This is a VERY L-O-N-G post which aims to clarify the truth regarding Wealthy Affiliate and its claims to be the very best "business building" system for web entrepreneurs.
If you're considering building a web business it will pay you to grab a cup of coffee and read it all.
It's not an original piece (by me) but has been written by a gentleman by the name of Dr. Ken Evoy.
You make up your own mind,
John.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Part 1: Fake Reviews, Our Response
and A Peek At The Truth (You are here)
Part 2: The Study: Objective,
Rigorous, Statistically Significant & Reproducible
Part 3: Full Results and Final
Summary & Conclusion
At Sitesell (SBI!), we are always
improving our methods and tools to better serve our customers. Since launching
SBI! in 2002, we have taken great pride in enabling more solopreneurs to build
profitable businesses than any other product.
Even two $50,000 challenges have
failed to surface a business that delivers higher levels of proven success, in
some verifiable way, such as how we prove it.
So when a Wealthy Affiliate review
claims that they have a better system than ours, it piques our interest. When
we found two more reviews making that claim, we started to dig. We didn’t stop
until we hit the truth.
In this first part, we’ll cover:
• Introduction
• Reviewing
the Wealthy Affiliate Website
• Delving
Deeper
• Reviewing
the Affiliate Program of Wealthy Affiliate
o So
Where Is SBI! Inferior?
o How
Do We Respond to All the Affiliate Claims?
o Is
SBI! Truly Inferior to WA, As Claimed by So Many Reviews?
• Conclusions
of the SBI! vs. Wealthy Affiliate Review
Ready? Let’s get started.
Introduction.
A company called Wealthy Affiliate
(WA) has affiliates who have written countless reviews promoting WA. The
claims, lacking any proof of success, were dubious.
We became interested, however, when
we discovered reviews by them about Solo Build It!, posts that rank in the Top
10 at Google. The first two were a curiosity, but we soon discovered many more.
It struck us as odd that there
should be so many, so we checked for Wealthy Affiliate reviews for our
pre-rebranding name, “Site Build It!.” These reviews virtually dominate those
search results. The “reviews” of our product were basically excuses for content
that ultimately linked to the Wealthy Affiliate website and/or the affiliate’s
Wealthy Affiliate review, claiming it to be superior to SBI!.
The majority follow a similar
format…
• They
“review” SBI! using various approaches (from attacking SBI! with untruths and
concluding it’s “useless” to a seemingly objective review, calling it “good”).
• Some
use the identical “Wealthy Affiliate vs. SBI!” product comparison table (see
right).
• No
matter what they conclude about SBI!, useless or good, they end with their “#1
Recommendation” link to Wealthy Affiliate, “the best.”
The “bait-and-switch fake review”
is a well-known affiliate strategy. We wondered, at first, if this was a couple
of rogue affiliates (for an honest company). It soon became clear that this was
a campaign initiated by the company itself.
So we headed over to the Wealthy
Affiliate website to find out more…
Reviewing the Wealthy Affiliate
Website
We recognised the company…
1. It
first released its product in 2005, using an approach that was superficially
similar to our C T P M
approach. We weren’t concerned — it was just another “make money” product where
almost all clients would fail.
2. Their
new headline message “Turn Your Passion into a Thriving Online Business” has
drifted from “Become a Wealthy Affiliate.” They seem to be positioning
themselves as a more direct competitor.
Sidebar: We have increasingly
emphasised important messaging that “site ≠ business” in recent years. That
culminated with our commitment to the solopreneur with our 2017 re-brand from
“Site Build It!” to “Solo Build It!.”
3. They
claim to have “over 800,000 Internet Entrepreneurs.” Almost 1M?
4. Their
sales copy suggests an approach that’s superficially similar in concept to
ours. Examination of its product’s materials, though, showed it hadn’t evolved
substantially, with out-of-date content…
5. Old
names of products renamed several years before
6. Missing
coverage of important new material
7. Failure
to revise material to reflect recent developments.
8. It
remains closer to C T P M,
circa 2006.
Despite the new headline, all
seemed superficial, behind the times and still mostly affiliate-focused…
The “Success” section of their
website makes vague comments such as “There are 1,000’s of people succeeding
every day within Wealthy Affiliate.” But there’s no way for the reader to
verify that claim of success, nor does Wealthy Affiliate try to provide any.
The home page does, though, show a stream of
non-success-generating activity, incentivised by rules and rewards (e.g., must
post 2 site reviews before being able to ask for 1).
