Wealthy Affiliate Review – 20 Pros & Cons (Is It Legit in 2024?)

Wealthy Affiliate Review

Welcome to the ultimate Wealthy Affiliate review.

Wealthy Affiliate aims to help you learn about and build your own affiliate marketing business from the ground up.

If you are looking to learn:

  • Is Wealthy Affiliate legit
  • Who are Kyle and Carson
  • How WA helps you earn
  • The real cost to start
  • Can you get a refund
  • Are students getting results
  • And more!

You’ve landed on the best website!

I’ve dedicated a few years to analyzing this popular online business program, taking notes, uncovering all sorts of hidden info, and thoroughly going over the program so that I can provide you with the most helpful Wealthy Affiliate review.

About

Affiliate marketing training, tools and community.

Cost

Free to join; Premium $49 a month; Premium+ $99 a month.

Pros

Wealthy Affiliate has been active for 16 years and counting. Beginner-friendly training. Despite negative comments, WA methods still work. The premium membership is a bargain, offering all the training, tools, and support. Live weekly webinars with Jay. The community aspect is awesome. Site support team available 24/7. Kyle and Carson frequently update Wealthy Affiliate. Lucrative affiliate program.

Cons

Some "experts" aren't real experts. Positive Wealthy Affiliate reviews mostly come from affiliates. Many join and fail within 3 months. The community aspect is somewhat cultish. Some people are just there to kill time. Wealthy Affiliate training is overwhelming. Too many features can be overwhelming. You're encouraged to promote Wealthy Affiliate. Some training parts are outdated. Wealthy Affiliate has no refund policy.

⚠️ Verdict

Although it's got its pros and cons, WA is a good place to learn about affiliate marketing, build your website, and hang with other affiliates.

 Rating

I Want To Know…

About the Reviewer

Hey, I’m Ivan Brozincevic!

Since 2018, I’ve been making a full-time income online, which allowed me to quit my old job (about me).

Initially, I struggled to identify legit courses and avoid ones that were just out for my money.

That’s why I created this website – my main goal is to help you steer clear of pitfalls and discover the top online business courses.

Every week, I invest hours reviewing online courses and writing reviews based on my fact-driven review guidelines to assist you in making an informed choice.

Related: Check out my FREE training program for making money online.

This review is going to be comprehensive, detailed, and incredibly helpful. So strap on your seatbelt and get ready to learn everything about WA!

Let’s start with…

What Is a Wealthy Affiliate?

Wealthy Affiliate is one of the internet’s most popular affiliate marketing training courses. It is also a huge community, as well as a hosting company (among many other tools they sell).

The WA community has 1.4 million members from all over the world. The main goal of the platform is to provide these members with affiliate marketing training, marketing tools (websites, hosting, research tools), and live help.

Wealthy Affiliate Website

Here is a quick overview of the features:

  • Affiliate marketing training
  • Websites, hosting, domains
  • Keyword research tool
  • Live help and tech support
  • Interactive Community
  • Lucrative affiliate program

A quick disclaimer before you continue…

I’m a long-time member of WA. However, my review is unbiased. That said, in this review, I’m sharing both the good and bad about this affiliate marketing training platform.

I joined WA in 2017 so I’m close to 5 years of continuous membership. I have earned 1000s of dollars in affiliate revenue thanks to this course (proof in this review).

About Kyle And Carson – Founders of WA

Kyle Loudon and Caron Lim established Wealthy Affiliate about 17 years ago. Their goal was and still is to help others achieve the same success they had over the last decade and a half.

WA started as a simple keyword research tool (Jaaxy) designed to help new marketers find marketing opportunities.

Over the last 17 years, the platform evolved by continuously adding training, more tools, and more. Along the way, Kyle and Carons built the largest community of online marketers…ever!

Kyle Loudon and Caron Lim

So how can you leverage this platform to start with affiliate marketing?

Let me first explain what affiliate marketing is. And then, I’ll show you how WA works in the process of making money online with affiliate marketing…

What Is Affiliate Marketing?

Affiliate marketing is the process by which an affiliate earns a commission for marketing another person’s or company’s products or services.

The affiliate simply searches for a product they like, then promotes that product to other interested individuals, and earns a piece of the profit from each sale they make.

What makes affiliate marketing the best online business model is the fact that it doesn’t require a big up-front investment (you can start for free with WA – more about this in my review)!

Furthermore, once you become an established and successful marketer, you can choose your hours, take your office wherever you want, and earn lots of money while having the freedom to enjoy your life.

And here’s how WA can help you start with affiliate marketing…

How Does Wealthy Affiliate Work?

