In 2019, we’ve seen affiliate marketing and partnerships grow rapidly across Europe, with more and more brands increasing their investment in these channels. As the partnership space broadens to include a more diverse set of partners and partner types, so has the ability for programs to deliver against a broader set of KPIs becomes stronger. 

The pay-for-performance model is proven to deliver outstanding ROI, be a viable source of customer acquisition, and drive higher lifetime customer value. As adoption spreads further across Europe, here are five approaches that can help drive continued strong growth in 2020. 

1. Expand content partnerships 

The depth and breadth of partnerships are growing at breakneck speed. Brands are experimenting more to find the optimal blend of not just partners, but partner types. In Europe, the affiliate space is growing with traditional participants like cashback and coupons and has now grown to include influencers and content publishers. Consumption of content is on the rise in part because mobile is increasing total connected time. Consider that in the UK, for example, mobile devices now account for 78% of all adult online minutes, and further, content umbrellas such as BBC and News UK sites fall in the top 10 properties for digital reach.

These numbers are for the UK, but the same trend can be seen across Europe. Brands will see continued growth in the opportunity to partner with premium content publishers to meet consumers in various stages of the buyer funnel. Integrating with content that is relevant to a specific audience can be rolled into a more strategic partnership mix. Use content for awareness and consideration, whilst keeping those cashback sites and coupon codes to seal the deal.

2. Go deep on leveraging local market expertise and shopping habits

As with expanding channel investment in any region, one of the first things you learn about partner marketing in EMEA is that you need to really understand the local market to succeed. For example, online commerce in Germany looks very different than commerce in other major world economies. 

German consumers have embraced e-commerce a little more gradually than those in leading world markets. While the German economy is more than 40% larger than Britain’s, for example, the total value of its e-commerce sales is significantly lower. That means that in Germany, e-commerce sales are just 8.8% of total retail sales, versus 16.5% for the UK. Nevertheless, most of the retail sales growth in Germany is coming from online and mobile commerce. And in the coming years, we expect the growth rates to far exceed those in more developed markets like the US. 
 
In addition, many Germans expect retailers to offer post-delivery, invoice-based payment methods, instead of focusing solely on credit or debit cards. Theirs is not a “debt culture” like North America. Allowing consumers to order now and pay later really is crucial for success.

Other regional nuances abound throughout EMEA and marketers must pursue more robust understanding across borders.

3. Commit to mobile and mobile measurement

It’s true, the digital community has been saying “mobile-first” for over 10 years. But the numbers simply don’t lie. In France, for example, mobile commerce sales were predicted to rise by 20.6% this year. In Germany, well over one-third of e-commerce sales are being made on mobile. These are just two examples; mobile usage for commerce continues to grow across Europe.

For partner marketers, a strong mobile strategy and measurement plan is mission-critical because many of the most well-known technologies for affiliate cannot, by themselves, holistically measure all partner-based revenue that passes through the mobile web and mobile apps. 

Apps are of growing importance to affiliate marketing. Partly because of their value for retail app install campaigns, and partly because of the higher conversion rates that retailer apps consistently deliver versus the PC and mobile web. Ergo, comprehensive app management is essential. 

4. Emphasise transparency 

We’ve entered an era in which consumer trust has risen to the top of marketers’ priorities. The General Data Privacy Regulations (GDPR) have been in effect in the EU for the better part of two years, and other global regions are following suit with similar legislation. 

The good news for those in the partnership and affiliate space is that more brands are getting on board because the industry doesn’t track intrusively. Companies are shifting to platforms that enable the use of first-party data, server to server tracking, and full clarity for consumers as to what is happening to their data. In 2020, we expect this trend to grow exponentially as regulation increases and reliance on third-party cookies declines. The ability of partnerships to deliver on the promise of transparency is unparalleled.

5. Monitor the DTC space

Direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands have been the eCommerce darlings of the US retail world for years, but that model has seen slower adoption in Europe. But that seems to be changing, especially in the UK. 

