I DO AFFILIATE 
MARKETING

Not sure where to start? Whether you're a publisher or retailer, you'll find some of the more basic affiliate questions answered below. Just click on the question to view the answer.

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• What is affiliate marketing?

• How does affiliate marketing work?

• What are the benefits of affiliate marketing for retailers?

• What are the benefits of affiliate marketing for publishers?

• As a retailer, where do I start with affiliate marketing?

• As a publisher, where to I start with affiliate marketing?

• How are publishers paid?

• I've heard about Skimlinks. Who are they and how do I work with them?

• What is an affiliate network and do I need one?

• How much money can affiliates make?

• I'm a retailer, can I manage my own affiliate programme?​

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What is affiliate marketing?

 

Affiliate marketing is a form of online marketing wherein a retailer (or merchant) partners with a publisher (affiliate), in order to promote their products or services. When an affiliate successfully refers a user to the merchant and a sale is tracked, the retailer pays the publisher a small fee, or commission. 

 

In short, affiliates help retailers promote their products and in return receive a small payment for every sale they help drive. This relationship can therefore be beneficial to both retailers, who sell more product, and publishers, who can generate revenue.

 

How does affiliate marketing work?

 

Essentially, a retailer provides a publisher with a unique link to promote their product. The publisher then shares this link with their users, most likely by embedding it in an appropriate place in their article. When a user clicks through the link and goes on to make a purchase, the link allows the retailer to knows that the publisher referred that user and attributes a commission back to them.

 

What are the benefits of affiliate marketing for retailers?

 

For retailers, affiliate marketing helps increase sales with minimal upfront, and ongoing, cost. It expands reach, by encouraging publishers to feature their products on their sites, and it provides a measurable return on investment, as commission is only paid when a sale is made. Affiliate marketing can often outperform other channels, such as PPC and paid social and is relatively low cost and low risk.

 

What are the benefits of affiliate marketing for publishers?

 

For publishers, affiliate marketing is a great way of diversifying the revenue mix, monetising existing content and generating revenue in a way that helps users on their shopping journeys. There are many ways to implement affiliate linking into a site, such as price comparison, or text links, so it can be a very easy way to build revenue over time. For some publishers, it is a crucial part of their revenue mix, generating millions a year in revenue. 

 

As a retailer, where do I start with affiliate marketing?

 

Although affiliate marketing is not suitable for all retailers, in many cases it can be a valuable addition to the marketing mix.

 

If you’re looking to build a sustainable programme that allows you to work with lots of major publishers, you’ll most likely need to work with an affiliate network (AWIN, CJ, Rakuten, etc) who will provide you with tracking technology, handle payments to affiliates, and give you access to a wide pool of publishers. There is usually a setup fee to pay, plus ongoing fees for working with networks - both monthly SAAS fees, and a small fee per sale. But don’t be put off; affiliate networks play a crucial role in the affiliate eco-system and will help you to operate a professional affiliate programme.

 

Once you’ve decided how you’re going to run your programme, you’ll need to decide how much commission you’re happy to pay per sale (competitive analysis can help here) and how you want to structure your commission rates. You may want to pay a different commission for different types of product. Perhaps you want to pay affiliates more when they refer a new customer, and less when they refer an existing one, or perhaps you want to pay content sites more than discount sites. There are lots of options, though the crucial thing is to balance the value of the referred sale, and ongoing customer value, with how much you’re willing to pay.

 

Once you’re set up with a network, you’ll need to recruit publishers to your programme by inviting them to join. You may also discover that lots of publishers apply to your programme who you’ve never heard of, and it will be up to you to decide whether they are likely to bring in the right kind of user for your site.

 

With publishers on board, you’ll then need to provide them with the assets required to promote your programme (display, text links, etc) and you’ll need to keep them up to date with your sales and promotions, most likely via a newsletter.

 

Once everything is up and running, it’s time to optimise your programme by looking at the purchase funnel and asking how you can increase conversion rates and sales. Consider if you’re paying enough commission, or if you can meet your businesses’ strategic needs through different kinds of offers. Boost basket value through bundles and multi-buy offers, run flash sales, pay day offers, etc. Testing is key.

 

If you’re a retailer, keen to learn more about affiliates, why not book in an introductory session with myself.

 

I’m a publisher, where do I start with affiliate marketing?

