Is the “Game” rigged?

Some things are just hard to accept.

But you have to ask yourself…

Especially, if you’ve experienced the frustrations, like I and others have…

Is this whole (online) game rigged against me?

First thing you need to know is that there’s a lot working against you in the online scene.

My worst experiences, close to 15 years online, have been, when working in the affiliate marketing scene.

Here’s some hard earned (with sweat and money) findings…

#Affiliate Networks (the places where we get offers to promote) – (& Especially “Bonus-Hungry” Affiliate Managers) Treat you like “proxy” traffic sources (a.k.a. traffic mules) & ask you (or expect of you) to push & stop traffic all the time.

They don’t even care (or even understand) that you’re spending your own money (& also the fact that you’re usually running in negative Return On Investment (ROI), at the start)…

And that you need constant cash flow to make money with their offers.

And some even try to share what you’re doing and working for you with other affiliates that they know have the budget to spend more on the offer.

So they make more off them via commissions.

Here’s an example.

Also, most networks are just re-brokering from (just a few) top networks (& even each other), so you’re getting undercut on payouts left & right.

And all these networks still (dare to) promote themselves as having “exclusive offers”.

#Traffic sources (the places we buy traffic)

Keep their best quality traffic (& also volumes) reserved for themselves (their internal teams)

And/or only for flat deal buyers, top spenders, & partners (a.k.a Networks, Advertisers, etc).

#Advertisers (the people who own the offers we promote if we are doing affiliate marketing)

Hold the most power here (in my opinion).

Some shave a % from your conversions (& networks actually know, and allow it).

Some (constantly) try to steal your campaigns (& sometimes your managers even help them).

And some choose to just not pay, at all (just because they don’t see fit).

There’s a lot working against us in this scene.

The question is what You can do about it?

I believe you need to create leverage for your self and insert some form of predictability in your marketing.

It’s not the only solution.

It might not even be the best.

But it’s has been working through the years consistently without exception (examples from  2013,  from 2019, 2021 and  2024).

And continues to work as we speak…