Wealthy Affiliate teaches you how to set up a WordPress website from scratch, use it to drive free organic traffic, promote other people’s products and earn a commission for every new sale you make.

Below is a diagram that paints a better picture than my words…

Affiliate Marketing Diagram

You can learn how to choose your niche based on your passions. This could be anything from fitness to playing the guitar or even basketball or cooking.

The second step is building a website that you will use to publish content (blog posts) and advertise affiliate programs.

Building the website part is super-easy in my experience because all the tech stuff is done for you (I hate to use that set of words, but that’s how it is with SiteBuilder).

Next, guys will spend a lot of time teaching you how to perfect content creation based on keyword research. The ultimate goal is to get top rankings in Google and other search engines and free organic traffic.

And YES, this method still works despite what some WA reviews say!

What I like about this method is that it is based on helping people in your niche. What I don’t like is the fact that it takes a lot of time to get life-changing results (12+ months).

Lastly, if all goes well (that part is up to you!), the making money part is going to be automatic.

With that being said, there are two different ways how you can start an affiliate marketing business via the WA program:

Approach #1 – Build Your Niche Website

The first way is to finish the core training called Online Entrepreneur Certification (I’ll share details later in my review). You will be learning how to promote ANY product in ANY niche you want.

Choosing Your Own Niche Approach

Some people say that this course (approach) doesn’t work anymore…but I beg to differ.

Building niche websites is a simple process that hasn’t changed much over the last 15 years. As I said earlier, there are four simple steps to this process and they are:

  • Choose your niche
  • Build a website
  • Attract visitors
  • Earn revenue

The Online Entrepreneur Certification course contains 50 step-by-step lessons where you can learn how to complete all four steps from the above.

Approach #2 – Build WA Bootcamp Website

Another course found inside Wealthy Affiliate is about building a website (using the same 4-step formula) and promoting the WA affiliate program to people inside the Make-Money-Online niche.

It’s called Affiliate Bootcamp and it’s composed of 70 step-by-step lessons.

Some people might say this is the “core” training, and they are not far away from the truth…

When I first joined, I had the feeling that Kyle and Carson were attracting newbies with no sense of direction. Their goal is to provide them with one and help them to earn their first dollar online.

Affiliate Bootcamp Recommendation Inside the Course

Whether this is true or not, doesn’t matter actually…

What matters is that both courses STILL WORK.

So if you have a passion for an MMO niche or any other niche out there, you can make use of these two courses to start making money online.

Speaking of which…

Are People Getting Results With WA?

A sure way to find out whether Wealthy Affiliate is a scam or not is to check out other people’s results with it. Keep in mind that success with this, or any other program of this nature is NOT guaranteed.

Like in every other business (online or offline), you have to hustle and then hustle some more to succeed.

These three persons are the prime example of what you can accomplish too if you take this (or any other) opportunity seriously…

Eddy Solomon Made Over $1 Million With Affiliate Marketing

Eddy is one of the oldest members of the WA (I’m not talking about his age). He’s been a member for over 10 years and his results with affiliate marketing are…well, fascinating.

Eddy's Wealthy Affiliate Success Story

In short, Solomon has managed to earn 1 million dollars using the methods and techniques from WA.

Fascinating results, right?

Jerry Huang Made $6K in One Month Promoting Wealthy Affiliate

Jerry was only 20 years old when he joined the community. Thanks to this training, he quickly went from a newbie to earning 1000s every single month from his affiliate websites!

Jerry's Wealthy Affiliate Success Story

In the meantime, Huang has created his affiliate course in the Mandarin language and turned his focus on helping people to follow in his footsteps.

Nathaniel Is Earning $1000s a Month Thanks to WA

Just like Eddy, Nathaniel is one of the senior members of the community. He owns multiple successful affiliate websites in various niches that make tens of 1000s of dollars each month!

Nathaniel's Wealthy Affiliate Success Story

Nathaniel has also decided to share his experience with others in the form of video training.

However, unlike Huang, he records his video tutorials and publishes them inside the platform for Premium (and free) members to learn from.

Now, is there any chance for you to replicate these results…?

How Much Can You Earn With a Wealthy Affiliate?

To be honest, there is no fixed answer or a concrete number. You see, you can earn as much as you want with Wealthy Affiliate. As I said in my review, there are no guarantees.

The best way to answer this question is to say this; how much you put in, you get out!

In other words, what you sow, so shall you reap (to be Biblical about it)…

Even Kyle (the co-founder) makes it VERY CLEAR at the beginning of the course that making money online is a process!

Kyle's Words of Caution

One thing is for sure, the training videos inside the platform are good enough to get you started on the right foot.