In fact, though, activities such as
creating a new profile blog post, asking and answering questions, creating blog
posts within your own Wealthy Affiliate account…
They all create new content for the
company, which increases its traffic, but does nothing for the solopreneur.
How big is the impact?
Of 366,000
Wealthy Affiliate pages that are indexed by Google, only 45 are created by the
company.
So all that activity you see on the
home page? It’s mostly non-productive work that creates success by capturing
increasing Google search traffic… for WA. It’s clever. We have nothing against
indexing information if people are aware of it. But…
Incentivizsing people into
activities that are sub-optimal use of their time (“time” being the
solopreneur’s most precious resource) is not in the best interests of the
client. You should not have to do 1 site review, let alone 2, before asking for
1. And, one must ask, what is the quality of a review when you have to “give 2
to get 1”?
Not an impressive way to start.
Meanwhile, on the Success page…
1. There’s
no mention of a single successful client.
2. Their
“forums” do not display domain names.
Affiliate “reviews” talk about
success, too, but offer no verifiable proof.
Providing domain names is the
simplest way to enable verification. The reader can check ballpark traffic by
using Alexa, SimilarWeb and SEMrush. Even ardent Alexa-haters would agree that
if WA’s sites were mostly >20,000,000 at Alexa, with only 50 having enough
traffic to rank <1,000,000 (Top 1M), that would be poor.
Sidebar: Alexa is the most widely
misunderstood and maligned product in all of Internet Marketing. See our Alexa
review for the definitive word on this useful tool. You’ll find that Alexa is
surprisingly useful — if you know when and how to use it.
Not only does Wealthy Affiliate not
provide any verifiable proof of online business success, we only found 2*
affiliate reviews that provided domain names (most do not). Ironically, both do
more harm than good to WA’s claim of success…
1. Of
its 16 “success stories,” one only provided domain names for two sites. But
those two were not WA-hosted sites.
2. The
other provided a list of 40 sites. Many of those had Alexa and SW ranks
>10M, >20M and even >30M, and/or with SEMrush of 0. Of the 40, only 4
were in the Top 1M with good SEMrush scores and hosted at WA. If those 40 sites
= success, this was a review working very hard to work with very little.
* Curiously, there were a few other
reviews with the identical lists. Compare this to the many different types of
genuine SBI! proof, none of which are failures.
SBI!, like WA, has its own
site builder. Those who use it must host with us (Name Servers NS1.SITESELL.COM
and NS2.SITESELL.COM). Wealthy Affiliate uses Name Servers NS1.MYWAHOSTING.COM
and NS2.MYWAHOSTING.COM.
It’s possible to be a “customer” of
both products without using the site builders, but it’s sub-optimal. For the purposes
of this discussion and the subsequent study, we define “paid customer” as
someone who uses the product fully, including the builder.
Our interest was indeed piqued.
Could Wealthy Affiliate in fact be outperforming us? Why would they not provide
verifiable proof of success, as we do? And why were all those affiliates using
morally dubious “fake reviews” to bait-and-switch to WA.
A fake review can be defined as a
positive, neutral or negative review that is not an actual consumer’s honest
and impartial opinion or that does not reflect a consumer’s genuine experience
of a product, service or business.European Parliamentary Research Service, 2015
What are the odds that so many
pages that claim to recommend SBI! all follow the format and process of the Wealthy
Affiliate affiliate training materials, do little to recommend SBI! except in
generalities or rehashes of other reviews, and finally choose WA as “#1?”
Remote.
The disconnect between Wealthy
Affiliate claims and lack of proof intrigued us. Think about it…
If you sold a product that truly
enabled people to lose weight, run faster, or be cured of a medical problem at
a greater rate, wouldn’t you provide lots of verifiable proof? “Before and
After.” Medical studies. Lottery winners.
Whatever the field, proof is a
powerful marketing tool.
Sadly, fake reviews are becoming
all too prevalent on the internet today. CBC News has done multiple stories on
the growing problem, and they actually have some advice on how to spot them:
Delving Deeper
Since both Wealthy Affiliate and
reviews by WA affiliates failed to prove success, and since our reputation was
under attack, we became determined to discover the truth.
This 3-part series, culminating in
a never-before-performed study, exposes an elaborate and long-standing scheme
that seems to have misled thousands (perhaps tens of thousands since 2005) down
the road of dashed dreams…
1. Part
1 (which you’re reading now) lays out the elaborate Wealthy Affiliate fake
review program. It closes with a “taste” of The Study’s results. The difference
from WA’s claims is astounding.