For these emerging DTC brands, partnerships with major retailers is a way to grow awareness and develop a following. Influencers have also been the core of many DTC marketing plans. Momentum for these brands comes through word of mouth and social communities, and success relies on the ability to deliver and pay all partners on time. For these new brands, being able to scale partnerships and their businesses will hinge on automation and strategy. 

But why should you care? Well, if you work for a DTC, exploring creative partnerships will be important in 2020. And if you are not working for a DTC, it’s important to monitor these brands as they are driving significant disruptions in many categories. 

2020 promises to be another great year for the partnerships space. By considering these five concepts, you can help ensure you get more than your fair share.

The post Five Partner Marketing Trends EMEA Marketers Should Leverage in 2020 appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Partnerize​, the leading provider of partner marketing solutions for global brands has announced the renewal of its contract agreement with TSB, a leading UK retail bank with more than 5 million customers nationwide. TSB leverages the Partnerize Partner Automation Platform to manage all aspects of the formation, management, optimization and payment across its large network of affiliate and other revenue partnerships.
 
TSB has leveraged the Partnerize Partner Automation Platform since early 2018 when the bank took the decision to take control of this activity by migrating its business away from its previous affiliate network. TSB is embracing the in-house partnership model in order to drive extraordinary business success. By leveraging the breadth and depth of real-time data available from the Partnerize platform, the company has accelerated growth across its partnerships channel while also improving insights into its customers.
 
“We’re delighted to announce the renewal of our relationship,” said Tony May, Digital Partnerships Manager for TSB. “As we look to scale our partner marketing channel, Partnerize offers us the perfect infrastructure to manage the day-to-day elements of our programme in-house, such as setting dynamic commission rates, reporting on performance in real-time and paying our partners quickly. Partnerize have also demonstrated that they are dedicated to releasing state-of-the-art product updates such as the ‘Intelligent Partner Discovery’ tool, which will help us in achieving our corporate goals of driving more valuable customers whilst diversifying our partner mix.”
 
Sean Sewell, Partnerize cofounder and VP-Revenue for EMEA, added: “We are incredibly proud to be continuing our relationship with TSB and its outstanding team. TSB is a real leader in maximizing the business potential of partnerships. We look forward to many years of working together to apply the power of partnership across the bank’s growth objectives.
 
Partnerize is the leader in partnership automation. The AI-powered Partnerize Partner Automation Platform delivers data-driven intelligence and industry-leading management tools that are essential for materially improving ROI from this fast-growing sales channel. The world’s leading companies, including 63 top retailers, 11 international airlines, 9 of the largest telecoms, and more than 200 other global brands rely on Partnerize to drive and manage more than $6B in partner sales and $500M in partner payments every year.  For more information on how Partnerize can grow your partnerships and business, please visit the website. 

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For brands to get the best results from partner marketing, they need rich insight into which publishers are driving high-quality traffic and conversions. Today (August 12), Partnerize and Skimlinks announce an enhanced integration to provide those insights about the thousands of publishers that use Skimlinks to deliver e-commerce content and offers. The new integration brings full transparency into which publishers drive visits and sales to brand campaigns. 

60,000 publishers – including over 54% of the top 100 US and UK publishers – leverage Skimlinks to drive revenue through their content. For the more than 300 leading global brands that rely on Partnerize to drive and measure partner sales, this new integration means dramatically enhanced data access down to the publisher level. 

Insights-driven partner marketing initiatives are transforming the industry. As brands place increasing pressure on partner leaders to drive even more revenue and profit for their organisations, growth leaders are adopting a more scientific approach to developing, fielding and optimising partner programs. 

Instead of “set-it-and-forget-it” programs, brands and their agencies increasingly take a very active role in proactively managing their efforts in the channel. By better understanding the publisher types and individual publishers that deliver best for their programs, Partnerize clients can now make better campaign decisions using the richest possible insights. 

