Affiliate Marketing Billionaires?

Can the sky be truly the limit with affiliate marketing? Just how much can one affiliate marketing web site be worth?

Well, 2 British guys may well have set the bar at a new all-time high for the affiliate marketing industry. The
prestigious Sunday Times newspaper in London recently profiled the astonishing success of web entrepreneurs Duncan Cameron and Simon Nixon of www.MoneySupermarket.com. Their web site enables visitors to easily compare a massive range of
financial products such as credit cards, insurance and mortgages.

The UK-based entrepreneurs only started in the affiliate marketing business in 1999 and their business is now valued by the Sunday Times at an astonishing $925 million–Yes, you did read that correctly by the way, although I did fall off my chair when I read their real life true story.
This makes them near-billionaires, and achieved largely via affiliate marketing in less than 5 years! It also makes them probably the wealthiest affiliate marketers in the world today!

More importantly, what does their success tell us about the affiliate marketing industry and what can we learn from their astonishing level of success?

1. Clearly, there is a lot of money to be made in the Financial Services industry as an affiliate marketer. Credit card companies for example, pay huge commissions (from $30
up to $80 and more) for every successful card application
completed. This highlights the enormous potential of this niche.

2. Their site is easy to navigate and use, allowing the comparison of several related financial products at one time.

3. The site solves problems for people and provides easy solutions. It is designed for people who perhaps do not
spend too many hours surfing but need services like this one.

4. The web site "pre-sells" a massive range of financial products. "Pre-selling" has been a frequently used term in the affiliate marketing industry. The site gently informs
visitors of all the key details associated with any financial
product and allows visitors to make truly informed decisions.

5. It tells us that Affiliate Marketers like you and I can
compete with big companies in the financial services niche. Here are just a few affiliate marketing sites that I found today, each with tremendous Google rankings. I happen to know that each are all home-based or small independent businesses:

www.creditcardexpert.co.uk

www.canadiancreditcenter.com

www.credit-cards-comparison-charts.com

www.creditcards121.com

www.ccapplication.com

The amazing thing is that affiliate sites like those above often significantly outrank some of the biggest financial institutions in the world. That, more than anything else,
shows the power that can rest with the little guy or gal, working at home on their affiliate marketing business.

It is true that financial services is a highly competitive niche. However, this can also be viewed positively as it validates the business model. When I interviewed Colin M. in my Success
Alert book recently, I came to realize that he certainly viewed it this way. Colin M. is an example of a guy making a mere $250,000 each year just from one financial services affiliate web site based around credit cards.

So, should we all go out today and build ourselves a range of affiliate marketing web sites based around the financial services industry?

Well, the business model is certainly valid and clearly there is a lot of money to be made from this niche. However, the competition out there is fierce so be aware of this. Never
though, has the small business operator been able to so effectively compete with large corporations.

Perhaps more importantly though are the lessons of helping people find solutions to their problems and gently
pre-selling them all the way to an affiliate commission. This
approach can usefully be applied to any niche market in the full knowledge that it does work amazingly well. Honest and useful product reviews are always a massive benefit to potential buyers.

Maybe you don't want to end up like the www.moneysupermarket.com
guys but you can easily duplicate Colin M's success as profiled in my recent Success Alert book.