2. Part
2 focuses mostly on the construction of The Study itself. It’s important
because a serious study such as this one must be objective, rigorous,
statistically significant and reproducible by third parties (i.e., you can
perform the same process to derive your own results).
3. Part
3 provides the full results of The Study, with discussion. We have provided a
small peek at its results near the end of today’s post (Part 1). The full
results yield startling conclusions and raise profound questions that go beyond
this particular instance that casts shame on our industry.
Before getting into the study (aka
“The Truth”), it’s necessary to set some contextual background information to
fully appreciate its importance…
Wealthy Affiliate uses a
superficially similar approach to SBI! and professes to care about its users.
Was the “busy work” activity (above) that serves WA’s business interests so
well just an anomaly? Let’s scratch the surface.
Wealthy Affiliate lures you in with
a “free” version that includes “two free sites.” Those are two subdomain sites
(e.g., subdomain.siterubix.com*), where you join thousands of others on a
single domain.
*Siterubix is the name of WA’s
site-building system laid on top of WordPress.
You have near-zero chance of
traffic with free subdomains such as these, let alone success, yet its
affiliate training program claims that this freemium is better than paid
programs. This, we knew, could not be true…
It has no value to the person who
signs up. The free functionality and training materials are meagre, access to
most materials restricted. You will be upsold to the paid system in a
relentless manner.
Comparison: SBI! provides full
access to all materials and tools. It even includes a free domain name in its
90-day trial period, risk-free due to its guarantee. We don’t waste your time
with freemium come-ons.
In the first Wealthy Affiliate
Certification Course (similar to SBI!’s Action Guide), they advised the new
would-be business-builder…
Please do not spend a week choosing
your niche. Within the next 15-30 minutes (maximum) you should have your
‘starting point’ niche chosen.Wealthy Affiliate
The Damage of Bait and Switch
Consider the fate of a would-be
solopreneur with important reasons for starting an online business. Interested
in SBI!, s/he searches for reviews. She finds pages that s/he believes to be
reviews but are bait-and-switch sales pages for WA.
With some help, such as we provide,
s/he could have found a “real” (non-“make money”) niche to build a site and
business to be proud about… a business with profits, one that builds equity.
Instead…
“Make money” is a difficult and
demoralising niche. There are loads of “dark side” and sophisticated marketers
out there. They will recommend anything to you for a buck, they’ll make it
sound good, and they’re pros at ranking high in search results.
We advise SBIers to stay away from
that niche for three reasons…
1. You’ll
do better in a niche that you know and love.
2. The
more you see of the “make money” niche, the more distasteful it becomes.
3. There
are fewer pros in your niche, if any.
In short, you will not only do
better in a niche that you truly care about, your chances of building a
long-term business that generates significant cash flow and grows in value
(equity) soar.
The damage that bait-and-switch
tactics do to human beings with the courage to try, the willingness to work to
succeed, to acquire some freedom and self-reliance cannot be measured. We find
the bait-and-switch practice shameful.
That’s why our advice is the
opposite — find the right niche!
So please — find a topic that you
know and love. Work in joy and build a business that you’re proud to show your
friends and family.
We provide strategies and tools to
help the solopreneur. If it takes weeks to find, refine, position, and
investigate its commercial potential, that’s fine. This upfront work pays huge
dividends later on.
Or does it? Could we be wrong? The
study will answer, but thinking it through…
Who benefits from the subtle, but
strong, push of new solopreneurs into “make money“? Having seen how the advice
works to the detriment of the Wealthy Affiliate user, it’s not the solopreneurs
who win. But it’s easy to see how Wealthy Affiliate benefits…
Reviewing the Affiliate Program of
Wealthy Affiliate
How strong is that push? Over ⅓ of
the Wealthy Affiliate sites are either about “make money” or “make money
online” (“MMO”) — or they’re related to the topic (e.g., affiliate marketing,
how to sell e-books, or how to do social media). On the other hand, almost all
SBI! sites are about what we will call “real” niches.
What’s a “real” niche? Folks who
search on “real” niches (e.g., Caribbean cruising, exotic tortoises, debt
consolidation) are not looking for information to help them build an online
business. They’re planning vacations, or researching how to breed a specific
type of tortoise, or they want to know how to deal with debt.
In our experience, the vast
majority of solopreneurs know something about something well enough to create
content that others want to know. But when it comes to MMO, they…
• know
little about the topic
• are
not ready to compete with the minority who do know some aspect of the topic
(e.g., email marketing)
• have
next to no chance of ranking against the even smaller fraction who really excel
at it
• would
do far better at a niche they know (e.g., Caribbean cruising, exotic tortoises,
debt consolidation).
