Hello Maor, tell us a little bit about yourself. What are you working with now and what takes up most of your time?
I've been a media buyer and an entrepreneur for basically all of my life, started out when I worked for an agency, moved up to being an affiliate and now i own several businesses that I invest resources and time into.
I have been a speaker since 2018 all around the world, at different events and I always maintain 3 channels or categories of revenue stream — as an affiliate, as an agency and as a business owner.
The stuff that was added throughout the years are more passive investments like stocks, funds and businesses that I'm not active in.
My biggest focus at the moment is ecom. We are on track to do over $100m this year.
How did you feel when you made your first $1,000,000? Have you realized that this is the point of no return? Has anything changed after reaching this figure?
I don’t believe in “point of no return” as i think things are always dynamic, people go in and out of business, change titles and move up and down in life, but i did understand that my life is going to change, and it did, several times after when i made my first million.
A lot has changed and keeps on changing after when you reach this financial milestone, some people become less hungry and more chill, because they now have enough money to live and ride a long period of time, you see them going to the beach and enjoy life, and some people are more like me — they become more motivated and hungry, I’m always looking for the next challenge, as soon as i complete the one I’m working on right now.
Outside of the financial stuff, there’s other things that having financial success allow you to do. One of my favorite things is the fact that I don't have to work with people who disrespect me or I just don’t want to work with.
There are also a lot of things I did not know that are going to change, for example:
I thought more people would want to be my friends, while in reality I lost more than gained friends, especially my old friends, who now I understand saw my success as a reflection of what they could not do.
I thought things were going to get less stressful, at least financially, but because I took on larger goals that demand more money — it only became more stressful throughout time, at least till I got to my end goal financially (or at least that’s what I tell myself right now).
I found it much harder to be interested in projects that have small upside.
I found out that the skills that brought me up to this point were great, but I needed to develop a lot of other things in order to maintain and grow from where I got.
You are the author of the bestseller "Unleash Your Inner Wolf". Please share who the book is aimed at (who will find it useful and why it is worth reading)?
The book is something I'm extremely proud of, a lot of people want to or even start to write a book but never finish it, and it was extremely hard and every good feedback I get from people fills me up every time and reminds me how much it was worth it.
When I wrote it, I wanted 2 main things: one is to make sure it’s ever-green, that people could read it even 10-20-30 years from now, so I didn’t want to make it technical and everytime I wrote something I asked myself if it’s going to be something that would age well or not, if time was even relevant to it. And the second thing I wanted is to make sure that everyone could read it, as large of a spectrum as possible, from someone who is outside of the industry (digital marketing) and wants to understand a little bit more than just the terminology, to someone who would just enjoy my journey and take whatever they can from it, to the more advanced media buyer or business owner that is looking for the next step. I honestly believe that for this industry, this is one of the best self-help / personal development book that there are.
Has anything changed in working with Google Ads after the USA elections in November 2024?
A lot has changed, but the easiest thing that I noticed are CPCs and CPMs drop right after, a lot of money has been poured into the platforms in a short amount of time and they also became a lot more strict in terms of policy during that period, but luckily for us it ended before Q4 really kicked into gear.
As we know, you have been working as a solo affiliate for a long time. Tell us, how are things with solo affiliates now, on the threshold of 2025? Does it make sense to enter a niche if you don't have a team?
I think the definition of a solo affiliate has changed, and is changing all the time, on one side — if you want to scale and grow — it’s always helpful to have a team, even if it’s small. But on the other hand, there has never been an easier time to be a true solo-affiliate because of AI and the fact that you can generate creatives a lot easier.
It does make sense to enter a niche without a team, at the very least for testing purposes, at the end of the day — you do not need much in order to get 1 or 2 campaigns to where they generate profits, it is do-able as a solo-affiliate or a one-person team.
The latest Google updates are aimed at giving a boost to small companies. Do you know anything about how these updates work? What has changed, are there any improvements? Is it true that small companies will be able to compete with the giants of the market in the future?
Yes, and Google has been trying to push towards this for a long time, since this is considered to be the most complicated platform out of the bigger ones, they are trying to simplify things so that every person that wants to run campaigns would have a fair chance, even without experience or an agency.
They are doing it with a few tools or ways, better and simple UI, use of AI for images, videos and text and more automated campaigns.
At the end of the day, I do not think that would be enough for smaller companies to compete with bigger ones because it takes a different level of understanding and using these tools in order to scale big.
How has AI Overviews affected the work with traffic on websites?
We Mainly use AI to help us with creatives, from texts to images right now.
What exactly has changed in Google Ads with the massive arrival of AI? How will AI content affect working with the source?
I think all platforms are still trying to find their spot when it comes to AI. At the end of the day I believe Google has the biggest risk on the table because people are starting to use other platforms for search, and that’s their main driver of revenue and profits.
There is a lot of discussion about Meta Ads right now. Do you think there is a real chance that Google will have a strong competitor in the near future? Are you going to diversify your efforts and start working with a new source?
I think it’s a strong competitor right now, I just think Meta ads are easier for a lot of people because it’s more simple and easier to convert there, but Google has always been a huge competitor.
Is it now possible to launch black hat in Google Ads? Is that true, that, despite the risks, it is more profitable and worth it? Or is it impossible?
I do not run or believe in BH campaigns, waste of time.
Now you are a sought-after speaker at Affiliate World and moderator of the famous STM forum. Could you please share how your first performance was at the conference? How did you manage to become a speaker at such a huge event?
The first performance I had on stage was an amazing and hard experience, I remember myself in front of a huge amount of people. I could not believe it myself that everyone came in to hear me.
Throughout time and experience I learned a lot of points that helped me improve my talks like being less afraid of being on stage, keeping it more casual and natural, the way I write my presentations, and knowing how to read the audience.
When you’re on stage your brain works on overdrive and is firing on all cylinders, if you know how to use this in order to react in real time — it takes your presentation to the next level.
The first time I was invited to speak on AW, they actually wanted to see that I don’t just talk the talk, they wanted to see numbers and actual figures in order to put me there, and I wish they would have done this now to new speakers so that the level of content would be higher.
What is the most difficult part of preparing for the conference? And what is the most exciting for you?
The most difficult part is right before i get on stage, where I want to remember all of the slides and what I wanted to pass on, outside of that, the most exciting thing is just knowing that with every event your life could completely change, and I’ve seen it happen a large number of times to myself and to other people.
We also know that you recently got married. First of all, we sincerely congratulate you! We wish you happiness and a lot of warmth and love in your relationship! But we also know that it was incredibly beautiful and powerful to make a proposal on the Affiliate World stage. Tell us, how did you decide to do this? Was it difficult from a technical point of view? Have you discussed it with the organizers and how do you and your wife remember it now?
Thank you! I agree, proposing on the main stage in front of a lot of people is not for everyone, I wanted to do something big and powerful that would be creative and first.
No one ever proposed on the main stage or at Affiliate World, and for me, this is the place where it all began, frome friendships to the skills that brought me the way I was into this relationship and so there was no better place to it other than there, we both think of that day as a special day and for sure that memory will pay dividends later on in life.
