This is the Authority Site System Review that you are looking for! In this post, you’ll read everything you need to find out — Is Authority Hacker A Scam – or something you’d want?

When you are passionate about something you most likely want to give it more than 100%. Whether you are into lead generation, funnel cloning, or making money online you want to make sure you have all the right tools in your arsenal.

Being involved in online business such as affiliate marketing, you definitely are looking to invest in not only great training but in the best tools that will equip you to earn some decent cash for your efforts.

The Authority Site System Review Summary

Product Name: Authority Site System

Founder: Gael Breton and Mark Webster

Price: $997

Rating: 44/100

Best For: Anyone who’s looking into starting an affiliate marketing website

Recommended: Not Recommended

What Is The Authority Site System About: Summary: The Authority Site system is one of two courses offered by Authority Hacker. It is most suitable for those who are interested in starting a content-driven affiliate website. But is it a sustainable program?

What is The Authority Site System About?

Authority Hacker is like the mothership of The Authority Site System (TASS) and Authority Hacker Pro. Their website claims that it was created to make actionable online marketing education available to those who want to learn.

In this review, we’ll be focusing more on The Authority Site System (TASS) —its features, how it works, and is it worth your time and money.

At its core, Authority Site System is primarily for anyone who is looking to start a content-driven affiliate website. Since the system starts from the ground up, they say that it doesn’t matter whether you are new to online marketing or someone who’s been doing this for quite some time now.

Somehow, I find it interesting how The Authority Site System will also appeal to many of those who already have a successful affiliate website. It can be of help especially if you don’t currently have a stable system that you can duplicate to scale up your operation. 

The ultimate goal of the program is to create a website that will end up producing job-replacing income in less than a year. 

One review I came across mentioned that TASS —unlike some other SEO courses, is very open about the financial commitments you will need to make going into affiliate marketing.

Gael and Mark are straightforward about the fact that you might start from around a few hundred dollars —this is if you’re writing all the content yourself. The cost of running your affiliate marketing business could actually go up to several thousands of dollars especially if you plan on outsourcing every aspect of your affiliate marketing business.

As for any business, you need to allocate a good amount of time, you’ll be expected to dedicate at least 1 hour each day within the first year of operating your business. Although putting in more time will definitely get you faster results, this is also in order to give yourself better chances of success.

The Authority Site System Background Info

The Authority Site System (TASS), describes itself as a complete, systematic authority site-building system. The course, which is filled with more than 130 lessons, is designed to help you start and grow what they refer to as a stage 1 authority site. What they are calling as a stage 1 authority site is simply a site that relies exclusively on affiliate revenue and organic traffic.

TASS promises to walk you through the beginning planning stages of a brand new authority site, the specific steps in creating the website and all the relevant components and then teaches you how to start building backlinks to fuel your organic rankings. This is because a stage 1 authority site tends to be the easiest, most efficient way to earn job-replacing income from a website, simply because it allows you to concentrate on one traffic source and one revenue source.

The Authority Site System Founders

Before we delve deeper into this course, let’s know more about The Authority Site System Founders. Who are they and what exactly do they do?

Gael Breton and Mark Webster are founders of Authority Hacker.

Gael functions as the editor-in-chief. As EIC, he creates and organizes content for both the Authority Hacker blog and its training courses. He also heads the market research and strategic planning of the site.

On the other hand, Mark Webster is a systems expert. His role is to develop the tactics through small-scale experimentation and expand them to enterprise level. 

Gael Breton started his marketing career as a college intern. After graduating, he went back to work for the same company. The company decided to put him in charge of the whole office after just 6 weeks there. Mark Webster, on the other hand got his start in online marketing playing around with AdSense campaigns and creating ClickBank products back in 2008. 

How Does The Authority Site System Work?

So how does Authority Site System Work? What does it have to do with your affiliate marketing website? Well, it turns out that the simple task of building a website isn’t that simple at all.

You know what? Scratch that. It can be quite HARD to put up a website. Especially one that you want to stand out and bring in money to you.

Imagine it like a baby that needs your constant attention until it can be a capable human being. Don’t worry —you don’t need to wait for it to turn 18. However, it does require hours of input, a ton of creativity, some technical knowledge and, like any other business, an ample amount of budget. And getting your website to start earning significant money can be something very few people looking to make money online are able to pull off without a step-by-step process to follow.