Nevertheless, over ⅓ drift into
“make money” (on the guidance of Wealthy Affiliate) instead of being challenged
and helped to find a higher-potential “real” niche. The natural progression is
that they are then moved toward the WA affiliate program…
1. The
commissions are high and recurring.
2. Wealthy
Affiliate “fits” with just about any topic related to MMO.
3. Wealthy
Affiliate advises them repeatedly to write reviews about competing or related
products, then conclude with an affiliate link to WA.
4. They
assure the affiliate over and over that they are indeed the best, that they do
their visitors a service to share that information.
5. Finally,
they become highly motivated by a free trip to Las Vegas if they reach certain
sales targets. Few make it.
Wealthy Affiliate has again served
their own best interests. They have created the perfect, circular,
self-propagating marketing system. Let’s review.
Wealthy Affiliate, a “make money”
business, sells a “make money” business opportunity to people who are “pushed”
into a niche related to “make money,” for which it’s natural to write “make
money” reviews or articles, which appear real to unsuspecting visitors, thereby
continuing the “vicious circle.”
The Wealthy Affiliate “reviews”
that rank highly are expertly written — this is “cream of the cream” material.
The information itself, though, is dubious or outright wrong, at least when it
comes to SBI!.
It’s written so convincingly that
the uninformed can’t see through the false, twisted or exaggerated information.
It’s especially convincing when so many other reviews (also from Wealthy
Affiliate affiliates) come to the same conclusion.
We mentioned the pattern of these
reviews at the beginning of this article. There are so many of them that they
drown out the occasional story of how SBI! has truly impacted a life in an
amazing way. Speaking of those…
Contrary to Wealthy Affiliate
users, SBI! members write about “real” niches. So they have no financial reason
to write about SBI!…
1. Their
sites attract visitors searching for information about “real” niches. Few of
those visitors, if any, are thinking of starting a business.
2. While
some SBIers do write about their experience with SBI! and how it has changed
their lives, it’s not for the money. They realize that the conversion rate will
be very low (for the above reason).
3. Only
a small number of SBI! stories rank in search results for “review” keywords.
It’s because their sites are considered authorities (by Google ) for their
niches, not for niches related to MMO.
We Call This the “Anti-Circle”
SBIers succeed more frequently and
at higher rates than any other group of solopreneurs. They produce value to get
value, and build profitable businesses that grow equity.
The Wealthy Affiliate “make money”
system is a self-feeding, circular “buy make-money” to “sell make-money” game.
These sites add little value and most fail. The low percent who generate fake
reviews that rank actually create negative value for their visitors, who are
lured into an inferior “make money” system.
It’s an ironic problem that we need
to solve. SBIers, who build sites about REAL niches, attract visitors
interested in that niche, not about “making money online.”
People searching for reviews of
SBI! are, therefore, flooded with fake reviews. We realize their need to find
real reviews by real SBIerswho explain how SBI! has been critical in creating
their high-value, profitable and joyful businesses. Therefore…
As of early May, 2017, we have
asked SBIers to share their stories on their sites, emphasizing clearly not to
expect much financial return if they use affiliate links.
We asked them this because we
believe Wealthy Affiliate’s fake reviews are immoral actions that threaten the
future of the only product that enables everyday solopreneurs to do
extraordinary things. We hope to see some SBIers’ review pages rank, despite
their lack of MMO authority (i.e., SBIers avoid these niches).
SBIers know that they will earn
little by writing their reviews and experiences with SBI!. They write their
reviews to support a product they love, the last bastion of everyday
solopreneurship and proven success.
What about Wealthy Affiliate affiliates?
Do Wealthy Affiliate’s Affiliates
Believe Their Reviews?
So far, we have found no proof of
success among many Wealthy Affiliate sites. We have found several reasons why
they should fail.While our research raised our suspicions, The Study reveals
the comprehensive success vs. failure truths for both SBI! and WA.
Wealthy Affiliate must know its own
internal data of how dismally their clients perform, overall. And they should
realize that, even though they have 70% more active sites than us, they cannot
come close to matching the cumulative proof we present on our own website, even
though that is only part of our success story.
Wealthy Affiliate claims on their
“success” page that “there are new member success stories being posted”, and
that there are “1,000’s of people succeeding every day within Wealthy
Affiliate.” They then go on to talk about the 2.8 billion buyers online in an
effort to overwhelm with numbers, rather than review actual success rates or
real solopreneur stories.
