strong relationships with your visitors, they won’t just click your link and disappear. If they trust your advice on products, they’ll keep coming back for more before making a purchase. This turns one-time buyers into loyal customers.
Start building an email list early on. This lets you send tailored, helpful content directly to your subscribers, fostering even stronger connections.
3. Lack of Product Knowledge
This is a common mistake among affiliates. Many don’t bother to thoroughly understand the products they’re promoting. They think providing surface-level information is enough.
For example, let’s say you’re promoting a new line of cooking gadgets. Instead of just listing their features, you could delve deeper by testing them out in your own kitchen. Share your experiences, such as how easy they are to use, the quality of the results they produce, and any tips or tricks you discover along the way.
Your audience isn’t just looking for regurgitated facts they can find anywhere. They want reliable, extra information, ideally from someone who knows the product inside and out.
You can’t offer valuable insights about a product unless you’ve tried it yourself. Even if it’s something you can’t use personally, like health supplements for conditions you don’t have, you can still do thorough research to learn about its benefits from other users’ experiences.
It’s best to promote products you’ve actually used and found success with. When you share your own positive experiences, it makes your endorsement genuine and persuasive for your audience.
4. Facing Too Much Competition
Choosing the right niche for your affiliate business can be tough, especially when you’re just starting out online. Many beginners struggle with this, and I was no exception.
The temptation is to target a broad market, thinking it will bring in more customers. But big markets often mean fierce competition and difficulty in reaching a specific audience.
A well-targeted audience is essential. They’re people genuinely interested in the content and product recommendations you provide. However, if your niche is too broad, like “travel,” visitors may leave quickly because they’re looking for something specific within that broad category.
That’s why it’s crucial to narrow down your niche. For example, instead of just “cooking,” you could focus on “easy vegan recipes for beginners.”
Imagine you write a helpful guide like “10 essential ingredients for beginner-friendly vegan recipes.” When someone searches for “easy vegan recipes for beginners,” your post pops up because it’s a perfect match for their specific query.
But how do you get your post to show up in search results? Two reasons:
- You offer great, helpful content.
- Your content fits perfectly with a specific search query that not many other websites cover.
You can discover these untapped search queries using keyword tools. For example, if you find that “easy vegan recipes for beginners” is searched around 100 times a month with little competition, that’s a golden opportunity to rank high on Google.
You might think 100 searches a month isn’t much, but if you write many posts targeting similar low-competition search terms, you’ll rank higher overall, driving more traffic to your blog.
5. Prioritizing Selling Over Helping
This mistake isn’t unique to affiliate marketing; it’s widespread across various industries. Many people put all their energy into selling but see little in return. Ironically, when they face poor results, they double down on selling, which only widens the gap.
I once had a mentor in offline marketing who taught me a valuable lesson applicable to any business: If you want to sell something, do anything but focus solely on selling.
For instance, let’s say you’re promoting beauty products as an affiliate. Instead of bombarding your email subscribers with sales pitches, focus on creating content that addresses their skincare concerns and offers valuable tips and advice.
Too often, entrepreneurs obsess over making sales and forget the crucial step that leads to them: helping people. This often leads to people unsubscribing due to feeling overwhelmed by spam.
But here’s the secret: when you shift your focus to helping your audience, remarkable results follow quickly.
Why is helping so essential? Because when you’re in helping mode, you’re not pushing products; you’re solving problems for your audience through your content, whether it’s blog posts, videos, podcasts, or other interactions.
Helping builds something invaluable: trust. Genuine efforts to assist your audience earn their trust, which is vital for making sales. Without trust, there won’t be any sales, let alone repeat ones.
6. Choosing the Wrong Affiliate Products
Your ability to earn money through affiliate marketing depends a lot on the products you choose to promote. You need to be aware that products with lower prices usually result in lower commissions per sale.
Let’s say you’re in a niche like hiking and you’re promoting gear like water bottles. A single water bottle might cost $10 on Amazon, with a commission rate of around 3%. In other words, you’d make around $0.3 per sale. To earn $500 a month, you’d need to sell about 1670 water bottles.
But to sell 1670 water bottles a month, you’d need to attract a lot of visitors to your site—around 1850 visitors every day, assuming a conversion rate of 3%.
Now, let’s compare that to promoting a product with a $50 commission. You’d only need to sell 10 of these products each month to make $500. With a 3% conversion rate, you’d need around 333 visitors per month.