Well, I actually know of a product that can help you with this. You know, hold your hand and walk you through it all.

Okay, maybe not exactly “hold your hand”, but you know what I mean. And well, let’s focus on this The Authority Site System Review first before I go luring you away with another shiny thing.

So, what The Authority Site System promise to do is to point out to you the exact approach to building a profitable authority site. The course is laid out in quite a logical way and is claimed to be in-depth. They might also throw in some side information here and there that you would likely encounter in the business, such as how niche research doesn’t just talk about the potential profitability of a niche but also the nature of the niche. This includes seasonality, opportunities for monetization, link building opportunities, and the like. You will also have access to their Facebook community group of over 1,700 members. It turns out that the owners are pretty active in their Facebook groups and Forums. This could be convenient especially if you have questions about building your website. You would be able to get answers from other users, especially those who are more experienced, or the instructors currently active.

The Authority Site System Courses

The videos in The Authority Site System also include written lessons, supporting files, and resources such as a Trello checklist. The course is broken up into 6 core modules.

Module #0: Preliminary Lessons

What you can find in this module:

• Consistency & Expectations
• Using the “New Site Todo System”
• Budgeting Your Site

Module #1: The Authority Site Model and IM 101

What you can find in this module:

• What Is an Authority Site
• How Authority Sites Get Traffic
• How Authority Sites Make Money
• Affiliate Marketing 101
• SEO 101

Module #2: Niche Research & Site Planning

What you can find in this module:

• Niches That Work Well
• Brainstorming Niches
• Market Research (10 Lessons)
• Getting Started With Market Research
• Planning Your V1 Site
• Planning Your V1 Site Structure
• Expanding Your Commercial Keyword List
• Expanding Your Info Content Keyword List

Module #3: Site Setup

What you can find in this module:

• Picking a Domain Name
• WordPress & Hosting Setup
• WordPress Basic Settings
• Branding Your Theme
• Analytics & SEO Setup
• G Suite Email Setup
• Picking a WordPress Theme
• Establishing a Basic Branding
• Home Page Building
• Custom Category Pages Setup
• Misc Plugins Setup
• Contact Page Setup
• Privacy Policy Page Setup
• About Page Setup

Module #4: Content Creation

What you can find in this module:

• Introduction to Content Templates
• [Template] Roundup Review
• [Template] Single Review
• [Template] Info Content
• Writing Your First Articles
• Outsourcing Content Creation
• Setting up the Amazon Associates Program
• Uploading and Publishing Content

Module #5: Link Building

What you can find in this module:

• Preparing for Outreach
• Target Selection
• Initial Outreach & Follow Up
• Link Tracking and Blacklist
• Negotiation and Link Placement

Module #6: Once You’re Done

• Tips on what to do next
• Upsell (joke!)

Module 6 doesn’t really have a lesson titled “upsell” but they might as well name it! I’ve read one review saying that the last module may just be a bit more of upsells.

So let’s look into each module shall we?

The first module isn’t module 1 my friends. They actually have some sort of preliminary module. So module 0 is what you might expect to find in every course. This is where Gael talks you through how most people set the wrong expectations when it comes to building authority sites. You will also learn how to access and work through the TASS checklist, as well as how much you’ll need to invest to get your site off the ground. Module 0 is some sort of introduction that walks you through the things you really need to know and understand before diving into the actual, step-by-step course material.

Module 1 is a short but essential module for those with limited knowledge on the affiliate marketing business model. This module moves away from mindset and expectations that you usually find in other courses, and instead hits the nail on the head on the questions surrounding authority sites as a whole. You’ll learn about what authority sites are, how they work, and of course how  they make money. If you think about it, it can even be a good refresher for someone who may have hit a wall in their affiliate marketing business. More importantly tough, Gael goes into the basics of affiliate marketing and SEO (search engine optimization) to enable you to gain a clear understanding of how each aspect of your future site comes together.