“For Partnerize, the integration helps the company deliver even more of the data-driven insights that help clients grow faster,” said Partnerize co-founder and CEO Mal Cowley.

“Everyone wins when clients have more of the relevant data they need to analyse and optimise their programs. Full visibility into the Skimlinks universe helps deliver that mission-critical information and insight.” he continued.

“From the beginning, our mission at Skimlinks has been to support growing and seamless relationships between brands and publishers,” added Skimlinks CEO Sebastien Blanc; “This powerful new integration helps us better fulfil that mission for some of the largest and most innovative businesses in the world.”

Many of the world’s leading companies, including 63 top retailers, 11 international airlines, eight of the largest telecoms, and more than 200 other global brands rely on Partnerize to drive and manage more than $6B in partner sales and $500M in partner payments every year.

The post Partnerize and Skimlinks Offer Enhanced Publisher Insights to Shared Clients appeared first on PerformanceIN.

When the PerformanceIN 50 gets published each year, there is always such a remarkable range of leadership qualities on display in the profiles. We are fortunate that we have strong leaders in this industry, especially as every aspect of the consumer journey is reshaped by a changing media environment. A few years ago, consulting firm Russell Reynolds produced a study of what makes an extraordinary chief marketing officer. When I first read it, I was struck by how the essential skills and traits that are so valuable in a marketing head jibe are exactly the winning traits for an affiliate and partner marketer. 

I have since made that assertion in face-to-face meetings with senior executives at leading brands. Many look back at me perplexed. Puzzled because CMOs must be generalists, whereas partner and affiliate marketers have historically been viewed as highly skilled but narrow specialists – people working in a discipline vital to the success of, by poorly understood by the larger organisation.

It’s undeniable that partner marketers have specialised knowledge. You cannot just be dropped into this world and expect to succeed in it, especially in today’s competitive landscape. But thinking about affiliate and partner marketers solely as specialists do a disservice to the transferable qualities that make them so well suited to the C-suite. Here are a few of the qualities that Russell Reynolds identified as essential – I’m sure they resonate with anyone reading this.

Innovation

Imaginative /abstract thinking styles / generators of imaginative solutions

Spend 10 minutes in partnership, and you quickly realise that this is anything but a place for cookie-cutter thinkers. Affiliate and partner leaders must constantly explore new ideas and approaches to drive outstanding business results. We are long past the set-it-and-forget-it phase of this industry.

In new partner recruitment, formulation of innovative commissioning and reward programs, even in the use of data for better decision-making, partner marketers must continuously test the boundaries of what’s possible. As consumer behaviours change, so too must effective engagement strategies. 

The partnerships arena is constantly at the forefront of technologies and platforms like mobile, geo-location, and customer relationship management. Yes, of course, there are some “gimme” approaches at work in the industry. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to deliver a big value coupon. But those who think this is a deep-discounts-only world need to meet us here in 2019. 

Pioneering

Persistent / Decisive / Action-Oriented / Open to New Ideas

Once again, these are core affiliate leader traits. Partner marketers know that the only way to grow is to continuously experiment. Today’s bread and butter tactics may lose effectiveness overnight – we must constantly prepare for what’s next. Further, persistence is part of every partner marketer’s DNA as they explain for the 18th time that yes, partnership is profitable, brand-enhancing, and incremental. And that we have data to prove it. 

Openness to ideas is at the heart of any successful business relationship. The best partner and affiliate marketers collaborate directly with their largest partners to identify new ways to improve conversion rates, revenue, and profit. At the same time, partner marketers must demonstrate fearlessness as they stretch the boundaries of technology and customer interactions to identify new sources of growth. 

Socially engaged

Outgoing / Able to Adapt to Different Audiences / Seek to Understand Others

Good social awareness – or emotional intelligence – is at the core of success in partnership. Affiliate and partnership leaders have so many stakeholders to juggle, so many people to persuade, and so many different perspectives to internalise and address seamlessly. 

