Every season brings a new crop of think pieces asking whether affiliate marketing is dying or not. There are almost as many of these kinds of posts as there are instructional videos explaining to you how to get started with affiliate marketing!

There are many different opinions about why affiliate marketing may be dying. Some blame chatbots, while others credit the rise of influencer marketing, noting how this is bringing fundamental changes to the entire model.

Perhaps the biggest challenge to the main model of affiliate marketing is Google's recent announcement that it will be cracking down on third-party cookies. Third-party cookies in browsers are key for affiliate marketing as they track transactions so that publishers get the credit for referring a sale that occurs within a particular time frame.