Ask Not What Your Affiliates Can Do For You
When Nickycakes first got into the affiliate game, less than a year ago, he saw a few affiliate networks offering incentives to sign up with them. Some networks gave out amazon gift cards if you generated a certain amount of revenue, or prizes like tv’s, laptops, and other electronic items. With the amount of profit the networks get from your traffic (usually around 20% of whatever you’re making) it’s easy for them to afford to send a few perks your way for your loyalty to their company.
The issue is, there are so many networks out there with the same offers and the same payouts. If you wanted to run a popular dating offer like Singlesnet, Nickycakes could rattle off 5-10 networks off the top of his head that have Singlesnet as an offer, and he can tell you with 95% certainty that the best payout you’re likely to get is around $4.25 per lead. With so many networks running the same offers, you could pretty much roll the dice and pick any old network to run the offer and get the same results. So what makes you decide which network to use? Here are a few of the factors most people use (or should use) when deciding:
- Credibility/History – With hundreds of affiliate networks to choose from, the first thing to look at is their credibility and history in the industry. A quick google search and a search on the popular affiliate marketing forums will give you a good idea on if they will pay you on time, rip you off, scrub your leads, etc. With so many options, it’s important for networks to keep their credibility, because even a hint of foul-play is reason enough to pick a different network with a clean record.
- Good Account Managers - If you’re a newbie, having a good AM who will be there to answer your questions and give you suggestions on your campaigns. If you’re a seasoned pro, having an AM who knows what you’re looking for and is willing to help you out with the important stuff and not spam you with emails can be key. When Nickycakes first started, he had an AM at one of the large networks who could barely speak english and couldn’t explain what a landing page was. Unacceptable. The relationship with the AM is often what convinces an affiliate to stick around or go elsewhere.
- Tracking – Nothing is worse than spending a few hundred or a few thousand dollars on traffic for a day and then finding out that none of your leads were tracked by the network. It happens, more frequently than should be acceptable, but it happens nonetheless. Many people dislike DirectTrack (the most popular tracking system used by networks to track your traffic and lead data, costs about $1k a month) for various reasons, so an accurate in-house tracking system is sometimes a plus. Tracking is the reason that many affiliates shy away from networks like Commission Junction who have significant delays in reporting your sales. Realtime tracking is available, so why don’t they employ it?
- “Exclusive” Offers – Nickycakes uses quotes around “exclusive” because offers are rarely actually exclusive. Not only can you generally find these offers on a couple other networks, but you can many times just run them directly with the advertiser. Still, some are actually exclusive to that network and, if it’s a good offer, is a reason for an affiliate to stick around.
- Payment Options - Most networks will give you weekly wire transfers if you have demonstrated that you can generate $1k or so per week and you aren’t getting your customers from a shady source. This can help get your cashflow going quickly if you’re just starting out and don’t have the cash in hand to invest huge amounts in your campaign. Offering weekly or bi-weekly wires to affiliates will make them happy, period. Waiting for checks paid on a net-15 schedule SUUUUCKS.  Some affiliates live in countries where most banks won’t even take American checks. Not 3rd world countries, mind you, but big ones.
- Availability – This ties in a little bit with good Account Managers. Affiliate Marketing is a 24/7 business. Internet marketers are notorious for having off-hours schedules for working. Customers don’t stop surfing the web and making purchases at night, and so there needs to be SOMEONE to help if there’s a big problem during non-business hours. If the tracking system goes down on your campaign at 2 am, there really should be someone to help get it sorted so money isn’t lost unnecessarily.
- Website Usability – Some networks have a great interface for the affiliates to use to get links and reports of their revenue. Some don’t. For a new person, a good interface can be crucial to feeling comfortable with getting things going and understanding how to pick offers, etc. For a veteran, this becomes less important, generally, as long as the tracking and communication with the network are all in order.
- BENEFITS – As was mentioned in the beginning of the post, some networks offer decent prizes for generating a certain amount of revenue from month to month. Awesome. It’s always nice to get free stuff. But what some networks don’t realize is that this is an area that can bring them HUGE affiliate loyalty. In Nickycakes’ opinion, this issue is largely underutilized to it’s full potential. Obviously, as an affiliate himself, this opinion is quite biased, but hey, if you want the Cakes’ traffic, you should be willing to hook him up a little.
So yeah, benefits. Since this is where an affiliate network can really shine, what are some good ideas for benefits and rewards for affiliate loyalty?
