If you’re interested in starting a new affiliate marketing business, the decision to strike out on your own as opposed to look for an extra part time job can be a difficult one.
For me, when I was first starting out, I really wanted to get a firm grasp of how many hours part time I had to work in order to earn a living online. I felt like so many people that are earning a living online work endless hours, and the average hourly rate seemed pretty low to me.
Fortunately, that’s not always true, and it is possible to earn significant income online while working part time. In this post I’ll talk about the how many hours are actually involved to earn money online…and yes it can be part time!
Money Earned vs. How Many Hours Part Time Affiliate Marketers Are Working
The problem with the word part time is that people can mean anywhere from 5 hours a week to 35 hours a week, which can obviously make a huge difference in your earnings potential.
Year 1: The Breakdown of Part Time Earnings
The only bad thing about affiliate marketing is that it usually takes several months to get the new business off the ground. It also takes more work in the beginning than it does later on. Here are some rough guidelines of what you can expect during your first year, working around 10-15 hours per week.
In your first year, you should go by the following guidelines:
- Don’t expect any earnings in the first 3 months
- Expect under $500 in earnings in months 3-6
- Expect $100-500 per month for months 6-9
- Expect $500+ per month for months 9-12
A lot of this has to do with how new site traffic grows, which is part of the process of getting established online.
These are expectations, not limitations! It is possible to earn far more much more quickly than I’ve outlined above. These numbers can vary significantly depending on the type of content you produce and the marketing competition and value of the niche you’re working in.
That said, these are numbers that I think are a good baseline expectation if you’re trying to decide whether affiliate marketing is right for you.
Year 2 and Beyond: Work Less, Earn More
Your first year is probably going to be the hardest and least profitable. After you reach the year 1 mark, you’ll already have a fairly large base of content on your site, you’ll have learned more about what processes work for you, and you’ll have a site that will already have some authority in the search engines.
All these factors mean that after your first year, you can hopefully work less and earn more.
In years 2 and beyond you’ll move into maintenance mode on your site, and can expect to see somewhere between 10 and 50% monthly growth!
Not only that, but to maintain a site you’ll only need to work about 5 hours per week or less!!! You can of course continue to grow the site further, which would take additional time.
Start Sooner, Earn Sooner
Now that you have a better grasp of what the hours worked to earnings ratio is for a new affiliate marketing site, it’s time to get to work!
The only question you have to ask yourself is: are you willing to invest a little time now to earn significant, passive income online for the future?
You should click here to start a free affiliate training, and get on the path to building a profitable business today!