Critical Success Factors in affiliate marketing

**Anastasia** · 13-05-11

In my research, I am trying to compile a list of the critical success factors in affiliate marketing, and to understand how advertisers can ensure the success of their affiliate programmes.

And while I understand that the question is very broad, I believe it could benefit several of us. So would anyone like to share their experience please? Thanks in advance.

**euraffiliates** · 14-05-11

Is it from an merchant perspective or from an affiliate perspective? Please clarify. Because the set of factors are totally different in each case.

**Anastasia** · 14-05-11

Thanks for your reply. I am interested in the critical success factors from a merchant perspective. I have my list of things, which I am happy to share with everyone, but it is very interesting to hear other people's opinion too. Many thanks in advance.

**euraffiliates** · 14-05-11

There are mainly 4 sets of factors that really come into the picture

1. Your (merchant’s) dedication and sincerity in promoting & running the affiliate program. A great affiliate program may fail if not marketed properly. Most fail because they can not move beyond the starting blocks.

2. Role of your affiliate software or network - If you are promoting through an in-house affiliate program then the efficiency of your affiliate software can make a big difference. You can have a clear picture in the article How to choose an affiliate software .

4. Role of your affiliate network – a good affiliate network can give you immediate access to a lot of quality affiliates. It will take age to get them if you don’t join a network where you can find quality affiliates already registered. If you have a product with fair conversion ratio and you can earn credibility of a few quality affiliates then none can stop you from getting the success.

3. The conversion ratio & popularity of your product - if your product benefits fails to convince your prospective clients and it has a very poor conversion ratio then even after a big affiliate marketing effort you will fail. Because affiliates soon discover that even after driving a quality traffic the can not make money from your site. And they will lose interest and stop promoting your product.

Thanks

**accelerator** · 14-05-11

Regular communication to your affiliates.

Appreciating your affiliates for the hard work they do.

Incentivizing your affiliates to make things more interesting for them.

Rgds

**Anastasia** · 16-05-11

euraffiliates and accelerator, many thanks for sharing your ideas and experiences. And would a set of the success factors be different for affiliates? And networks?

**euraffiliates** · 16-05-11

Surely yes.

For affiliates the main factors are

1. Amount of quality Traffic (who often buy from internet) in his own site
2. Choosing program that matches with the visitors demography
3. Choosing Merchants product that sales (have high conversion rate)
4. Promoting on behalf of the merchants to his own clients/friends/other contacts
5. Placement of the adverts in the relevant pages

For networks

1. Again the software factors - How to choose an affiliate software
2. Lining up quality merchants and affiliates (value addition + promotions)

**Anastasia** · 16-05-11

This is very valuable information, thanks. Does this mean that in addition to the common performance metrics, each of the three (affiliate, merchant, network) will measure the performance of affiliate programme(s) differently and use different metrics?

**euraffiliates** · 18-05-11

There will be a common metrics to all, the average earning per month . And I think this will be the only metric for an affiliate to measure the performance of an affiliate program.

Though some would like to solicit for conversion rate or earning per click, but I won't agree with them. For a rare product conversion ratio or earning per click may be higher but out of 2000 one may click and the affiliate may not earn as expected. The fact is, at the end of the day one must see, "how much he has earned from a affiliate program".

But the merchant and network owner may look for long term gains. The brand, goodwill, number of quality affiliate/merchant joined, the efficiency of different tools, user satisfaction & successful track record to maintain affiliate communication etc may be added to the list.

Thanks

**Anastasia** · 19-05-11

Thanks euraffiliates.

But do merchants and networks actually measure the long term gains, such as brand, goodwill? And is this measurment taken into account in the assessment of the affiliate marketing performance?

As far as I understand it (and this is based on my reading about affiliate programmes), affiliate makreting is typically measured in terms of conversions, clicks, etc. Does anyone actually include intangibles, such as brand awareness into their measurement systems? Thank you in advance.

**euraffiliates** · 19-05-11

Not really. They measure the goodwill or long term gain rather qualitatively.

But to take proactive decision they must look for long term trends of overall performance or performance of individual items in the system. This is a must-factor for success. Normally every merchant do it relying on the system made performance reports.

You can learn it in details at Performance reports in affiliate software

**Anastasia** · 23-05-11

And will it be correct to say that a lot of the metrics are detemined by the tracking platforms that affiliate networks use? In other words, do merchants rely on the metrics they are offered from the tracking platform providers, or do they themselves decide on the affiliate marketing metrics that they wish to monitor? Or are they only able to mix and match the metrics from the pool of metrics that the tracking platforms offer? Or perhaps they add their own metrics to their measurements? But if they do, that must mean extra work for merchants, is that right?

**euraffiliates** · 23-05-11

The tracking platform providers always provide the metrics that match most of the merchant. It may not match with a merchant problem 100%. They provide many metrics, it is the merchant who will finally decide what to rely and how much. So an extra analysis is always required from merchant side for right decision making.

**Anastasia** · 25-05-11

Thank you for this discussion euraffiliates! And do merchants really perform this extra analysis? Perhaps you know this from your practice? Or do they simply choose the metrics that are already made available by networks.

Would any merchants here like to share their experiences?

I find this whole topic very interesting.

**euraffiliates** · 25-05-11

No, not all merchants do it. Most merchants do not feel its need. Normally they fail. Many want but sometimes their affiliate softwares do not help them with proper performance reports to start with the process. In many cases the performance audit sees a premature death if the merchant affiliate software tools are not enough flexible to take proper call-to-action decisions. To make a successful performance audit, it requires an efficient merchant-affiliate communication, and then make proper adjustments linking options and/or software setting and/or commission setting for an affiliate or a group of affiliate or for all affiliates.