12 Minute Affiliate describes itself as “an affiliate marketing system with built in funnels to help its members promote affiliate products” with the ‘Sleep Sales Technology’ based on the fact that you can make money with it whilst you sleep. It has been around for a number of years and looks to still be generating interest within the make money online world.
The trouble is that there are so many sites out there that say they will help, but when it comes to setting up your very own online business, many don’t. In fact, it has become even more and more important to do your due diligence before you purchase anything these days.
So, let’s look at this one and see whether it is worth the effort (and spending money on).
- Product name: 12 Minute affiliate
- Founders: Devon Brown and David Sloan
- Product type: Affiliate marketing platform
- Price: $9.95 initial access + upsells + Autoresponder costs + traffic purchase then monthly subscriptions $47 – $67 per month.
- Best for: Affiliate marketers
- Is it a scam?: No
- Recommended: Look, it will work, but not without quite a bit of upfront cost
What Are The Red Flags To Look For Online?
Usually programs of this type with the sorts of headings they have used (in this case “make $460 a day with 10 minutes work”) come with all sorts of red flags and straight off the bat, there are plenty of them here.
Here are some of the main ones to look out for:
1. Programs That Don’t Offer a Free Trial. I am all for making an investment in your online business, however what is the point in paying for something that is worthless, or a scam? Many hide behind this by not offering the option of a free trial to see if the program you are purchasing is really worth it.
Does 12 Minute Affiliate offer a Free Trial? No, there is no available free trial. There is a $9.95 upfront cost for the base package with internal upsells involved. There are also additional traffic, email, and autoresponder costs.
2. Programs That Don’t Clearly Outline Pricing. As a follow on from the above, many product sales pages will give you a base price (usually at a highly discounted price if you purchase in the next 10 minutes) but don’t outline what you get for that.
In most cases, they HIDE their pricing via the numerous upsells that appear only once you have made your first purchase. This is unethical and the upsells often include essential functionality needed if you are going to get anywhere close to the promises on the sales page – not that this is usually really achievable anyway.
How Much Does 12 Minute Affiliate Cost? The initial cost is $9.99, then $39 to get access to further niches and $67 for some ‘done for you option’s. You will then also be up for either $47 per month for basic or $67 per month for Gold memberships.
The training inside also discusses the use of funnel software and an autoresponder – which all add extra costs as well as the purchase of traffic – which is never an effective option. As you can see it is not just the $9.95 fee advertised on the front end, you are looking at at least $117 + recurring costs!
3. Programs That Use Long Winded Video Sales Pages / Squeeze Pages. If you visit a “sales page” and it runs for miles and miles without actually showing you what it is that you are purchasing, this is almost certainly going to be an expensive, overpriced scam. This is a marketing tactic used to HIDE pricing, but also to hide the product itself. They typically ask for your email or a small payment, and then you are going to be put through an extensive, and expensive sales funnel.
Other things to look for here include:
- Long sales videos with lots of pitches but with no identification of the actual person behind the program or any demonstration of what you are actually purchasing.
- Fake testimonials telling me they made $1000’s in the first month that they owned the program.
- Constant reminders that “I know you have been scammed in the past, but this is different – this is the real deal”
- A lot of bullet point sales pitches outlining just how much work you don’t need to do…
Does 12 Minute Affiliate Use These Sales Pages? Absolutely it does!
4. Low TrustPilot Ratings. TrustPilot is the place where you should be going to do to get real consumer reviews about products/services that you plan on buying. If a company doesn’t existing on this website, or has a rating lower rating than 4.5 out 5 stars, then you may want to second guess it and there are definitely going to be better programs and services available.
12 Minute Affiliate Rating: 0.0/5.0. This program currently doesn’t have any reviews on TrustPilot.
5. The Program Sells “Riches” Without Telling You The Process. If you are being pushed the idea that you are going to make a lot of money of not much work without telling you what you will be doing to earn this money (in a specific way), then it is maybe time to look elsewhere… Look for warning words such as ‘autopilot’ or an amount of commissions/day you will make.
