I AM an affiliate for a set of tools that I use. Most of the time anything I recommend is something that I use or have used so I tend to know retty well what I am writing or talking about.
So, yes, I 'sell' the service. Since when did that make what one writes an irrelevance. You see, I am writing about stuff about which I know. Some here are writing about stuff that they know nothing. There is a difference.

When one tosses turds at a decent thing then one must expect to either get criticism for doing so, or to be smacked about a bit. So, as I can't and don't do the latter it makes sense for me to do the former.
If you can't afford to come take a look then simply accept that one day you will get your very own credit card, or your business will have grown to the point where it can support paying to use tools; but do not be surprised when people who know more than you pop up and tell you that the unfounded criticism is misplaced.

By the way, if one applies Occam's Razor then one would quickly take away the insight that it is simpler to accept that the offering from a bunch of blokes with a track record of well made and long lasting products is likely to be in the same vein than it is to suggest that all of a sudden they have decided to rook their new, future and previous clients.
It simply makes no sense.

Portillo ~ this is how I earn my living and yes, I am subscribed to this thread - it is part of the forum software - did you not notice?

Jargrmeister ~ You can drop out and the work that you have done is not lost however site promotion is a process and, much as I'd prefer it otherwise, does not end once one has done a job once, or for a few weeks. It goes on as a part of one's business process.
The blog network is just a part of the tools you have to hand and so you are going to be expanding the reach of your sites tremendously. Of course to some degree the tools you use and how you use them will be dictated by your business strategy. For example, in one part of my business we are concerned with building a large presence in SERPS very fast but less concerned with long term results. Elsewhere we have a very different requirement and thus use the Traffic Kahuna tools in a different way.

I'd suggest hunkering down, looking at what you have and what your medium/long term needs are and setting up a plan to integrate the TK toolbox into your business. To some degree it is, at least partly, a case of seeing the potential for each of the tools so there is some video watching and PDF reading to be done.