And with all the coaching and the community inside, you can easily replicate Eddy’s, Jerry’s, and Nathaniel’s success. But only under the condition that you are willing to roll up your sleeves, and hustle like there’s no tomorrow!

If you are a newbie, you might get lucky and earn a few quick bucks.

However, the reality is that most people who join ANY affiliate marketing course give up only after a few short months. This is because they don’t understand that affiliate marketing is a real business…

They’ve been influenced by courses like 12 Minute Affiliate or Perpetual Income 365 to think that you can make money with affiliate marketing fast and without any effort.

In other words, don’t get fooled by thinking that affiliate marketing is a quick way to riches.

That said, as you can see from my review, WA can help you to begin your journey. But it is your responsibility to invest enough time, effort, and money into your success.

Nothing in this world comes easy…

How Much Can You Make Promoting WA?

As I said in the opening paragraphs, Wealthy Affiliate has a lucrative affiliate program. You can earn commissions by promoting the platform to other people interested in the affiliate marketing business.

WA Commission Structure

Your affiliate commission is about 49% if you are a Premium Member, and 23% if you are a free member.

And since there are a few different payment plans, the amount that you can earn from one sale varies.

Below is the official view of the affiliate program…

Wealthy Affiliate Affiliate Program Details

For example:

  • If a person enrols in the 7-day $19 test deal, you’ll earn a one-time payment of $8 ($4 if you’re a free member).
  • You earn $22.50 ($11.25 if you’re a free member) on every full-price Premium sale.
  • If a person buys a Yearly Premium subscription, you earn about $235 per sale ($117.50 if you are a free member)

There is also a PremiumPlus membership (more about this later in my review), which costs $99 a month or $995 a year.

Your affiliate commissions are:

  • You earn $23.50 if your referral buys the 7-day $49 test deal (free members earn 25% of the deal).
  • If a person buys a full package for $99 a month, you earn $46.50 from each sale ($23.25  for free remembers).
  • You can also earn $465 once your referral upgrades to a yearly subscription (3232.50 if you’re a free member).

All payment plans are recurring, which means you keep making money for as long as your referral maintains paying their subscription charges.

According to WA’s affiliate page, the standard Starter to Premium conversion is 12%.

This means that 12 out of 100 people that join WA as a free member will at some point upgrade to a Premium subscription.

My Results Promoting Wealthy Affiliate Program

By the way, I have joined and tested the WA affiliate program. Check out the video below…

Not bad, right?

And I’m not the only one who earned something promoting WA.

You can watch the WA review from one of the members below to see how much and how he is making money with the WA affiliate program…

Looks like Roope is getting nice results…

So as you can see, there is good money in promoting WA. But how much is it going to cost you to get started? Keep reading my review to learn more…

How Much Does Wealthy Affiliate Cost?

You can join Wealthy Affiliate free of charge. But since Kyle and Carson are constantly changing things, free membership went from a free-forever model to a 7-day free trial.

Still, this is a great deal! It’s always good to have the option to test drive the program before taking out your credit card without even seeing the deal.

Here are some of the top features of free WA membership:

  • Access to Level 1 of the training
  • Community access for seven days
  • One free WordPress website
  • Access to WA’s affiliate program
  • 30 free searches in Jaaxy

I recommend you give it a free test drive before making any judgment. One of the best ways to make sure that WA is not a scam, is to see it for yourself, right?

If you feel that it is not for you, you have wasted only seven days…

How Much Does Wealthy Affiliate Premium Cost?

On the other hand, if you decide to join Wealthy Affiliate Premium, it will cost you $49 a month or $495 a year.

Here are some of the top features of Premium membership:

  • Access to all levels of training
  • Unlimited 356 community access
  • Direct access to Kyle and Carson
  • Ability to host up to 50 websites
  • Advanced hosting features and tools
  • 50% commission on the WA affiliate program
  • Access to Premium coaches and website support

You can also bump your membership to PremiumPlus ($99 a month or $995 per year). Below are more details…

Wealthy Affiliate Prices and Packages

In my opinion, this is not necessary right away. However, once you get established and your websites start to grow, some cool features come with PremiumPlus.

Keep in mind that this is not an upsell…

You can think of PremiumPlus as a business-class ticket to an aeroplane. Both economy and business class get to ride in the same plane and go to the same destination, just under different conditions.

Can You Cancel Your Subscription?

WA offers full flexibility when it comes to managing subscriptions, which is something I like about the platform.

That said, you can cancel your subscription anytime!

All you have to do is log in, go to your Account Settings/Subscriptions, and cancel the billing.

Can You Get a Refund From WA?

To be honest, WA doesn’t offer refunds…but there’s a trick on how to get one.

