*This is an unbiased wealthy affiliate review, since I am not an affiliate with the Wealthy Affiliate*
Product: Wealthy Affiliate or also known as The Wealthy Affiliate University.
Price: Depending on the membership. There is a Starter membership and a Premium membership. Read on to find out more.
Owners: Kyle and Carson.
Verdict: Not recommended. Read further below to learn why.
What is Wealthy Affiliate?
Wealthy affiliate is an online platform created to help affiliate marketers and entrepreneurs create successful businesses online through training and live help. The Wealthy affiliate or the Wealthy Affiliate University was founded in 2005 by two individuals named Kyle and Carson.
Wealthy Affiliate also helps starters, or referred to as “Newbies” start their own online business from scratch. There are more than 100,000 members (at the time of this review).
Having said that, over time, Wealthy Affiliate has become a very reputable business in teaching its members about the ways to become full time online income earners.
How Much Does It Cost To Join The Wealthy Affiliate University?
As mentioned earlier, Wealthy Affiliate has 2 membership options. A starter member which is free of cost, and a Premium membership which costs $19 for the first month, and $49 a month on wards. These prices are of the time of this review.
What Do You Get In Each Membership:
♦ Starter Membership
The first question that comes to mind is whether you can actually start an online business with just a starter package? The answer is No. Read more to learn why I say that.
As a starter member at Wealthy Affiliate, you have free access to the starter training program Level 1 (see below), which is a free 10 lesson training to help you start your online business. However, there are 5 lessons in total. But you only have access to the first level as a starter member.
With all this said, you can still get an idea of what it’s like to start an online business from the free material offered by wealthy affiliate to you as a starter member (A.K.A free member). But you will not learn how to make money from your online business.
Further more, as a starter member you have access to the affiliate boot camp phase 1. And below you will see what is covered in Phase 1 of the Affiliate boot camp.
Having said that, there are 7 phases of the affiliate boot camp course. However, as a starter member, you only have access to the first level.
Do You Really Get 2 Free Websites As A Starter Member At Wealthy Affiliate?
You get 2 free websites, which are hosted on a sub-domain. Having said that, you really don’t own these websites. In other words, Wealthy affiliate can take your websites (with your content in it) and make it theirs. Not that they have done it before, but they can and there’s nothing you can do about it.
♦ Premium Membership
So as a premium member, you will unlock the rest of the training material and get access to the rest of the Online Entrepreneur Certification courses (additional 4 courses). You can see them below:
Moreover, you will unlock the rest of the phases in the affiliate boot camp (6 phases). See below:
Moreover, as a premium member you will have access to classrooms, webinars, live chat help, Jaaxy Lite, and much more.
How good/useful is the training provided to you as a premium member?
From personal experience, the training material provided to premium members at wealthy affiliate you can get if you do a web search and actually subscribe to YouTube channels. So there is really no need to be paying membership fees per month to get access to that information (some of it is even outdated). Please read further to learn the pros and cons of wealthy affiliate.
The Good About Wealthy Affiliate:
- Free to join as a starter member. You can try out the platform, and see if it is something you would be interested in going forward with.
- All you need is a valid Email address to get started as a Free member.You can opt out any time. There are no hidden costs or credit card required.
- If you upgrade to a premium within the first 7 days of joining, you will get your first month for $19, instead of $49 per month.
- They are always looking for ways to improve the platform to make it more user friendly. I remember when they released a new look in 2018. See below how the platform now looks like :
- They have a good affiliate program. They have a recurring commission payout. See below for more information. Keep reading below to learn why the Wealthy Affiliate affiliate program can get really UGLY.
If you are a starter member and refer people to wealthy affiliate who end up becoming premium members, you will earn good commissions ($4 for the first month $19 special offer, then $11.75 there after and $87.50 yearly commissions).
- If you are a premium member, you have access to JAAXY LITE (See Image Below), which will give you unlimited number of searches per month. You basically have access to a free keyword research tool.
- They have webinars for Premium Members every week, so you learn new things along the way. These webinars are saved for you to check whenever you need to.
- Wealthy Affiliate has a great support team. They have a 24/7 live chat and support available for you as a premium member. So whenever you need assistance, or if you are ever having problems with your website, support will ensure you are back up and running in no time.
The Bad About Wealthy Affiliate:
- If you want to purchase a domain through wealthy affiliate as a starter member, you can’t. You have to upgrade to a premium member in order to purchase a domain through wealthy affiliate.
- As a starter member, you only have access to 10 Getting Started Lessons.
- As a starter member, you have access to the chat and community support for ONLY the first 7 days of you joining the platform.
- As a starter member, you only have access to JAAXY for a limited number of searches. If you wish to use it after you’ve reached your free searches, you will need to pay.
- If you are a starter member, and refer someone to the community, you only make money if they upgrade to the premium.
- As a starter member, you cannot attend webinars, which are held every Friday of each week.
- Starter membership is not available in Egypt, India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Vietnam, Philippines, Nigeria, Kenya, Morocco. If you reside in these countries, you need to sign up as a premium member.
- Wealthy Affiliate does not have a money back guarantee. So if for any reason, you dislike the platform, you can’t ask for a refund.
- Wealthy Affiliate has their own hosting, which is very expensive. See my #1 recommendation for hosting.
The Ugly-
Wealthy Affiliate makes it very clear when you first join, they don’t promise you of an “Overnight rich scheme”. But how do members make money? The only way you can make money with Wealthy Affiliate:
- If you refer people to the community, you earn great recurring commissions as long as subscribers stay subscribed. And that’s why you will notice all these great reviews on Wealthy Affiliate.
- Also, if you refer people to join their key word tool (Jaaxy), you will also earn good commissions. Again, that’s why you will see some great reviews on Jaaxy when you search for it.
Verdict: Is Wealthy Affiliate A Scam?
Wealthy Affiliate is not a scam. But that does not mean they are recommended, because as mentioned earlier, it’s clear how members are earning money from the wealthy affiliate platform.
Alternatives To Wealthy Affiliate?
Of course there are alternatives. You don’t need to be paying a membership fee to learn how to start an online business. There are tons of free guides online which you can read and learn from (check out some of the great guides I have come across in my recommended section). In fact, if you have the Amazon Kindle Unlimited membership, you can read guides on Amazon for free.
Moreover, go on YouTube and learn how you can start your own online business without having to join membership sites.
We have reached the end of the Wealthy Affiliate Review. If you want to share your unbiased thoughts about Wealthy Affiliate, please leave your comment below. I would love to hear from you.
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