Are you looking for a JVZoo review? If you want to make money online, you might have heard of JVZoo. But you may wonder if this affiliate network is a scam.
The internet is rife with reports of scams. Affiliate marketing is particularly true in that regard.
JVZoo is one affiliate network that people like to refer to as a scam when talking about different affiliate networks.
The majority of these claims, however, come from users who have only been using the network for a short time. Furthermore, the affiliate network has plenty of positive reviews.
Then, what is the truth? Can affiliate marketers benefit from JVZoo, or is it a scam network?
To help you make a more informed decision, I have thoroughly researched JVZoo so I can tell you more about it.
At the end of this review, I’ll also share with you a platform where I’ve learned affiliate marketing skills that have enabled me to make a full-time passive income.
In this JVZoo review, I’m going to cover the following.
What is JVZoo?
A software as a service (or SaaS) company, JVZoo is listed in the Inc. 5000 Fastest Growing Companies in the United States (for 2016 and 2017).
With JVZoo, you can sell products, market and deliver them seamlessly through a fully automatic process, like that of ShareASale, Amazon, and ClickBank.
In 2001, Laura Casselman (current CEO), Bryan Zimmerman (co-founder and COO) and Chad Casselman (co-founder, chairman and CIO) started JVZoo. The company’s current CFO is Nathan Green. Founded in Florida, the company offers a user-friendly network for beginners and other users.
Although no one is sure what JVZoo means, according to the company, “Joint Venture Zoo” makes the most sense and is the most appealing of all the conspiracy theories online!
JVZoo earns money from sales only when the vendors do. The company partners with vendors in order to generate sales. Because of this, JVZoo doesn’t charge a monthly subscription fee or membership fee; vendors can register and use the network free of charge, with 5% of every subsequent sale going to JVZoo.
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How To Sign Up for JVZoo?
JVZoo affiliate applications are simple and straightforward. To get started, you simply need to register on the site for free and then request a product for promotion.
The prerequisite to becoming a Premium Affiliate is making a certain number of sales of a specified affiliate program with a low refund rate.
You can also request affiliate status from JVZoo’s Support Desk. Management will review this request in order to determine if you meet the criteria to become a Premium Affiliate.
Registering for a new account consists of four steps, including entering your name, email address, and choosing a password.
The link to activate your account is then embedded within the email you receive for verification.
Once logged in, you’re prompted to select a payment method.
PayPal is the preferred method of payment for JVZoo affiliates because commissions are paid instantly.
To complete the signup process, you may need to upgrade to a ‘PayPal Business’ account or Payoneer account.
The final step in the activation process is to select from a list of “Recommended tools”.
Below is a video that shows you how to set up a JVZoo account:
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What Affiliate Programs Does JVZoo Offer?
As JVZoo primarily focuses on digital products, the Digital Product Library offers many categories and niches (over 200 categories and niches) for vendors to choose from and for affiliates to promote. The following are a few of the site’s most popular niches:
- Self-Improvement
- Finance
- eCommerce
- Software
- Health and Fitness
- Business
Many of the products in these niches consist of webinars, games, guides, and tutorials. There is even an automated webinar platform where vendors can upload pre-recorded webinars or create pre-recorded webinars for free, which affiliates can promote.
In addition, the site has a “best-sellers’ ‘ section, where best-selling items are highlighted every day; these are also the most profitable items to promote.
As far as the network models are concerned, it does not seem that the company limits affiliates’ ability to promote products.
Bloggers, website operators, YouTube video producers, commenters (on YouTube videos as well as blog pages), forum participants, as well as alternative CPA companies may promote their products.
According to their payment offer, they appear to pay by cost-per-click (CPC) or cost-per-sale (CPS).
JVZoo’s Digital Product Library has over 200 niches, which means there are a lot of digital products to choose from. Affiliates can promote a program of their choosing, whether it is health and fitness, business, software or e-commerce.
Commissions at JVZoo vary from 30-70% depending on the product. JVZoo’s affiliates can earn 100% commissions on the site, unlike other affiliate networks!
When products cost more than $35, commissions are typically higher. A niche that is popular has a greater potential for income as well as a niche that is less popular.
The fact that the niche is the bestseller of the day doesn’t entail an automatic guarantee of good commission; the quality of the product must also be acceptable.