Does 12 Minute Affiliate Focus On The Riches? Yes, yes it does! I can make $460 a day while I sleep with this one.
6. Support options are available. In many cases, there are no direct ways to contact to the owner/developer to answer questions about their program. That is something that you can easily test as there is usually only an email address available. Email the company and if you don’t get a response within 48 hours max then that is probably the sort of help you can expect in the future.
Sadly you will usually need to purchase the program to test this as there are usually never any contact details on the sales pages either.
Does 12 Minute Affiliate Have Support Options Available? There is an online form to contact support – however I did not receive a response.
7. No Access/Communication With the Owners. If the sales page outlines who it is that owns the product, many of them don’t, then can you get help and/or communicate with them directly? If NOT, then this program is more than likely not going to be helpful. Owners of reputable systems make themselves available to their customers.
Can You Contact The Owners of 12 Minute Affiliate: There is NO contact facility to reach out to Devon Brown or David Sloan on the website.
8. Are you Just Purchasing “Information”? Of course there is absolutely a market out there for training platforms that are very effective. However, if the program is telling you they can help you earn money online but end up just providing you with “ideas” without offering you all the tools, services and levels of ongoing support that you need to succeed, then it may be time to walk away
Unfortunately, many programs use their sales pages to charge you for their information, and then tell you that you need to purchase all sorts of stuff in order to actually use the techniques taught.
Are You Just Purchasing Information with 12 Minute Affiliate? There is definitely some functionality here however the main services you need to build a business are not included in this product. You have to spend extra money on traffic, an autoresponder and a sales funnel. These are additional fees, some of which are ongoing monthly costs.
Does the “12 Minute Affiliate″ program that you are reviewing meeting ANY of these points? Perhaps it is a good thing that you are doing your research and second guessing yourself here. It could very well one of the programs that we warn people against.
I Used Wealthy Affiliate Instead
OK, now that we got that out of the way, I wanted you to introduce to a company that is free of ALL of the red flags, and in fact, goes above and beyond what you would need to build a successful business online. Let’s run it through the red flag check we outlined above:
1. Programs That Don’t Offer a Free Trial. One of the things that first attracted me to Wealthy Affiliate after losing money on other rubbish was the free trial.
Most people who join Wealthy Affiliate do so via the Free Starter Membership. Unlike most other online platforms, the FREE starter membership provides for enough access to get a website started. There is no time limit to the starter membership and it gives you access to:
- The first phase of the either the Online Entrepreneur Certification and/or Affiliate bootcamp training – 10 lessons
- Access to 2 out of 12 Member Training Classrooms
- 1 free website
- Web hosting for your free website
- Access to the WA SiteBuilder to build and manage your website
- Limited access to Jaaxy – WA’s keyword research tool
- Access to Site Content – WA’s post writing and publishing tool
- 7 Days of Full Mentorship & Expert Help
- Access to Site Support.
2. Programs That Don’t Clearly Outline Pricing. Wealthy Affiliate has 3 available memberships clearly outlined on their pricing page. They have a Starter membership (FREE), Premium ($49/mth) or Premium Plus+ ($99/mth) with discounted yearly pricing also available. There is no time limit on the starter membership and there are no further upsells involved.
It would be remiss of me not to outline here however that in order to fully create your online business, you will at some stage need to invest in a membership options Pricing table is as follows:
3. Programs That Use Long Winded Video Sales Pages / Squeeze Pages. Yes, Wealthy
Affiliate does have a decent sized sales page. However this is a full website that clearly explains everything to do with the program, what you will get and how much it will all cost. All without the fake testimonies and empty promises of lots of money for no work.
4. Low TrustPilot Ratings. WealthyAffiliate.com has a 4.8 STAR rating on TrustPilot. The owners personally get back to each and every comment, and this leads to the industry. It is very difficult to achieve a rating like this in any industry, let alone the opportunity world one.