All this raises the obvious
question…
How aware are Wealthy Affiliate
clients and affiliates of this reality? How many clients know that they have
been misled regarding success? Do affiliates know that they are not “doing a
good service for their visitors?” Do they realize that they are far more likely
to dash the dreams and goals of real people who dare to try?
We have discovered why Wealthy
Affiliate affiliates really seem to believe what they write. The WA training
materials repeatedly assure them that their product is the best… over and over
again until the affiliates believe it.
That untruth is then magnified
thousands of times by affiliates, many of whom we believe do not know better.
They beat down competitors with what are fake reviews, a major problem (even if
they don’t realise it).
Is WA’s high commission the driver
of Wealthy Affiliate reviews? That depends. it’s either…
• “the
cherry on top” bonus for those who truly believe they’re doing solopreneurs a
service.
-OR-
• the
driving force, for those who may not believe that Wealthy Affiliate is better
and who do not care (or who do not care to investigate more deeply, given the
promised payments… if they make a sale). As long as the truth is murky, “it’s
all good.”
But What If the Truth Comes Out?
Our own interest in this subject
evolved from curiosity to disbelief to anger about underhanded techniques.
Wealthy Affiliate affiliate reviews attack more than our long-term viability.
While profits grow our ability to accelerate the SBI! Advantage, it’s SBI!’s
human impact that fuels us all.
That undermines the viability of our core
belief upon which SBI! was created…
We believe that if we clear the
obstacles, everyday solopreneurs with BAM are capable of far more than they
could have realized. Many start SBI! with doubts.
Boiling this down to its deeper
ramifications…
Wealthy Affiliate attacks
successful everyday solopreneurship by establishing a tightening choke hold at
the final point of decision. The under-informed pre-customer, expecting honest
reviews, is virtually defenceless against this approach.
With hundreds or thousands of
reviews out there, all coming to the same conclusion (“Wealthy Affiliate is
#1”), we’re reminded of a famous quote (right)…
Would-be solopreneurs who seek
information have no way of knowing what the truth is.
Given the number of fake reviews, all making
the same “recommendation,” they conclude Wealthy Affiliate is best. Repetition
does seem to confirm Lenin’s famous quote.
But Is Wealthy Affiliate Truly #1?
Our existing proof, compared to
Wealthy Affiliate’s lack of proof, raises serious questions about Wealthy
Affiliate. The Study answers them, as you’ll soon see. The answer is obvious…
Solopreneurs who make the wrong
choice unknowingly suffer a large decrease in the likelihood of success, right
at the moment of purchase. The Study’s results are important because…
1. The
human cost to people who are fooled by “bait-and-switch” to Wealthy Affiliate
is high. The Study shows that 87% of those using Wealthy Affiliate fail at its
worst level.
Note: If you are a Wealthy
Affiliate customer and you’re failing, too, switch to SBI!. Like other
ex-Wealthy Affiliate users who now use SBI!, you’ll find the difference
striking.
2. Most
Wealthy Affiliate affiliates are likely not aware of the damage they do. We
openly call upon them to examine their hearts after reading The Study. We
invite you, the Wealthy Affiliate affiliate, to do the right thing after
reviewing it…
Support SBI! instead. It pays less,
that’s true. (We pass those savings on to SBIers, keeping its price as
accessible as possible.)
If you have Top 10 rankings, we’ll
organize 1-to-1s or small, live webinars to answer your questions. Contact
SiteSell Support for more information.
3. Wealthy
Affiliate threatens the future of “everyday solopreneurship.” This is the most
important damage of all.
On a Personal Note:
Personally
speaking, if I ever did encounter a clearly superior product at a similar
price, run by good people who believe that they only succeed if their
solopreneurs do, I would, after discussion with SBIers, arrange with that
company to migrate SBIers and SiteSellers to it, ideally with the click of a
button.
Pre-SBI! ventures have treated me
well. SBI! was never about the money. It was the ultimate experiment, a bet on
the individual and concepts such as freedom and self-reliance. However, my wife
of 40 years has been patient for far too long. So the day after the last SBIer
was transferred to good hands that will continue the concept of successful
everyday solopreneurship…
Janice and I will be back to our
joint passion. We’ll be on the first jet to someplace far, far away. ✈
😃
But are we telling the truth?