There are also products available that require subscriptions rather than one-time payments (i.e. recurring payments). When a customer purchases the product and is billed, a commission is paid.
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How Does JVZoo Work?
It would be boring to go over every menu option in detail. In addition, affiliates are interested in only two aspects of this stuff:
- Where can I find the products?
- How do I create my affiliate link?
Finding Affiliate Programs
The menu option ‘Find Products’ provides the following answer to the first question:
You’re directed to a list of different product offers which can be filtered.
This can be done by:
- Keyword
- Category
- Sub-category
The fact that there are currently 57,600 active offers on JVZoo is also worth mentioning. There’s a big difference between a JVZoo “Top Seller” and a product considered excellent.
The more important thing to look at is the intersection between low refund rates and good sales figures.
Unfortunately, you cannot filter by refund rates or any other metric – only the column of values can be sorted.
Every program must also be applied separately.
But it only takes a few minutes in most cases for JVZoo’s approval to take place because most creators are eager to make money.
This brings us to the second most important thing affiliates need to do – setting up referral links.
Creating Affiliate Links
You may now start creating your affiliate link after you have been approved to promote your desired digital product.
It is quicker to check out what products you have already been approved to promote rather than searching for the product by its name.
Click ‘Get Links’ to access those links.
In this context, “delayed” means the publisher/creator will hold onto your commission payment until they are certain you are legit.
Getting Paid
What are the ways and when do you get paid as a JVZoo affiliate?
The payment schedule really depends on the program or offer you’re promoting.
There are a number of offers on JVZoo that will pay you instantly to your PayPal account. However, this is only offered after proving yourself and becoming a ‘Premium Affiliate’.
Making that happen requires a lot of sales and a low refund rate. The problem is, you aren’t given targets to work towards – instead, you’re advised to contact their help desk.
You can choose from a variety of payment options, including:
- PayPal
- Payoneer
- Check
- Direct deposit (via JVZoo Pay)
There should be a payment method compatible with your country’s banks, though. Nobody wants to market a product that they can’t get paid for.
It is possible for your JVZoo account to have a negative balance, as long as your account has a net positive balance.
Publisher Help
What happens if you encounter a problem? The JVZoo affiliate program actually does a pretty good job of supporting both affiliates and sellers.
You can choose from:
- Searching the knowledgebase
- Opening a ticket
A structured knowledge base enables you to easily find the answers you need. The support desk is open (via ticket) 7 days a week, excluding certain holidays.
JVZoo Payout Terms and Options
On JVZoo, payouts are instant; at the moment a sale occurs, the affiliate is credited with the commission. Affiliates receive commissions from vendors of specific products via PayPal, but there are other options such as JVZoo pay, checks by mail, and manual payments. Affiliates earn commissions on sale prices ranging from 30 to 100% (decided by the vendors).
Both JVZoo and PayPal do not charge transaction fees for commissions transferred if they are 100%, as the vendor must pay these fees on behalf of the affiliate.
In other words, it could also mean that the vendor will pay 100% of the remaining balance after paying the transaction fees.
Sometimes, the seller holds the commission for 90 days before paying the commission in case the seller needs to refund the customer.
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Cons and Complaints of JVZoo
It’s easy to understand why some doubt the reliability of JVZoo when so many people claim that it’s a scam.
Let’s examine the biggest grievances people post online.
1. JVZoo Products are Worthless
It is common for affiliate marketers to promote any product that seems appropriate for their website. Not only JVZoo affiliate marketers are at risk, but all affiliate marketers.
Where does this claim that JVZoo is a scam come from? It comes from the fact that some products on JVZoo are really worthless.
The JVZoo product database is huge, as has already been mentioned several times, and new products are added every day.
Due to the lack of rules and regulations governing the additions to the website, many scam complaints have been reported. Since JVZoo doesn’t take responsibility for product verification, it falls on the customers to do so.
Sites like this one may offer “Products of the Day” but they often do not translate into good products; they are just arbitrarily chosen to make money.
No matter whether a product makes it to the daily, weekly, or monthly bestseller lists, you should do your research first.
There isn’t a review system in place where people can see if they’re getting good service. Many people buy the wrong programs, which end up ruining their businesses because of following the wrong advice.
