With this ClickBank review, I will overview everything important about the network to determine if it is worth the time and effort or if it is not something worth pursuing. ClickBank is one of the globally leading marketplaces for both affiliates and vendors and was always the top to-go-place for many years, is this still the case?
Before we continue, do you use ClickBank, or used it in the past? Please be so kind as to tell us about your experience in the comments to prevent this review from being one-sided as this will help others to make a more informed decision.
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What Is ClickBank?
ClickBank is an online marketplace that connects both affiliates and vendors, vendors being the ones to create and sell products/services, and affiliates being the people who then promote the products/services in return for commissions. With everything ClickBank has to offer, reliable tracking and payouts, secure payment processing, global presence, extensive affiliate network, and so forth, you can’t go wrong.
What Does It Cost?
ClickBank itself is completely free to join, but they do however have a few fees that need to be paid before payments are made.
There is a one-time activation fee that will need to be paid before one can start listing products. The rest of the service fees and so forth are listed below.
Payments, Payment Methods, and Fees
How do I get paid with ClickBank?
Check: ClickBank mails a paper check to an address of your choice.
Direct Deposit: Within a few select countries payments can be directly deposited into your bank account.
Wire Transfer: For countries that don’t do direct deposits, payments can be wired to you.
Payoneer: Payments are made via a Payoneer account.
Payment Amounts and schedules
The threshold amount (The smallest amount of money that needs to be reached before payment can be done), is set by you, in other words, you choose how little you have to earn before payment can be made, whether it be $10 or $ 1,000,000.
ClickBank allows its members to choose when they are paid, either weekly or every other week (once every 2 weeks). Payments are however only done on Wednesdays.
Fees and Payments
There are a few fees that will be debited from your accounts, such as refunds and charge-back fees.
The following fees will need to be paid before payout:
- A $2.50 processing charge with every cash-out
- A $0.50 to $1.00 return fee
- Refund Charges
- Debit Backdating
- ClickBank takes 7.5% of the cost price plus $1. (If the product costs $50 then $4.75 charge)
- The Commission fees are redacted from the price.
Other things to consider
Payments are withheld if you do not have at least 2 sales made using the following payment methods:
- Carte Bleue
- Discover
- JCB
- MasterCard
- Visa
- American Express
- Diners Club
- ELV (European Direct Debit)
- Maestro
- PayPal
For those living in the U.S., if you make more than $600 in commissions, then 1099 forms will be sent out.
What About a Money-Back Guarantee?
A Money-back guarantee is not needed as it is free to join and become a member. Fees and payments are only taken or redacted once you start making money, other than the activation fee of course.
Nonetheless, they do have refund policies for those purchasing products from the marketplace, however, do make sure to read these policies before purchasing as they can and do differ depending on the product, vendors, and to a degree even the affiliates.
How To Make Money Online – Popular Options
Scam or Legit?
The program is most definitely legit, for a multitude of reasons such as the fact they have been around for decades, and have millions of users, both vendors and affiliates alike. They even have a training program Spark by Clickbank.
Hundreds, if not thousands of products are sold in the marketplace to clients all over and they always deliver. Now do keep in mind that ClickBank itself is not responsible for the vendors, and as such quality of products and so forth rely solely on the vendors themselves.
What About Support?
24/7 Support is offered by Clickbank to their affiliates and their vendors. Getting information can be done in a few different ways including FAQ Pages, customer service lines, and so on. The customer service line is especially helpful to customers.
ClickBank Review – Pros
High commissions are offered to their affiliates with some going as high as 75%.
Signing up and getting started is easy and straightforward.
A Bunch of different languages is available to include everyone.
They have a rather convenient payment schedule.
The amount of products they have is astounding and everyone is bound to find something.
Massive amounts of money can be earned via ClickBank.
Products from Clickbank are some of the most profitable and highest converting platforms that there are in the online industry, not to mention a relatively good reputation.
A boatload of helpful articles is offered to both affiliates and vendors.
A separate program, Spark by ClickBank an affiliate training program, is available to affiliates and vendors of all levels.
Cons
The email support is not the best quality and can be a bit slow.
With the massive amounts of products available, it is bound for some of them not to sell.
Some of the niches have a hefty amount of competition.
ClickBank is unfortunately the home of get-rich-quick products. Always make sure to do the proper research beforehand when it comes to promoting money-making opportunities.
Clickbank Alternatives?
ShareASale – A bit difficult for newbies to join but awesome products are available.
CJ Affiliate – Difficult to join and get approved by vendors but a huge variety of quality products.
