To get an idea of the potential of Affiliate Marketing you need to know some facts about the behavior of the Internet.
1) Only between 20 and 25% of the world’s population are Internet users, however if we consider that the population is around 7.000 million people by 2010, we have approximately 1.750 million people have Internet access.
2) Of these 1.750 million people about 85% use search engines like Google, Yahoo, MSN or any other to find the information they need about all possible subjects such as home appliances, books, ways to earn money, travel, recipes cooking, dieting, dating, toys, and an endless list of all topics related to human activities. We are talking to about 1.500 million people used at least one search engine to find information.
3) From the people who use search engines to find information, about 80% use or used at some point Google. This represents 1.200 million people using Google worldwide.
What these data tell us? For comparison the United States population for 2010 was estimated at around 310 million people. That is the world’s population using Google at least one time to find information is 4 times the population of the United States!
Unless you are Coca Cola, McDonalds or any other company at this level, how else can imagine you could get this market of potential buyers for a product that you offer?
Something more, companies I just mentioned have achieved global penetration power thanks to multimillion-dollar investments in infrastructure, personnel, distribution systems, marketing, advertising, etc. Affiliate marketing is a home-based business that does not require you to spend a dime unless you choose certain strategies to boost your business but just as an alternative, but does not represent by far the costs of a large company. What home-based businesses know that can have the penetrating power of the web I’ve shown?
Think about affiliate marketing as a cake which many people still can get a slice! Claim yours!
Hi! The reach we have with affiliate marketing is incredible. As you have stated, only companies like Coca-Cola or McDonald’s could dream of having access to so many people 30 years ago. This post has really opened my eyes concerning potential. Thanks for sharing these stats. Even if we only get to a tiny slice of that cake (that tiny slice is a lot of people).
Hello Henry,
When we start with an online business and start learning the niche concept, we think our audience expectations are reduced. However, we have to keep in mind that our content is exposed to the world and that although the audience we focus on is very specific, it still represents thousands or millions of people in the global context.
Thank you for sharing the facts about Internet. Personally, I think that internet marketing goes into a new direction as we speak. No more of that car sale personality or the gorilla marketing. Consumers are actually go online to do their research before they purchase a product, I myself included. We are a social being, we always trust a real person’s review about a product rather than hearing it from the ads. Sure some of the old school marketing still works but you need to invest a lot of money on a campaign. Why spending all that money while you can just share your review on a product and get an affiliate commission from that? I think affiliate marketing is here to stay. Soon all the big companies will choose affiliate marketing over the storefront. The stores are just for them to feel the products that is it.
I agree. I think that most people are fed up with that profile of the seller who is only interested in their product and sees the potential buyer as prey to hunt. Consumers have become increasingly selective in part because the information available on products or services is increasingly detailed and comparative. Who can offer this, gets the trust of interested people, which is an essential part of affiliate marketing. The acquisition by recommendation.