In case you need your money back, you can contact the billing team or Kyle and Carson directly and ask them nicely to give you a refund.

Is Wealthy Affiliate Worth the Time and Money?

I believe that a Wealthy Affiliate is worth time, money, and effort in the long run, of course.

Even if you don’t make any money in your first year with affiliate marketing, you will “only” waste about $500 on subscription fees. I know this sounds a bit negative…but stick with me.

Most newbies hardly ever make any income during the first 12 months!

However, if you stick to it for another year, the second 12 months might bring an avalanche of positive results and your investment could pay off quickly.

Wealthy Affiliate Success Stories

This scenario has happened to me (and I’m glad it did!).

I came in in 2017 as a newbie with very limited knowledge and experience. My first year with WA was not so lucrative, although I earned some cash (proof in this review!).

But I kept learning and working on my websites and today, I’m looking at a different picture. All my membership fees have been paid off and I’m raking in pure profits.

Now, talking from a strict price-to-quality standpoint, WA is, once again, worth it.

For only $49 a month, you get access to 120 training lessons, all the tools that you need to become an affiliate marketer, community help and technical support, access to Premium coaches, and more.

Other affiliate marketing courses charge 10x more for 5x less value…

What’s Inside Wealthy Affiliate?

So as I said earlier in my review, there are two training courses:

Online Entrepreneur Certification Training

OEC is good for newbies who are interested in learning the basics of affiliate marketing. The course is good and it works for people who put the effort into the lessons.

Here’s a quick overview of topics covered with each of the 5 modules inside this training…

Wealthy Affiliate Online Entrepreneur Certification

Some people might say that this course is outdated…but once again, I beg to differ.

You see, three years ago, I joined this course and started building a website in the personal development niche. It was a passion project and I was a newbie from head to toe!

Today, this website holds several first-page rankings on Google (even though I was clueless about the process of ranking websites for keywords in search engines!).

Moreover, this site has made a few $1000s along the way on ClickBank and CJ Affiliate.

My Results With Wealthy Affiliate

So it is safe to say that this training still works in 2022!

Affiliate Bootcamp Training

Another training inside the WA is called Affiliate Bootcamp and it is all about learning how to promote WA.

Here is a quick overview of the topics covered in this course…

Wealthy Affiliate Bootcamp Course

Once again, there are naysayers out there who say that Affiliate Bootcamp is Kyle’s and Carson’s main focus. And they are not too wrong here.

However, you as a free person have the free will to choose your direction.

All that I can say is that, after being a member for over 4 years, I have strong evidence that both Online Entrepreneur Certification and Affiliate Bootcamp are good enough to help you make money with affiliate marketing.

Here are some of the payments that I got from promoting WA.

My Results With Wealthy Affiliate 1

Therefore, both courses WORK and are legit! I openly promote WA because I’m GETTING RESULTS with it.

You may have read some reviews that claim differently, but they haven’t taken action with this course and are probably promoting something else.

If you like the idea of WA and affiliate marketing, you should stop reading fake reviews! It WORKS!

Anyway, let’s continue this review by sharing what else you get for $49 a month…

Wealthy Affiliate Tools and Resources

What I liked about WA when I first joined back in 2017 was its so-called toolbox. In other words, you get lots of cool features that help to build and profit from affiliate marketing websites.

Here is what you will be getting:

  • Website hosting and domains
  • Website Builder
  • Keyword research tools
  • Content writing tool
  • Affiliate programs research tool

To be honest, these are not the best tools in their categories, but they serve the purpose and will help to build your affiliate marketing website and get results.

In other words, you don’t need to spend tons of cash on already overpriced marketing tools.

I haven’t bought ClickFunnels, AHREFS, or BlueHost yet I get results…

Wealthy Affiliate Support

One of the top features of WA, and in my opinion, one of the main reasons why this company is still the main topic when it comes to the best affiliate marketing courses is the support they provide.

First of all, free members have only seven days of access to these features. However, this is long enough to allow you to test it with your questions.

On the other hand, all Premium members have 24/7 access to support.

Non-Stop Technical Support Team

For example, if your site breaks down, the support team will jump right into the problem and get you up and running in no time.

And you won’t believe how fast the support is!

WA SiteSupport Live Chat

As you can see from the screenshot above, I have sent them a request to create a staging environment for one of my websites hosted on the platform.

I wanted to test some plugins without having to worry about breaking my site…

Guys from the site support team were quick to respond to my request. They created the child website for me, sent me the instructions, and everything else went smoothly.

So team the support element is GREAT!

Live Chat and Instant Help Feature

And even if you have questions, you can post them on the platform and the members of the community will give you a hand.

