Wealthy Affiliate Review – The Program That Taught Me To Make Money Online!

Hey there and welcome to my Wealthy Affiliate review. This is where I will take you through the platform that is Wealthy Affiliate and give you a run through of everything it has to offer. Before we begin however, I guess I need to be a little up front with you.

This is NOT an unbiased review. Sure I will highlight some of the realities of it all below, however I say this because it is the sole reason that I have 3 websites that make me real money each and every month. Even when I am sleeping.

Now of course I will get to it all below but before I do, let’s just give the basics first:

• Company: Wealthy Affiliate
• Website URL: https://www.wealthyaffiliate.com
• Owners: Kyle Loudoun, Carson Lim
• Cost: Starter (Free), Premium ($49/mth), Premium Plus+ ($99/mth)
• Training: 21 lessons covering everything from affiliate marketing to social media and scaling your business plus 4-5 Expert Classes Weekly
• Websites/Hosting Included: Yes
• Research Tools Included: Yes
• Who It’s For: Beginner to Expert
• Our Overall Rating: 9.8/10
• Trust Pilot Rating: 4.9 out of 5 Stars

So if you are looking to make money online from home, then read on. And if you are anything like me, then it could turn out to be the best decision you ever made.

Wealthy Affiliate an online platform that provides all of the tools you need to set up an online business – afterall, every business needs tools to get started and grow right?

And even though it is essentially aimed at affiliate marketers, it can also help you with dropshipping, whitelabelling, selling your own products or even driving more sales into your network marketing programs.

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 1 week I had a website created and was well on the way to earning my first dollar – which I managed within the next month.

Which brings me to another point… This program will NOT make you $1000’s of dollars with just 10 minutes worth of work a day. 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.

We will elaborate on all of this below. However, once you join Wealthy Affiliate, you are presented with all of the tools needed to run through and setup your online business in line with the 4 steps above including:

• Task based training – this is the starting point and uses a ‘learn and do’ approach to get you using the tools needed to start an online business quickly and easily.
• 21 lessons covering everything from affiliate marketing to social media and scaling your business.
• Domain purchase and management (you get free domains when you upgrade to premium memberships)
• WordPress website creator and editor
• Super fast and secured web hosting for up to 10 websites based in your membership level
• Access to Jaaxy keyword tool
• Access to Site Content – WA’s AI powered post writing and publishing tool and all templates
• Access to Site Support.
• Access to weekly Live training and webinars
• SiteSpeed – makes your websites super fast to load, a ranking factor
• SiteProtect – amazing spam protection
• SSL Certificates

Who Is Wealthy Affiliate For?

Wealthy Affiliate is obviously aimed at affiliate marketers but in reality is suitable for anybody who is looking to make an income online world based on their interests or passion such as :

• Those looking to set up an online business that makes money.
• Manufacturers/writers looking to sell their own products or services online.
• Bloggers and Vloggers looking to increase traffic to their sites.
• ‘Brick and Mortar’ business owners looking to increase their online presence.
• Anybody who is looking for ways to make money from home.
• Retirees looking for a little extra income.
• People who want to earn money to fund travel etc.

Who is Wealthy Affiliate NOT For?

If you are one of the following, you should probably avoid singing up at this stage:

• Scammers and spammers.
• Those looking for a get-rich-quick program.
• Those not willing to put in the work.
• Those not looking to make an investment in their business

And in all honesty, if your current life situation is one that necessitates the need to earn an income straight away for whatever reason, then I would recommend trying one of these options in the short term whilst you get up and running.

The steps undertaken in the WA training program will absolutely earn you an income, just not in the immediate future. A good sustainable income can take up to 12 months to 2 years to achieve. There are however many members of WA that work at their sites around their normal 9 to 5 roles.

Ok, so once you join, the first thing you will see is the Hub. the Wealthy Affiliate Hub is the focal point of everything you need to get started with your online business.

Task Based Training

This is Wealthy Affiliate’s niche and website creation tool that will get you up and running with the foundation of your OWN business in just a few minutes. This includes:

• Your website
• Your brand
• Your ‘done-for-you’ research
• Your blueprint
• A task list that is going to help you drive the creation and growth of your business moving forward.

Plus all of the training you need to help you use all of the above.

This simple button makes the website creation process simple and allows you to get started on the training with a solid base and understanding of the processes. All you need to do is choose your subject – which is known as your ‘niche’ – and follow the steps on the screen.

Oh, and as you run through the training below you may realize that what you created above is not exactly what you want. That’s ok, you can just start again!

Wealthy Affiliate Training

As you then start your journey, Wealthy Affiliate is there for you with the most comprehensive training package I have ever seen – And I have used a few in my professional career trust me.

