How To Avoid That Affiliate Marketing Scam

How To Avoid That Affiliate Marketing Scam

You have finally decided that the 9-5 day job isn’t for you. You're tired of your work being undervalues and underappreciated. You would like to work when you feel you are most productive, not when some boss or manager feels it is so. You are also tired of working hard with no incentive or reward scheme in place.

The internet has helped up change so many aspects of our lives. We can study and work from home with the help of a computer and high speed internet access. However, there are unfortunately lots of scammers out there ready to take either your money or your work to use for their benefit. Many of these email scam programs and work at home schemes have little hope of amounting to any kind of living.


Unfortunately, these scammers have made their way into the world of affiliate marketing as well. There are some excellent affiliate marketing programs to get involved with; the trick is how to spot the scammers.

Affiliate marketing is a great opportunity for those who want to venture out on their own. The minimal risk and zero start up costs make it an attractive option to many. Affiliate marketing programs are perfect for those people who are motivated and self starters. They are also great for those who want to set their own working hours.

The face and manner of the internet and affiliate marketing is constantly changing. This makes it very difficult to produce a definitive list of do’s and don’ts. However, there are some signs that one can look for. If your company displays any of these signs it does not mean for sure that they are con artists. However, it should warrant further investigation.

An affiliate marketing program should always provide you with some support. This can include an agent that you can contact with questions or problems. A legitimate company should want you to do well. The better you do the better they do. It should at very least contain a toll free phone number, email address and fixed street address. If your company is an online affiliate marketing program, the lack of an email or web page should definitely raise some red flags. Other things such as no phone or address do not mean necessarily that they are trying to scam you. However, you need to investigate them with a fine tooth comb.

A good test is to send the company an email with some basic questions. If it takes them weeks to get back to you then you need to give this venture careful consideration. Again, they may not be out to con you but if they are poor at communication, this could be a sign of other internal problems.

If the company has no website then you should consider something else. Legitimate affiliate marketing programs generally have a detailed website with all the information you need. One should be suspicious of companies that operate only by email. A website is fairly easy to create so why hasn’t this company invested the time to do so? Also, a website leaves a bit more of a trail to a company. If they do end up scamming you, the chances of tracing the people via a website are much better then tracing them through masses of email addresses.

Many of us would love the opportunity to work for ourselves. We would love to chuck in the day job and start our own businesses. However, the costs of starting a business combined with the risk involved stop most of us before we even get started. Affiliate marketing is a great way to make some money by working for yourself. The costs are none and the risk minimal. One needs to use some caution when signing onto a program. Make sure there is adequate support available to you. Make sure the company is contactable and that they answer queries in a timely fashion. Be incredibly cautious of companies that have no website. These factors do not always mean that the company is out to scam you; however they should be looked at carefully.

Things To Look Out For To Prevent Scam In Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate marketing is a way to work for you without the financial risk
There are many great affiliate programs right now in the market. However there are many affiliate programs out there which could be consider as fraud or scam.

Before deciding on a direction to take, check their testimonials. Use the internet to dig the dirt up. Check the company track record. An empty track record company could be considered as a negative record company. Tread with cautious with new companies, if they are worth the investments, they would still be there in a few months time.

We live in an internet age and business fraud. Countless people have been scam, and lost huge sums of money on home businesses scam. And the bad news is affiliate marketing is not immune to this. It is hard to put out a list of precautions, cause depending on situation to situations it might occur that the list of precautions might be invalid cause these don’t always mean that the company is fraudulent but they should be looked into carefully.

Affiliate marketing is a way to counter fraud, due to its low start up cost. Affiliate marketing costs nothing to join that makes the risk minimal. You pay only for what you produce and not to how the company is performing. There are many wonderful affiliate programs for you to get involved with, however as with anything one still needs to tread with cautions.

It is advisable to not fall into a false sense of security when it comes to affiliate marketing.
Don’t feel that without a startup cost, you have nothing to lose. You may get away without losing any money, but you could lose loads of your time. And time is much more precious than time. You are going to work hard to build up your affiliate marketing business so you would want it to be legitimate.

Always try to ask for testimonials. Don’t always believe in the ones you see on their website. That could have been written by anyone. Get names and contacts of people that you could contact with to find out how the program worked for them. You could also do a search on search engines. Look for scams under the company name.

Read the reviews, read the testimonials carefully. If there is a few bad reviews, do not let that put you off. Sometimes certain programs are just not fitted for someone else.

