This was a project that I started in April 2022 with Rishabh Garg, my tech cofounder. I am talking about “Affiliate Corner”. We sold it for a 5-figure exit in July 2024.
With Affiliate Corner, you can browse, filter affiliate programs, and get a lot of insights on hundreds of affiliate niches like SEO, competition, audience & more. So it was a complete research solution for affiliate marketers.
Initially, we started with a pre-sell offer while building the product.
Watch my full video here:
And we got off to a superb start. We raked $6000 in 2-3 days with our pre-sell offer.
We knew there, that our product has a lot of potential and we will keep growing this until we can.
That was our pre-validation moment. I recommend doing this for any of your big products.
- Create a pre-sell offer
- Sell it for a lifetime deal or a discounted monthly pricing locked in
- Watch out for the customers
- Limit the quantity of orders (Maybe 50-60)
- Release the product to them
- Take good feedback and re-iterate again
This is a highly effective blueprint that you can follow.
We did that.
Revenue + Exit
In 2 years of Affiliate Corner, from April 2022 to July 2024, we generated over $90,000. Got customers from almost 100+ countries.
We sold it for a 5-figure exit. That constitutes a 2x valuation of the yearly revenue we got.
Since it was a lifetime deal product (One-time price and not a subscription product), the valuation multiple was 2x and we were okay with that since we know that subscription products hold a better valuation.
Marketing & Scaling Affiliate Corner
Rishabh handled all the tech and I handled all the marketing stuff for Affiliate Corner.
We did every marketing strategy that we could to make sales.
Initial Phase
- Initially, we started off on Twitter (X). I have a good following, so we started really well. We used to get some consistent sales from Twitter (X).
- For pre-orders or pre-sell, we launched the offer in 2 niche Facebook groups related to lifetime deals. That is where we got the majority of our sales in our pre-sell period.
- Then, I had an email list that I already had, with a marketing-related audience. They were interested too.
Second Phase
- Product Hunt Launch:
- Ofcourse, we did what every founder does. Launched on Product Hunt. I don’t recommend this strategy for long term, but yes, getting some eyeballs is good to have. So we did launch on PH.
- The Micro-Influencer Strategy:
- We onboarded micro-influencers on a commission basis on YouTube. They did a phenomenal job. We told them to promote our product for a nice hefty commission. They agreed. Those YouTube videos got us consistent sales over a long period.
- The Sub-Reddit Strategy:
- I analyzed Reddit and found some niche sub-reddits, where I thought if I could promote here, it would be awesome. So I contacted the Sub-Reddit owners, and they agreed to have a listing of our product in the Sub-Reddit info menu. Many people go through the resources/info menu of the Sub-Reddit to know more about it.
- There we listed our product for a fixed price for a fixed amount of time. Got good sales from there.
- I analyzed Reddit and found some niche sub-reddits, where I thought if I could promote here, it would be awesome. So I contacted the Sub-Reddit owners, and they agreed to have a listing of our product in the Sub-Reddit info menu. Many people go through the resources/info menu of the Sub-Reddit to know more about it.
- Paid Advertising:
- We ran Facebook Ads (Meta Ads) and were able to get 3x ROAS for it. We ran that for almost 2 months but later realized that scaling FB Ads is not for the faint-hearted. It’s a complex strategy that involves a good amount of funds, patience, and skill.
- We thought that we should not do something that we are not an expert in. But for whatever period we did run, it was quite profitable given that we got ~3x ROAS (Return on Ad Spend)
- We ran Facebook Ads (Meta Ads) and were able to get 3x ROAS for it. We ran that for almost 2 months but later realized that scaling FB Ads is not for the faint-hearted. It’s a complex strategy that involves a good amount of funds, patience, and skill.
Last Phase
- LTD Marketplaces
- In our final phase of marketing and sales, we launched our product in various LTD marketplaces like Appsumo, Deal Fuel, Deal Mirror, and more.
- We got a nice amount of sales from there and it was constant. Not sustainable enough but constant.
Learnings & Final Thoughts
This was my first major online product that generated almost close to a 6-figure revenue. Learnt a lot of marketing hacks, selling online, and especially launch strategies.
The biggest learning in this journey was: If you build something really useful and can market it to the right person, there is no way you cannot make money.
You can make money. Just build a useful solution.
The reason I sold Affiliate Corner was 2 things: First, we needed some upfront cash to have some peace of mind and Second, I wanted to build more products and focus on them.
With this, I was able to free up my time to focus on other things and simultaneously get some good cash in my hands.
As an entrepreneur, I follow a simple rule for money: Cash now is always better than cash later.
Ofcourse, it depends person to person and the situation you are in. But I try to align with this principle, as you can do a lot of things once you have some cash in your hands.
What’s next?
I currently run 2 products and I am building some more products with AI coding platforms like Lovable.Dev
- LTD Ideas (Get product ideas that you can sell for lifetime deals)
- RaaP Course (Learn to Build Directory Products with No-code & AI)
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