Month: August 2008

By CT Moore

In my last post, Affiliate Marketing – Part 3: Choosing the Right Affiliate Marketing Partner, I went over some of things you need to consider before partnering with an affiliate network to launch your affiliate program. Whether you partner with an existing network or decide to set up your own standalone program, the most important consideration to make is the technology behind it.

No matter how attractive your commissions are, the software that powers your affiliate program can make it or break it. Affiliate marketing is a symbiotic relationship between advertisers and publishers, so the software behind that relationship needs to support the needs of both parties.

One key software feature, for example, is being able to provide in-depth tracking reports for both affiliates and merchants. This allows both parties to optimize their respective marketing efforts and get the most out of the relationship.

Not only should affiliate marketing software accurately track all conversions, but it should also have an array of functions and features that allow you to efficiently manage your various kinds of affiliates and product promotions. Basically, a piece of affiliate marketing software should offer both comprehensive analytics and enhanced program management features:

1. Comprehensive Affiliate Reporting

To best analyze your campaign performance, you’re going to need information on affiliate traffic, conversion rates, revenue, and commissions. You will also want to be able to run specialized reports that let you easily monitor account balances and transaction details. Being able to group these reports according to factors such as month, affiliate ID, or transaction will also enhance your data analysis.

2. Customizable & Brandable

If you’re going to white label an affiliate marketing software solution to set up your own standalone affiliate program, then that software needs to reflect both your brand and your business model.

On the customization side, you should be able to control what functions, features, and fields are available to which affiliates. On the branding side, you should be able to skin it to reflect, well, your brand.

3. Advanced Marketing Tool Support

For your affiliate program to succeed, you need to help your affiliates succeed by offering them pre-made marketing materials such as banners, text links, datafeeds, and HTML mailers.

Being able to also group marketing tools into banner groups that point to specific landing pages will optimize the process: it will increase conversions which mean more sales for you, and more commissions for affiliates.

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