Let’s be honest, every affiliate marketer would prefer to earn a high ticket commission vs a low ticket one. In fact, no one in their right mind would ever say “Sure I prefer a lower commission”.
But there are many benefits to focusing on the latter option vs the former one and I want to give you both sides of this argument since I am actively involved in promoting offers in both realms.
I do this business full time, and to date, promoting lower ticket offers has produced a greater income result for me personally in the affiliate marketing realm vs promoting high ticket offers (which I have also made sales for).
Here’s the most important thing to note about high ticket vs low ticket affiliate marketing:
Unless you’re a truly advanced affiliate marketer and can promote just about anything in this realm (most of us are not in this category), the most important thing you need to know to succeed in this business is this:
- Do not focus on the promotion with your affiliate business, but the niche you love.
- The niche is what opens up all the true opportunity and flexibility in promotions across all levels (low ticket to high ticket).
Here is a video breakdown on high ticket vs low ticket affiliate marketing:
Avoid the high ticket affiliate marketing blue pill propaganda:
1) Too often, I find beginner affiliates swallowing the blue pill of this topic that says something like “Just make 5 high ticket sales a month to earn $10,000” and scale that to six figures (or something along those lines).
2) And that also happens to be connected to a high ticket affiliate marketing program that costs $2,000 to buy (Isn’t that ironic?).
3) Then it turns out that to make the high ticket sales back, you have to become an active affiliate to promote the same scheme of a program you bought (can someone say pyramid scheme?).
4) Then you spend the big money to access the system, the owner is the one who truly makes the high ticket sales and odds are, you and 99% of other people who bought into this garbage end up broke.
This is sadly how much of today’s high ticket affiliate marketing industry works in most cases and it’s one of the reasons why I review so many of these programs, expose them and warn people to stay away from it!
It’s certainly possible in theory to succeed this way, but realistically speaking, not only is it unethical affiliate marketing practice (in my opinion), but there is a 99% chance of failure and too often, those who go down the high ticket affiliate marketing hole, end up broke and in debt, and all because they took that blue pill.
So now that I’ve explained this, let me give you realistic takes on each affiliate marketing promotion and where it has advantages over the other:
Where high ticket affiliate marketing beats low ticket (5 areas):
1) Truly, every sale you make with a high ticket offer is substantially more than low ticket ones. A single high ticket sale can earn you $100’s vs a low ticket one which could be $2 (average commissions of most products).
2) In rare cases (but it happens), high ticket affiliate marketing can help you create and scale a successful online business quickly.
3) There are numerous and ethical high ticket niches for affiliate marketers to enter into and make money off.
4) Usually, coaching, local marketing agencies and consulting are some of the best broad niches to make high ticket sales from. Just be careful which of them “go too far” with how much they charge. For example, I typically will not endorse a $5,000 online marketing course when places like Wealthy Affiliate offer that type of benefit for $49 a month.
5) There will always be (rare) people who have the money to spend on high ticket promotions.
Where low ticket affiliate marketing beats high ticket (9 areas):
1) It is much easier to make low ticket affiliate sales in larger amounts vs high ticket sales. On a good day, a low ticket promotion can net me a 20% conversion rate (1 in 4 people buying my promotion) whereas with high ticket offers, good luck getting a 0.001% conversion rate (1 in 1,000 people buying my promotion). This means:
2) Long term, it is easier to make consistent (and more) low ticket affiliate sales vs high ticket ones.
3) Long term, it is easier to keep making low ticket sales off the same people vs high ticket ones where people usually spend a lot of money at first, and then either don’t have anymore to spend or just don’t trust you with their money anymore.
4) It is generally much more difficult to sell a high ticket promotion vs a low ticket one (money talks here and people are just more comfortable buying stuff if it hardly affects their wallet).
5) Low ticket offers can yield better results even if you’re doing affiliate marketing during a recession.
6) You generally don’t need to resort to sleazy or unethical promotions to sell low ticket products. A lot of high ticket people will really say some truly dishonest things to make that high ticket sale (ridiculous claims).
7) Consider recurring affiliate commissions that are low ticket. People are more likely to remain in membership websites for instance for the long run are a lot more comfortable spending little by little every month vs a giant chunk of their money going away on one product/service, which means:
8) In the long run, you can make a bigger commission off a low ticket offer vs a high ticket one. As an example, the Wealthy Affiliate program I promote has great long term value for people and their online business, so many people stay for many months (or years) and that provides little trickle commissions that add up to big ticket commissions over the months/years they remain in the program.