But here’s the catch: Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that higher-priced products always mean more money. Sure, you might earn more per sale, but you’ll also need to work harder to build trust and make those sales happen. This can be especially challenging for newcomers.
Ideally, you should aim for a good mix of products with both decent and moderate commissions to maximize your earnings without overwhelming yourself.
7. Falling for Fake Training and Affiliate Programs
Even though affiliate marketing is evolving towards quality over quick wins, it still has the reputation of being an easy, get-rich-quick scheme.
This reputation is largely due to the numerous scammers who lure in newcomers with promises of overnight success on autopilot. The online world is unfortunately filled with these scams, preying on people eager to make money online.
These scams often masquerade as online marketing training programs or fake affiliate programs, or sometimes a combination of both.
Why do so many people fall for these scams? Because they’re human beings targeted by slick manipulative marketing tactics. Phrases like “buy this product and become a millionaire” are things we might consciously reject, but subconsciously, they influence us in the direction the scammer wants.
Many newcomers have been burned by these scams, causing them to give up before realizing the true potential of affiliate marketing.
So, when choosing a training program, always ensure that you retain ownership of your business and domains, and avoid getting trapped in endless upsells often associated with scams.
And if you come across affiliate programs that require you to pay to promote their products, steer clear! Many of these are based on MLM or pyramid schemes disguised as affiliate programs, where you’re essentially being scammed to scam others.
8. Starting with Too Many Niches
This happens a lot, and I’ll be honest, I’ve been tempted by it too: Once you figure out how a profitable niche business works, you might think, “Hey, why not build a bunch of them to make even more money?” But for many of us, especially beginners, this is a recipe for failure.
Let me give you an example: Imagine you’re just starting out in affiliate marketing. Instead of focusing on one niche, you decide to tackle several at once: fitness, cooking, fashion, and technology. Each niche requires its own content, marketing strategy, and audience research. Before you know it, you’re spread too thin, struggling to keep up with the demands of each niche.
I’m not saying that affiliate marketers who focus on just one or a few websites are automatically more successful than those with a bunch of sites. It really depends on who you are and how much experience you have in this field. Not everyone can juggle multiple things like a pro!
Even if managing several niches is doable, it’s not a great idea for newcomers. Building an affiliate marketing business is way more complicated than it seems.
I see a lot of beginners underestimating how much work goes into this business. They end up with several niches, but none of them get the attention they need to really succeed.
My advice? Start with one niche and focus on making it profitable. Once you’ve got that down pat, you can think about expanding into other markets or trying different business models.
9. Forgetting to Test Different Approaches
When you’re trying to boost traffic, improve user experience, or increase conversions, testing different approaches can make a huge difference. But strangely enough, many affiliate marketers don’t make this a regular part of their routine.
Sure, it might not be a top priority when you’re just starting out. But as your business grows and more people visit your site, it’s crucial to seize every opportunity to fine-tune what you’re doing.
For instance, let’s say you’re testing different headlines for your blog posts. You might find that questions generate more clicks than statements. That’s valuable information you can use to tailor your content to your audience’s preferences.
One great thing about online marketing is that you get quick feedback on what’s working and what’s not. Unlike traditional marketing, where it’s harder to see direct results, online efforts give you almost instant responses.
You can test all sorts of things: headlines, the tone you use, where you place your affiliate links, the design of your calls to action, and even your sales funnel setup. There’s a ton to explore!
10. Lack of Persistence
Now we’re diving into mindset matters—the core points that can make or break your success. No matter how skilled you are at affiliate marketing, if your mindset isn’t strong, you’re bound to fail. In fact, I’d argue that the biggest reason for failure in business, including affiliate marketing, is a weak mindset.
Persistence is key. No matter your goal, you need unwavering determination to achieve it. In this business, setbacks are inevitable. What sets successful marketers apart is their ability to keep moving forward, even when things get tough.
Here’s the truth about affiliate marketing: anyone, even someone starting from scratch, can make it work. It’s not about being exceptionally smart or having all the right skills. Success comes to those who refuse to give up. They stay the course, believing in themselves and their vision.
For instance, think about a marathon runner. They don’t quit halfway through the race because they haven’t reached the finish line yet. They keep pushing forward, step by step, until they reach their goal.