A partner marketer’s morning may begin with a finance team meeting, move on to collaboration with the brand team, then a QBR with a top 5 partner, and end with responding to feedback from social influencers. That takes social dexterity, a big dose of diplomacy, and a passion for working successfully with others. 

Active and productive

Unconventional / Initiative Takers / Not Beholden to Structures

Partnership rarely gets all the resources it deserves, given its astounding contribution to company revenue and profit. Historically, brands treated it as a quirky channel one-step-removed from the mainstream. When things like budget and tech resources get doled out, partner marketers often find that they need to figure out a way around barriers and bureaucracy. 

Further, partner marketers that wait for process to move in their favour often find themselves waiting forever. The channel has often been so successful because its leaders run counter to brand and business conventions. Fortified with the certainty that there is a better way. 

Influential

Persuasive / Inclusive / Bold / Lead from the Front

Once again, it’s difficult to see the words listed above and NOT think of partner leaders immediately. People who must fight and scrap for resources, who must work with others without being limited by others, who jump in head-first and start delivering results. Affiliate and the larger world of partnerships aren’t suited to wallflowers. 

Partnership hasn’t always been the first place companies look when they are scouting for their next generation of leaders. But I’m guessing that is changing as more people recognise that great partner leaders are exactly the innovative business-builders that companies need running all of marketing. Perhaps this is true more than ever today, as we hear more about CMO role being given a broader purview and, at some major companies, morphing into titles like “Chief Growth Officer” and “Chief Brand Officer.” 

Nominations for the PerformanceIN 50 close today at midnight July 25. Submit your nominee here.

The post PerformanceIN 50: How Partnership Provides The Best Training for Future CMOs appeared first on PerformanceIN.

2018 has been a landmark year in the partner marketing space as we’ve seen more brands expanding their activities beyond the affiliate space and move into growing areas like influencer marketing and bespoke brand-to-brand engagements. As partnerships continue to represent a broader and more robust category within marketing departments, we’re also seeing the space take on a necessary level of maturity. That’s a trend that’s going to define partner marketing throughout 2019, and one with significant implications for both partner marketing specialists and company executives alike.

Here are five areas we expect to see significant progress in the coming year.  

Mobile measurement will get broad adoption

As we rapidly transition from a digital-first to a mobile-first world, marketers have recognised the importance of attribution models that properly account for mobile channels – thank goodness. Considering that eMarketer expects mobile ad spend to surpass all traditional channels by 2020, any understanding of marketing ROI simply isn’t complete if it doesn’t integrate mobile touchpoints for a more complete understanding of the customer journey.

Marketers have been slower, however, to expand this mobile attribution discipline into their partnership programme and that’s about to change. With a majority of company executives now reporting that partnerships account for more than 20% of revenue, and with an increasing amount of those partner interactions moving into the mobile space, this blind spot will finally come into view in 2019. This visibility will include not only interactions on the mobile web but also in the apps where consumers are spending a growing portion of their time.

On a related note, over the coming year we’re also going to see most marketers finally seek alternatives to third-party cookie-based tracking methods for partnership performance. Credit Safari’s ITP2 for the “sudden” interest.

Partnership data will get integrated in the stack

Another growing trend within the partner marketing space is that more brands are integrating campaign results and data and are becoming more deeply integrated into the marketing stack. This enhanced focus on incorporating partner data into a brand’s broader data and insights strategy represents a notable shift in mindset among marketing executives, who have long thought of affiliate and partner transactions as being important but often separate endeavors from their own branding and performance-driven initiatives.

Increasingly, as brand marketers look to take more ownership over their customer relationships, they’re recognising that partnerships serve as a valuable source of first-party data that can be used to deepen their consumer profiles and enhance cross-channel communications.