- Tiered Prizes – This is already being done by a few networks. If you make $xxxx, you will get prize Y. If you make $xxxxx, you will get prize Z. Pretty simple, and you will see networks offering things like gift cards, big screen tv’s, and even harleys. Again, this is already being done, so not exactly an original idea.
-  Free Services – This should really be a no-brainer, but Nicky has yet to see it implemented by any network. If you make a certain amount, you should be given free membership to one of the many useful online services that help with affiliate marketing. Especially things like keyword tools such as Wordze or Wordtracker. This is not only a benefit to the affiliate like the prize gifts, but is a benefit to the network as it helps the affiliate generate more income for them. Again, no-brainer.
- Conference Passes – Conferences like Affiliate Summit help affiliates make more money, period. You will network with new people, build stronger relationships with the networks you work with, get new ideas, and generally get into a good mindset for making more money online when you attend them. Give your top performers free passes to these things.
- REAL Benefits – When you work for a real company, you get real benefits. You never see things like health insurance offered by affiliate networks for their top affiliates. Why? Aren’t they pretty easy to write off on the taxes compared to big screen tv gifts? How about offering financial management or tax services? Would free copies of turbotax in January be out of the question? Or if you’re a big earner, maybe even a tax guy to crunch your numbers?
Nickycakes would love some feedback from both the networks and affiliates on this one. Are these ideas unrealistic or do you see some of this stuff as being a possibility in the future?
Keep it real.
Nice post there Cakes. You’re making some good points there. I’m especially with you on the AM credibility thing. Some of them just don’t get it. Some big networks (I’m not gonna mention names) could also do a bit better effort in giving you reasons why you should stick with them and not their competitors.
Definitely agree with you on this one dude. More and more networks are popping up and customer service is king as an affiliate manager.
nOObs and vets need different things but meeting your affiliates needs, and being customer service oriented, is the focus no matter what.
When you’re a n00b a good affiliate manager will offer their time whenever you need it. No matter what the question we’ll do our best to answer it and if we don’t know it we’ll find out.
When you’re a vet we can offer you our time and show our appreciation for your business. All good affiliate managers know this.
There are also two sides to every network though. And keeping advertisers happy is also priority. So its a fine balance. Sometimes you’ll see ridiculous posts, some affiliate spraying, because they haven’t got paid or whatever but the only reason whey an affiliate network wouldn’t pay is because that guy or gal has done something fraudulent that has broken the T&C’s. So take blog posts with a grain of salt.
That being said, there is a lot of info to learn and forums are a great place to learn about networks.
I think onething that has been overlooked is rather then just researching the network, reserach the affiliate manager themselves. We get to manage our accounts how under some guidelines but alot of it is how we see fit.
Woooooord!
[EDIT by nickycakes: Scotty is my AM at neverblue]
What’s interesting is there really has been a shift in control in the last number years. All the networks and advertisers thought they were the big shots. Things are constantly evolving. Now affiliates are in control. In my best Tony Montana impressions “He who has the traffic has the power.” I think it’s going to get better and better for affiliates as networks and advertisers compete now more and more for their traffic. Will take a while for them to catch on though I think.
Now taking bribes at => http://www.oooff.com
This post truly touches on key questions that I get asked at every conference by affiliates. Every Network out there has a ‘canned’ pitch that as affiliates know is over used and common – we have the most exclusives, highest payouts, flexible payment terms and revenue bonuses. As an affiliate first and for most you should check out if the Network is credible and then see if there are willing to earn your business, that is key. Far too often the simple things are over looked, will my AM be available 24/7, will he/she answer my emails and phone calls immediately? Just because this is advertising in Cyber Space, doesn’t mean an AM should allow a disconnect and remove the customer service aspect from which is the essence in sales. When I am asked the question, “what makes you different from the other networks?” I simply say say nothing. But if you would like to enjoy working with your AM, have him/her pick up the phone, respond to emails and have a genuine interest in you and a desire to share mutual success with campaigns, give me a shot – because i know and the affiliate will find out that my company Motive possess unique top payout offers, flexible payment terms and our own UI that tracks properly. This brings me back to my original point, myself and Motive are willing to do what it takes to earn your business. It’s like the dating scene, are you going to contribute to a cliche to get that girls attention? Or are you going to be genuine and unique to intrigue that female accepting multiple applications? I agree that Networks could be more creative on bonus packages like conference passes for example and all it will take is one Network to start the trend with one Supper Affiliate, then it will catch on. Money talks, it’s why we are here. So if the numbers work for the Network, creative bonus packages should be obtainable. I just started to work with Nicky so we will see how this relationship develops, myself and Motive want to keep our Affiliates loyal to us and we will do what it takes for that to be a reality.
