Is Wealthy Affiliate Legit?

I’ve spent years trying to find ways to work at home and make money online, and as a result, I’ve come across (and fallen for!) many (many, many, many) of the scams out there.  So is Wealthy Affiliate legit? I will explain to you in detail whether I believe Wealthy Affiliate is legit or not, but first, let me share with you what I’ve found.

Some are an all-out scam.

This is where someone is offering something that sounds too good to be true and it turns out to be just that. Those are the worst cases – where someone actually takes your money and gives you nothing of value in return.

Some aren’t technically a scam, but…

Others make offers that aren’t actually false or fraudulent, but not exactly honest either.  Those are the guys who only give you part of the story – the ones who make a bunch of promises and make things sound easy, when really you’d have to have a magic wand to actually accomplish making one dime with their program.

Some fail to tell you what’s really involved.

Other programs make promises that you’ll make money, but they fail to tell you just how little you’ll be paid for your work.  The survey-answering scams come to mind on this one.  Yes, you can actually be paid for answering surveys online – but they take HOURS and you get only pennies for doing it.

Some are legit but not worthwhile.

I believe that affiliate marketing is no doubt an honest, realistic way to make money online, but there are scams for this out there too.  I signed up for an affiliate marketing training course a few years ago and I got so excited!  I thought the training was awesome and I was excited about what I was learning.  

I was convinced I’d soon be rich!  But what I didn’t realize at the time, because I was brand new at affiliate marketing and knew absolutely nothing about it at that point, was that the training they were giving me was far from thorough.  I was able to set up a website that looked cool.  

They even showed me how to become an affiliate for companies I liked. They gave me some training about how to insert affiliate links and banners on my website.  Wah-la, right?  I honestly thought that once my website went live, the money would start pouring in! Sounds stupid, I know – but in my defense, I thought that because it’s what they were leading me to believe.  In actuality, no one ever visited my website because I was doing absolutely nothing to make that happen. They left out the most important part of the training – how to actually get people to come to your website!

There’s absolutely no way I could’ve been successful just with the training they were offering.

But I’m not upset…I’m actually thankful for those guys because they’re the ones that helped me get my feet wet in affiliate marketing.  They’re the ones that showed me what it was, and at least gave me an idea of how it worked and what it could be.  I wish they would’ve made good on their promise to actually show me how to make money with it – but at least they opened the door.

Wealthy Affiliate is NOT a Scam.  It’s the real deal.

Wealthy Affiliate, the company I finally ended up with (and who helped me create this website, is a legit, actual, real training program for how to become an affiliate marketer. It covers absolutely everything you could possibly need to know to be successful.  Everything from setting up a website, to learning how to get traffic. And all the stuff in between – simple stuff like how to add pictures to your website, how to set it up so it looks good and is easy to read. And harder stuff like Search Engine Optimization, setting up a Google Analytics account.  

I’m getting tons of traffic on my website. People share my pages on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and LinkedIn.

There are dozens of conversations going on at any given moment on or about MY website – either via comments and discussions on the website itself, or comments on social media.  I cannot express how exciting it is to actually have people coming to my website.  Seeing my work. Visitors…Customers!  Now there’s a concept!  LOL!  That’s what the other guys never taught me.  This is the difference between the scams and Wealthy Affiliate.

Starting with Wealthy Affiliate is absolutely free.  You can set up your own website, go through tons of how-to classes.  Actually build a successful website, learn how to be an affiliate marketer, be successful, and go on for the rest of your life earning a full time income from the website you’ve built with their free help.

OK, so…What’s the Catch?

Let’s get right to it.  

I might actually be the only person on the internet who is going to tell you upfront exactly what to expect and what “the catch” is with this program. The truth is, there is not only one “catch” with Wealthy Affiliate, there are two!

 

First Catch:  Going Premium

What does “Going Premium” mean? During the first 20 (Free) training classes, the trainer (owner, Kyle) repeatedly encourages you to “Go Premium.”  What this means is that there are two memberships with Wealthy Affiliate.  The Starter Membership is absolutely free and includes everything I’ve talked about. The upgraded membership is called, “Premium.”  I am currently a Premium Member with Wealthy Affiliate.  

The cost of the Premium Membership is $49 per month. Well worth it, in my opinion, to basically have a teacher in your office with you 24/7!

So there’s the first catch.  Wealthy affiliate is absolutely free to start. And you can absolutely use the free training to build a website, learn to be an affiliate marketer, work and earn money the rest of your life without ever paying a dime – without ever becoming a premium member.  But I personally am a premium member.  I feel the fee is worth it all over the place.

Second Catch: Promoting Wealthy Affiliate 

The second catch is that not only does Wealthy Affiliate teach you how to start your own website on a topic that YOU love – mine happens to be about animals – but they also include free training called Affiliate Bootcamp where they teach you how to promote Wealthy Affiliate! Brilliant, don’t you agree?  These guys really had a fantastic idea when they came up with this. It’s like they said, “Let’s start a free website where we teach people step-by-step how to become awesome, super effective affiliate marketers – then encourage them to market….US!”

These guys have changed my life.  I honestly couldn’t feel right about myself if I didn’t share it with people.  So many people out there – from single moms to people who couldn’t go to college – executives who got fired due to downsizing after slaving for 30 years…so many people in every category of life can benefit from working at home and making money online.

And most importantly, if I can teach even one person how to do something they love for a living then, well…it’s worth it.  So I decided to start this website and promote Wealthy Affiliate – and they pay me to do that (twice as much since I’m a Premium Member) – so why not? So there’s the second catch. 

So there it is.  

I hope you realize now that you’ve finished this article that I’m being completely honest about what I’m promoting.  I believe in Wealthy Affiliate. I’m a member and I have no doubt this will be my job for the rest of my life.  I won’t ever work for anyone else again – I’ll never have a J.O.B. again.  I’m self-employed now, I’m an online entrepreneur – I set my own hours, I’m my own boss.  And it’s all because of Wealthy Affiliate.

Go ahead…ask me any question you want 🙂

Comment below with questions (I’ll respond!) Debra

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