Holistic customer journey will take center stage

A deepening integration of partnership data into the tech stack will also prompt a new imperative for marketers to go further with the metrics they capture from their affiliate and other relationships. Going into 2019, marketers will track more data points than ever, going beyond conversions and dollars to include information around what’s being purchased and the broader customer journey on the way to purchase. These are vital inputs for brands looking to implement complete multi-touch attribution strategies. Furthermore, the insights garnered from these new data inputs will enable brands to better refine and their partnerships for improved performance.

Partnerships gain executive attention

Affiliate and partner marketing programmes have always fallen under the purview of senior marketing executives but their execution and management have often been siloed and relatively autonomous from the broader marketing organisation. However, with the growing revenue contributions of affiliate and partner programme, senior marketing executives in 2019 and beyond will give more direct attention to the channel as it continues to encompass more strategic and bespoke collaborations.

Brand-to-brand activity will heat up

Part of the increase in executive attention being paid to partnerships emanates from the growing prevalence of creative and custom brand-to-brand engagements being formed across a wide array of verticals. As many brands are discovering, the secret to success is in aligning with brands whose customer bases have interests and passions similar to their own, while offering products and services in a distinct but complementary area. Sometimes something as simple as a passion for a casual beach lifestyle can be enough to unite two brands, as evidenced in the recent alliance between Hawaiian Airlines and SurfStitch.

The partnership channel is poised for continued robust growth in 2019, and with this growth will come a necessary deepening in sophistication. The above five trends need to be at the forefront of executives and partner marketers minds as they chart their course for the coming year.

The post Partnerize’s Five Partner Marketing Predictions for 2019 appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Retailers who are just now starting to turn their attention to holiday planning might feel like they’re already behind the eight ball. The common observation that the holidays seem to start earlier every year isn’t just a casual conversation-starter. It’s become an observable fact—and it’s rapidly changing how people shop. If brands want to reach shoppers throughout the entirety of their holiday shopping cycle, now is the time to be forging the partnerships that can deliver much-needed sales boosts during this critical time of year. 

In developing partnerships for the holiday season, retailers need to keep in mind the dramatic shifts seen in consumer shopping behaviour over the past few years. Let’s take a look at a few of these trends, and how marketers can leverage partnerships to respond to current consumer desires and demands in the holiday shopping season.

The shopping season Is expanding in both directions

In 2018, the holiday shopping season will start earlier and run later than ever before. Last year, major retailers didn’t wait for Black Friday to start their holiday promotions. Rather, they kicked things off in early November. Shoppers took notice and adjusted their own shopping schedules accordingly. We can expect this trend to continue this year, and shoppers are going to start looking for promotions as early as October. 

Once upon a time, Black Friday was the pivotal holiday shopping event across the retail sector, but that’s changed in relatively short order. While Black Friday is not to be ignored, Cyber Monday has usurped it as the biggest shopping day of the year. Meanwhile, the holiday season doesn’t stop at Christmas. In fact, the day after Christmas is the fourth biggest shopping day of the season, and that increased activity carries on well into the new year. That week between Christmas and New Year’s (also known as Cyber Week II) just might be the most under-tapped opportunity for retailers. 

Marketers looking to fully capitalize on this extended season should work with their partners, whether affiliate or strategic, to schedule promotions to the optimal times to reach their specific shopper segments. 

Mobile’s role has increased

Last year, a third of all holiday purchases were made on smartphones. You can bet that figure is only going up. As shoppers get more comfortable with making mobile purchases, including through social apps, marketers should think about how to make mobile device transactions a source of competitive advantage. For example, work closely with partners that are able to deliver offers and promotions while shoppers are researching gifts or comparing prices. Even better, a partner who can offer in-store deals and promo codes will facilitate the seamless integration of online and offline experiences that shoppers crave. It’s all about catching that holiday shopper at the right point and converting a browser to a buyer.