9) I personally find it much more comfortable (and flexible) to promote low ticket commissions as there is a larger customer base for me to promote to and there are also many more niche choices I have that I can build a profitable online business on. This is also better for beginners in my opinion.
Even if your promotion earns you $2 a sale, if you can make 500 of them in a month (totally possible), then that’s a $1,000 for you. And people like to make it seem like you have to do a lot more work for that to happen.
Initially this is true, but then it becomes automated. And for high ticket offers, you will have to gamble more to make that initial commission using things like pay per click ads to get people to the offer.
The main point about high ticket vs low ticket affiliate marketing explained (again):
High ticket affiliate marketing can absolutely be profitable (and ethical) for you, but I find the most successful high ticket marketers (like I said before) have to be extremely advanced to make a convincing sales pitch for their offers.
And if you’re not in that spot right now and are just getting started, you have more potential with low ticket affiliate marketing, especially if you start with a niche you love to do that. That is much more rewarding and profitable for you in the short run.
I’m not telling you to avoid high ticket affiliate marketing, but I’m just giving you my experiences in both methods, which I possess a lot of and I’d love to hear your thoughts on this below!
Its like the Rabbit and Turtle Story. The high hicket is the Rabbit, and the low ticket is the Turtle, and we all know who won that. Low ticket has always been the better choice. Thanks for making such an informative article, I do have a question though. Does Kangen Water by Enagic fall in the high ticket category?
Hi Champ, I love that analogy, but I would say there’s times when promoting high ticket products makes a lot of sense (and should be done). To me it’s all about promoting something you like and something that is actually legitimate, with commission potential being last on that list.
For Kangen enagic water stuff, yes that is a high ticket promotion that can be $1,000’s of dollars. I personally am not a fan of these products and promoting them and included a link explaining why that is.
I enjoyed this a lot. I mean, I’ve read tons of various takes on the idea of high ticket vs low ticket. And it’s basically always the conclusion that if you don’t go for a high ticket, then you’re a sucker. But that never really felt true despite it being preached so much across the internet. It just never felt to be so black and white if that makes sense. Indeed, felt like the blue pill all the way.
I feel that your take is genuinely the most truth-oriented I’ve read. And that just speaks volumes for me when it comes to you as an affiliate marketer and a teacher. Thank you and I really appreciate your opinion. Looking forward to learning more from you. Cheers. 🙂
Thanks Matiss!
I really like this article and it relieved some anxiety thinking that I needed to promote high ticket items because I will only need a few sales to make a lot of money fast but depending on my niche, it may not happen easily. So, I promote mostly low-ticket items, but I see a lot of other ads or people saying I should do otherwise. My logic was exactly how you said it, as in it’s easier for people to buy the lowest cost items and if it’s a membership, that’s even better. Thanks for this great article, it really helped me out and gave me reassurance that I’ll be just fine as long as I am creating quality content as well.
Funny enough, the ads you speak of promoting high ticket affiliate marketing in most cases actually promote their own high ticket courses, and get you to buy their upsells that make them a lot of money Ash.
The very same programs also often act as pyramid scheme affiliate programs, so be very careful with this stuff. You’re doing the right thing in marketing low ticket products, but you can certainly promote real products that are high ticket too. You don’t need to limit yourself to only high ticket promotions.
Hi, Vitaliy. I have often concluded that the bigger the affiliate ticket item, the more money you are making for the program and not for yourself. Big ticket promotions are like the shiney balls that cats bat at. Very attractive but not much substance.
And paying out a lot of money for one of these programs is absurd. The smaller ticket affiliate programs can lead you to stability and ultimately more profitability in the long run.
Warren
I agree in some areas with your points Warren, but I think it ultimately depends on WHAT you are promoting, either in the high ticket or low ticket department. The example you made regarding the high ticket items from my understanding revolves around promoting courses and high ticket affiliate marketing courses which aren’t even worth that price in the value they give.
On the other hand, there are legitimate high ticket affiliate products (not courses) you can promote for which the product’s price matches it’s value (mountain bikes, drones, kayaks, ect…). You can build an entire business (that is ethical) selling high ticket items.
Of course, such businesses can also diversify their promotional portfolio and promote other items in the lower ticket department too.
Hi Vitaliy
I can’t hide my admiration for your blog. I visit it every day to learn more and more. Thank you very much for the valuable information you share here.
I think that bikes niche is a legit and less competitive niche. Jet and yacht private rent is another high ticket program.
What do you think of going to one of the popular pay per click agencies to design a highly converting landing page for one of the high commission products and launch a paid advertising campaign for it?
