Category: CT Moore

by CT Moore

So you’ve decided to choose affiliate marketing as part of your online marketing strategy.

You’ve researched affiliate software and finally chose an affiliate marketing partner.

Now it comes down to the nitty-gritty of deploying your affiliate program.

But wait! How have you structured your affiliate program? I mean, have you considered how it’s actually going to work and integrate with your overall business model?
There are a lot of different directions in which you can take your affiliate marketing strategy, but you have to remember that affiliate marketing is just one part of your business’ picture. Your business model and your brand should still take primacy.

After all, as a marketing strategy, an affiliate program should add value and drives sales by serving the needs of your business model, not the other way around. In fact, affiliates should never be responsible for more than 30-40% of your revenues — otherwise, you just become one big super-affiliate yourself.

Some questions you need to ask yourself, then, are:

• What is your retail philosophy?
• What are your priorities?
• Why did you choose affiliate marketing?
• What kind of affiliates are you looking to partner with?

Depending on how you answer these questions, chances are your philosophy of affiliate marketing fits into one of three general categories.

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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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By CT Moore In my last post, Affiliate Marketing – Part 2: Why Choose Affiliate Marketing, I looked at how affiliate marketing is a marketing strategy that lets you: Drive…

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