Right off the bat, module 2 starts off by introducing you to some broad niches that are already proven, so those who don’t feel confident in their research abilities can play it somewhat safe. To be honest though, this might be a bad idea putting saturation in mind, but then a little bit of security might be what you need. From there, it will be exhibited to you how to brainstorm other niches and dig into the market research. This is where the work really starts taking place. One thing you should know, niche selection can make or break your success in the affiliate marketing business. Choosing the wrong niche could easily cost you not only hundreds —but thousands of potential dollars along the road.

This module includes assessing traffic, monetization methods, seasonality, link building, and a few other factors to make sure that the niche you have in mind is worth pursuing. This is where you’ll see how to plan the site, its structure and its keywords based on the research you’ve already done.

For many people looking to start an online business for the first time module 3 is where they’ll likely find a lot of value in TASS. This module directly discusses a lot of the technical challenges that come along with starting a site that has the potential to make consistent and passive income. Module 3 is where you begin to transition from planning to executing. If you think about it, it is a really big deal to have seasoned site builders help you out with exactly what hosting company to go with, what CMS to use, what theme to install, what plugins to pick and countless other complex decisions.

If you don’t know yet, like if you are new to the business, let me tell you — this part is a headache.

It is in this module where Gael and Mark break down the website creation process into easy to follow steps so you can practically copy the same decisions they made. The majority of Module 3 includes setting up the foundations of a website, creating the branding, and building out your core pages.

Module 4 is where you get to learn that building an affiliate site that relies on organic traffic would need content —good content— and plenty of it— in order to work. This module is said to not beat around the bush into the nitty-gritty of content creation. It starts with various content templates for structure and guidance, as well as writing and publishing the initial articles following a proper format.

If you’re thinking writing and publishing is a walk in the park —you are pretty lost child. You should know that your ability to gain exposure in Google search results and ultimately generate organic traffic is largely dependent on the SEO nuances of this process. So, to finish module 4, you’ll get a full course on hiring writing in order to outsource content creation that allows for scaling up. This is a crucial step for those who have more money than time and want results fast.

In Module 5, Mark shows you how to leverage certain tools and resources to scale email outreach in an easy, efficient, and cost-effective way using an outreach-based approach. This approach includes building a prospecting list, drafting outreach scripts and negotiating placements. So, link building remains a controversial topic in a few SEO circles. Some industry leaders claim that building links isn’t even necessary for success. Good examples of this are Income School and Fat Stacks.

Honestly, I am not an expert on link building as I prefer to focus on building quality content that helps readers and that people will naturally link to.

However it seems that others who are in the affiliate marketing business observe a surge in traffic coming from link building campaigns. It seems that links matter a whole lot. It seems that The Authority Site System doesn’t avoid the hard topic of link building. Instead, they actually formed a link acquisition system that anyone can replicate so all things considered, this module could help you build your links quite quickly and efficiently.

Finally, the last module, Module 6 should be about some do’s and don’ts in affiliate marketing. If you ask me, it is supposed to give you a few directions on what to do next. Let’s be real, we know that we’ll be expecting some upsells in the end, but it’s a direct opposite to ending things with a bang. The lack of value (or content) is a striking contrast to the rest of the modules on the course. It turns out that the course refresh was released almost a year ago. However, this module turns out to still be empty. 

Money-Back Guarantee

Is there a money-back guarantee? 

Yes, turns out, The Authority Site System has a 30-day Money-Back Guarantee.

How Much Does The Authority Site System Cost

With all the things covered in the course you must already be thinking about the price tag right? Well The Authority Site System is priced at $997 —yup, a bit pricey. Also, I don’t see anywhere on the Authority Hacker website that they give any sort of discounts for Authority Site System  when you sign up.  However, rest assured that it is a one-time payment where you can get lifetime updates.

Oh by the way, you can actually get access to TASS for free if you invest in Gael and Mark’s flagship course I mentioned earlier —the Authority Hacker Pro. But you know what, I think I like this better than the other courses and programs out there who offer perpetual “discounts” and uses some “fake scarcity” tactics.

Can You Make Money With The Authority Site System?

You can make money with The Authority Site System when you create a top-notch website and pair it with good content and an efficient marketing strategy. 