If there are more good reviews than bad. High chances things will be okay.

When you have a problem finding information, or when information is insufficient. That might be a warning for you. Good affiliate programs that have been around for a while would have a track record. Resist the temptation to join the offer while it is still hot. If the program is good, it will still be there in 6 months time.

What Goes On In a Day Of An Affiliate Marketer

Wake up in the morning. Have your breakfast. Logging in, checking your emails, updating on your sites, checking up on your statistic.

Nowadays everything is all at your fingertips, being in the affiliate marketing business with the internet at your disposal. You could forget about the days when phone calls were made, just to get the latest information or to make the latest updates.

With technology in hand, affiliate marketing from home, is made so simple.

What does internet marketers really do?

Newsletter and ezines which were updated days or weeks ago, time for it to be updated with the latest things that are happening in the market. This will be written and will be up for publication to be distributed to new and old customers.

These publications are an important tool to keep up to date with the newly introduced products. Sales and promotions are put up for customers whom might be interested.
Marketers have to keep in mind for the deadline of sales written in the publication.

Write out recommendations to those who want credible sources for products that are being promoted. Post some comments on how to be a successful affiliate marketer on related sites with potential customers.

Don’t forget to show appreciation to those that have helped the marketer in the success of their promotions and sales increase. It’s good to mention person, sites and the process that have been done to show how that everything was made to move forward smoothly.

Of course all these would have been mention in the newsletter, along with the other important information that had been written.


Site design has to be revised, every marketer would know that a well design site could bring forth increased sign ups from visitors. This would in turn also help in the conversion rates.

Submit your affiliate programs to directories. These directories are means to attract people to join your affiliate program. Directories that list affiliate program, these are a sure way of promoting affiliate programs.

Track down your sales that you are getting from your affiliates. Check if there are new clients for your products. Not forgetting to note down their contact information which might be an important source in the future.

Sort out your Ads, banners, button ads and sample recommendations which are meant to be given out because the marketer knows that this is one way of ensuring more sales. Best to keep it visible and accessible.

From time to time, there are questions which are needed to be answered from the visitors.
This has to be done A.S.A.P. Nothing is worse than a customer that gets turn off by an email that has not been replied.

To prove that the affiliate is working effectively and efficiently, inquiries would have to be paid more attention on. Nobody wants to be ignored and customers are not always the most patient of all people. Answers should be quick, and appear professional and not forgetting friendly.


There are things to be learned and it is a continuous process. Sharing tips and advices is a good way of showing support. There may be others out there wanting to join and may be enticed by the discussion that is going on. There is no harm in assuming what opportunities lies ahead.


That’s roughly what’s going on in a day of an affiliate marketer.

Are you up for it?

4 Steps To Not Fail In Affiliate Marketing

Affiliate Marketer is defined as: “A business relationship with a merchant or other service provider who allows you to link to that business. When a visitor clicks on the link at your site and subsequently makes a purchase from the merchant, you receive a commission based on the amount of the sale, a referral fee or a pay-for-click fee.”

It’s a simple straight-forward agreement between a merchant and an affiliate.
There are many budding Affiliate marketers whom tend to make a mistake and ended up failing, instead of beginning from the start they prefer to begin from the end.

Towards the end, it’s all about making money. Yes? No?

The beginning process is to educate oneself and there are several other steps in between.
There are many people who started on affiliate marketing failed at the necessary steps and ended up getting nowhere near the end process.

1st Step- Educating yourself. Simply means to research and gather the best information about affiliate marketing. Education is the foundation, the building blocks to a successful affiliate marketing. It’s amazing to know that by knowing more, you’re actually opening doors to opportunities.

2nd Step- Using that knowledge. Don’t be surprise if you felt like you’ve known everything and you’re still getting nowhere. The best information are useless if you’ve never learn how to use it. Discover, and learn how to use it to serve you better.

3rd Step- Action speaks louder. This is one of the most frightening steps.
Start building up that affiliate marketing you’re thinking of. After all that investment in educating it’s time to take action.

4th Step- T&T. Testing and Tweaking. The dynamite of all marketing campaign. Yes we all will make mistakes. Test and tweak This is a never ending process. It’s those minor details that will return bigger rewards. It’s the small T & T, that makes the big Kaboom!


Get this 4 steps going, and you're on the way to a much more fruitful experience with affiliate marketing.

Cheers