Blog Monetization Myth #2: Affiliate marketing is the only way to make real money blogging.

Welcome to the second episode of a series in which I debunk some common myths you might believe around making money from your blog. Today’s one is that affiliate marketing is the only real way to earn as a blogger. Well, it’s not, let me share why. Why this is a common belief For a start, everyone online is talking about affiliate marketing and teaching it. It’s something that has been around for a long time and it’s so popular and profitable. Also, newbie bloggers are doing it a lot. If you see something happening that much with others, you’ll subconsciously start to believe that is the only way to actually make it as a blogger. It’s something I used to think many years ago and affiliate marketing was one of my income streams, but it’s not anymore. However, all those bloggers that I was following were teaching this, they were doing it and most of their income, 80-90% was coming from this. So I really was thinking that this is where the real money is made. That’s when I started learning more about affiliate marketing and how it applies to a blogging business. I started practicing it more and a portion of my revenue was coming from it. Then it slowed down, but I just wasn’t passionate about investing more time in it or promoting it that actively. I still have affiliate links on my website, of course. I have some affiliate reviews. Every now and then I participate in a new campaign that I’m an affiliate for or I include affiliate links inside the newsletter. Not often, but it can happen. It’s mainly for the tools I’m using and when I teach anything business related, you need tools. So I recommend the ones I’m using and the ones I believe in. Then it makes sense and that’s the genuine way to do affiliate marketing. But anytime I would start creating content solely for that purpose, meaning with the goal to include more affiliate links in it and to potentially make profit, it just didn’t feel right. Another reason why this is a common belief is that it’s easy to spot who is monetizing through affiliate marketing online because of their links, banners on their website linking to affiliate products, affiliate reviews and promos in their newsletters and so on. It’s just obvious. Nothing bad with it, of course. It’s just easy to see that a particular website is promoting affiliate products. The more you see it, the more you might assume this is the way to go for any blogger. The same can be said for ads and selling digital products, but not so much for sponsorships. You don’t usually know which posts or links are paid on a certain website. That’s fine because they’re supposed to look like any other blog post on the platform. So another reason why you might assume affiliate marketing is the only blog income stream worth pursuing is that the other ones are not talked about that much, especially sponsorships. Not only can you not see if someone is monetizing through that, but they don’t talk about it. They don’t disclose their partnerships, which is a good practice to do. It’s good to disclose them. Bloggers also don’t like to reveal that income stream because they think that they risk their relationship with brands this way,