Even
my personal note could be a con. After all, this space is a quagmire of clever
tricks. And most folks have waded through the muck to reach the search results
at Google for “Solo Build It! review.” Consider this…
We have presented more verifiable
proof of success than anyone else. There’s little room for “trickery” when we
present a combination of proof that illustrates…
1. volume
(500 sites in the Top 1M of all active sites — 170M!).
2. longevity
(case studies that stick with the same businesses for as many as 10 years or
more, posting their occasional update).
(We’re proud to say that two have
recently realized the equity in their business by selling some or all of each.
There’s little if any equity in “make money.”)
3. new,
current stories from our blog, with a focus on the human aspect of what it
means to build a profitable business based on a subject you love (it angers us
to think of what their stories could have been with Wealthy Affiliate).
This proof alone is especially
convincing because no company, not even Wix and its 2.7 million paid sites
(source: quarterly earnings report) matches that. Still, this form of
presentation does not tell the whole story. What about failure, you may ask?
Wealthy Affiliate sparked our
desire for a study that reviews every active site at both Wealthy Affiliate and
SBI!. Head-to-head, company-to-company, “marketese” eliminated, what would such
a comparison look like, warts and all?
We’re About to Find Out!
Yes, we’re getting closer to the
Study and SBI! vs. Wealthy Affiliate results.
Meanwhile, we should state the
obvious for greater clarity. Even before the Study, we found enough evidence to
conclude that these reviews were not the work of rogue affiliates. Wealthy
Affiliate not only knows what’s happening, it’s training/encouraging much of
it. The plethora of fake reviews by WA affiliates confirms the intent.
So when we talk about Wealthy
Affiliate promoting itself as being the best, we mean that they do so
indirectly, using affiliates. They promote themselves as the best to their
affiliates, who in turn magnify the message a thousand-fold, seeming to believe
it (we feel that most do believe the Wealthy Affiliate claims).
This affiliate action is widespread
and done with Wealthy Affiliate’s knowledge. It’s Wealthy Affiliate’s claim,
without any evidence to support it, that is multiplied and blankets Google
search results with fake reviews.
This study will settle that claim
conclusively.
So Where Is SBI! Inferior?
Our weakness lies, ironically, in
our strength…
We do not have a circular system
like Wealthy Affiliate. We have no “make money” business that sells a “make
money” product to those “pushed” into a niche related to “make money,” for
which it’s natural to write “make money”-related reviews or articles, which
appear real to unsuspecting visitors, who purchase that “make money” product
and so continues the “vicious circle.”
“Real niche” businesses (e.g.,
about Anguilla) have clients who are not searching for online business info
(e.g., they’re planning a vacation). Instead of Wealthy Affiliate’s circular
system that produces (it could be argued) negative value by recommending an
inferior product, we have the “anti-circle” — clients have no business need to
write a review, let alone an SBI! vs. Wealthy Affiliate review.
The whole Wealthy Affiliate system
is, we must admit, clever — in an immoral way. It comes at a heavy cost…
1. It
does a disservice to the solopreneur-customer and to all affiliates with a
conscience (once they know the truth, for the reasons outlined above). It’s
nice to be proud of the business you build, to sleep well at night.
2. Wealthy
Affiliate contributes heavily to the increasing problem of fake reviews. While
this is a growing problem for every niche, business or consumer, WA affiliates
virtually blanket the “Internet Marketing products” space.
Many respected pundits consider
“make money” and “affiliate marketing” to be a particular problem. Consumer
protection groups and government bodies are looking to legislation to address
the issues. Meanwhile, all of us in this general space take a hit while
cynicism rises among prospective clients.
3. Little
or nothing of value is contributed to the amazing diversity that solopreneurs
bring to the Web.
The Fortune 500 do not make the Internet what
it is. Solopreneurs do — the “Fortune 5,000,000!” Sharing your unique knowledge
not only adds what you know to this infinitely diverse ecosystem, your content
is of value to others (who search for it).
Those searches for your knowledge,
along with your social media component, can be converted into an honest,
valuable and joyful business. Instead, many Wealthy Affiliate solopreneurs
focus their precious time on luring others into “make money
opportunities.”That’s likely not what many anticipated when starting out.
In summary.
Wealthy Affiliate, by
moving new recruits into “make money,” has created an affiliate-written,
review-generating machine with which a tiny number of sites dominate the
rankings. Whatever they write about SBI!, Wealthy Affiliate seems to justify it
to them through heavy repetition of being the best.
After all…
If you say it often enough, it must
be true.
A very small percent of
solopreneurs can make this work. The rest make little to nothing. But the
incentivised, frenetic activity keeps them excited, well beyond the time that
they should see the writing on the wall.
