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Internet marketing is a term that is thrown around by experts, media outlets, and average internet users in a context that makes it seem like a "dirty" industry to get into. Sure there will be a fair share of affiliate marketers that feel that they need to maximize profits even if it means selling their souls by advertising programs and products such as Zango that benefit nobody but themselves and company. The problem is that the vast majority of good deeds done by affiliate marketers go unseen and these acts are the ones that people remember. As a result, getting into affiliate marketing can be a very difficult road unless you have the proper resources in place and for this reason most people will not achieve the success they are capable of.

Reason #1: "Get rich quick schemes" The top reason that affiliate marketers will fail is because they buy get rich quick schemes rather than properly written affiliate marketing guides and they do not learn the basics as a result. These schemes are designed so that the buyer becomes the affiliate and anyone that bought this product is trying to sell it to others, without the slightest clue how to market it. As a result no affiliates make money but the company gets rich.

Reason #2: "Lack of patience" This is a simple one yet many people fail into this trap without realizing it. The whole purpose of affiliate marketing is to establish a long term income by doing the majority of the work upfront, for instance this article will still be read in a year even though I wrote it far before the reader will actually find it. If you are watching you much money you have made every 10 minutes rather than actually doing work you are losing time, and through loss of productivity affiliates become aggravated and eventually give up. Take a breather, and continue to do work, set a schedule for yourself and stick to it.

Reason #3: "Lack of effort" This should be a complete no brain-er, but for some reason many of the new affiliate marketers that come to me for advice start asking questions about why they have failed before they've invested any time. You cannot possibly succeed if you do not try, if you haven't spent at least 200 hours on your affiliate marketing campaign than you should be happy if you are seeing results at all. In order to get big results you need to out work your competition, it isn't hard but it is hilarious how the curve works out, almost all people will quit after the same amount of effort. Once you put in more effort than these people or have more acquired knowledge than them you will see a drastic increase in traffic and sales.

Reason #4: "Lack of knowledge" This is actually the number one reason but I felt that it should go in the fourth slot simply because it should really be that obvious. Many people jump into affiliate marketing with hopes of making millions by making a thousand different websites for a thousand different profits then they will all magically get traffic and backlinks and they can buy a nice sized island. No. I'm sorry but that isn't how it works, in order to be successful you will need to level the massive advantage in knowledge that others will have. Affiliate marketing isn't a new thing, it is just new to you and the only way out there to quickly level the playing field is by buying a few of the better guides and ebooks that are out there. Before I started making websites I bought 6 guides, each around $40 and then did another 200 hours of independent research. As a result I was able to explode into the market once I started since I had a large knowledge base and a ton of pent up energy from studying without putting it into practice. I would highly recommend you buy a few guides before trying to go off on your own (if you are making $3000 a day from Commission Junction or Amazon I doubt you will mind the $40 you spent on a guide).

Reason #5: "Shaving the yak" This is a term made famous by Seth Godin that refers to the fact that whenever there is something you need to do, you decide you'd rather do something else which inevitably leads to you shaving the yak rather than submitting to those other 300 directories. I fall victim to this myself as there are many things that I would rather do than respond to emails and call up business contacts, unfortunately this comes with the territory. Once you learn good time management skills and treat affiliate marketing as if it is actually your job and not just an income source you will waste far less time and make far more money.

Now that you have read all five reasons for failure you have no excuse to fail yourself. These should be constant reminders in your head of what not to do or else you will become a common failure yourself. Just remember that there is always something to learn and something to do, and you will go far.