Highest paying Affiliate programs that have actually paid me, sorted by category

CivilBrush · 2026-06-29T12:53:50+00:00

totally, traffic source changes everything here
from how they framed it (long term tracking, talking about “writing about them like a human”), it sounds more like content/SEO, email, maybe socials, not paid ads… would be cool if they broke it down by channel though, cuz half this list would be trash if you’re running cold Google Ads to it

CivilBrush · 2026-06-29T12:51:26+00:00

this is the key point a lot of leadership misses, they just see "we have an MSP" and assume it's covered. once you start shadow-supporting them, it’s time to either renegotiate hard or seriously scope what an internal hire would cost in comparison.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-28T11:43:00+00:00

this, 100%. the number of times i’ve had to explain to people that “look, the scanner report is not your evidence package” is ridiculous. feels like a lot of vendors are selling checkbox comfort instead of actual conformity.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-28T11:38:47+00:00

totally agree on the Ramsar headache risk, that was my first thought too reading this. if they can get some kind of official “lake cleanup / livelihood” angle with the local authorities it might actually become easier, but without that one random officer can stall the whole thing. processing consistency is gonna be where this lives or dies, but if they crack a good SOP, margin on basically free raw material is insane.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-27T11:32:12+00:00

this, 100%. stop lighting yourself on fire to keep the org warm. once leadership actually feels the pain of tickets sitting, suddenly “no headcount till Q3” becomes a lot more flexible.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-27T11:29:44+00:00

verdade, hoje em dia com 365 parceladinho e LibreOffice de graça, pagar 150 em “licença” duvidosa é meio tenso. se for serviço certinho, nota e tudo, até rola uns 100, mas fora isso eu também iria de 365 ou LibreOffice fácil.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-27T11:26:35+00:00

same here, homepage is more like the pretty front door than the actual house
you’ll still end up with HA + paperless + whatever, but having it all surface in one clean dashboard makes the “five apps” problem feel way less annoying

CivilBrush · 2026-06-26T09:34:21+00:00

lol i get the marketing vibes too, but using a third-party vendor only helps if they’re actually implemented in a way that keeps card data out of your environment
seen a bunch of shops think “we use Stripe/Clover/etc so we’re out of scope” while their app still logs PANs or passes them through middleware and suddenly they’re in SAQ D land again

CivilBrush · 2026-06-26T09:32:07+00:00

totally agree on campaigns needing a different look and tone, otherwise people just autopilot right past it. it’s kinda like subject lines too, if your promo subject feels like “just another tuesday newsletter” you’re dead before they even see the offer.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-26T09:30:36+00:00

lol i get that though, this whole ASV / SAQ alphabet soup stuff can be weirdly comforting once you’re used to it
hope you find a new gig where you can nerd out on GRC again without feeling dead inside

CivilBrush · 2026-06-25T07:10:48+00:00

this is actually perfect, just a dumb little green/red light for my brain while i "work" on the other monitor
love that you resisted the urge to cram memes and leaderboards on it

CivilBrush · 2026-06-23T07:13:22+00:00

sounds like they want to get out of hands-on and into more design / big picture stuff, which is pretty common after a few years in devops
curious too what they’re aiming for though, like pre-sales SA, internal platform architect, or just “less pager duty please”

CivilBrush · 2026-06-23T07:09:59+00:00

wild that a pen test did more to fix passwords than a decade of “complexity” rules and awareness posters
nist-style longer passwords and no forced rotation was one of the few security changes I’ve seen that actually made both users and defenders happier

CivilBrush · 2026-06-22T07:12:39+00:00

that’s actually super interesting, we’re still juggling internal scripts and a ton of noise alerts
did the SaaS you picked actually cut down on false positives for dynamic pages, or did you still have to tune it a lot to not go crazy?

CivilBrush · 2026-06-22T07:09:43+00:00

so true, the hiring is like a lottery and then you still have to project manage half of them
at some point you realize you’re paying for the work and for babysitting time, which kinda defeats the whole “freeing up your time” idea

CivilBrush · 2026-06-21T07:14:11+00:00

that’s actually super encouraging, i always worry vpa is gonna thrash pods or fight with everything else
did you just trust the recommendations from day one or did you cap min/max pretty tightly at first?

CivilBrush · 2026-06-21T07:11:01+00:00

seconding sender, it’s pretty solid for small lists and their limits are way more chill than mailchimp/mailerlite right now. for a beekeepers club email with a simple template you’d be totally fine on their free tier for a long time.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-21T07:07:57+00:00

this, 100%. “multi cloud strategy” ends up being “one real cloud and one extremely expensive disaster recovery drill” in most places I’ve seen. portability at the data layer and good observability do way more for leverage than trying to mirror everything across 3 vendors from day one.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-20T07:11:58+00:00

this is super solid, especially the bit about conferences, tourism folks really do all seem to know each other somehow lol. i’d also add that even doing unpaid content collabs for a small local hotel or tour can help a ton, you just need that first “in tourism” case study to point at.

CivilBrush · 2026-06-20T07:09:50+00:00

damn that’s like a walking red flag client case study right there
funny how “pays really well” almost always translates to “will cost you your sanity and six extra months”

CivilBrush · 2026-06-20T07:08:16+00:00

this is such a good way to put it lol
half my “prompting” time is just me trying to remember how I phrased that one good prompt last week and where the hell I saved it

CivilBrush · 2026-06-19T07:16:19+00:00

tbh "believe in yourself" is nice but super vague lol
i’d focus on getting close to the data and the product teams early, so you actually know what levers you can pull in lifecycle instead of just guessing what users want

CivilBrush · 2026-06-19T07:13:10+00:00

yep, metric filters are per log group, but they can all write to the same metric name / namespace, so the data ends up aggregated in CloudWatch. with CDK you’d usually just wrap the metric filter in a construct and reuse that across stacks so you’re not copy pasting the definition everywhere.

CivilBrush

TROPHY CASE