I'll also add in that so far it doesn't sound like you've risked even a dollar of your own to test and prove the offer.

To me that's VERY important. The problem is anyone can claim that they've tested it... but if I have someway of knowing and believing that this person at least put $200 bucks onto facebook or $100 bucks on Bing Search or $300 into banner ads etc... it shows me they are at least investing a few dollars (and we're talking VERY low figures here) to test conversions from cold traffic and to tweak their offer BEFORE asking me to send them traffic.

So my suggestion is if your friends sent you some sales, then that's new capital in your business account. Snowball it. Use those "free sales" to go buy advertising (since it doesn't sound like you've done that at all). Test 2-3 venues with cold traffic. Even just $100-$300 spent in each may be enough to drive a dozen sales.

Get a feel for conversions. Have market research/survey pop-ups for that cold traffic to find out why they're not buying. Be willing to give them the product for FREE if they simply give you valuable insights on why they didn't buy.

Use your work, your testing, your ad money spent, your conversion results, your market research results to create a better funnel BEFORE you start recruiting new affiliates.

And this has an amazing benefit... not only will you end up with a more professional and higher converting offer, but because of it, affiliates will earn more (so they'll promote harder and more often for you) but you'll also GREATLY stand out from the crowd and be viewed as professional not another something-for-nothing hobbiest.