Wealthy Affiliate Support

Indeed, there is no doubt about it that support is one of the best features in my review. However, the community aspect has its pros and cons…

Wealthy Affiliate Community

The community is one of the most talked-about aspects of the entire platform. That’s for two reasons…

One, the community is HUGE!

There are over 1.4 million members that are actively engaged in the community. This means that you’ll never be alone on your journey to success with affiliate marketing.

In other words, whenever you have questions or a problem, you can simply post them in the community and you’re guaranteed to get answers in a matter of minutes!

You can also access the Live chat…however, it is available only to Premium members.

Wealthy Affiliate Live Chat

On top of that, Kyle and Carson are quite active in the community. That said, they too are always ready to share some knowledge and give you a hand.

Even more, they are really friendly guys and WILL help you with any issue you may face.

Live Chat With Wealthy Affiliate Co-Founder Kyle

For example, as a Premium member of WA and active affiliate, I have managed to qualify for their annual conference in Las Vegas (300 sales in a calendar year!).

Below is the friendly conversation I’ve had with Kyle regarding the trip.

Live Chat With Kyle the Co-Owner

And that’s not the only occasion I have had to chat with him or Carson (I just used this one to brag a bit about my success LOL).

I’ve reached out to them numerous times with questions like how to increase conversion rates, boost my traffic, etc. And each time, they went two steps further to help me out!

This is a rare, rare thing in this industry…trust me.

Does Wealthy Affiliate Training Deliver?

The Wealthy Affiliate training program is good and it delivers value. The quality of the videos and the information shared is invaluable.

When compared to the likes of The Authority Site System (complete SEO course) and Affiliate Lab by Matt Diggity, WA falls short.

However, WA, Affiliate Lab, and TASS teach almost the same techniques for building and ranking authority websites on Google.

The only difference is that WA is focused on content creation and organic backlinks, while on the other hand, the Affiliate Lab and TASS are all about content creation and manual backlink building.

Their method brings faster results, but it’s riskier…

Is Wealthy Affiliate Good For Beginners?

In my opinion, Wealthy Affiliate is best for newbies and affiliate marketing beginners.

As a beginner, in my opinion, you need access to three things for a reasonable price:

  1. Step-by-step and easy-to-understand training
  2. Tools such as keyword research tools, websites, etc.
  3. Coaching, support, and live help

That said, WA has all a newbie needs to make his or her first steps online. And a lot of newbies confirm that it works for them every single day…

WA Newbie Success Example

If you are just getting started, you will quickly see the difference between WA and other courses. Other courses are designed to cater to advanced marketers mostly.

And this is exactly the reason why some people in other reviews say that the training is not good. See they speak from an advanced standpoint.

That’s all…

The bottom line is, that the training is designed to cater to newbies, not advanced marketers.

But even if you are an expert who is on a hunt for some golden nuggets (or just a newbie looking for a ton of knowledge), you WILL find them in WA for sure.

You see, OEC and Affiliate Bootcamp are not the only training courses available!

Let me explain…

WA platform has concentrated a TON of user-generated training over the years. You can learn from the likes of Nathaniel, Eddy, and Jerry through their tutorials, training videos, and guides.

Wealthy Affiliate Live Events and Classes

These guys are all experts and super-successful marketers. They’ve gone through the basic training, went out on the field, and brought back a ton of valuable knowledge.

So when you read a review where people say that WA is a scam or outdated, refer to my review instead…

And with that said, you can count that even advanced marketers will find a lot of value in being members of this training program for sure.

Is Wealthy Affiliate a Scam?

Wealthy Affiliate is not a scam! WA is not mistreating people in any way, shape, or form. It’s a real affiliate marketing company that provides people with training, tools, and live community help.

However, some people say differently…

Wealthy Affiliate Scam Experience

This person above has left his review over at eBizFacts.com (credits for the image above and below!). However, he or she was misinformed before joining the program.

Kyle and Carson DON’T promise too much! But they do deliver a workable course…

The problem is that some people get lost and forget that they have to work to earn their share of success.

Here is another negative WA review…

Wealthy Affiliate Scam Experience

The reason why this user’s website was “ugly” and didn’t make him or her any money is that he or she is one of those people who expect instant results.

If he or she was an action taker, this review wouldn’t be so negative…

That said, the main reason why some people say that WA is a scam is that they tried it, didn’t get instant results, and then, they post negative comments online.

But at the end of the day, that’s their fault. They just blamed WA.

Another group might call it a scam because they promote some other training company so they want to get leverage over WA.

DreamGrow Negative Review

The screenshot above is from the DreamGrow website where the author writes unverified information about WA to make it look bad so that he can promote the Affiliate Lab course.

