Top 20 Wealthy Affiliate Complaints

I have been very fortunate to have the opportunity to mentor members when they join Wealthy Affiliate and they complain about a lot of things.

Here are the Wealthy Affiliate complaints that I hear the most:

1. Not Enough in The FREE Version

This surprises me every time because there is real value in the Starter Membership.

Most importantly, the starter membership gives you the opportunity to see what it is like inside of Wealthy Affiliate without having to give a credit card or any information, besides an email.

So while it may be limited, it is a huge opportunity and one that you will not find anywhere else.

I specifically asked Kyle, one of the owners of Wealthy Affiliate, about the free starter membership in my exclusive interview with him.

You can see the interview by clicking here.

With the free membership you learn how to build a real website using WordPress, which is huge!

You also get access to an enormous amount of training that is a fantastic introduction into affiliate marketing and building an online business.

Yet some people still complain!

Some people will always want something for nothing, and I get that.

But complaining that something free is not enough, that I don't get.

It surprises me that this tops the list of Wealthy Affiliate complaints.

2. Too Many People Promote Wealthy Affiliate

I am sure that you have Googled "Wealthy Affiliate Review", and when you did, you came across numerous reviews that just blindly recommend Wealthy Affiliate.

I personally like Wealthy Affiliate. I think it is very valuable for someone that wants to learn how to make money online, but they do tend to push members to promote WA through Wealthy Affiliate Bootcamp.

This leads to thousands of positive reviews for Wealthy Affiliate.

With most of them written by people that probably should not be writing reviews yet.

But because Wealthy Affiliate actually works, a lot of those reviews actually get pretty good rankings.

This makes it difficult for someone like you to find a true, unbiased review of Wealthy Affiliate.

This is definitely one of my biggest Wealthy Affiliate complaints.

3. There is No Phone Number

This is one of the Wealthy Affiliate complaints that I hear a lot from my referrals.

They have a question and they want a phone number that they can call to get answers.

I get it.

But there are so many other, better ways to get answers inside Wealthy Affiliate.

• If you joined Wealthy Affiliate through my link, you can reach out to me for answers!
• There is Live Chat, in which you will get answers almost instantly.
• Type your question in the Search Bar and answers will pop up. Chances are, someone else has had the same question.

• If it is a question about your website or Wealthy Affiliate hosting, you can reach out to site support. They are awesome! I have had great experiences with site support.

I guess a phone number would be helpful for billing questions, but again it is not necessary.

4. Too Much Like a Social Network

This another one that I hear very often and I have to admit, it is one of my Wealthy Affiliate complaints.

The community inside Wealthy Affiliate is very much like Facebook.

It kind of has an interface like the news feed, with lots of posts from members.

There is a lot going on and it easy to get distracted.

How many times have you been on facebook and the next thing you know, an hour has passed and you have gotten nothing done.

Yea...

Me too!

It does take some discipline to make yourself focus and get work done.

This can be accomplished by setting goals and having an awareness of what you are accomplishing.

One of the good things about the Wealthy Affiliate training is that it takes you out of the community and to a page that is just the training.

This makes it easier to concentrate and focus on the task at hand.

This is true of both the written trainings and the video trainings.

5. They Send Too Many Emails

Look, if you are going to build an online business, then you are going to be getting way more emails than you are used to.

I get it.

Too many emails are a huge time suck, but it is one of the tools of the trade.

That being said, you can cut down on the number of emails that you receive from Wealthy Affiliate.

Simply go to your settings and click on Email Notification Settings.

Then check or uncheck which email notifications you would like to receive from Wealthy Affiliate. 

The last thing that I will say about too many emails is this:

Take the time to through your emails and unsubscribe from those that do not offer you some kind of value.

Every marketer is looking for space in your inbox and a lot of them don't deserve it.

You may even find that some of those emails that you thought were from Wealthy Affiliate, in fact, weren't from them at all.

6. Refund Policy

Ok, this is probably one of the legitimate Wealthy Affiliate complaints.

When you sign up for the Premium Membership, You pay either monthly or yearly.

How much you pay depends on which Wealthy Affiliate discount you take advantage of.

If you decide to leave Wealthy Affiliate, there is no refund. 

Basically, once you pay, you are a member for as long as you paid for.

I get that most businesses will give you a refund, but most businesses also don't give you a free option to join and see what is inside.

My advice to you:

Join as a free starter member.

If you like it, join as a premium member for a month at $49.

Now you have access to everything that there is inside of Wealthy Affiliate.

Once you have had a chance to assess everything, then decide if you want to pay yearly.

That way, you never are really risking anything.

And you can start for free.

As you can see, with a little planning you can virtually eliminate the risk that this complaint will affect you.