2. Poor customer service
There is no way for JVZoo customers to contact some personnel within the actual network if they are having a problem with a JVZoo product. If you wish to return the product, you need to contact the seller directly (the same applies to Warrior Plus, another popular network).
The problem with JVZoo is twofold: first, what’s the point of even having a support system? Secondly, how about when the product owner is disappointing? What if contacting the product owner wasn’t easy? All of these questions are realistic.
I’ve encountered issues with products I bought from JVZoo and I found it difficult to reach the owner. Furthermore, all support I could get from JVZoo was indirect, and I ended up disputing some charges with my credit card company.
3. JVZoo Needs To Make Improvement on Filtering
It would be better if JVZoo did a better job of filtering out the programs they allow on their network.
The affiliate network is filled with “serial” marketers who create bad programs after bad programs, but they keep getting away with it because they know how to hype up the system and create good compensation for their affiliates.
In my experience, I have purchased well over 30 products and systems (for review) and about 80% of those have been a disappointment, 15% may have been ok while only 5% have been great.
This is actually normal since there are many poor systems and a few good ones in this industry. Unfortunately, there are also worse cases like Clickbetter, which I have found to have a larger percentage of bad programs than the good.
Besides JVZoo, even Clickbank is affected by this, so it’s not isolated to just JVZoo, though I can actually contact Clickbank to solve problems if I have any. I cannot really do that with JVZoo.
4. Quality Programs Face Fierce Competition.
If you ask me, this is a good problem. Why do I say that? It is because the more competition there is, the higher will be the amount of searching as everyone is promoting the product.
Thus, if you can master advanced SEO (search engine optimization) techniques and rank your article on the first page of your target keywords, you might get sales automatically.
This is what you can learn for free from my #1 recommended affiliate training platform.
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Pros of JVZoo
1. Signing Up is Easy.
Creating an account is straightforward. The process of signing up for a JVZoo account takes only a few minutes and you can start trading without filling out complicated paperwork or going through administrative hoops.
As a vendor, you can then connect to a massive group of affiliates who will promote your products, and a software system is designed to compensate these affiliates and you for each sale (you don’t have to know how to program, this network handles it all for you).
2. You Can Be Both a Vendor and Affiliate
The network is free to join. This is a great resource for anyone who wants to make money on affiliate marketing.
Most affiliate marketing networks allow you to sign up as either a vendor or an affiliate. You can participate on JVZoo both as a vendor and a marketer, so you can maximize your earnings.
It is extremely popular to create and post products and programs related to making money on this site.
3. High Commission Rates
Good Commission Rates. Commissions from JVZoo can reach 75% and even 100%. It’s also fast, so you can spend less time waiting for that you-know-what you’ve been eyeing.
You will find dozens of affiliate products to choose from in every possible niche, so your options are endless.
The commissions are usually recurring, which gives affiliates and vendors a steady income.
4. Easy To Use
As the company claims, JVZoo is extremely user-friendly. Users will find it easy to navigate, has an extensive knowledge base, and is perfect for both individuals just getting started and those with some experience.
In JVZoo, buyers and vendors can communicate directly, so customer service is not necessary.
They do, however, provide a helpful knowledge base and hosting support, where you can either submit a support ticket or contact their team directly during regular business hours (except on certain holidays).
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Any Better Alternatives To JVZoo?
Today, JVZoo is considered one of the top affiliate programs online due to the variety of products and high payout rates – with top affiliates earning up to 75% in commission.
It’s great news that JVZoo isn’t the only name around. Alternatives to JVZoo have helped affiliate marketing reach new heights.
Here are the JVZoo alternatives that offer equal value.
ClickBank
We have included ClickBank as our first JVZoo alternative. Known as one of the top American retailers and affiliate networks, ClickBank has thousands of physical and digital products on its site that affiliates can promote and earn a regular income from.
Founded in 1998, ClickBank’s transparency, high-quality tracking system, and high commissions that vendors provide to their affiliates have made this platform a trusted platform.
The simplicity of this platform is another reason why it is so renowned. This system is very easy to use on the backend and makes it very easy for affiliates and vendors to understand their numbers.
CJ Affiliate
Affiliate programs like CJ Affiliate are among the largest around, as well as JVZoo. There are millions of companies, products, brands, and services available for online promotion at this site.
