AdultFriendFinder

There are dozens of categories on my site and few are as important as the affiliate marketing section. If you want to break down the whole porn webmaster process into two main sections, it goes something like this: Make your website not look like shit, then profit. Those would be the two main steps, if you wanted to sum it all up. Step one is covered by all my articles about web design and content writing services. Then there’s the SEO optimization and all kinds of security tweaks. That all falls under making your website better than a piece of shit. After that’s done and you’re comfortable about your site's content, you want to rake in the big bucks. That’s where AdultFriendFinder comes in.

Now, keep in mind, they mostly service end-users. This is a dating service. You sign up, you find someone to bang. Very straightforward. It’s also a global service. They do their best to cater to every single country. It’s all online and remote, so there’s no reason for them to limit themselves geographically. As for the webmasters, well, it’s pretty straightforward. You must have caught a glimpse of all the AdultFriendFinder ads across the porn side of the internet.

They’re pretty unavoidable. Before I got deep into holistic webmaster analysis, I was surprised by how far-reaching their program was. But, getting into the terms and conditions, I’m starting to realize why they’re so successful. They really want you to make money. They want every and any porn webmaster to reach out to them and join their program. And above all, they want to pay you.

The Business Model

We can go into the specifics of how much you can earn further down this review, but let’s analyze how and why AdultFriendFinder can afford to pay you so much money. It doesn’t seem realistic at first. I’ll admit, I was skeptical too. I think that the bottom line here is that their end-user service – the actual dating profiles, cost a lot of money. On top of that, they often encourage people to sign up continually. Paying customers are important cash cows for AdultFriendFinder. It’s kind of like how casino concierge services are all about getting the whales inside the actual casino. What they do after that is none of your concern. You just have to funnel them to the right location.

Then, there’s the fact that no matter how far-reaching AdultFriendFinder’s campaigns are, they can’t realistically hope to cover a spread across the entire globe. They’re not Google; they’re a dating service. Apps like Tinder, for example, market automatically. The users do the marketing for them. The platform just has to make itself available. You get a similar play here, except they take it many steps further. You, the webmaster, serve as the actual outreach program. That’s why they’re more than willing to cater to you. The leads you bring in likely wouldn’t have come in were it not for your popularity. So, you’re not competition – you’re just a source of leads. And, they don’t throw money at you across the board. They pay you per measured success. They pay per lead, per sign up and so on. So, everyone wins.

The Paid Programs

Let’s go over some of the paid services and how they’re segmented. Keep in mind that these numbers are taken straight from their public site and they are subject to change. In other words, check the actual numbers on their site. Don’t take my word for gospel. At the most, this review serves to get my finger on their pulse and sort of break AdultFriendFinder down for you. Don’t quote me, ok?

Singular affiliate programs usually have tiers. AdultFriendFinder has programs instead. They’re all the same type of tier, if you want to get technical about it. But, they pay you differently depending on the types of leads you want to generate for them. First up, there’s the percentage program, which pays out up to 75% on initial orders and 55% on recurring orders.

That means that when you first bring them a user, you get 75% of what they pay and then 55% for life, for that user. This is what I had in mind when I said that they weren’t going to shell out the big bucks in perpetuity. You make most of your money for the initial signup. Still, 55% for life isn’t a bad deal. It’s a lot more than non-porn marketers get for referrals.

Then there’s the per-order + rev-share option, which goes up to $130, as well as the payout by country option. There’s also a lead program that scales up to $5 per lead. This option’s great if you prioritize quantity over quality.

Scaling Up

You’ll notice I said “up to 75%” and “up to $130”. There’s a catch. There’s always a catch. The very first original signup pays you 35%, not 75. Why? Well, you scale up. You start from 35% with the first 10 unique signups; then, this number increases by around 5% every 50 signups. Then there’s the 100 to 199-member tier and finally, once you’ve got 200 signups, you reach the maximum and you stay there. They want you to scale up; it’s only natural.

Granted, they could just as easily give you the big numbers out the gate, but that would discourage people from long term cooperation. Many middle-man services do this kind of thing and it’s pretty much business-standard. You get the same rigmarole on Upwork, for example. They increase the profit for you over time, building loyalty. Now, for an aspiring webmaster who’s done everything right on their site, this isn’t as scary as you’d think. A streamlined porn site should ideally be getting hundreds and thousands of clicks on their ads, as long as they’re well placed and planned out. Annoying ads don’t work. Alluring ads do. Simple logic.

So, the scaling up isn’t a huge problem; it’s just incentive. Besides, once the original work has been done and AdultFriendFinder has been integrated into your site as an automated ad source, you don’t reinvent the wheel. You just work on your site and increasing traffic. You let them worry about raking in the big bucks. They just send the winnings back to you. It’s a lovely system.

Technical Details

Starting off with the worst part: Some countries are straight-up not listed on AdultFriendFinder for cooperation, which is non-negotiable. I don’t have a list of them, but you can see which countries are missing if you just jump to the sign-up page and click the list. If your country isn’t listed, you’re shit out of luck. There’s also the possibility that your country hasn’t been listed yet and is in the works in the future, but these guys haven’t exactly said that explicitly. I’m just assuming that certain developing countries haven’t even made it on their radar. I’m not sure. Maybe you could try reaching out, but don’t hold your breath. They seem to be pretty happy with their current geographic setup.

Then there’s the tax stuff, and oh boy, is there a lot of tax work. It varies from country to country. There are a lot of places in the world that literally don’t give a shit about this kind of income, but for the most part, you’ll need to submit your paperwork. It appears to be the most complicated if you’re from the US. It’s straightforward, sure, but there are forms that the IRS will need to see. You’ll also need a Tax ID. You can’t sign-up with a W-8BEN as an individual.

Beyond that, shit’s pretty standard. You can’t withdraw money until you have at least $50. That’s sensible. They pay by check, initially, but you can change the payment method after the initial cycle is over.

Proper Brand Building

AdultFriendFinder’s process is extremely streamlined and boasts a lot of credibility. If you want to, you can even opt into their co-brand program, which lets you share your personal brand and logo onto their landing page. To the user, this makes it look like you are affiliated with the site, rather than just bouncing them to another business. It adds credibility and usually, it serves to lower your bounce rate.

They also cover the spread on types of ads and types of forwarding. They pretty much allow any kind of redirect that you could think of. You can use blind links that straight up reroute users against their will, which is kind of annoying, but hey, it’s good to know you have the option. I’d stick to the properly marked banners, though. That way, you know you’re making maximal use of AdultFriendFinder’s design team. They provide the imagery. You just allocate the space on your site and call it a day.