CPA Marketing vs Traditional Affiliate Marketing
Ever tried to get paid just for convincing someone to type their zip code into a box?
Yeah, sounds kinda weird. But that’s basically the internet money game in a nutshell sometimes. People ask me all the time, Stephen what’s the deal with CPA marketing vs traditional affiliate marketing, is one better, which one makes more money, blah blah blah.
Honestly it drives me a bit crazy because they’re not really enemies. They’re more like… cousins. One is just a little more high-strung and picky.
So What’s The Big Freaking Difference Anyway?
Look, let me break it down so simple a 5th grader could get it.
Traditional Affiliate Marketing: You get paid when someone BUYS something. It’s almost always a Cost Per Sale (CPS). You promote a product, someone clicks your link, they pull out their credit card and buy it, you get a percentage. Simple. You’re a commissioned salesperson for the internet.
CPA Marketing: You get paid when someone does an ACTION. CPA literally means Cost Per Action. That action could be anything.
- Filling out a form
- Submitting an email address
- Entering a zip code
- Requesting a quote
- Downloading an app
See the difference? You dont need a sale. You just need the action. This is why people get so hyped about it. It feels easier.
And yeah, technically CPA is just a type of affiliate marketing, which is why everyone gets so confused. But when people say “affiliate marketing” they usually mean the classic sales model. It’s just lingo. Dont overthink it.
The Payout Model: Fast Nickels vs. Slow Dimes
This is where it gets interesting.
With CPA, the payouts are small. Like, $1.80 for an email submit. Maybe $5 for a long-form lead. Sometimes more for stuff like insurance quotes, but you get the idea. It’s not huge money per action.
But… and this is a BIG but… it’s a hell of a lot easier to get someone to enter their email than it is to get them to buy a $200 product.
So you can get hundreds of these little conversions a day. The volume can be insane. The cash flow is also faster. Some CPA networks pay weekly. You get data fast, you get paid fast.
Traditional affiliate marketing is the opposite. You might be pushing a $1,000 course that pays a 40% commission. That’s a $400 payday from ONE person. That’s wild. But think how much work and trust goes into convincing someone to spend a grand. You might work for weeks to get just one of those. And then you might have to wait 60 days to get paid because of refund policies.
It’s a classic trade-off. You can read more on the whole CPA vs CPS thing here if you want the deep dive. Do you want fast nickels or slow dimes? Your call.
Let’s Talk Risk (And Getting Banned lol)
ok so this is important.
CPA networks are INTENSE. Like, super strict. They will ban you in a heartbeat and not even tell you why.
Why? Because their reputation with the advertisers is everything. If they send a company like Allstate a bunch of fake leads from bots, Allstate is gonna be pissed and pull their offer. The network cant have that. So they watch your traffic quality like a hawk.
I saw a guy on some forum complaining his MaxBounty account got shut down after one day. After a bunch of questions it came out he was sending traffic from some sketchy Russian pop-under ad network. I mean come ON man. What did you think was gonna happen? They want real people, real intent. Send garbage traffic, you’re gone. Period.
Traditional affiliate programs are a little more chill… kinda.
The risk isn’t so much getting banned (unless you do really dumb stuff like bidding on the company’s brand name in Google Ads). The risk is you. You can spend $500 on ads and get zero sales. Poof. Money gone. The company you’re promoting doesn’t care. You just failed. With CPA, at least you might get some $2 conversions to offset your ad spend a little bit while you’re testing.
The risk shifts from pleasing the network (CPA) to managing your own budget (Traditional).
Which One’s Better for Beginners, CPA or Affiliate Marketing?
Ugh, this question. I get it, you’re new, you want the “easiest” path. There isn’t one. They both take work.
CPA is tempting for beginners because getting a conversion feels easier. An email submit is a low bar. This gives you data SUPER fast. You can launch an ad campaign and know within hours if your landing page is a total dud or not. That quick feedback loop is powerful.
BUT… and it’s a huge but… getting accepted into a good CPA network as a complete newbie with no experience is tough. The affiliate managers will grill you. “What’s your experience?” “What traffic sources you gonna use?” “Show me examples of past campaigns.” If you say “uhhh i was gonna post on my facebook?” you’re getting denied. lol.
Also, unfortunately, even some of the best CPA networks out there still practice shaving (the aff. network or the advertiser will cancel some of the leads from you but they keep the profit and pay you nothing). Which sucks, because you will have no idea why that happened or if it happened.
And I talk from real experience, here’s one of the worst one that happened:
One of the biggest CPA networks that was dominating a couple of years back, (think top 5), made my account “inactive” or something like that, without telling me.
There was no notification in the dashboard, or in my emails, nothing…
So when I started promoting their offers again. I sent them thousands or so clicks, and had 0 conversions. I was puzzled… what is going on? So I asked them, and I was shocked when they told me that the account was set to be dormant/inactive or some crap like that, because I haven’t used it in a while. So it was all looking good, I was able to search offers, choose one, get the link, start promoting etc… but all for nothing.
Who knows how many leads I’ve lost? Anyway, they aren’t in the business anymore, so no point in keeping a grudge. But yeah, things like these happen (even tho this one was pretty weird and I doubt it happens regularly).
Another small note about CPA:
If you have social media traffic, or free traffic that you cannot control (for example, you can’t choose the user country etc), then CPA is again tricky, because if you have an offer that is only valid for USA traffic, but you have a global audience on your Instagram or TikTok account, someone that clicks on your bio link from Lithuania for example, will either get redirected to another similar offer (if the network is good like that), or they will get an error: “Offer not available in your country.”
This will make you lose a ton of conversions, so because of that, affiliate marketing can be better. That’s why choosing between the two is challenging, because it ultimately depends on your specific situation.
Traditional affiliate marketing, (check out my affiliate marketing guide if you’re just starting out), is way more accessible. You can sign up for Amazon Associates or ClickBank or ShareASale pretty easily. The concepts are more straightforward: build a site, write content, get traffic, promote a product, hope for a sale.
It’s a slower burn. But it’s where you learn the fundamentals.
Honestly? Stop trying to pick the “perfect” one. They’re just different tools. There’s no right answer, only what’s right for you right now.
If you’re brand new, learn the basics with a traditional affiliate offer. Build a small site. Learn SEO. Learn how to write copy that doesn’t suck. Once you understand how to actually generate traffic and pre-sell a user, then you can think about applying to a CPA network.
Don’t try to sprint before you can crawl.
Stay hustlin’,
Stephen
