Is there any future for affiliate marketing?

Do you find it harder to earn more money from affiliate marketing? From what I observed, there are many sites set up solely to promote  their products. These site owners do not try to build their brand name and just hope to make a quick bucks out of their product. Personally, I think this is detrimental to their own business as this type of income is short-term.

Then there are a group of people who profess that multiple sources of income is the way to go for internet marketing. Multiple source of income is good but it is not good for those who have not yet established their business and brand name. Losing focus is the number one reason why many people fail at internet marketing. Multiple sources of income is for those who has already one establised business earning them passive income and should be looking out for other opportunites to increase their wealth or expand their business.

Affiliate marketing is not like it is before. Though the basic principle still holds and affiliates make money by referrals. But with thousands of sites devoted in promoting affiliate products, it is really difficult to stand out among them. Why should I buy from you when I can buy directly from the publisher or the shop. Even with lots of traffic, it is getting harder to monetize it with conversion rate dropping to a pathetic number.

There are those who believes they should not hard-sell their prospects with their product. But if you don’t hard-sell, people may think that you have no confidence in your own product. If you hard-sell, your prospects might think that you are just going to make a quick buck out of them. People are a bunch of unpredictable creatures. No matter what you do, you will not be able to satisfy everybody. In business, it is best to experiment to see whether the aggressive or soft approach works with your prospects.

Even niche markets are becoming elusive. Once people find out any new niche markets, it will quickly become over satuated with people selling or promoting the same kind of product. Even PLR articles are not as useful because many people may also have the PLR to the same product. I think PLR products are only useful in helping you to generate new ideas for your next million dollar product. I guess creativity is one quality which makes us stand out in any market.

Does this mean that affiliate marketing is easier in the past then now? Depending on how you look at it, in the past, though there are far less affiliate marketers around, people are less acceptance to new ideas, so it is harder to market to them. Now, people have become more open to new ideas but there are too many affiliate marketers doing the same thing. So does this mean that either way, it is impossible to survive. There are success stories everyday. So I guess if we are able to create value, we will be able to survive regardless of whether market is saturated or not.

So what lies in the future? Though the playing ground has changed, the basic principles that revolve around successful businesses still hold. The winner will be the one who can come out with new idea and brand himself with new idea just like what people in the past have done.

Evolve and achieve success in your affilite marketing business.

What do you think? I hope to gather your opinion on what you think about the future of affiliate marketing.

Feel free to leave your comments.

Tags: Affiliate marketing, success, future, multiple source of income, niche market