Earlier in this post we discussed the use of the task based training to set up a website. As a starter member, you will be able to access the “Step-by-Step Core Training & Tasks” which will give you everything you need to know to continue to create your online business.

Once you join as a member (see pricing options below), the Wealthy Affiliate training continues your journey with 5 phases that are constantly upgraded and refreshed to reflect the ever changing online world.

Each of these phases then breaks down to 5 sections which contains a video, training notes, discussion pages and action items to allow you to continue to work on the website you created in your Hub.

This training is comprehensive and as I can fully attest to, really works. It is simple, easy to follow and I could not believe how quickly I got my site up and running in the beginning.

Before we go on, I will note here that lesson 2 does require you to enter a domain into the WA platform to build out your website, so this is probably where you need to look at upgrading (remember, no business is built without an investment in tools).

If you are not ready to do that yet however, you can still play around with the training to really get yourself familiar with niches and branding of course.

Member Training

Another advantage of Wealthy Affiliate is that it gives you access to some of the best affiliate marketing minds on the planet. As it turns out, there are also some very smart technical cookies amongst them as well.

Wealthy Affiliate give them the opportunity to post their own training programs to assist other members. Some examples include:

Live Training

Every Friday afternoon (U.S. Time which is Saturday Morning where I live) Jay – WA account name Magistudios – runs live online training sessions in all manner of subjects which are a great way to get more information in regards to best practices when it comes to affiliate marketing.

Jay has over 15 years experience in this space and these sessions are priceless regardless of whether you are commencing your affiliate marketing journey or an experienced player. See below for examples of some of the subjects covered:

The real beauty of this training is that it is fully interactive meaning that if you have a question, you can ask it in the live chat and Jay will answer as he goes.  This training is available to Starter members within their first two weeks in the platform and ongoing for Premium and Premium+ members .

Premium + Training

For those who upgrade to Premium + which is the highest membership level at WA, there is another level of training provided as well.  This is a series of webinars run by the most successful ‘super affiliates’ within the platform. Examples are as below:

These guys provide ‘real world’ training and advice as they have been there and done that and speak from what has worked for them.  Oh, and the beauty here is that every one of them started out just like me and you – limited knowledge but a commitment to succeed.

Support

One of the most impressive and important features of the Wealthy Affiliate platform is it support functions. The training takes you to a point obviously, but it is not until you start to do some of these things on your own that the real questions come up. When these issues arise, the Wealthy Affiliate Help Center can provide support in a number of ways including:

Site Support – Something not working within your website as it should? You can send a message to site support for assistance. They are available 24/7 and always answer within minutes to get your problem sorted and website back on track.

Live Chat – Have a question on the fly? Jump onto Live chat and ask away – there are some very smart people in there and you are usually answered instantly.

Ask a Question – This one is my favourite. If your question is a little too complex for live chat or need assistance, this is the way to go. Not only can you ask your question but you are able to search through previous questions that have been asked by other users.

Private Message – You have access to some of the best affiliate marketers in the world – if you have a question about something that they do – send them a private message and ask them.

What else is there?

On top of the training, there are many other tools and services that Wealthy Affiliate contains. I will not run through them all completely here as there is just so much – but here is a list:

• Site content creator – Allows you to create and publish blog posts within WA – this can be undertaken manually or via the inbuilt AI tools ( word credits needed for AI tools).
• Website hosting – Your websites are hosted within WA as part of your membership options.
• Internal Blogging – Write blogs for other members about your progress, learning, achievements or anything else that takes your fancy.
• Jaaxy Keyword search – As part of your membership you have access to Jaaxy – WA’s keyword search tool that gives you the absolute best chance possible to get your posts ranked highly in search engines.
• Affiliate Program search – A key part of affiliate marketing is finding affiliate programs to access and promote.  With Wealthy Affiliate’s Affiliate Programs section, you can locate suitable programs to offer as part of your own site.  Programs can be located via
  • Categories
  • Keywords
  • Trending opportunities
  • High commissions
  • Recent keyword searches

Wealthy Affiliate has three membership options:

Starter Membership

Most people who join Wealthy Affiliate do so via the Free Starter Membership where they can practice with the Hub to gain an understanding of the Hub with enough access to get a subdomain website started.

Cost: Free

What do you get?

• Access to the Hub
• 1,500 AI Word Credits
• Access to the AI-powered Author Platform (BETA)
• 1 Practice Website
• Jaaxy Starter
• Limited Help & Support
• Core Niche Training (8 Classes)

Note: The free starter membership is not available in all countries.