7. Not Enough Training on Choosing a Niche

This another one of the Wealthy Affiliate complaints that I agree with.

One of the things that my students find difficult is choosing a niche.

There is a good amount of training on the subject at Wealthy Affiliate, but many still struggle with this.

This is one of the reasons that so many Wealthy Affiliate members go with the Make Money Online niche.

MMO is an incredibly competitive niche and is probably not the right niche for most beginners.

While there are literally thousands of niches to choose from, you have to find one:

• That you are passionate about.
• That you have a lot of knowledge about.
• That you have a passion for learning about.
• That you can monetize.
• That you can create a ton of content around.
• That is not too competitive.

For beginners, that is a lot to swallow, and I don't think that Wealthy Affiliate has addressed it thoroughly enough.

But there is good news.

I saw this problem and decided that I would create my own training around How to Choose a Niche.

I created an acclaimed ebook on the subject and I am willing to share it with you at absolutely no cost!

Simply send me an email asking for the Niche Authority, and I will send it to you at no charge.

You can email me at john@jvanderlaandotcom.

Yes, I wrote that out.

If I posted my email online, I would be subjected to spam from bots that pick up emails online.

See that!

You just learned something!

There is so much more to learn.

Just join me at Wealthy Affiliate for FREE!

So while not enough training on choosing a niche is a legit Wealthy Affiliate complaint, I feel like I have solved the issue by offering you the training that is needed.

8. Hard to Find Success Stories

This is one of the Wealthy Affiliate complaints that I really don't understand.

I have actually documented 17 Wealthy Affiliate Success Stories That Will Blow Your Mind!

And those are just a fraction of the success stories.

There are thousands!

Also, I think success means different things to different people.

• Some members are at Wealthy Affiliate to build successful online businesses.
• Some are there to learn how to build a website.
• Some are there for the hosting.
• Some are there to learn WordPress.
• Some are there to make a side income.

There are success stories in all of those categories and more.

I came to Wealthy Affiliate with an affiliate marketing business already making money.

Wealthy Affiliate has allowed me to dramatically increase my earnings all while doing something I love!

I think that if you are complaining about not finding enough success stories, you are not looking hard enough.

9. Wealthy Affiliate Costs Too Much

I have had my referrals complain about the cost of Wealthy Affiliate many times while comparing the FREE Starter Membership with the Premium Membership.

When you are just starting out, it is tough to justify spending that kind of money on something that you are unsure of.

That is why you are here, doing your due diligence and learning all that you can about Wealthy Affiliate.

I think that one of the biggest obstacles to get over concerning the cost of Wealthy Affiliate is realizing exactly how much is included in the premium membership.

Let's take a look at what is included:

• State of the Art Hosting - This is really overlooked. I have paid more than the cost of Wealthy Affiliate for hosting like this. Wealthy Affiliate does limit the number of websites that you can host to 10 now, so I have some websites hosted at WPX hosting which cost me the same as a Wealthy Affiliate membership. The hosting alone is worth the cost.
• Website Security
• Free SSL
• Lightning Fast
• Website Backups
• Private Messaging - Even with the owners!
• Keyword Research Tool
• Online Entrepreneur Training
• Wealthy Affiliate Bootcamp Training
• Live Trainings
• Live Video Classes
• 24/7/365 Website Support
• 1 on 1 coaching
• Website Feedback
• Website Comments

The list goes on and on...

Here's the way I look at it.

If you take advantage of the Wealthy Affiliate Discounts that are available, You will spend less than the cost of a cup of coffee per day.

That's right less than a cup of coffee a day.

That's $63 per month!

For less than half that, you can be investing in a real online business.

10. Wealthy Affiliate Pushes Beginners into the Make Money Online Niche

I can see the rationale behind this Wealthy Affiliate complaint.

I don't really see it as WA pushing beginners into the MMO niche, I see more as the fact that beginners have a hard time choosing a niche and Wealthy Affiliate makes it very easy to go through Wealthy Affiliate Bootcamp.

Wealthy Affiliate Bootcamp is specialized training that teaches you to build a website in the Make Money Online Niche.

You can promote Wealthy Affiliate or you can use the skills to promote any program in the MMO niche.

The problem is:

The make money online niche is probably one of the most competitive niches available today and is really no place for beginners.

The result is:

You have a lot of Wealthy Affiliate members that do not become successful because of the niche that they chose.

This results in a slew of Wealthy Affiliate complaints.

The solution is to take your time and choose your niche wisely.

Join through my link and I will help you choose a niche that is right for you.

11. Wealthy Affiliate Doesn't Have Competition

This is one of the Wealthy Affiliate complaints that I hear from other business owners.