In some cases, partnerships can help retailers overcome deficiencies in their own m-commerce experiences. By forming partnerships with apps that shoppers can’t live without, retailers can bridge that gap. Great offers and digital merchandising can dramatically boost conversion rates. In addition, marketers should look to ensure their methods of measurement and attribution for partnerships can accurately track and report on any mobile contribution to conversion. 

Influencers increasingly shaping holiday purchases

Ever been stumped on what gift to buy for a certain individual? Of course, you have. In this common situation, shoppers are grateful for recommendations and gift ideas from the social influencers and bloggers that they know and trust. 

Brands should look to partner with those influencers who have the right audience, while also remaining authentic. It is important to give those partners the assets and promotions needed to make the engagement a success. According to Media Group Online, 19% of consumers surveyed said social media was “very influential” or “extremely influential” on their 2017 holiday purchases. Facebook (56%) and Pinterest (25%) are the social media sites that consumers primarily consulted for holiday gift ideas.

Data can help marketers pivot faster

Because the holiday season is longer than ever, it’s even more vital that retailers avoid a “set it and forget it” mindset. Constant tracking, measuring and optimizing of campaigns — including those being run with partners — is more important than ever. 

Marketers must equip themselves with the tools needed for accurate, real-time conversion tracking, and they must ensure they understand the full path to purchase around their holiday promotions. Share information with your partners and affiliates throughout your campaigns with them to ensure they have the information needed to adjust on their end. 

Brand-to-brand partnerships are hotter than ever

Finally, retailers should get creative this holiday season when it comes to the scope of their partnerships. Traditional affiliate relationships are extremely valuable in driving holiday sales, but so too are strategic brand-to-brand alliances. 

For the holidays, take time to consider the hot gift categories likely to appeal to your target consumer, and look to align your company with complementary brands for clever cross-promotions. For example, if you represent a travel brand, take a look at luxury brands and how joint promotions could prove mutually beneficial. You might be surprised to learn how many brands out there are eager to partner around a good idea. 

Above all, as you prepare your holiday campaigns, keep in mind that the new customers you reach this season have the potential to become lifelong brand loyalists. By investing in the creation of custom, mutually beneficial partnerships, you’ll be well positioned to convert one-off holiday purchases to meaningful long-term customer relationships. 

The post Shopping Season: How Partnerships Can Boost Holiday Sales appeared first on PerformanceIN.

If your brand has been doing performance partnerships for awhile, take a few moments now to walk through this program health questionnaire to see if your program is where it needs to be.

1. How’s your program growing?

Your program’s growth rate is probably the most important assessment you can make. There’s no magic growth percentage that can be used by a company to determine how it stacks up; every company’s partner marketing growth rate is a little different because of its unique business opportunities. But this little rule of thumb may be helpful: For many companies, partner marketing is among the fastest growing business channels. Given that, I tell people to examine their partner growth rate against the overall growth of the business as a whole. If you don’t like what you see, it probably makes sense to reexamine your strategy and business practices.

2. Is your program mobilised?

Mobile now accounts for the vast majority of connected consumer time, but many companies don’t have a true cross-device, cross-channel measurement solution to track and pay commission on purchases made across devices and channels. If you aren’t counting mobile completely, you’re missing out on a lot of sales. Can your tracking solution track sales where the journey goes from app to app or web to app? Can you deliver tracking with deeplinking? Many partner programs do not currently track transactions with these journeys, so their marketing teams miss credit for significant numbers of sales. With cross-device measurement, you need to ensure that you are counting sales from customer journeys that involve both web and apps. The app part there is the tricky bit, but it’s critical. After all, the people who have downloaded your app are almost always your most loyal and committed customers. If you aren’t already mobile-equipped, it’s time to get a complete measurement solution in place.