Among the products they offer is everything from technology devices to pet accessories and restaurants.
Barnes & Noble, J. Crew, and Office Depot are among the brands represented. The commission varies depending on the program.
CJ requires you to apply for each offer like Rakuten. Even if you’ve been accepted into the network, you need to complete this step. If you’re not used to it, this can be a frustrating obstacle to overcome.
CJ continues to be the best option for buyers due to its access to large brands. Despite its age, this affiliate network continues to deal with a wide range of premium brands that do not advertise elsewhere.
ShareASale
Another site similar to JVZoo is ShareASale. Affiliates can use this site to promote thousands of products, brands, and other websites. This site has an excellent payout rate, as well as a reputation for trustworthiness.
They represent brands such as Reebok, Sally Beauty, and Etsy. Commissions vary according to the program.
Almost any type of physical product can be found here as an affiliate offer. Viator, WP Engine, and the NBA Store are represented.
Affiliates with low performance may be kicked off ShareASale for insufficient balances due to its policies. Warnings aren’t always given.
If you are interested in starting to offer physical products, choose ShareASale. With so many affiliates offers available, this network is often referred to as an alternative to Amazon.
Affiliate Window
Affiliate Window, like the other JVZoo alternatives, offers affiliates thousands of products and services to promote online. Furthermore, Affiliate Window offers affiliates of different levels of experience the opportunity to participate in a global market. There are big brands represented by Affiliate Window, including Under Armour, Burton, and HP.
Rakuten
Rakuten offers an affiliate program that is highly regarded. Additionally, they offer affiliates an easy-to-use dashboard that displays earnings, clicks, and conversions information. Eight years in a row, this affiliate network has been voted the mThink’s best affiliate marketing network.
However, this affiliate marketing network only provides commissions on direct sales, and it only deals with physical goods. It may be more convenient to choose between information and physical products on another network if you prefer this.
Moreover, this network’s affiliate registration process is more difficult than other networks’. In order to get attention from advertisers, your website must be popular. There is more information to gather and it takes longer. After joining successfully, each affiliate offer must be applied for separately.
Amazon Associates
Since Amazon Associates is one of the biggest affiliate programs in the world, it is a great place to start. With millions of products available, you’re sure to find a product that appeals to your niche. As long as you’re a member of their affiliate program, you can promote anything.
Amazon has a tiered commission structure ranging from 1% to 10% per sale. The structure is based on product categories, with Luxury Beauty, Luxury Stores Beauty, and Amazon Coins paying out the highest commissions.
There is a physical product for almost every need on Amazon. Even though some don’t offer the highest commissions, you can build a website around selling them.
There’s no warning when Amazon exercises its discretion. The platform can ban you without stating a reason. In spite of their high performance and good reputations, high-performing affiliates often struggle to survive.
Choosing Amazon means that you will have the flexibility of being able to sell a wide variety of physical products. Promotions for digital and physical products are endless.
Market Health
The health/beauty niche is the focus of Market Health, an affiliate marketing company with years of experience.
There is still a large number of products to sell, despite its narrow niche. The company managing the network also manufactures some of these health products.
Market health offers a physical product-focused network focused on health foods. Vitamins and supplements are among the products shipped directly to consumers, as are powders and creams.
Small affiliate networks have a tendency to maintain closer relationships with their partners. The rates here are higher than those on some other networks because publishers with strong websites can negotiate higher rates.
If personalized attention is what’s most important to you, choose this JVZoo alternative. Affiliate networks that sell their own products are few and far between and this is one of them.
PeerFly
PeerFly is an affiliate network focused on CPA offers, with a strong user platform and well-curated offers. The products you can promote include those in many different niches including health, fashion, and eCommerce. B2B offers are also available.
On the network, commission structures and affiliate offers are as diverse as the offers. With some advertisers, you can work out revenue share deals or CPS offers.
PeerFly has fewer affiliate offers than Google AdSense, but it has plenty of offers other than those that are digital.
PeerFly’s platform has been praised by many users in reviews. With its easy navigation and rich features, it was developed in-house by PeerFly.
Choose PeerFly if you want to start promoting CPA offers (but also have the flexibility to experiment with others on the same platform), and you want to mainly generate leads. With PeerFly, these kinds of affiliate offers will be easier to find.
