Danny Brown‘s recent post, Why Affiliate Marketers Piss Me Off got me to thinking.
Truth: I don’t read enough on what Affiliate Marketers do right these days. So here’s my take on the matter.
Disclosure: I am one.
Disclosure #2: I am biased.
Disclosure #3: I think we are a pretty cool bunch.
With these “disclosures” in hand, let me give you three reasons I love Affiliate Marketers:
1. We do the grunt work.
A good Affiliate will put in the time and effort to:
- See a need in the marketplace
- Discover a product or service to meet that need
- Evaluate that product or service
- Evaluate the individual or company who offers the product or service
- Bring the product or service to the marketplace in a effective manner
- Provide a means for that product or service to be purchased
Can you do this “grunt work” on your own? Sure, but do you really want to?
2. We are the “small business” of the online economy.
In the political and economic debate here in the United States, we often here how it is “small businesses” that drive our economy. I love these facts according to the Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy:
Small businesses:
- Represent 99.7 percent of all employer firms.
- Pay 44% of total U.S. payroll.
- Firms with fewer than 500 employees accounted for 64% (or 14.5 million) of the 22.5 million net new jobs (gains minus losses) between 1993 and the third quarter of 2008.
- Create more than half of the nonfarm private gross domestic product (GDP).
- Are 52% home-based and 2% franchises.
I am proud to be a small business Affiliate Marketer.
3. Passive income.
For 20 years, through network marketing, insurance sales and now affiliate marketing, I have believed in the concept of passive income. In my humble opinion, there is simply no way to expend your energies in the workplace.
Hey, if it’s good enough for the likes of Avon, Mary Kay and Amazon, it’s good enough for me.
At times, Affiliate Marketing gets a bad rap. Sometimes it deserves it.
At the end of the day, when all is said and done, this ol’ corn fed Midwesterner loves Affiliate Marketers.
Your turn. What do you think?
photo: izzie whizzie