While The Study should be expected
to show that a much higher percentage of SBIers succeed (if the above logic
holds true), we have created the anti-circular system, one where the visitors
to SBI! sites do not come seeking online business info.
How Do We Respond to All the
Affiliate Claims?
We don’t need to, thanks to The
Study.
We should warn you of two general
approaches of many of these fake reviews…
1. “Fair”
These seem to be objective, balanced and fair. They may not be up-to-date
(which suggests pulling information from old reviews by others). Overall,
they’ll say that SBI! is “good”… “except Wealthy Affiliate is best.”
2. “Unfair”
These use an amazing range of claims that go from lies to exaggerations and
twisting of half-truths; from molehills turned into mountains to “assumption
jumpers” (take a small fact and make a huge incorrect conclusion without
knowing the facts).
It really doesn’t matter what the
content is because these are not actually “reviews” in the true and expected
sense of that word. They amount to Wealthy Affiliate sales pages.
Debating just creates more smoke.
This study seeks the truth by blowing away the smoke. A hard data study that
can be replicated by anyone, one that delivers a clear winner based purely on
the data, eliminates debate. Just send them The Study…
THAT reveals the truth in a single
breath of fresh air.
Summary of the Background for the
SBI! vs. Wealthy Affiliate Review
Initially, we wondered if Wealthy
Affiliate had truly found a better way. The more we dug into this before the
study, the more we smelled something wrong.
There’s a lot wrong. They have
developed what appears to be a superficial copy of the SBI! process of C T
P M. Next, it looks like they
corrupted our total focus on success with policies and approaches that work to
their advantage but to the solopreneur’s disadvantage.
As a company dedicated to
solopreneurs since 1997, we took umbrage with that. The study, comparing actual
traffic results of all SBI! vs. Wealthy Affiliate sites, is much more than just
“who’s-best” bragging rights.
We undertake and publish this to
(hopefully)…
1. restore
our reputation
2. “vaccinate”
those who find those fake reviews
3. assure
potential new SBI! members that your best choice is SBI!. The difference in our
already-existing proof makes you wonder, “where’s theirs?“
But the head-to-head Study is
overwhelmingly clear. Those with unshakeable ulterior motives will try to find
fault with it. I look forward to debating that.
4. provide
thought-provoking, data-proven facts to convince Wealthy Affiliate’s customers
that their best future lies with SBI!.
5. reveal
reality to those honest Wealthy Affiliate affiliates who promote Wealthy
Affiliate because they truly believe the repeated claims. It seems you were
misled…
If you have Top 10 rankings, we’ll
organise 1-to-1s or small, live webinars to answer your questions. Contact
SiteSell Support for more information.
If this study shows SBI! to be as
conclusively superior as we claim, Wealthy Affiliate affiliates will be faced
with decisions…
“Do I reject this behaviour and
leave a program that puts my reputation at risk?”
“Can I live with now knowingly
misleading my visitors to a less effective program?”
Those who continue to knowingly
send innocent people to an inferior product now “own it.” These are fellow
human beings with solopreneur dreams and goals, too. They deserve better. Also…
Check with an attorney in your own
state or country regarding how much liability you carry if honesty does not
matter to you (read this example lawsuit). We have no intent of suing any
individual affiliate (barring outrageous defamation), but some of the other 175
competitors from a list received from Wealthy Affiliate may not feel the same.
So, let’s get to the BIG question
of the day…
Is SBI! Truly Inferior to WA, As Claimed by So Many “Reviews”?
Before the final discussion, here’s
a sample of the results…
1. SBI!
places 2,200% (Alexa), 3,340% (SimilarWeb) and 4,280% (SEMrush) more sites into
the Top 1,000,000 sites than Wealthy Affiliate. That’s way more than our
estimates (400-500%).
If you’re not a numbers person,
that means 22X, 33X and 43X better. And that comes to an average (Alexa, SW and
SEMrush) of 33x better.
2. In
the bar chart below, you see bar couples for each range of Alexa traffic
rankings. SBI! is blue. Wealthy Affiliate is red, and each couple adds up to
100%. In other words, you see how much of each traffic ranking range (e.g.,
0-100K) is “owned” by SBI! and WA.
For example…
• SBI!
“owns” 96% and 98% of the 0-100K and 100K-200K brackets, nearly unattainably
high traffic for a solopreneur.
• SBI!
owns more than 95% of each 100K bracket until 900K-1M.