Digistore24 – 100% Newbie friendly. Easy to get approved by both the Network and Vendors.
Conclusion
Clickbank is a great place to start if you are fairly new to marketing, whether it will be as an affiliate or a Vendor. Affiliates should always make a point to do some decent research on the products that they plan to promote. Use the statistics that are available to you and browse around Google to find out if the product has a good or bad reputation.
Make a point to test products before you start to promote them. I usually test Clickbank products on my social networks first to see if it has a positive or negative impact on individuals. You can also email a few friends or even get friends and family to give you their honest opinions before you implement your marketing strategy. Remember everyone is different and what you might see as a great product might just be a lousy one for others.
Being a successful affiliate has been awesome, but a successful vendor is way better!
Clickbank makes it super easy to get your own product online and literally puts it in front of thousands of affiliates who are skilled enough to make tons of sales. Most people think that their only option is to become an affiliate and promote the Vendor’s product. If you have skills or knowledge that others can benefit from – then why not create your own product?
Make Money Online – Importance of a Website
ClickBank Review – Features
What Does ClickBank Have to Offer for Vendors?
Vendors can submit their products to a very busy marketplace that is browsed by consumers and affiliates. ClickBank currently has thousands of affiliates that promote their products, most of them very experienced marketers.
ClickBank is a middleman between vendors and customers, taking care of payment confirmations, customer services, processing orders, and so forth. Of course, the program does take a processing fee, but working with them is much easier and allows you to avoid the headache of having to open a merchant account and take orders online.
Help in the form of articles that provide an understanding of what a vendor is and how to begin.
Vendors more often than not work with affiliates and even have more than just a single product to sell, thus the reason why ClickBank offers helpful articles that teach a person how to do so.
A bunch of tools are provided to help members reach their goals and do their work, but understanding how to and when to use what tools is a tricky business, and as such, ClickBank offers a wide range of articles to explain how their tools work.
What Does ClickBank Have to Offer for Affiliates?
The ClickBank marketplace offers all kinds of products in all kinds of niches from archaic to new, to popular, and as an affiliate, you can browse these products and find one or more to promote.
The importance of marketing tools is known by vendors, which is why they provide all their affiliates with marketing materials such as banners, sales letters, or even in some cases, email marketing campaign letters.
Understanding what it is to be an affiliate is just as important, which is why Clickbank offers articles on a wide range of topics to help get you started, including articles on how to get started.
All kinds of tools are provided, including reporting and tracking tools.
More articles are provided for detailed General Account Help.
The Marketplace
A Marketplace such as the one ClickBank has, is an online space where vendors sell products and affiliates market them to earn commissions. In short, vendors sell their products, and affiliates promote them.
Both vendors and affiliates are not limited to a single product, and as vendors can sell more than one, affiliates can choose to promote more than one as well. It’s simple really, just pick a product, generate the Hoplink, start promoting, and start earning.
Finding products in the marketplace can be done in several ways including;
Basic search – A simple search bar at the top of the page that will yield you the basic search results.
Advanced Search – Located beside the basic search bar, this technique gives you the ability to do a refined search that yields specific products.
Improving Search Results – Refine or broaden your search results with the use of characters (*?*~).
Sorting Search Results – A Filter sidebar will appear once you have made your search, allowing you to get more specific products.
Attributes – A Second sidebar will appear consisting of attributes that can help shorten a list even more.
Categories – Categories allow you to search for item-specific results such as sports categories, or health and wellness.
Resources – Tools and features provided that will help one understand and view the marketplace.
Understanding the ClickBank Marketplace Statistics
The following information is provided in the statistics section:
Initial $/sale – The average amount that affiliates can earn for every sale made of a vendor’s product.
Grav (Gravity) – A calculation consisting of all commissions made by varying affiliates for a single product over 12 weeks. This information gives a person an idea of which products are selling. Keep in mind the higher the gravity, the more competition to go up against so do not choose something that is too loaded.
Marketplace Categories
Now I am not writing a spelling bee competition list and as such I will only list some of the sub-categories available with ClickBank plus the main category to which it belongs.
- Health and Beauty – As Seen On TV
- Economics – Business and Investing
- Baking – Cooking, Food, and Wine
- Student Loans – Education
- General – Fiction
- Fashion – Arts and Entertainment
- American Football – Betting System
- Hardware – Computers and Internet
- Domains – E-Business and E-Marketing
- Job Listings – Employment and Jobs
Well, this is it for this Clickbank review then, thank you for stopping by. Please do not forget to leave a comment with your own opinion regarding CB, it would be much appreciated.
Thank You and Have Yourself an Awesome Day!