In any case, both groups are wrong…

Is Wealthy Affiliate Legit?

Wealthy Affiliate is a legitimate training company. The main reason for saying so is that you can join the platform for free. You get 7 days to test-drive the features and training, and if you don’t like it, you can walk away freely.

In my experience, I find that all features of WA are legit.

The Online Entrepreneur Certification is a legitimate and workable training course for beginners to learn about affiliate marketing.

As you can see throughout my review, and from the screenshots below, people are getting success with Wealthy Affiliate, which can mean only one thing……it’s LEGIT!

Wealthy Affiliate Legit Success Stories

A user named CLoney has successfully followed the course, and as a result, she made it to her first $1000 month!

Can you see from her Wealthy Affiliate success story that she’s earning money by promoting products from Amazon?

So what’s that about WA Online Entrepreneur Certification being outdated…? Rubbish talk. That’s all.

Here’s another example…

Wealthy Affiliate Legit Success Stories

BrokFTJFH, on the other hand, is 10 steps ahead of CLoney!

For your reference, you can check whether these Wealthy Affiliate success stories are legit by joining the platform and contacting these members directly.

Also, you can go to TrustPilot and check out some reviews there as well…

TrustPilot Wealthy Affiliate Reviews

At the moment of writing my review, the company has 485 reviews, 91% of which are 5-star ratings!

The company also provides people with all the tools, websites, and even help and support.

On top of that, the fact that WA has been around for 16 years (and counting) confirms that WA is legit indeed.

Furthermore, Affiliate Bootcamp is a legitimate training that teaches you how to promote WA itself. However, for this reason, some might say it is an MLM or even a Pyramid scheme…

Is it true?

Is Wealthy Affiliate an MLM?

First of all, There’s a world of difference between affiliate marketing and MLM! And before you proceed with my review, I suggest learning what this difference is…

An MLM is a business that sells products or services and also recruits people to train them to become the company’s representatives and salespeople.

These people then have two options:

  • Sell the products through an affiliate program to earn commissions
  • Recruit a team and earn commissions from their sales

Hence, the multi-level marketing expression…

Now, WA has an affiliate program that allows you to market their products and earn commissions each time someone signs up under you.

But that’s it! There’s no second option. In other words, you can’t earn an income from your referrals in case they decide to promote the company.

Therefore, there are no multiple levels of compensation.

That said, while Wealthy Affiliate does have an affiliate program that you can join to learn how to sell the program to others, it is not a multi-level marketing company…

But what about a pyramid scheme? Is WA forcing you to recruit others without giving any physical (or digital) value in return?

Is Wealthy Affiliate a Pyramid Scheme?

Wealthy Affiliate is not a pyramid scheme either. The company does not have any features that could connect it with any type of pyramid scheme, or even worse, a Ponzi scheme.

See, a pyramid scheme simply asks you to recruit people into a downline without offering any value in return except monetary compensation from your downline.

Therefore, pyramid schemes are illegal!

On the contrary, WA is a real company that creates real products (hosting, research tools).

Wa Hosting Company

In addition to those extremely valuable products that are needed and useful for building affiliate marketing, or any other type of website, WA includes training as well.

Do you remember?

WA owners, Kyle and Carson started a company back in 2006 selling keyword research software. You can check out a cool infographic about WA history here.

In the meantime, the company has evolved into a large community, a training company, and more!

However, one of the main reasons why some might say that WA is a pyramid scheme is the fact that it has its affiliate program.

And two, the fact that WA has an ambassador system (image below).

WA Ambassadors Leaderboard

But this ranking system has nothing to do with pyramidal selling…

It’s just a scoreboard that measures members’ activity within the community awards activity credits and ranks the most active members, that’s all.

People probably look at it, get confused, and throw some accusations at it quickly…

So it probably goes without saying that, once again, WA is not a pyramid scheme, Ponzi, MLM or a scam.

If it were, they would have been closed by FTC a long long time ago…

Wealthy Affiliate Review: Pros

  1. WA Is Active For 16 Years and Counting
  2. The Training Is Created For Beginners
  3. Despite Negative Comments, WA Methods Still Work
  4. The Premium Membership is a Bargain
  5. You Get All the Training, Tools, and Support
  6. Live Weekley Webinars With Jay
  7. Community Aspect is Simply Awesome
  8. The site Support Team is Available 24/7
  9. Kyle and Carson Update WA a Lot
  10. Affiliate Program is a Lucrative

Wealthy Affiliate Review: Cons

  1. Some Of the “Experts” Are Not Experts
  2. Most Positive Reviews Come From Affiliates
  3. A Lot Of People Join and Fail In the First 3 Months
  4. The Community Aspect is a Bit Cultish
  5. Some People are There To Kill Time
  6. WA Training Is Overwhelming
  7. Too Many Features Can Be Overwhelming
  8. You’re Led To Start Promoting WA
  9. Some Parts Of the Training is Outdated
  10. WA Doesn’t Offer a Refund Policy

Do I Recommend Wealthy Affiliate?