However, you must be open to a few business costs such as website hosting and Ahrefs as TASS is actually a training-only program. So anyone using TASS would probably need hosting like SiteGround GrowBig which is $24.99 per month ongoing.  When I wrote this post SiteGround GrowBig was at an initial discount of $9.99 per month but will eventually increase to $24.99 per month after the initial discount period you choose.

If this sounds too expensive for you, I know a program that can offer you free website hosting for up to 10 websites. For newbies, there is also an additional 10 siterubix websites which are like training websites for you.

Is The Authority Site System A Scam?

Just to be fully transparent with you, I am not a student of Authority Site System myself and I do not endorse any of Authority Site System in any way.

I have researched the website, testimonials, and information on the Internet to get to the bottom of what the The Authority Site System genuinely does. This is because I have been burnt from programs just like this in the past and I want to prevent others from making the same mistakes. If you’d like to learn Ways to Avoid Online Scams then click the highlighted text.

The About Authority Site System is not a scam. In fact, it is actually quite a good program.

What I Don’t Like About The Authority Site System

Can be overwhelming for Newbies. TASS has more than 130 recorded videos with texts included, resources, supporting files, tools and an interactive checklist on top of it all. Having loads of content can also have a downside. There’s a ton of content to get through in TASS and it can get quite overwhelming.

Not to mention, you would also have to actually stop after each lesson and implement what you just learned which can actually take a good amount of your time.

Can easily be outdated. Anyone who’s been in the SEO game long enough knows that drastic changes is just one of its uncontrollable characteristics. Online marketing can change drastically in a year or less, from its different tools, tactics, ever changing techniques, and most especially search engine optimization (SEO).

You would need to make HUGE and sometimes costly changes or else leave the game.

Can be a budget-kill. As I mentioned earlier, TASS can get really expensive real quick. From Website hosting that will need $24.99 per month on regular pricing, and Ahrefs which will set you back $99 per month. Ouch!

Too much focus on link building and too little focus on content creation. When you consider that the link building section is 12 lessons and the content creation section is only 8 lessons, there is an imbalance here. From doing research into this, it seems only about 20% of the course is about how to write valuable content to help your readers and get that content ranked in Google.

Google will always reward valuable content that gives the user what they are looking for. Think about the page experience focus of Google moving forward. On the other hand, what is the future of link building?

As Google’s algorithm gets smarter and focuses on delivering relevant results for real people, “link juice” should continue to lose value. Think about 10 years ago versus now? Back then, It used to be all about the number of links. Then it was quality of links. Since link building is so easy to manipulate, do you really think that in 5 or even 10 years, Google’s still going to be rewarding this and relying on that metric?

What I Like About The Authority Site System

Can be quite systematic. The Authority Site System really has a step-by-step system. TASS has what we call a “do this, then that” approach to building a profitable authority site. The dashboard I showed in an earlier section actually shows that. You actually find in the course how they build a case-study site unlike the theory-based courses of certain influencers.

Can give sustainable value. Gael and Mark each bring something unique to TASS. There will be some obvious crossover between the two and it seems to be quite effective throughout The Authority Site System.

Helpful Reviews From Current The Authority Site System Members

“I was interested in TASS to get a specific approach and new set of ideas on how to do things.  It has been really good and I’ve learnt a ton, but it’s also made me realise this…

It’s not made for beginners. 

If I were to take this course when I first started out online, I probably would have thrown in the towel pretty quick. It’s overwhelming thinking about all the things I still need to do and learn to implement everything. 

The beauty of reviewing so many different courses and products is that I’ve been able to see a lot of what is on offer out there. Some courses like this one also piques my interest enough to go through them (and it’s not cheap!) 

But it continually makes me realise this…

Wealthy Affiliate is perfect for beginners to get a profitable online business up and running.“ – Mike Beatty

What is The Best Choice For YOU? Is it Wealthy Affiliate or Authority Site System?

Both Wealthy Affiliate and Authority Site System are legit affiliate marketing businesses which offer training and community support. As a matter of fact, Authority Site System is a notable competitor in the affiliate marketing training market. In my opinion, training is more important now as much as support. A good learning space and well-structured guidance are the most important thing for beginners who want to learn affiliate marketing.

As for support, Wealthy Affiliate brags of an all-in-one and convenient support system for anyone to ask for assistance 24/7.

