For the past 5 years I’ve been a full-time online marketer. In late 2008 I quit my last 9-5 job and fired all of my freelance clients so that I could dedicate myself to making money online – and I never looked back.
Success in this field has given me the opportunity to be my own boss, work whenever I want and focus on things I enjoy like making music and experiment with Intermittent Fasting.
The people in my life have reacted to this in two ways:
- They don’t understand what I do and want me to explain it
- They want me to immediately teach them how to do it
I would say the majority of people fall into category #2. They see that I’m doing this and they think they should be able to do it to. The general thought is “if Malan can do it, I can too, right?”
WRONG.
Out of the 10 or so people that I have tried to teach the majority lasted less than 14 days and none of them quit their day jobs.
While there is always the possibility that my teaching just sucks, I believe it’s something else.
The Fear of Losing Money
The scenario goes like this:
- Person A wants to learn affiliate marketing and has $1000 to invest into it
- I give Person A an offer, traffic source, ads and instructions
- Person A loses $250 in the first week
- Person A quits
I would bet that this scenario happens with about 99.9% of the people that give affiliate marketing a try. The problem isn’t that they’re doing anything wrong, they just don’t know what success looks like.
What Success Looks Like
Let’s take a look at a campaign from June. As you can see the first two weeks were rough. But here’s the key – during Week 2, I lost less money than I did in Week 1.
This is a success.
This is the breakthrough in thinking that has to happen in order to make this work.
(Above): What a successful campaign looks like
When put in the above scenario the majority of people will think “it’s been losing for two weeks straight, I quit!” and move on to the next thing.
The person that’s going to make it work will look at the first two weeks and see a slight improvement and go even HARDER knowing it’s turning around.
And sure, there are plenty of campaigns that I will abandon. If I’ve spent enough money and collected enough data and all signs point to Loser, I’ll pull the plug.
But never before I know I’ve tried everything.
In Conclusion:
The common trait among most successful affiliate marketers is the ability to sustain losses in the beginning and turn it around. If you’re risk adverse you should stick with a 9-5 and a steady paycheck.
But if you’re a little nuts and have a few dollars to lose and the guts to hang in there until it turns around it’s an exceptional way to make a living.
P.S. If you want me to teach you – no problem. My retainer is $1,000,000 per month with a minimum 12 month contract. Contact me anytime.