Business people know that it is competition that keeps you on your toes.

It makes you continually innovate and improve so that you stay ahead of the competition.

I am always amazed to see the new innovation and improvements that Wealthy Affiliate rolls out every year.

Last Year it was:

• Millions of free images that you could use on your website.
• A brand new user friendly platform.
• A new blog editor inside WA.
• Free SSL.
• SiteSpeed upgrade.
• SiteComments platform.

This year:

• This year Wealthy Affiliate is on a mission to create the best managed WordPress Hosting in the industry and they are doing it all at the same price!

That is just a sampling of the recent innovations that have been going on at Wealthy Affiliate.

The truth is:

They do have competition, but there are very few competitors that include an all in one system of creating an online business.

The only other one that I know of is Solo Build It.

That is where I started back in 2007.

Some of my readers like Solo Build It and some of them don't.

Having been a long term member at both, I prefer Wealthy Affiliate.

I think Wealthy Affiliate provides more value and I prefer the learning methods and user interface.

12. Some Plugins Are Not Allowed

Yes, it is true.

Some WordPress Plugins are banned at Wealthy Affiliate, but it is for good reasons.

The biggest reason that some plugins are not allowed is that they are resource heavy and can bog down the servers.

This is not just a Wealthy Affiliate Complaint.

There are many other hosting providers that ban some plugins for the same reasons.

The biggest plugin that is banned is Jetpack, and with good reason.

This plugin does a lot of things, but it also overwhelms server resources and causes very frustrating issues.

I used to use Jetpack on some of my websites and if I ever had a problem with the website, the first thing I would do is deactivate Jetpack.

Guess what?

That solved the issue most of the time.

As a matter of fact, a number of years ago, I had an issue with this website where the images were not displaying.

Of course it was hosted at Bluehost and I thought that they were the issue.

I contacted support and after hours, they still couldn't figure it out.

I got so frustrated with Bluehost, that I hung up on support and contacted a friend of mine that was a techie.

He told me to go through my plugins one by one and deactivate them and then check the site.

Sure enough, I deactivated Jetpack and my images appeared!

I had allowed Jetpack to optimize my images and when it did, it changed the URL.

This made it look like the images didn't exist to my website!

Anyway, the point is that it is a good thing that Wealthy Affiliate bans some plugins.

They know from experience which ones cause issues and they are helping you to avoid the frustration of trying to figure out issues with your website.

13. Not Enough Email Marketing Training

This is one of my biggest Wealthy Affiliate complaints.

One of the biggest sources of income for an online business is email marketing and I feel that Wealthy Affiliate could have done a better job with more training and direction for their members.

The truth is that email marketing training could easily fill all of your time.

It is that complex.

I cover it extensively in my book - 7 Steps to Your First $1000 Online.

You can get the book for free by just providing your email.

There should be a form somewhere on this page.

I also provide it as a bonus inside of Wealthy Affiliate if you join through my link and become a premium member.

There are also other really good email marketing training programs that you can access for free.

One of the best that I have found is at GetResponse.

I use GetResponse for email marketing and they offer their course which is called 10,000 Subscribers in 90 Days with a FREE membership.

You should check it out.

Go here to open a free account and gain access to the course.

GetResponse FREE Account.

So, while one of my biggest Wealthy Affiliate complaints is that there is not enough email marketing training, I can provide you with some awesome free trainings to make up for it!

14. A Free Domain is Not Included

Some website hosting companies will offer new customers a free domain if they sign up for hosting.

Wealthy Affiliate does not do this.

You will have to buy your own domain name for your website when you are a premium member.

Domain names cost $13.99 per year, which is quite a deal!

That includes privacy for your domain which most hosting companies charge more for.

Just to give you an example:

I recently renewed 2 domains that I had bought through GoDaddy.

They charged me almost $60!

That is nearly 3 times what I would have paid at Wealthy Affiliate!

Needless to say, I will be transferring those domains over to Wealthy Affiliate.

So, Wealthy Affiliate does not provide you with a free domain. but they do provide so much other value that I don't really think this is a legit complaint.

15. The Free Website is on a SubDomain

Out of all of the Wealthy Affiliate complaints about the Starter Membership, this is probably the biggest one.

When you join Wealthy Affiliate with the FREE Starter Membership, you get to build a WordPress website using the training provided.

The website that you are learning on is on a subdomain.

Let me explain.

There are top level domains, .com, .org, .net etcetera.

That would be a domain that you would buy and it would look like this - mywebsite.com.

The free website is on a subdomain.

And would look like this - mywebsite.siterubix.com.

Very similar to free Blogger websites. They are on the subdomain - mywebsite.blogspot.com.