Transform your mindset from “Can I do this?” to “I will make it happen, no matter what.” Celebrate every small victory along the way, and set achievable goals to keep yourself motivated.
Find a niche that ignites your passion. It’s easy to feel inspired in the moment, but the real challenge is maintaining that positive mindset throughout your workday, especially when you hit roadblocks.
Make a pact with yourself: no matter what obstacles you face, keep pushing forward. Never give up.
I know this might sound like familiar advice, but it’s crucial. Your mindset is the single most important factor in determining your success. It’s more vital than any skill you’ll ever learn for running your business.
It’s astonishing how many people give up right when they’re on the verge of a breakthrough. After putting in all that hard work, they throw in the towel because they haven’t seen the results they expected within their desired timeframe.
11. Falling into Distraction and Procrastination
Distraction is a constant temptation, especially in our line of work. With everything just a click away, it’s easy to lose focus. We spend hours in front of screens creating content, and any notification on our phone or computer can lure us away into a rabbit hole of emails, social media, analytics, and news.
For example, imagine you’re working on a blog post, and suddenly a notification pops up on your phone. You intend to check it quickly, but before you know it, you’ve spent half an hour scrolling through social media.
It’s impossible to work non-stop without breaks. Our brains need downtime, maybe signaling us to take a breather after a couple of hours of solid work. Distractions aren’t all bad—they can be beneficial if managed properly. Schedule short breaks every 1.5 hours to refresh your mind.
But sometimes, we deceive ourselves with distractions. We might prioritize tasks we enjoy over ones that are truly crucial. Spending excessive time on tools like Google Analytics might feel productive, but if it’s at the expense of essential tasks like niche research or content creation, it’s counterproductive.
You should focus on what’s most important for business growth, like generating traffic through content creation. Without traffic, there’s little point in obsessing over analytics. And even when your traffic is flowing, resist the urge to check stats multiple times a day—once is plenty.
12. Not Enough Patience
How patient are you? Maybe not as much as you’d like to be, and that’s okay. Many folks diving into affiliate marketing struggle with patience from the get-go.
It’s no surprise, really. The rush to succeed quickly is often fueled by the shady characters in our industry, peddling the idea of effortless overnight riches.
Here’s the deal: Before you dive in, clear your mind of all that scammy hype surrounding affiliate marketing. The truth? It’s a slow burn.
Building a reliable affiliate business takes time. You need to earn the trust of both your audience and search engines. Results don’t happen overnight. Turning your affiliate gig into a full-time income? Yep, that takes time too. Scaling it to a lucrative level? Time again.
Let me share a personal story: I spent three years pouring my heart and soul into a mindfulness blog. The first two years? Not a penny in earnings. It was tough, but I stuck with it, consistently creating valuable content and engaging with my audience. In the third year, things started to turn around. Slowly but surely, my income began to grow, and by the end of that year, I was making a stable income from my affiliate partnerships.
When you embrace the reality that success takes time, you’ll steer clear of shiny but ultimately harmful shortcuts. Patience keeps you focused on solid strategies that pay off big in the long run.
If you’re running a website or blog, the timeline varies. Some see results in a few months, while for others, it’s closer to a year. It all boils down to how much time you can invest in steadily growing your business.
Let’s be real here: Every self-employed venture demands hard work upfront. But once you’ve laid that foundation, the perks—like a great income, flexibility, and independence—start rolling in.
Final Words
Here’s the deal: Many folks try affiliate marketing, but most don’t find success. I’ve highlighted some common reasons for this above. But here’s the kicker: It’s not because affiliate marketing is dead. Nope, it’s usually because of personal stuff—like mindset and behavior. The good news? You can change that.
You’ve got what it takes to thrive in this game. Just steer clear of scams, learn from trustworthy mentors, stay consistent with your efforts, bounce back from setbacks, and keep your mindset in check. Seriously, mindset is key.
I hope you’ve picked up some useful insights about affiliate marketing. Share your experiences and tips below. And if you’ve got questions, hit me up! I’m here to help.
Jack Davis is an internet entrepreneur. He created the Affiliate Marketing Masterclass and offers personal coaching on affiliate marketing. He has been featured in major publications like Forbes, Entrepreneur, and CNBC for his achievements in online marketing. He owns more than 10 niche websites and has made millions of dollars from them. So, he’s the guy you can trust when it comes to building niche sites and SEO.