Apsense is an online business network designed to help business owners grow their business. The site was started about 10 years ago and has four membership levels – basic (free), pro (paid), premium (paid) and deluxe (paid).
Each membership level allows you to earn monthly residual income from their affiliate system, the percentage increasing incrementally with each level.
I first joined Apsense years ago as a basic member when they had just launched. I had a couple reasons for joining Apsense:
- I wanted to ”network” (so that I could promote my other programs)
- I wanted to earn money from referring Apsense
This was back when I had no idea what I was doing. Around the same time I had just joined an internet marketing training website but wasn’t really making any money yet so I didn’t have anything to lose.
I didn’t have much success then so I concentrated on the training website which was starting to open my eyes about how to actually make money promoting affiliate programs.
I recently got reminded about Apsense and logged into my account to check it out again.
What Apsense Offers
Apsense offers several ways for business owners to promote their business using the Apsense network including the popular RevPages, a credit system you can use to send emails to other Apsense members, CPM ads, articles and groups which most people use to spam their program.
The social network aspect includes setting up your profile and following other members, discussions and groups.
Free members can use many of these features with little restriction but pro members have additional benefits. I haven’t really seen the value in upgrading to pro so I never did.
Pros & Cons of Apsense Business Network
I personally don’t see much value in using the Apsense Business Network so I seldom log in to check my account. There are a couple of pros that are heavily outweighed by the cons.
Pros:
- RevPages and articles can be SEO optimized giving you search engine exposure and traffic.
- You can get free credits to use the credits system for CPM ads and other free advertising.
- You can get content ideas for building your sites (through Apsense questions).
Cons:
- Most people on Apsense are just trying to promote themselves so the networking aspect isn’t particularly great. Try it if you love reading spam.
- Advertising inside the network is a waste of time because there are lots of people who aren’t interested in much other than Paid to Click programs, matrix programs and penny earning referrals.
- There isn’t really a focus once you’re logged in. There is way too much you can choose to do which is distracting.
If you’re serious about online business and would like to network with other business owners, I wouldn’t really recommend you take Apsense too seriously. It’s possible to build meaningful relationships within but that would take a lot of time and effort which would be better spent on building content for your website.
Online Business Networks like Apsense?
So are there any other online business networks like Apsense?
You bet.
The other site I told you about that I joined around the same time as Apsense is Wealthy Affiliate – you can read my review of them here. Wealthy Affiliate is billed as an online business network and is filled with folks who are serious about online business.
With Wealthy Affiliate you can also sign up for free. You can them set up your profile (see mine here), follow other members and interact with them. Your own blog can be used to help others inside Wealthy Affiliate but not to spam your programs. This ensures that the quality of the site remains high and is used for its intended purpose – learning, building your business and networking with others.
I guess the difference between the Apsense and Wealthy Affiliate’s business networks is that one is a free for all networking site with advertising as its focus and other other while free, focuses on education and business building.
In addition Wealthy Affiliate has a lot more to offer in terms of business tools and training. You’re more likely to achieve success with Wealthy Affiliate than with Apsense.
I won’t recommend Apsense for anyone looking to connect and interact with other business owners. There are much better alternatives.
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