 

If you’re a publisher, you’ll either have an archive of content you’re looking to monetise, or an idea about the sort of content you want to create. Start by considering whether this content is ‘shoppable’ or not. Ask yourself, does it help a user make a buying decision? Will it play a natural part in the purchase funnel, either helping users to research or narrow down their choices? Best of articles, reviews, round ups and listicles are all particularly effective at driving affiliate revenue, and are a great place to start.

 

Once you have relevant shoppable content, make sure you’re signed up with the key affiliate networks, plus retailers who work outside of networks (such as eBay and Amazon), so the mechanism for driving affiliate revenue is in place. 

 

As a first step to monetisation, you can then start to add text links to your content, being sure to use clear Calls to Action (CTAs). You can simplify this process by signing up to a sub-network, such as Skimlinks. These services allow you to monetise links programmatically; all you need to do is add a piece of code to your site, and links will automatically be affiliatised - though keep in mind, you’ll need to pay the sub-network a share of the revenue you generate.

 

If you’re successfully driving some affiliate revenue from your content, it may be time to look at optimising your affiliate channel. Click Through Rate (CTR) is arguably the metric you have the most influence on as a publisher, and this can be improved by looking at the hierarchy of information on the page, the speed your page loads, and how clear your CTAs are. Ask yourself, would buttons perform better than text links? Would price comparison add extra useful functionality to your site? There are lots of ways to improve performance, though don’t forget that user experience, trust and accuracy of information are all crucial.

 

How are publishers paid?

 

There are a number of different payment models that retailers use. Most common is CPA - or cost per acquisitions, where a fixed fee or a percentage of basket value is paid to the affiliate.

 

You may also come across, CPC (Cost per Clicks) when retailers pay for each click you send through to a merchant, or CPL (Cost per LEad) when retailers pay for each lead referred - often seen in business where signup is required. 

 

What is an affiliate network?

 

An affiliate network is a platform that helps connect retailers (merchants) and publishers (affiliates). It handles the tracking, payments and reporting, and allows retailers to work with lots of publishers, and publishers to work with lots of retailers.

 

Popular networks include AWIN, ShareASale, CJ, Impact and Rakuten. They all offer a range of tools to connect publishers and merchants, though all have particular strengths.

 

Publishers don’t pay to work with affiliate networks, and will frequently have relationships with many networks, allowing them to work with many retailers. Retailers do pay to work with affiliate networks, and will usually work with only one affiliate network, though may work with multiple networks to give them broader geo-coverage. 

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Do you need to work with one? If you're a publisher, you probably need to work with several. If you're a retailer, it's advisble (though not mandatory) to run your affiliate programme through a network as they will help you to connect with a pool of relevant publishers and make the process of paying your affiliate much safer and simpler.

 

How much money can affiliates make?

 

Earnings from affiliate marketing vary widely, and depend on many factors, such as volume of site traffic, the categories the affiliate covers, and the commissions available. Many sites drive a few hundred pounds a month, while in FY23 Future Publishing generated £87 million from affiliate revenue, having driven over 10 million affiliate transactions.

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I'm a retailer, can I manage my own affiliate programme?

 

You certainly can, and lots of retailers do. Utlimately, affiliate programmes perform at their best when they are nurtured like any other channel. They need time to scale, and testing plays a crucial part in understanding what works and what doesn't, so having a staff member who knows your business well is likely to yield the best results. Alternately, there are a number of agencies who will manage your programme for you, or you can employ a freelance consultant such as myself at a rate that suits your budget.

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I've heard of Skimlinks. Who are they and how do I work with them?

 

Skimlinks are what's known as an affiliate sub-network, meaning that they plug in to networks themselves to offer publishers a method of monetising lots of links to retailers easily. Their core offering allows publishers to add a piece of code to their website (or use a plugin), which will then turn outbound retailer links into affiliate links when a user clicks on them. The advantage of this is that publishers don't need to worry about signing up to lots of affiliate networks, they simply add the code to thier page template, and their existing links will be monetised. Skimlinks will take a share of the revenue generated, but are a brilliant way of starting to drive affiliate revenue with minimal investment.

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Retailers who want to work with Skimlinks must do so via an affiliate network. They will find Skimlinks listed as an affiliate within the portal and can apply to sign up. There are a number of similar businesses who work in the same way, and you are free to sign up with as many as you like.

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Still have questions?

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Affiliates can be tricky to get your head around, both for publishers and retailers. If you have questions, feel free to reach out via my contact form or book in a half hour advice session to discuss.

 

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