One of the things I've been saying in the big argumentative threads about tubes and torrents was that as an affiliate it has pretty much killed my ability to make sales to the hundreds of programs I promote.
BUT, as a paysite owner...I can tell you that our type-in sales are higher than ever.
And as I stated back in the x-sell fights...I could see it happening. The review sites started exposing the affiliate business and explaining to surfers how it works. Freeones put up icons explaining x-sells etc. These were well intentioned things...but the results were that surfers now understand completely the affiliate business.
And just like I did over 13 years ago when my eyes were opened about affiliates and how it works...they started NOT clicking on links and instead either typing it in or going to a search engine.
I've been saying that for a few months now, and my stats re-confirm it everytime I look at Stats Remote.
Here's some of my worst ratios for you:
Fuck You Cash: 0:1284
Jug Cash: 0:2092
Naughty America: 0:2172
Nasty Dollars: 0:834
And the list goes on and on and on. I listed these 4 companies because before there were tubes and torrents I made hundreds of thousands of dollars with them. Do I think they are going out of business? No, these are great companies with awesome content. I'm theorizing that just like I'm seeing with Claudia-Marie.Com, they are getting the highest percentage of type-in traffic that they have ever experienced.
Does that equal as much revenue as 2 years ago? No, not at all. Claudia-Marie.Com revenue has lost 1/4 of it's revenue from a year ago. And when I speak with other program owners...they are giving me much worse figures on their end.
But not enough to shut down operations by any means for the majority.
As for us affiliates? I'm not coming close to making what I did as an affiliate from a year ago. Up until this year, my affiliate money has always grown each year.
In 2008 I made $539,278.77 with my affiliate work (keep in mind that is from being a pretty major affiliate since 1997 so I have a lot of cookies and a lot of rebills). That was the first year that I didn't really grow, because in 2007 I made $521,475.75 so I pretty much went sideways.
But this year? Holy shit! Affiliate work isn't paying at all. I've lost most of my traffic to the tubes and torrents of course. And according to Stats Remote's forecast I'm on track to only make $316,731.37 for 2009!!! I don't care who you are...dropping over $200,000.00 in a single year is HUGE.
Perfect storm of the explosion of torrents and the surfer forums that literally have links up to every paysite on the planet ripped and waiting for free.
Yeah, it's hurting paysites. But it is KILLING affiliates.