Yes, I recommend Wealthy Affiliate. I recommend it, especially to newbies who are looking for an easy-to-understand training program for learning about affiliate marketing.

You can join WA for free, and make your own financial decisions later…

Moreover, one of the main reasons why I recommend WA to newbies is that they will get everything else that’s needed for making their first steps online without breaking the bank.

This includes:

  • training course
  • hosting and domains
  • websites
  • research tools
  • live community help
  • technical support
  • private coaching
  • and more!

All that for a price of $49 a month seems like a fair deal to me…

Other affiliate training programs that compete with WA for supremacy in this industry will charge $500, $1000, and even $2000+ upfront without even giving you a chance to check out the content.

So when I say in my review that WA is legit and best for beginners…the price is one of the main reasons for saying so.

Plus, other courses in this industry are not so beginner-friendly.

I’m not saying this is the only course for beginners… But it is #1 on my list.

Another reason why I recommend WA, despite everything bad I’ve said in my review, is that their training works!

I have gone through the entire content, followed the instructions from training lessons, and achieved results.

That said, I’m guessing that you are reading my post because you want to know whether it is worth it or not.

You can rest assured, that WA is worth it! It works, but it takes time and effort to see results.

My Wealthy Affiliate YouTube Review

I have also created a YouTube review of Wealthy Affiliate in case you want to check it out. Click the play button to watch!

Wealthy Affiliate Alternatives

At the end of this comprehensive review, here are a few alternatives to consider.

The Authority Site System

The Authority Site System has been and is one of the best affiliate marketing courses on the market today. And the recent update is to the TASS version 3.0

The course was created by Mark Webster & Gael Breton, two guys who have slowly proved themselves as pretty knowledgeable figures in the SEO and affiliate marketing world.

  • PROS: The Authority Site System 3.0 includes over 180 comprehensive lessons, created and hosted by two experts, Mark Webster & Gael Breton.
  • CONS: One of the things that I find dislikable about TASS is the price. I know that ROI could be a lot greater, but at the same time, $599 is a sum of money that most people can’t afford.

Affiliate Lab

Affiliate Lab is a training course that teaches how to create niche sites, rank them on Google, monetize with affiliate marketing, and even sell for up to 40x their monthly profit.

Matt Diggity is one of the most mentioned people in this industry because of his skills in building these websites. And with this course, he aims to help you to follow in his footsteps.

  • PROS: One of the main features of this program is step-by-step video training. In my opinion, Affiliate Lab is comprehensive, and best of all, it is based on workable methods for making money online.
  • CONS: One of the most frequent criticisms about Affiliate Lab is the high price tag. Matt Diggity’s course costs almost a thousand dollars. You can find the same content online even for free!

Commission Hero

Commission Hero is a step-by-step training course for making money online. The main focus of the course is on ClickBank affiliate marketing and Facebook ads.

Basically, with this course, you can learn how to find profitable products on ClickBank, create sales funnels, and drive targeted Facebook traffic to your funnels.

  • PROS: You get access to nine training modules. Each module is designed to lead you from choosing products, building affiliate sales funnels, getting traffic to your pages, and finally, making money.
  • CONS: The bad thing about the Commission Hero course is that it’s not beginner-friendly. See, Robby’s method is based on paid ads. Most beginners are not ready for it financially.

Invincible Marketer

Invincible Marketer is a training course designed for people who want to become affiliate marketers. It was created by Aaron Chen – a legit online marketer and YouTube coach.

The good thing about Invincible Marketer is that you can learn how to start a LEGIT affiliate marketing business. Aaron Chen is a successful marketer and his training is packed with a lot of value.

  • PROS: I like the fact that you get actionable steps after each lesson. In other words, Invincible Marketer is a step-by-step course and it’s suitable for beginners.
  • CONS: The downside of this course is the price is a bit expensive in the long run, and it will cost you some extra money. For example, you’ll have to buy tools and traffic, and the price is recurring.

Legendary Marketer

Legendary Marketer is an affiliate marketing training platform created by David Sharpe. The main goal behind this platform is to help newbies dive into the world of affiliate marketing through a series of courses.

