An affiliate program is a tool that allows an advertiser to increase sales in their online store. It is no coincidence that interest in affiliate marketing is growing among both advertisers and publishers. An effective affiliate program enables both sides to generate profits.
Launching an affiliate program within an affiliate network opens up a range of benefits for the advertiser. Above all, the advertiser gains access to software that enables them to settle advertising in the Cost Per Sale model, i.e. commission on sales.
An affiliate platform enables the use of a tracking system. This system tracks traffic and sales generated by publishers in advertisers’ stores. Based on the collected data, the affiliate system counts transactions and calculates the appropriate commissions for publishers. The advertiser also gains access to detailed statistics, which allow them to optimize cooperation with the publisher in order to achieve higher sales.
This is not the end of the benefits of working with an affiliate network. Searching for publishers independently can be extremely time-consuming. An advertiser who registers, for example, with our affiliate network gains access to a database of over 12,000 publishers! Publishers can send requests to join the advertiser’s affiliate program, or advertisers can invite selected publishers themselves.
The process of adding new publishers to the program can be automated, with all requests approved in advance. Settlements with publishers and the distribution of discount codes also require no additional action from the advertiser, all thanks to the technology available to the affiliate network.
Nevertheless, for cooperation between advertisers and publishers to be effective and generate profits in the form of increased sales, one more element is needed – the advertiser’s engagement.
In 1996, Amazon launched the first affiliate program in the Cost Per Sale model. The beginnings of the program were difficult, and there were few people interested in cooperation. However, patient work on developing the publisher network and offering an attractive commission increased Amazon’s effectiveness and number of sales. Other stores began to follow Amazon’s example, introducing a commission-based settlement model with their online publishers. Advertisers realized that affiliate marketing was an effective and safe way to advertise, while publishers found an equally simple way to earn money online.
Thanks to Amazon, affiliate marketing gained enormous popularity in the United States and even became one of the pillars of online marketing. Data from a Forrester report shows that in 2017, more than 80% of advertisers in the USA used affiliate marketing. Average spending on this promotion channel amounted to around 10% of the marketing budget. After the success of Amazon’s affiliate program, it was only a matter of time before performance marketing also appeared in Europe.
The e-commerce industry in Poland only began to develop intensively around 2010. Since then, the number of online stores in Poland has grown to over 50,000. Unfortunately, most of them are still not using the potential offered by affiliate marketing. Only 5% of advertisers have chosen an affiliate program as a way to promote their products and increase sales. They have already built a strong publisher network, which has become the foundation for further promotional activities settled exclusively based on results in the form of sales.
Let’s go back to the basics—what an affiliate program is and how it works. An affiliate program is one of the tools of online marketing that makes it possible to increase sales by engaging a network of publishers who promote the advertiser’s products. The greater the advertiser’s involvement in building a publisher network, the higher the chance of developing the program and increasing sales in the online store.
A group of publishers cooperating within an affiliate program promotes the advertiser’s products and thereby redirects traffic from their websites to the online store. To promote products, publishers can use any tools provided by the affiliate network. Most often they use affiliate links, but they also have access to product widgets, an XML file, and banners.
It should be noted that an affiliate program in e-commerce is not only about cooperation between online stores and well-known influencers. Anyone can be a publisher: a blogger, YouTuber, or user of social media platforms such as TikTok, Facebook, or Instagram. The advertiser’s products can also be promoted by various types of thematic websites, comparison websites and product search engines, discount websites, as well as SEO and Google Ads specialists.
Today, launching an affiliate program does not create major technological problems for the advertiser. The only challenge is implementing the tracking code on the advertiser’s online store website. If the store website is based on custom software, implementation may take one business day. However, there are certain facilitations in the form of free plugins for popular e-commerce platforms, thanks to which the code can be implemented independently, even within a few minutes.
Launching an affiliate program is not the end of the activities. It is important to remember that publishers are the greatest value of an affiliate program. A strong and effective network of online publishers makes the largest contribution to the success of an affiliate program. That is why it is so important to actively recruit publishers to the program, monitor and analyze their activities, and develop cooperation with full engagement from both sides.
An affiliate program allows advertisers to minimize the risk of an unsuccessful advertising campaign. Why? In the Cost Per Sale settlement model, the advertiser rewards the publisher with a commission only when a purchase has been made through their referral and the transaction has been verified and approved. It is the publisher who takes the risk that, despite their efforts to promote the product, they may not lead the reader to a purchase decision and therefore will not receive a commission. This risk requires mutual trust. Fair and timely payments to publishers increase their engagement in promoting the advertiser’s products and brand. Initial setbacks should not be discouraging, as building a publisher network and maintaining good relationships with them requires time and patience.
Any online store owner can launch an affiliate program in an affiliate network. The affiliate network provides the appropriate technological infrastructure and a large base of publishers who are willing to cooperate in the Cost Per Sale model. The advertiser accepts requests to join from interested publishers or invites them independently, using the system available on the platform.
But activities supporting an affiliate program are not limited to the affiliate platform. The advertiser should also encourage users outside the affiliate network to join their program. How? By promoting their affiliate program wherever possible – on the blog, in social media, and even in the newsletter.
It is worth placing information about the possibility of cooperation within the affiliate program on the advertiser’s store website. Every customer is, in fact, a potential publisher. A customer who is satisfied with their purchase very often recommends it to others, and they will do so even more willingly if they can also earn money from these referrals.
An affiliate link is the basic tool of affiliate marketing. It does not require any advanced skills from the user, which means that virtually anyone can become a publisher!
Any advertiser engagement in building relationships with publishers has an extremely positive impact on the results of cooperation. It is worth starting relationship building with a quick response to requests to join the program. The second stage is timely order verification and not delaying commission payments. These practices allow the advertiser to build trust and establish credibility as an honest advertiser. It is also a great idea to reward the most active publishers by offering them higher commission rates. Such recognition is an excellent incentive for even greater engagement in promoting the advertiser’s products.
Cooperation between publishers and advertisers works much better when they stay in regular contact. Informing publishers about discounts, discount codes, sales, or free delivery days in online stores should be a standard practice for every advertiser. The more actions of this type, the easier it will be for publishers to encourage their audiences to make purchases.
A particularly attractive opportunity for publishers in affiliate activities is promoting new products or bestsellers. From the publisher’s perspective, it is very important for the advertiser to inform them which products are worth advertising because, for example, they achieve the highest sales in a given period or enjoy the best reviews among buyers. Sharing this type of information is crucial for developing good relationships and effective cooperation.
