Is Affiliate Marketing MLM?

While affiliate marketing has grown extensively over the past few decades, there are still a select few amount of people that question if it is a legit business practice. Thinking about this you might question, is affiliate marketing MLM? No, affiliate marketing is not identical to MLM (Network Marketing)

And no, affiliate marketing is not a pyramid scheme, and neither is MLM.

Affiliate Marketing And MLM Are Ethical And Legal

Affiliate marketing and MLM are both a legal and legitimate business practice that can be very profitable for both marketers and companies, and both of these industries have been around for many centuries in different forms, started as direct selling.

Through many countries in the world, it’s been found that affiliate marketing and MLM are often highly celebrated.

For example, for Islamic and Muslim countries, it has been found that affiliate marketing is halal (good or acceptable). In the Philippines MLM is highly looked upon as prestigious, they celebrate it highly.

So in this article will be walking you through some of the main differences between affiliate marketing and MLM.

Why Affiliate Marketing Is Not MLM

There are a variety of important distinctions to understand about affiliate marketing and MLM. They are completely different for a variety of reasons you should consider.

Here is 5 key reasons why affiliate marketing is not exactly the same as MLM:

1. Affiliate Marketing vs. MLM Compensation Structure

Affiliate Marketing:

The main difference between affiliate marketing and an MLM, is the focus of what you’re getting paid to do.

As an affiliate marketer, your job is to sell products and services to people who will use them. That’s it.

As an example: If you click on this link Bookle and were to go purchase it, we will make a one off commission.

However, there are some affiliate programs that pay tier two commissions, so you can refer people as well in the ones that have a two tiered structure.

So some affiliate programs can kinda be similar to MLM.

MLM:

In most MLM opportunities, you’re selling a product or service with the goal of also recruiting more distributors. Your focus is also on helping your distributors sell more products and recruit more distributors.

This team environment allows you to get paid on your whole organizations sales.

As an example: In our GreatLife Worldwide MLM we are distributors for, we get paid 8 different ways.

However, Do not mistake a pyramid scheme with MLM. With a pyramid scheme there is no real products or services being bought or sold, it’s all just a big money game.

2. Initial Investment Required

MLM often requires an initial investment of a one-time low cost reseller fee or purchase of a starter kit to begin selling products and recruiting other people.

In affiliate marketing most affiliate programs are free to join, but not all are. And this leads to difference number 3.

3. Marketing Training

The biggest factor in being successful in affiliate marketing or MLM is in knowing how to market.

And with affiliate marketing most of the affiliate programs a person will join, you will get no marketing training, so you will have to spend more money and time to learn how to market products and services online on your own.

The MLM industry is very well known for its marketing training and personal development aspects that help new network marketers learn how to sell and recruit others.

We have done both over the years, and in our opinion and experience, affiliate marketing is way more costly in the long run for many reasons.

Yea most affiliate programs are free to join, but your also going to have steep learning curve and you will need to buy many other marketing tools to truly be successful and paid advertising, otherwise you will never reach enough people to make enough sales that matter.

And affiliate marketing does not have the big residual income potential of MLM.

We still do affiliate marketing, but MLM is our main focus and always has been, this is where we have made the bulk of our living from for years now.

4. Recruitment And Sales vs. Just Sales

MLM emphasizes both product sales and building a network of distributors under you, leading to multiple methods for earning income .

Affiliate marketing focuses solely on promoting products or services to earn commissions, so if you stop selling in most cases, you stop earning.

Where as MLM, you can build residual income from building a team.

5. Customer Lifespan

Many affiliate programs you lose your customers to the company.

Example: Let’s say you decide to sell web hosting as an affiliate marketer, most web hosting companies pay you a one-time commission, so if your customer buys anything else later on, you lose all future commissions, you essentially were paid only to acquire the customer.

And most affiliate programs are like this, where you do all the work to get the customer, but you enjoy no future profits.

In MLM the customer is yours for ever, as well as your recruits. So if they keep buying products or services for 10 years, you keep getting paid over and over again with no further effort on your part.

Good MLM companies do not steal your customers.

The One Main Common Factor

The main common factor for MLM and affiliate marketing is that you get paid commissions for selling products and services. So technically MLM is a form of affiliate marketing.

Affiliate Marketing vs. MLM: Which One Is Easier?

We get asked all of the time by leads and subscribers of ours: Is affiliate marketing hard? Is MLM difficult?

And actually they are both very simple to do, if you already have the marketing skills, knowledge and drive, otherwise both have a learning curve.

If you take the time to learn the marketing for either niche, and be consistent, making sales will become very just repetitious. You just keep doing more of what works everyday.

We just know from personal experience that affiliate marketing is way more competitive, because it is more main stream online. In many MLM companies people still build offline more than they do online, but many are now realizing the power of the digital age.

And affiliate marketing is still growing rapidly, affiliate marketing is not dead.

Final Thoughts: Is Affiliate Marketing MLM

Affiliate marketing and MLM are a completely normal business practice that is attracting millions of everyday people, entrepreneurs, and business owners. Whether you’re looking to start your own affiliate program, become an affiliate or network marketer yourself, you now know their key differences.

They are both a great side hustle or full time career.

Thank you so much for reading through this article, we appreciate your time and hope this helped you understand more about Is Affiliate Marketing MLM.

With our kindest regards,

Jon Weberg

Richard Weberg