Advertisers, publishers, and offers chosen by this network must be serious about its rules. Affiliates starting here may find it challenging, but if your experience is decent, you will encounter fewer low-quality offers.
eBay Partner Network
A vast affiliate network similar to Amazon’s, but eBay’s affiliate program operates differently.
Unlike Amazon, eBay rewards you based on the amount of traffic you drive. It could either be a better bargain or a worse bargain, depending on the product.
In light of eBay’s emphasis on CPCs, the traffic requirements for affiliates are higher than those for most programs. The rest isn’t too hard as long as your website has traffic.
When buyers follow your link but don’t trust the website however they end up on, they might stop short of converting. There are millions of accounts on eBay, a well-known website.
CPC commissions can be earned by selling physical goods through the eBay partner network. You could promote plenty of products and some of them come with high commission rates for affiliates.
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Is JVZoo A Scam?
JVZoo is NOT a scam.
JVZoo affiliate programs are sometimes of poor quality. Overhyped junk products are easy to come by. But that’s only half the story.
It’s a megastore filled with lots of good programs too. JVZoo is like a mega supermarket with everything under one roof.
You must always do good research to achieve success. If you choose to promote the products, ensure that they are authentic. Visit sites like MunchEye and JVNotifyPro for product reviews and read other affiliates’ reviews.
Check out the refund rates of products as well. If you really want to find out what a product is like, you should buy it.
To ensure you understand JVZoo’s affiliate program before joining, make sure you carefully review it. Overall, JVZoo looks like an offer you shouldn’t overlook.
Final Verdict: JVZoo Review
As we can see, JVZoo is not a scam. For affiliate marketers, it can be an important tool in earning money.
You may not be able to earn your main income from JVZoo, but it can contribute significantly to your affiliate marketing income.
However, if you want to take your affiliate marketing to the next level, you must learn how to drive organic traffic to your affiliate site.
The more you know about keyword rankings, SEO metrics, and backlinks, the better you will be able to compete.
All these valuable insights can be learned for free from my #1 recommended platform.
How To Make A Full-time Passive Income on Affiliate Marketing?
To make a full-time passive income from affiliate marketing, you need to master advanced SEO techniques so that you can quickly scale your affiliate business.
My #1 recommended platform to learn advanced SEO is called Wealthy Affiliate.
Wealthy Affiliate is an all-in-one platform for building your affiliate marketing business from scratch.
When you join Wealthy Affiliate, you can get access to the first-class web hosting service, keyword research tools, community support, comprehensive training, writing tools, and other software to help you build an online business step-by-step.
You can register a free account with Wealthy Affiliate, which enables you to get started with affiliate marketing right away without paying a penny.
If you like the platform, you can then upgrade to the premium membership to get access to everything on the platform. There are no upsells afterwards.
But How Much Can You Earn with Wealthy Affiliate?
A 21-year old student from Wealthy Affiliate was able to earn $7,395 in just 1 week, which means he made more than $1k a day…all while applying what is taught inside Wealthy Affiliate.
Wealthy Affiliate has a long history. It has been established for 15 years and there are many success stories in the past decade.
Actually, Wealthy Affiliate has more than a million members so far, so you can see how popular this platform is.
To give you more examples, here are some of the other inspiring success stories of Wealthy Affiliate members.
If you don’t trust my words, you can go to Trustpilot to see what the members have to say:
At the time of writing, Wealthy Affiliate is rated 4.8 out of 5, which is excellent. It’s incredible to get such a high rating with more than 400 reviews.
If there are only two or three good reviews, you may say they are fake reviews. But you cannot fake it when there are more than 400 reviews there. Remember, Trustpilot has a very intelligent system to detect fake reviews.
Where to Join Wealthy Affiliate?
Wealthy Affiliate has a very simple pricing scheme. It has a free and premium membership. The premium membership only costs $49/month or $395/year.
If you want to feel about Wealthy Affiliate, you can sign up for the free starter membership here (no credit card required). You can select to be a free member with no time limit.
And as a starter member, you can get instant access to the community, live chat, over 500 training modules, 2 classrooms, networking, commenting, 1 free website, access to the keyword tool.
You can enjoy all these values without paying a penny.
So I strongly recommend you to register a free account and see it yourself.
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