Cheers,
Todd
Cakes is dead on here. With a gazillion ad networks out there these days, it’s an affilites world. Affiliates that perform deserve special treatment (and you mentioned some great examples), and networks that understand how to take care of their affs will ultimately cultivate more long term business with them and generate referals.
i am a complete newbie to affiliate. I am looking for some good AM to guide me through. Please tell me what are best programmes for newbies?
Smaxor:
I wonder if you are overstating the strength of any one affiliate?
I think that as better tools are put into play, and more people join the aff game, affiliates will actually lose power as individuals. There is always another super affiliate around the corner, so losing one is no big deal.
Add to that the likelihood that networks will bring many of their biggest campaigns in house. Why pay commissions to superaffiliates on a list of kw that anyone can just plug in from an in-house position?
@freddy: The entire reason affiliate networks have affiliates instead of running their own campaigns is that they want to collect commission without risking their cash. Their affiliates make up their business, and an affiliate pulling 6-7 figures a year in commission of which they are getting 25% is no small sum. The big guys hide as much campaign information as possible from the networks and merchants, so pulling them all in-house isn’t going to happen very easily.
Freddy,
There is obviously a lot more to it then “just plugging in the keywords.” Their’s landing pages, text ads, bid management technique etc. If it were as easy as just putting in some keywords you could just get a spyfu account and become an overnight millionaire.
Just let me know where the affiliate networks with benefits are and I’ll sign up. I’ve rarely seen anything more enticing than a performance incentive.
Great post!
Your relationship with your AM is absolutely key to your success, and is one of the key factors when I’m deciding which network to promote an offer with.
Hey nicky cakes
I’m a great fan of you, keep up the great work!!!
NOT
u suck bitch
lol
I’m still appalled at the crap stats that many/most of the networks I work with use. My two main wants:
1. Wild cards in subid searches.
2. Better drill down capabilities.
Unfortunately, it seems like half of them use directAffailiate (or whatever it’s called) and the stats package is just annoying as all hell.
As for Free Services:
What I love is how COPEAC is pimping that DT Bid Management package. Then you click and find out they want you to pay $80 a pop for using it. Huh? Are they serious? What a marvelous benefit!
[...] Nicky made a post about what makes affiliate networks stand out from all the rest, and they hit a few of these points on the [...]
Nice post Nicky, I agree with most of what you said. Being an account manager myself, customer service is #1. I don’t care if you make $50 or $5000 a month, you signed up for the network, you deserve the same amount of attention — when necessary. Not to mention, you never know when those small affiliates are going to come up with the “next big thing”. An affiliate manager’s dedication and knowledge of the network/industry is most important to making any affiliate/relationship successful
Of course, the quality of the overall network plays a role as well — ie. reporting, offers/exclusives, payment, etc. Even if the network lacks many true exclusives, the AM can always go out and (hopefully) get a deal direct and offer the affiliate the payment necessary to run successfully.
Overall, however, outside of an AM’s knowledge of the network (as well an understanding of how to promote offers and make money) the ultimate success comes down to the affiliate themselves. The largest PPC affiliates are busting their ass to build out the campaign and risking money to start it up. I’m not the one taking the risk, but I do collect off the $5-$10K my super affiliates generate every day in commissions. Back to communication and TRUST… If an affiliate is not happy with their relationship with the acct manager, they could very easily switch networks. Go above and beyond. Give the affiliates not only what the need, but throw in something special from time to time for allowing you the PRIVILEGE to work with other professional entrepreneurs!
-Matt
nicely done post. some good points here. thx.
If the affiliate networks offered health insurance, that would definitely be a HUGE incentive for people to sign up. You’re right – instead of just TVs and other prizes, why not offer something of REAL value? Insurance would definitely be a step in the right direction and also create more loyalty between affiliates and their chosen networks. Great post, Nicky.
I’ll add one more.
Not having to ask for a bump.
It gets old very quick…
I can understand when you’re brand new… but once you do some volume the games should end and you should just have all your payouts to the max instantly.
Only one network is really doing this. (Hint: They’re dominating)