The Pros and Cons of Cheap Traffic Sources for Affiliate Marketing. 

When it comes to affiliate marketing, there are a lot of different cheap traffic sources that you can use to get the word out about your offers. But not all of these sources are created equal. This blog post will discuss the pros and cons of some of the most popular cheap traffic sources for affiliate marketing. We will also give you some tips on choosing the right source for your business. So let's get started!

What is considered a "cheap" Traffic source?

When it comes to cheap traffic sources, free is king. Free traffic sources cost you a lot of time because it usually involves a lot of content creation. Since time is money, we won't count "free" traffic as cheap.

We'll be considering paid traffic based on a CPC or cost per click. Now for myself, I consider anything under $.50 CPC cheap traffic. I've also seen traffic as low as $.001 CPC and as high as $20+ CPC. So, it depends on what you're looking for and your overall budget.

Pros to cheap traffic for affiliate marketing

These may be obvious, but I'll address them.

Requires a Lower testing budget

Some of the more expensive traffic sources are out of the question if money is tight. At the same time, platforms like Propeller Ads have CPC's as low as $.001. At that price, $1 can get you 1000 clicks. That's a lot of data you can collect for very cheap. In perspective, 1000 clicks at $.50 will cost you $500. This seems too good to be true, and it might be.

Promote low commission affiliate offers.

Low traffic cost means you have an opportunity to promote offers with lower conversion barriers. Usually, that means sweepstakes offers or CPL (cost per Leads), where the commissions can be meager. The lowest I've seen was $.35, but $2.50-$1.00 is expected. A good CPA network can get you CPL's of $8+.

Let's do the math. If we get a CPC of $.01 and get a commission of $1.50, you can get 150 clicks without losing money. This doesn't look like a win, but you're getting plenty of data for free, letting you optimize your campaign without worry.

Fewer regulations for affiliates.

Usually cheaper the traffic source, the less regulated it is. Meaning you can be more aggressive with your advertising. Also, more risky verticals like crypto, gambling, and CBD, which would get you banned on Facebook, are usually given the green light on cheaper traffic sources.

Lots of traffic for Affiliate offers

We've all heard of the term supply and demand. One of the reasons cheap traffic sources are affordable is because there is so much traffic. You can easily spend $30 a day with a $.01 CPC. So the potential to scale a successful campaign is enormous!

Now that explored the pros let's explore the cons to cheap traffic for affiliate marketing.

Looking for a niche Check out "The Top Ten Niches for Affiliate Offers."

Cons of cheap traffic for affiliate marketing

I've learned these things through my personal experiences with the cheapest of cheap traffic.

Lower Quality Traffic

The quality of the traffic is usually lower than more expensive sources. This means that your conversion rate will be lower, and you'll have a higher number of refunds or people who don't buy. Cheap traffic can also be filled with bots meaning you're only paying for clicks that don't result in conversions. Which means you just threw your money away.

Ads Can Be Spammy

One thing to note about cheap traffic is that many advertisers are spammy. Meaning people use black-hat techniques like buying fake likes or followers, clickbait titles, and other nefarious methods to get their ads seen. If you're not careful, this spammy behavior can hurt your brand's reputation.

Less Targeted Traffic

Since the traffic is cheap, it's usually not as targeted. Sure, you can optimize your campaign, but only after spending some money to get data. At the same time, places that can be more expensive, like google or Bing, allow you to target high intent keywords, so you're not shooting in the dark.

Promoting with cheap traffic, you'll be getting a lot of impressions and clicks from people who are never going to buy your product. They clicked your ad by accident, or your ad was more interesting than your offer. Again, this hurts your conversion rate and lowers your ROI.

Requires A lot of optimizing

To be clear, you will always need to optimize your campaigns, but you got your work cut out with cheap traffic sources. Everything from ad placement to iOS to iOS version to the device can and should be optimized if you're going to be successful.

This means you need a lot of data to find what works. That means a lot of traffic, and you can easily spend your budget. But if the traffic is cheap enough, then why not?

Recap

Pros

• Requires a Lower testing budget
• Promote low commission affiliate offers.
• Fewer regulations for affiliates.
• Lots of traffic for Affiliate offers

Cons

• Lower Quality Traffic
• Ads Can Be Spammy
• Less Targeted Traffic
• Requires A lot of optimizing

Pros and Cons of cheap traffic sources for affiliate marketing Conclusion

Affordable traffic sources for affiliate marketing can be a great way to get started with your campaigns. Just be aware of the pros and cons to make an informed decision on whether this traffic source is right for you.

Tips when using Cheap traffic sources.

In general, offers with a universal appeal work well. The lack of targeting means the more niche you go, the fewer conversions you'll see.

Always use third-party tracking.

Third-party trackers will ensure you get the data needed to optimize the campaign. BeMob is an easy-to-use and free option to get started with.

Use Spy tools

Spying on the competitions will help you see what works, so you're not starting from scratch. Adplexity is one option, but a free alternative is affbank.com.

Communicate with your account manager

Most traffic sources give you an account manager. Your account manager is your inside source to help you make a successful campaign.

if you want to know more about affiliate marketing read "How to be good at affiliate marketing."

Hope you enjoyed this post.