5. The Program Sells “Riches” Without Telling You The Process. Wealthy Affiliate offers the best of both worlds, a full training suite and all of the tools required to put it into practice. There are no promises of getting rich quick and the reality is, you first have to build a solid foundation and you need to understand the business.
As within the pricing table above, Your Wealthy Affiliate membership – even the free starter option – you will have access to all the tools, training and platform you need to create a business of any size online.
6. Support options are available. The platform offers a complete support network in both the training and website build arenas. Training support is provided via the Questions section and Site Support offer an extremely fast response to any technical website issues that arise.
Their hosting package also offers assistance with site speed, backups and other optimization options as well.
7. No Access/Communication With the Owners. You can contact Wealthy Affiliate directly from their website without being a member. They have a contact form, and the owners freely share their email addresses if you ever need to get in touch with them or have any questions. They are kyle@wealthyaffiliate.com and carson@wealthyaffiliate.com, feel free to reach them directly if you have question and of course as a member you are going to have access to them within the community.
8. Are you Just Purchasing “Information”. For me, I strongly believe that everything you need to build your own online business is all found within Wealthy Affiliate. And all within your chosen membership option.
Compare that to 12 Minute Affiliate’s traffic costs alone that can reach up to between $192 and $3840 a month. You can learn just as much if not more in Wealthy Affiliate (and for way less).
Why I Recommend Wealthy Affiliate
I joined the program myself back in 2018 as I wanted to sell essential oils online. And after trying quite a few programs where I paid good money for not much in return, I found Wealthy Affiliate. Within 2 weeks I had a website created and was well on the way to earning my first dollar – which I managed within the next month.
As above. This program will NOT make you $460 dollars a day with just 10 minutes worth of work. As with any business, it takes time and dedication to reach success and not everybody who joins will make money.
That said, if you follow the training and take advantage of the tools available, there is no reason why you can’t make money either.
What Do They Teach You?
In the interests of keeping things simple, the training within Wealthy Affiliate focuses on four simple steps as follows:
Let’s explain these in more detail:
Step 1: Choose an Interest
Have you ever looked at someone else and said “How lucky are they that they get to work in area that they love!”. Well guess what, this is your opportunity to do the same – regardless of whether you do it through Wealthy Affiliate or not!
You see the advantage you have here is that you can build an online business based on absolutely any subject that you like. This can be either:
- Something you are passionate about – such as a hobby or skill
- An area you have expert knowledge in
- A subject where you can help people
And to tell the truth, can even be something that you want to learn about yourself – yep, you can learn as you go! I mean what is better than spending your days researching and writing about something you love?
In website geek speak, the subject you will be working on is usually referred to as your niche!
Step 2 – Build a Website
A website is the tool we use to talk about our niche in order to earn income. Now, creating a website can be a daunting task for many however it really is not as difficult as you may think. To start with, let’s address the most common question I receive: What if I get it wrong?”.
The answer? You really can’t! Now you can do things you don’t like, or don’t work for your audience of course. However if this does occur – which it will – you can change anything you like within seconds! It really is that easy.
And of course one the main purposes of Wealthy Affiliate is to assist you with this very step which we will cover soon.
Step 3 – Attract Visitors
For this next part, think about a normal brick and mortar store. You can stock it with products but how do people know that you are there? Getting people to visit your website – called traffic – is what this part is all about.
You may have heard terms such as Search Engine Optimizations (SEO) and keywords however again, this does not have to be complicated. I have to be honest here – there are some technical integrations to set up but once that is out the way, all you need to do is write about your passion – that’s it!
Step 4 – Earn Revenue
Ok, elephant in the room, this is what it is all about – making money. And as above this can be via:
- Affiliate marketing
- Dropshipping
- Selling your own products
- Network marketing
You can also run advertising on your site as well.
At the end of the day, if you are sick of working in an office, sitting on a train for hours to and from work or just not being able to to what you want to do then why not check it out. You don’t need a credit card to join so what have you got to lose?
Conclusion
So there you have it – my take on the 12 Minute Affiliate system.
Let me know of your thoughts and/or experiences or if you have any questions below.
Thanks for reading
Paul