Premium Membership

Once you have had a look around, you then have the option to upgrade to the Premium Membership – again – a business needs to tools to gorw.

Cost:

• $49 USD per month
• Pay yearly for USD $499 (save $91 per year)

What do you get?

• 1 Free .com domain ($16 value)
• 7,000 AI Word Credits per month
• AI Author Platform (BETA)
• Weekly Expert Classes
• Core Niche Training (20 Classes)
• Bootcamp Training (20 Classes)
• 3 Profit-Ready Websites
• 3 Full Business Hubs
• Jaaxy Lite
• Unlimited Help & Support
• 24/7 Website Tech Support

Premium + Membership

The Premium + membership provides access to everything covered above as well as some premium training, enhanced hosting and bundling options and upgrades.

Cost:

• $99 USD per month
• Pay yearly for USD $697 (save $491 per year)

What do you get?

• 2 Free .com domains ($32 value)
• 15,000 AI Word Credits per month
• AI Author Platform (BETA)
• Daily Expert Classes
• Core Niche Training (20 Classes)
• Bootcamp Training (20 Classes)
• 10 Profit-Ready Websites
• 10 Full Business Hubs
• Jaaxy Enterprise ($99/mo value)
• Unlimited Help & Support
• 24/7 Website Tech Support

As above, I have made some good money using all of the tools provided by the Wealthy Affiliate platform and the included training. So here are the pros that I can highlight based on my experience:

• All of the above – As I have mentioned a number of times above, the features and functions I have outlined above have taught me everything I need to build two websites that make me money every day.
• You can contact the owners/founders directly – Many platforms hide the details of the owners and founders – or simply provide a support email. Within Wealthy Affiliate you really can contact Kyle and Carson with questions, feedback or to simply have a chat.
• No messing around – The training simply doesn’t mess around – you will build a website within the first few lessons meaning you have it done before you get the chance to second guess yourself.
• All of the tools are in the one place – Your training, website editors, support, hosting, security and so on is all in the one spot. This means there is no need to spend extra on any of these things as you build your site.
• Live training weekly – The live training is really live, meaning that you are always getting the latest information based on current trends and technologies.

Look, I have not hidden the fact that I am an unashamed fan of the platform however of course there are some things you should be aware of as follows:

• The starter membership does not give full access – you will need to purchase a membership for personal domain purchase etc.
• The platform is a little ‘busy’ which causes some new users to get a little lost.
• There are spammers and scammers – yep! they are everywhere – Fortunately they are weeded out fairly quickly.
• You can be subject to abusive comments – Again, Wealthy Affiliate is not immune to online trolls or the impatient. Again, they are removed hastily from the platform.
• Some websites do not make money – I am not sure if this is a Con or simply a cautionary note however if I am being honest, there are many more members of the platform that don’t make money than those that do. This is for a number of reasons however the main one is consistency of work. If you do the work, this is a tried and true process that does produce income.

My opinion? This is a legit program and definitely not a scam. I joined Wealthy Affiliate in 2018 with limited knowledge of the internet and how to build a website. My initial search was “how to sell essential oils online” which after a bit of looking around led me to the platform. I joined and then did two things:

1. Started the training – I did about an hour each night
2. Kept going!

I had no idea what I was doing but I just kept doing the training and hoping that in time it would all ‘stick’. And the thing is that even though I really had no idea, within a week I had a website up and running.

I then learned one thing which is number 2 above – I just kept going. Even if I did 5 minutes of ‘tweaking’ I just made sure I tried to do something every day. Bit by bit, I understood more and after about 3 months – BOOM! I made a sale!

I ended up selling the essential oils website as I lost interest in that subject. I then worked on one about fishing. I was loving that but when someone offers you $17k for it whilst you are standing on a mountain in Whistler, Canada – Yep sold it.

Now I am working on a travel site and making money again!

My experience above is not unique, nor is it the same as everybody else. Some earn money immediately and some take months longer. I mentioned in my Cons above that many don’t make money at all. This can obviously be for a number of reasons but for those that persevere and do the work, then anything can happen…

At the end of the day, if you are looking for something that allows you to work from anywhere and make passive income, then why not give Wealthy Affiliate a try? You will not make $1000s within your first month – or maybe even the first year (although many do). This is no get rich quick platform so there are no promises here!

But 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?

So there you have it – my 100% biased review of Wealthy Affiliate. So if you are at all interested in affiliate marketing or building a website for any other reason, I strongly recommend giving it a try.

After all, you can sign up for free, build a site and see how you go – with all the support you need to get your business built and attract visitors.

What more could you ask for?

Oh, let me know of your thoughts and/or experiences below.

Paul