Do you think it is worth the cost? Do you think that as long as you hand your business over to a reputable agency that has a successful track record with clients, it can guarantee you success in high ticket affiliate marketing?
Do you offer private training that I can subscribe to? Do you offer a paid PPC service?
Hi Sam, really appreciate all the positive feedback you have on my content. Let me answer your questions with some main points I want to explain:
1) Technically, finding a PPC network to sell high ticket products on is a good way to go, BUT there are many problems along the way which make me not recommend you do that. If you’re a beginner or don’t have money to spend and even lose in the PPC world, do NOT get into this.
Every person I know who hears about PPC thinks they can easily make high ticket sales and because the profit margin is so high, that it’s easy money. It isn’t and the PPC network you deal with will have you spending more than you can imagine and this is not a good long term model.
2) Make good money first with free methods like SEO, YouTube and invest then into PPC with the knowledge you have because SEO and YouTube will teach you to create highly converting sales funnels. You can’t go into PPC fresh and expect this gamble to work. This is how people get into serious trouble there.
3) I know a ton about PPC and it makes up less than 10% of my business because I know the risks and the red tape I have to overcome there too (which you know about as well). I made the mistake on relying on PPC in the past and it left me broke. Never again.
4) As for agencies, you would have to be a seriously reputable individual for them to consider hiring you. This is why you have to develop your own brand name and site so potential businesses and agencies can see you know what you’re doing before considering hiring you.
I get emails from individuals and companies to this day because of this very site, but you can’t expect to just approach PPC agencies and tell them you’ll make them a highly converting page. I promise you there’s tons of people without any proof doing that already and their emails and requests are being ignored (and I don’t blame them).
5) As for private training and all that, the way it works is like this:
You can join up with Wealthy Affiliate here (through me), start their main training for free and see if you wish to upgrade. That membership comes with my coaching included (no extra costs). There are also 2 upgraded memberships, which are Premium and Premium Plus. I recommend going with Premium for now because it has training on SEO, PPC and what you’re looking for.
6) Most importantly, what I see is the biggest issue is you are rushing into this business to make money quickly and this can lead you down a very disastrous road that I was on when I began. Start with the simple stuff (building a site and doing SEO). It’s worth the time and the lessons and money you can make from this is amazing. I do that mostly today in spite of the PPC world being available to me (but they have gotten more difficult to use).
7) Basically Wealthy Affiliate will give you the right direction and guidance, like it did for me when I was in a similar situation. The goal is to do their training and applying that at a good pace without rushing.
Thank you very much.
I already have a site about health and fitness for a year ago, and I have launched a Google ad campaign recently
I will join up with Wealthy Affiliate through you because I really need help and answers to some questions that confuse me about PPC & SEO & marketing strategies
But I have two questions:
1) Which membership do you advise me to start within my case “I think that I am in upper-intermediate level in the world of digital marketing and making money online, as I have read many e-books and blogs years ago, but I am facing problems with the Implementation”
2) To be honest with you, I am not a native English speaker, but I can read and write English fluently. My listening is OK. Speaking may be the weakest part.
Do you still recommend this program for me in this case?
Hi Sam, I’ll answer both of your questions in a moment, but first things first:
I would recommend you pause the current site you have and start a fresh one in WA. I really believe that there is a passion you can find if you just use the WA training will help you build a better site faster through WA and that experience will help you become a pro at SEO and PPC.
I have a feeling based on our interactions that you are holding on to this current site you mentioned because you know the niche is popular and has money to be made, which is true, but I doubt your passion is there and I think if you find a niche you like, it’ll be better to build that with WA, and keeping this one on pause.
Now to answer your questions:
1) Start with the starter so you can see this for free.
Starter in Wealthy Affiliate will give you level 1 training access and help you start a niche site. Even if you go premium which is $49 a month which gives you ALL of the training, you’d still have to start with level 1 anyway, so just begin with this, see if you like it, then decide if premium is where you want to go.
We do also have premium plus which has expert classes on many beginner-advanced ways to make money online, including PPC, but I would only do that after going starter first, then to premium, then deciding if that’s the next step for you.
2) It’s totally OK not to be native in English speaking.
The site/s you create in WA don’t have to have videos and you can rank on Google and get traffic by writing anyway, which you’re good at so you’d be a perfect fit. I also think that you are more than capable of creating video content if you just become more comfortable with the text writing process first.
But yes, WA is perfect for you.
I signed up for the starter membership through you
What is the next step?
Focus on the main training you start once you join. There’s a whole step by step guide there to do (10 lessons). When you make a profile in WA, I will also contact you there so you can ask me your future questions inside the WA platform.