And speaking of support, Wealthy Affiliate has a very competent support system which includes:

• 24/7 Technical Support (for any problems you face on your website)
• 24/7 Live Chat within the community for you to get immediate help anytime
• Able to Private Message all the members so you can get help directly from more experienced members
• Discussion areas within each training so you won’t get lost at each step
• Able to privately contact the owners of Wealthy Affiliate should you have any inquiries

Wealthy Affiliate’s Premium Membership grants you access to the whole shebang within the platform. WA features include:

• 50 Affiliate Marketing Lessons
• Weekly Live Training on advanced internet marketing topics
• Thousands of Community Training on a wide range of topics
• AND hosting for 10 websites, yes super fast and secure hosting is also included.

Basically, there is a good amount of learning you can take away from the Wealthy Affiliate because there is new training being added every single day. Furthermore, there is weekly live training by WA coaches from Wealthy Affiliate.

But what is really the main factor that made me decide? Which is one of the biggest differences between Wealthy Affiliate and TASS? One big things is the huge amount of extra costs  with Ahrefs and website hosting you’ll be facing with TASS compared to when you build an affiliate marketing business with Wealthy Affiliate.

Another big factor is that Wealthy Affiliate has a much more active community, with a lot more support channels. The Authority Site System and most other course providers run only Facebook Groups for their community support. With Facebook groups people ask questions or make comments and its just get kind of lost in the scroll and continual feed.

So by relying on the Facebook group model, The Authority Site System isn’t really conducive to one-on-one coaching style help. For example, step-by-step “I cannot figure this out, can you help me” type of help. Facebook groups are OK for broad questions.  Think about it, when you post questions in Facebook groups, it’s very hit and miss with he responses you get. So you’ll always face the challenge of your questions getting lost in the feed.

Beginners – So given all this training, tools and support – Wealthy Affiliate clearly wins out in terms of being better suited for beginners. In addition, you will get personal coaching from me to guide you every step of the way.

Intermediate and Advanced Internet Marketers – You can have the hosting and keyword research tools already covered by your Wealthy Affiliate Premium Annual membership so this will save you on the expensive keyword research tools and hosting that you would need if you just did The Authority Site System on its own. Then you could have two further options:

1. Add The Authority Site System training later if you want to do a deeper dive into Link Building and to get additional perspectives on building authority niche websites.
2. Just listen to the Authority Hacker Podcast for free – these guys do give away a fair bit of value in their free training by the podcasts. I have listened to their key episodes on link building, can implement this, and can also guide you in the direction for the more valuable free content these guys provide.

It’s worth noting that on their podcasts, they openly admit to past practices of grey hat SEO, using fake profiles and past practices that Google has shut down. These guys seem to like taking things to the edge and personally I’d rather not be trying to game Google so much. It also raises questions of integrity in my mind. Honesty and integrity are things I won’t compromise on.

Look it could also be an “AND” rather than an “OR”. Here’s a thought for you – if you have already progressed through Wealthy Affiliate’s Core Training – Online Entrepreneur Certification, with quality content creation as your focus and you want to learn from a different angle. Their competition research, content planning sections have received very positive reviews. Also link building, which the TASS course and also Facebook group community thrive upon.

Why is Wealthy Affiliate the Best for Me?

Thanks for reading until the end of my Authority Site System Review. As for the question, is Authority Hacker a scam? Clearly not. It is a solid training platform and does suit the very analytical types and experienced internet marketer.

However, for beginners and particularly for the huge savings, Wealthy Affiliate clearly wins over The Authority Site System. Some of the tools you need for the The Authority Site System can be quite expensive.

Also, just with the tremendous value that Wealthy Affiliate provides, it is the perfect “base” for beginners and can optionally add additional training to it later. I am on a lifelong learning journey as an affiliate marketing professional and can personally help you too.

Joana is a dedicated content writer. She learned how to search for keywords well and write straightforward perky content writing for EFYL. She loves learning a lot of new things as she writes about them.

Above all, she sees herself as a cool wife, mom, and furmom. She used to be an elementary and college teacher but chose to work from home to have more flexibility with her time and be more connected with her family and rescuing stray and abandoned pets.