  • PROS: A good thing about this program is that it is based on affiliate marketing, which is a legitimate method for making money online.
  • CONS: The bad thing about Legendary Marketer is that it is designed to get you to sign up for high-ticket courses. Those beginner courses will not show you how to make money for real, so you will have to buy upsells.

Verdict – Wealthy Affiliate Review

As for the conclusion of my review, I’ll remind you that Wealthy Affiliate is legit. There are no signs of a scam, MLM, pyramid scheme, or any other fraudulent activity.

In other words, it is a legitimate training company that you can join if you desire to learn about and start your own affiliate marketing business online.

The company boasts hundreds and even thousands of success stories that you can easily verify.

Most importantly, WA is sort of an all-in-one shop for building affiliate marketing websites. You can keyword research tools, website builders, affiliate program research tools, and more.

You don’t have to leave the platform until you start making money online.

Once you do start earning an income from your website, I highly recommend you brighten your horizons with any of the courses that I’ve mentioned in my review.

Affiliate Lab compliments WA well because it focuses a lot on building backlinks. As I said, WA focuses on organic backlink acquisition techniques (as per Google’s guidelines!).

Another great alternative to WA is The Authority Site System (TASS).

But before you invest $1000s into advanced courses like that, I recommend joining WA today.

They will teach you how to build your own affiliate marketing business from scratch.

You will learn how to set up your WordPress site, find keywords through keyword research, write helpful content, generate free organic traffic, make money with affiliate marketing, and more!

About

Affiliate marketing training, tools and community.

Cost

Free to join; Premium $49 a month; Premium+ $99 a month.

Pros

Wealthy Affiliate has been active for 16 years and counting. Beginner-friendly training. Despite negative comments, WA methods still work. The premium membership is a bargain, offering all the training, tools, and support. Live weekly webinars with Jay. The community aspect is awesome. Site support team available 24/7. Kyle and Carson frequently update Wealthy Affiliate. Lucrative affiliate program.

Cons

Some "experts" aren't real experts. Positive Wealthy Affiliate reviews mostly come from affiliates. Many join and fail within 3 months. The community aspect is somewhat cultish. Some people are just there to kill time. Wealthy Affiliate training is overwhelming. Too many features can be overwhelming. You're encouraged to promote Wealthy Affiliate. Some training parts are outdated. Wealthy Affiliate has no refund policy.

⚠️ Verdict

Although it's got its pros and cons, WA is a good place to learn about affiliate marketing, build your website, and hang with other affiliates.

 Rating

FAQs

Is Wealthy Affiliate a Get-Rich-Quick Scheme?

Not. WA is not a get-rich-quick scheme nor do they imply that you can make money quickly with their training program. It’s a legit step-by-step training for making money online.

Do I Have To Promote Wealthy Affiliate?

No, you don’t have to promote WA. There are two courses and the main course is going to teach you how to promote any products from thousands of niches out there.

Do I Have To Pay Every Month For Access?

Yes, you have to pay every month. WA is a membership platform. There are two levels of membership (Premium and PremiumPlus) and both offer monthly or yearly subscription plans.

Are There Any Hidden Costs And Upsells?

There are no upsells inside the platform. You will, however, have to invest $15 a year for your own domain name. WA provides hosting, websites, themes, plugins, etc.

Does Wealthy Affiliate Membership Include Tools?

Yes, all WA members get access to essential affiliate marketing tools. These include keyword research tools, website builder tools, affiliate program research, and content writing platforms.

Can I Make Money With Wealthy Affiliate?

Yes, you can earn an income with WA. The base premise of the training is to show you how to make money by promoting other people’s products or services aka Affiliate Marketing.

How Fast Can I Make Money With Wealthy Affiliate?

The speed of your results depends on multiple factors. Number one, the amount of time you can invest daily into the training. Two, your ability to implement the instructions. Three, your choice of products and niche.

How Much Time Do I Have To Invest?

Ideally, you should be able to invest at least 1-2 hours daily into watching and learning from the training lessons and implementing the instructions. The more, the better!

Is Wealthy Affiliate a Scam?

No. WA is not a scam. It is a legit affiliate marketing training platform. Reviews that write otherwise are misleading you to sell you their training program.

You can test-drive the training and platform’s features and make your own decision…

If you have any questions for me or want to share your reviews, feel free to drop them in the comment box below…

The Best Way To Make Money Online

I earn online by creating simple affiliate websites to connect people with products they are already looking for.

It’s called affiliate marketing and it is the best way to make money online (at least in my humble opinion).

If you want to learn more about how to start making money online with affiliate marketing, I strongly suggest you sign up for the free training on the next page.

And don’t forget to share this Wealthy Affiliate review with your friends and family!

All the best, Ivan @freeaffiliatemarketingbusiness.com

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