It is a great way to give you control of your own free website while you are learning.

If you go Premium, it is a very simple process to migrate your website from the subdomain to a domain of your own.

So, while I understand the complaint, I think it is a great way to introduce beginners to building a website.

16. Don't Like the Wealthy Affiliate Ranking System

Inside of Wealthy Affiliate, every member has a rank.

That rank is determined by how active you are in the community.

The top ranked members are called Ambassadors.

You move up the ranks by:

• Engaging on Chat.
• Commenting on posts.
• Answering questions.
• Publishing blogs.
• Creating trainings
• And more.

The Wealthy Affiliate complaints arise out of members being active simply to increase their rank.

In other words, members will leave short, unhelpful comments just to increase there activity, while providing very little value.

It isn't a rampant problem, but it does exist and I can understand some people's frustration with it.

This happens mostly with new members and lower ranked members that really don't understand the platform yet.

The members that are ranked at the top and are Ambassadors are awesome!

17. Wealthy Affiliate Does Not Have cPanel Access

This is one of my Wealthy Affiliate complaints, but it is not one that you will hear from beginners.

cPanel is an interface used to access the server used for making changes directly in the files that are on the server.

Beginners should not be using cPanel, but for more experienced members, there are things that I can only do in cPanel.

As usual, Wealthy Affiliate has a workaround.

I can contact Wealthy Affiliate Site Support anytime 24/7 and they will access cPanel for me and do whatever it is that I am trying to do.

I think that restricting cPanel access is a good idea that will lead to a lot less headaches and less Site Support requests to fix things that members have messed up.

I am hoping that cPanel access may be available in the future for experienced members, but we will see.

18. It is Sometimes Difficult to Get the Right Answer

This kind of relates to the Wealthy Affiliate complaint about the ranking system.

There are sometimes over zealous beginners that give advice and answer questions that are not the right answers.

There are plenty of places to get the right answers in Wealthy Affiliate.

Sometimes you just need to dig a little deeper.

My best advice for getting the right answers is to consider the source.

Go to the persons profile that you are listening to.

Have they been at Wealthy Affiliate long?

Have they been successful?

Reach out to your mentor.

If you are a premium member, you can Private Message anyone.

Even the owners!

And they will respond!

So, it may be difficult to get the right answer instantly, but if you try hard enough, you can always find the right answer fairly quickly.

19. You Can't Go Back to Free Once You Go Premium

There are some members that upgrade to the premium membership and then life gets in the way.

They find that they don't have the time to use their membership, but they don't want to give it up either.

These member's complaint is that they should be able to downgrade their membership from premium to starter.

Unfortunately, that's not how it works.

Once you are a premium member, you are either in or you're out.

If you decide to cancel, you would have to re-join at a later date and start over.

I get the argument, but as a business owner, I have to agree with Wealthy Affiliate's policy.

So this one of the Wealthy Affiliate complaints that I do not agree with.

The best option is to join as a free member and don't upgrade to premium until you are ready, both financially and time wise.

20. The Included Keyword Tool Isn't The Best

This is one of the Wealthy Affiliate complaints that I agree with.

The keyword research tool that is included with your membership is called Jaaxy.

As you can see in the image, you enter your keyword and Jaaxy recommends other related keywords.

It also gives you:

• The average number of searches per month.
• The amount of traffic that you can expect with front page rankings on Google.
• QSR is the rating for how easy it is to rank. Jaaxy uses a green, yellow, red ranking system.
• SEO is similar to QSR. It is score that rates the SEO of the pages already ranked for that keyword on a scale of 1 - 100.
• Under the Domains tab you can find available domains related to the keyword.

I have found Jaaxy to be ok for beginners, but beyond that, their are so many better keyword research tools available.

Some of them are very expensive and not practical for someone with only one website.

The keyword research tool that I use most often is called Long Tail Pro.

You can see my Long Tail Pro Review here.

Long Tail Pro is great, but it is going to cost you around $297 per year, after your $1 trial.

My advice is to use Jaaxy until you are making some money and can afford a better keyword research tool.

Final Thoughts About Wealthy Affiliate Complaints

So, there you have the top 20 Wealthy Affiliate complaints that I have come across.

And yet I am still a member and still recommend it to people.

Why?

I'll tell you why:

Wealthy Affiliate is really good at what they do!

They are the leader in the field of providing EVERYTHING that someone needs to build a real, sustainable online business.

It doesn't matter how good you are at something, there are always going to be complaints.

The one thing I can assure you is that no other company that offers as much as Wealthy Affiliate does is going to give you a 100% FREE, NO CREDIT CARD required look inside of their program!

Join me for FREE.

You have nothing to lose and everything to gain.

See you on the inside!