Affiliate Marketing Industry News Roundup 3-11-2020

“In this edition of Affiliate Spotlight, we speak to Chris Tradgett. Chris is the co-founder of Publisher Discovery, which develops machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies for affiliates. Within affiliate marketing, Publisher Discovery’s main focus is forex.

At the moment, Chris operates in a Chief Marketing Officer position at the company.

In this interview, Chris speaks about why AI and machine learning are important for affiliates. He also discusses possible barriers related to adopting this technology, plus more.”

Transformational Leadership in Affiliate Management Context

“Successful affiliate program management has always been relationship-based and heavily so. If you are managing an affiliate program, the first step is to realize that it’s the program that you’re managing (not the affiliates that drive its performance). The second (and equally important) step is to take the principles of transformational leadership and transfer them over to how you work with your affiliates.

As transformational leader, you want to be (i) inspirational in how you motivate affiliates, (ii) intellectually stimulating, and always (iii) practicing individualized consideration.”

Your Affiliate Program Manager Account + New Features Coming Soon!

“One of the issues that came up that has an easy fix is being logged out of your account too frequently. We found that this particular issue is due to multiple people sharing a login. When one person is already logged in and another person logs on using the same credentials, the original user is logged out.

Usually, sub-accounts are only available to premium subscribers, but if you have a large team using a free account please let us know and we’ll work with you to create some sub-accounts to make using your account as easy as possible.

We also have some exciting news! We are currently integrating with 2 companies in order to provide you with ways to recruit affiliates and view consolidated reporting for multiple affiliate networks. These features will be available very shortly, so keep an eye out for announcements!”

Affiliate Program Success: Ten Examples Of Performance-Based Partners

“The key to a successful affiliate program is two-fold. First is having a variety of partners in your program (check out our article on Diversifying your Program) and second is to have productive partners in your program.

In affiliate marketing, there are different types of partners to consider: Cashback/Loyalty, Coupon/Deal, Employee Benefit, Content, and Subnetworks. But not all partners are created equal.

To give you a foundational understanding of the types of partners you should be recruiting, here are ten key examples of performance-based partners.”

Recruitment & Optimization: Drive Revenue Growth With These 10 Pro Tips [Download]

“Not surprisingly, a consequence of consumer hyper-connectivity is the expectation of a fluid and cohesive experience across their buying journey—regardless of which device or medium brand engagement occurs. In turn, the responsibility to create an authentic omnipresence—an initiative that significantly drives up the cost of customer acquisition—falls squarely on marketers’ shoulders.”

Partner Recruitment Best Practice

“It’s long been known that many affiliate programmes are overly reliant on a handful of affiliates. To alleviate risk, find new audiences and see programme growth, brands are looking to diversify their partners outside of traditional affiliates including, B2B, Podcasts, Referral programmes.”

Back to Basics: Guide on Affiliate Tracking for Publishers and Advertisers

“Rumours are swirling that the future of affiliate networks is looking grim. Marketers fear that the mighty Google updates will put the entire industry to rest. But will it? We will dispel these widespread rumours and explain how to play by the rules without losing revenue.

Affiliate marketers are concerned about the future of their industry because of the impact of Google’s updates on affiliate sites. The most recent updates, specifically the Chrome v. 80 release and the shift to the HTTPS-only standard, have threatened the quality of affiliate tracking.”

ThinkTank US 2020 Network Awards categories announced

“We are delighted and privileged to host the ThinkTank Network Awards for the third consecutive year. These awards are a small testament to our gratitude for our clients, partners and friends – providing the opportunity to honor the Awin Group’s esteemed network collective for innovation, performance and growth over the past 12 months.

In addition to revealing the categories themselves, in 2020 we’re excited to share all clients with an active program on Awin or ShareASale are now eligible to nominate themselves or a partner for Most Original Performance Marketing Campaign and Campaign Strategy of the Year. Nominations must be received by April 3, 2020, to qualify.”

Partner With These Ship-shape Instagram Influencers for Spring Cleaning Season

“Soon it will be time for those springtime purges, re-orgs, and refreshes, which means consumers are looking for tips, inspiration, and products — ideally all in one place! Now’s a great time to partner up with one of our type-A content creators to rejuvenate your revenue.  Or scour the Partnership Cloud’s Enhanced Discovery function, where you’ll find all kinds of influencers to promote your brand and tap into spring fever.

Check out our database of more than 60K potential partners to browse and recruit content creators not only by category, region, and follower count, but also by engagement and audience quality, whether or not they’re Instagram verified, Alexa rank, and dozens of other criteria. Our discovery tool makes it easy to find partners who are right in line with your business goals any time of year.”

A content marketing blueprint for affiliate merchants

“People will tell you “content is king” and it certainly is, but coming up with ideas off the cuff about things you think sound good and putting it out randomly isn’t using content marketing to the best of its ability.

What you need is a blueprint, a detailed plan to guide you through and ensure you’re working towards the right goals for your business. But first, you need to take a look at what it means to be an affiliate merchant and dive deeper into the world of content marketing.”