Making money in mainstream is easy if you are strategic in what you promote.
The most profitable mainstream products are those which are recurring in nature and thing which everyone needs and uses.
Examples are: electricity, internet access, gas, water, mobile phones etc
All you need to do is place yourself between the consumer and the vendor then take your cut.
Many profitable products don't have an affiliate sign up link , you need to contact the vendors yourself and make deals.
If this is too hard then try selling things which have recurring commissions that are readily available for instant promotion, examples include web hosting, subscription products such as Usenet or Movie streaming services. The problem here however is that competition is high and returns are spread amongst many affiliates.
Using a product such as
Market Samurai will help you target profitable keywords and long tail keywords which will in turn make it easier to capture consumers who will buy. Flying blind and just putting up links never works, you need to do research using tools such as
Market Samurai to ensure you reach the people actually searching for what you are promoting.
It's always a case of placing yourself between the consumer and the vendor. Therefore sites which re-affirm the consumers decision to buy a product are often successful.
Someone searching for "usenet servers", "newsgroup servers" , "usenet downloads" etc has probably already decided they want to join a Usenet service. So your task is to convince the consumer that they do wish to get Usenet and show them the best way to get it ie: convince them that your product is the best. Often your job is no more than re-affirming a desire.
There is plenty of money to be made in mainstream if you target your efforts rather than try to take a blanket approach with lots of unplanned links.