• SBI!
owns more than 80% of each bracket from 900K-1M until 4-5M.
Important: This chart shows
absolute numbers, uncorrected for the fact that Wealthy Affiliate has 70% more
sites. So the above results are 70% stronger than they look.
• Finally,
we get to the worst level. Alexa >30M correlates with SimilarWeb > 30M
and SEMrush of 0 (zero). This is the only bracket where Wealthy Affiliate
significantly “passes” SBI! — the worst traffic level possible (>30M).
Wealthy Affiliate excels only at failure.
The bar chart speaks for itself.
The pattern, for those who like math, shows that Wealthy Affiliate’s numbers
have a “power curve” distribution. It levels out towards 0% at the highest
levels of success, grows slowly and then starts to grow geometrically until we
reach the worst level of traffic (i.e., none, basically). We suspect that, if
Alexa went as high as 50M, Wealthy Affiliate would “own” 100% — just a
mathematical speculation, for those so inclined.
In fact, in our subsequent study of
GoDaddy, we found that GoDaddy members, who get no additional training or
guidance, still do better than Wealthy Affiliate members!
While GoDaddy sites were found to
be 10X less likely to achieve outstanding levels of traffic compared to Solo
Build It! sites, Wealthy Affiliate members were found to be 33X less likely to
achieve those levels!
In other words, GoDaddy users did
over 3X better than WA.
That speaks volumes to the
questionable validity of the information Wealthy Affiliate provides, and the
complete waste of time the encouraged activities represent. Folks are truly
more successful going off on their own, than to follow the Wealthy Affiliate
program.
Here’s what we can say
conclusively, based upon this…
1. SBI!
dominates at success.
2. Wealthy
Affiliate dominates at failure.
Note: The study was performed
identically for all SBI! and Wealthy Affiliate sites using Alexa. It was
repeated using Similar Web and SEMrush, for which the results were even more
favorable.
Conclusions of the SBI! vs. Wealthy Affiliate Review
1. Wealthy
Affiliate appears to be misleading its customers with claims of success..
2. Wealthy
Affiliate also seems to mislead its affiliates with repeated assurances that
they do their visitors a service when recommending people to Wealthy Affiliate
in their “SBI! reviews.” We suspect that many would not be morally comfortable
with their recommendations if they knew the truth.
Wealthy Affiliate’s fake SBI!
“reviews” get found at Google by folks searching for reviews about us. The
content is designed to send those visitors to Wealthy Affiliate directly or to
the affiliates WA review (glowing, of course)…
We know this deceitful strategy is
successful due to the decrease in our conversion rate. Prospective SBI! clients
who chose Wealthy Affiliate due to this, as you can see above, significantly
diminish their chance of success and greatly increase the odds of failure.
We detest being used to fool
solopreneurs into choosing Wealthy Affiliate. They preach success (without
proving it) and (per The Study) they deliver failure (an average of 87% of
their sites are Alexa >30M, SW >30M or are 0 [zero traffic] at SEMrush).
At the opposite end of the spectrum, there’s near-zero real success (53 sites
in the Alexa Top 1M out of almost 17,000 active sites).
Finally, while numbers don’t lie, this is
really about the people behind those numbers.It’s important to put a human face
on this…
Imagine the people we feature on
our blog failing dismally in a niche they despise, trying to mislead others
into “make money.”
We sincerely hope that Wealthy
Affiliate stops their misleading marketing techniques that are putting a choke
hold on the only company that makes “everyday solopreneurship” a reality.
We invite Wealthy Affiliate clients
to join SBI!. If you’re one of the very few customers who succeed at Wealthy
Affiliate, congratulations! We invite the vast majority who are failing to come
over to SBI! for a much greater shot at success.
To Wealthy Affiliate affiliates
with ranking SBI! vs. Wealthy Affiliate reviews, please contact us through
Support if you would like to do the right thing. We would be happy to work with
you to set the record straight.
And finally, to all with the heart
of a solopreneur, if you want to build an online business to achieve goals that
matter to you, ignore those fake reviews and start with SBI! now. We can’t be
sure that it’s right for you, but the 90-Day Guarantee….
1. gives
you total access to all of SBI!, including a free domain name (instead of 2
useless free subdomains that waste your time by giving you only partial access,
while upselling you to the paid product)
2. provides
more than enough time to understand what we’re all about, and see how you’re
going to achieve what so many others do.
3. makes
your attempt totally risk-free.
Get started today. You may have
lost time, the solopreneur’s most precious asset, up until now. It’s gone.
But
it’s never too late…
