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Affiliate Marketing & MLM - A Comparison

By Dina Dove

Long before online Affiliate Marketing even existed; I had been involved in several MLM’s,with measurable success in some. However, not all of my down line did well and that was a concern to me.

I found that taking into account the upfront product costs, conventions and training, the large majority of people do not come out ahead. I wanted everyone to win and continued searching for a solution that would benefit all.

We’ve all heard about the new wave of millionaires who are making their fortune thru internet marketing. Hearing more, I decided to do some research into affiliate marketing. In looking into that phenomenon, I have come across a whole lot more people making at least a living and many making a considerable income in the Affiliate Marketing world.

To many of us, who grew up with the MLM model, this new method holds an air of mystery and confusion. If you do not really know what Affiliate Marketing is all about, you owe it to yourself to check into it.

In my humble opinion, it is much faster and easier than MLM and, although the common misconception is that you cannot build a residual income with Affiliate Marketing, with the right affiliate program you can make money now and build a residual income.

Pros and Cons - Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate Marketing is where a company or person allows a marketer to sell their product or service on behalf of them. The marketer does all the marketing of the product or service and is paid a commission based on the value of the sale by the company or person who owns the product / service. The company usually provides all the marketing materials and any training you need for no additional cost and online.

Pros

• An affiliate marketer does not require a down line for their business to be successful.
• There is no stock to store. The affiliate marketer is simply the middleman for the sale. The company ships the goods and deals with all the customer services.
• There are many affiliate products to choose from.
• Companies with affiliate marketing programs never make rules that you can’t market another company’s affiliate products, so once you are making money on one, you can add more if you choose.
• As an affiliate marketer, your success and failure is completely in your hands as you are the only person in your business.
• An affiliate marketer CAN make a residual income with the right program.
• Your team is the company and usually these are hired professionals not other marketers who are helping you.
• Affiliate marketers leverage their time once they have the right program and a system in place.
• Once you have people signed up for a continual product, you can walk away and keep making money.
• All training and customer service is done by the company, NOT YOU!!
• With the right system, you can start making money immediately.
• Low or no overhead or start up costs.
• No meetings, conventions or conference calls.
• No down line to have to train, help and try to get to perform.
• You get paid a stated percentage of each sale so knowing what you will get paid is easy. There are no minimums. You make a sale. You get paid.

Cons

• As an affiliate marketer you only make money on what you produce.
• Affiliate marketers are in direct competition with every other affiliate marketer who is also trying to sell the same products. (But this is the same in any MLM program for all the people not in your own down line.)

Pros and Cons - MLM

MLM is a marketing structure used by companies as one of their marketing strategies. The structure is designed to create a marketing and sales force by compensating promoters of company products (reps) not only for sales they personally generate, but also for the sales of other promoters (reps) they enroll to the company, creating a down line of distributors and multiple levels of compensation.

Pros

• As an MLM rep you get paid for your direct efforts and the direct efforts of the people in your down line (some companies allow you to have an infinite down line).
• MLM reps can generate residual income which when your reach a certain level will continue to gradually increase every month. This usually requires minimums to be met in sales volume and very few people ever hit these minimums.
• MLM is a team business. The more active reps in you have in your business the more successful you will be. This can be a plus or a burden.
• As MLM has a hierarchy structure there is a lot of support throughout all the levels, you are not alone.
• MLMers get to leverage their time.

Cons

• MLMers have to build a team to be successful.
• There is usually a large start up price and lots of costly training to pay for also.
• Learning how to sell and recruit are the core skills required to be successful in MLM. This can take a whole lot of time.
• I have found that in many of the MLM companies I’ve been a part of, my down line end up taking so much of my time that I do not believe I could ever be truly free.
• The strength of your business is largely dependent upon other people. I always felt like I could control myself but not other people.
• It generally takes longer to make money in MLM.
• You have to get trained and then train your down line.
• Meetings, conventions and conference calls.
• From what I’ve seen, the highest paid MLM’ers can’t walk away from their business and keep making money.
• Companies with a MLM compensation plan have many rules and restrictions that you cannot market or sell for another MLM company.
• Usually with complicated compensation plans to learn and monthly minimums to meet, you are not sure if you will get paid or how much you get paid.

Since real freedom is what I am after, I’ve found that learning to work online in Affiliate Marketing is the easiest way to get there. You get a product, promote it, a person buys it and you are paid a commission. Once the sale is made, that's it. And if it is a monthly pay or repeat purchase item, you keep getting paid month after month.

There is skill involved, but the skills are easy to learn. And further, no matter what you do, learning to maximize the internet is extremely important in today’s world. There is a turn-key program that brings you up to speed. www.HarryTurtle.com.

HarryTurtle.com can help you in 7 ways.

It teaches you step by step
1. How to build your internet presence.
2. How to use social networking to build a list of followers
3. The psychology behind successful online marketing
4. Gives you one affiliate marketing program to start with
5. You develop one income stream as you learn
6. All the tools needed for your online affiliate business
7. Plus a financial education course geared to building long term wealth

Thanks Dina for the info especially on affiliate marketing. I've tried MLM - not for me.

James,
Thanks for being such a dedicated reader of my intel. I really appreciate your support.
Dina

Great information. I wanted to sign up for the Harry Turtle thing but it was too expensive for me.

Bill, are you saying that $19.95 is too expensive? Because once you are a member at that price, you stay at that price. Also, if you get 2 of your friends involved, yours is paid for 100%. Why not join for the free 7 days and see what you think or if you can get 2 friends to join you?

Had about 3 or 4 affiliate relationships. Only 1 did anything, none charged. The one that gave an income of $10 a month was taken over by another outfit, who paid nothing. With eToro forex and have put clicks their way but no income arises. You perhaps can see I am a bit chary of these schemes.

To this day I work on both sides of the affiliate fence as my website has its own affiliate program plus I make some decent money from the affiliate programs of others.

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