3. Are your compensation models aligned to your objectives?

What are you and your team measured on? Total revenue? Customer acquisition? Share of requirements? Average revenue per user? Are your partner compensation models aligned to how you and your program are ultimately measured? Many partner programs have very simple partner compensation models — often a percentage of sales. There’s nothing wrong with increased revenue, of course, but if you are investing company resources into the affiliate and partner sectors, it makes sense to ensure that your commission structures are pulling in the same direction. We’re seeing more and more brands driving better alignment with more sophisticated commission models like compensating based on customer lifetime value. This kind of sync can make a big difference in your success.

4. Are you using data to customise and personalise messaging for better results?

Fifteen years ago, lots of affiliate programs offered partners only a tiny number of generic creative units. One message fits all. But no longer. Now, the most successful brands are using signals like customer browsing and search data to tailor dynamic messages and grow response rates. This trend got its start in the travel sector, where it was quickly shown that ads that mentioned desired destinations convert much better than general messaging. Now that same concept is powering superior results for retail, finance, subscription services and more. Take a few minutes to consider how it could make a difference for your results.

5. Are your program results and customer insights integrated into your company’s attribution and analytics?

For many companies, partner and affiliate are managed separately from other channels, even while those same businesses have made great strides integrating data from other channels into a single customer view. Part of the reason is that, traditionally, affiliate didn’t capture very many data points. But today, brands have the opportunity to collect rich real-time insights about every step or action taken in the partner-driven customer journey. I know of a number of companies that are now porting partner data into their data lakes, home-grown and purchased attribution toolsets, and business intelligence tools. Not only does this enrich customer understanding, but it also ensures that partnerships are recognised for the enormous business value they drive. Make the commitment to integrating data and insights to ensure partnerships get their rightful seat at the marketing table.

6. Are you preparing for a post-pixel-tracking world?

Most partner and affiliate programs still rely on pixels for tracking and measurement. Over time, most industry experts expect that this tracking method will face new challenges as the browsers and digital giants try to exercise control over the information that brands can collect. A growing number of leading brands are taking steps to move away from pixel tracking and toward direct, API-based measurement. With a small investment of tech resources, you can replace pixels with something that works a lot better, especially in mobile, and simultaneously mitigate any potential future risks at a stroke.

Partner marketing drives such a strong portion of revenue for many companies that it makes sense to reexamine your programs to make sure you are driving maximum revenue. These six questions are a great starting point for a simple program check-up — much like an annual physical. After all, the health of your brand depends on the condition of every system that drives it.

The post Six Health Checkups for Your Partner Marketing appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Affiliate marketing is an incredibly powerful and efficient marketing channel for driving incremental sales. Like any sales channel, getting the most from affiliate marketing requires a continued commitment to learn from your customers, test new programmes, and leverage data to determine the best ways to optimise results.

Years ago, we used to talk about avoiding the “affiliate marketing plateau” – in which a period of initial sales growth levelled off and even started to slip over time. This pattern was particularly common for brands that had a “set-it-and-forget-it” approach to partnership. They’d create an initially successful programme and then expect it to continue to grow for months or years. Many such brands learned the hard way that, as with any kind of marketing, partnerships require continued commitment in order to be successful.

If you’re looking for ways to drive extraordinary growth for your existing affiliate marketing programmes, here are five tips to drive better results.

1.  Constantly reassess the compensation model

Successful partnerships are about having great revenue agreements that satisfy advertisers and partners alike. Most companies engage in some initial research and modelling to create their commission and bounty programmes. But what worked last year may not be the right thing for today.

Brands must constantly assess how well their partners are doing with an existing compensation structure. They must also stay abreast of new programmes and competitive programme changes that may make their affiliate programmes more or less appealing. By staying vigilant, you can ensure that partners continue to back your programme and drive new sales. Also, be sure to keep track of how quickly your clients are being paid for their work. Slow paying is one of the surest ways to get partners to drop your programmes.

2.  Work hard to stay top of mind

The best partners are constantly being solicited to join new affiliate programmes. Often, partners that accept a new programme have only so much real estate and attention to devote. So, they de-emphasise or cut programmes that aren’t growing or innovating. By cultivating direct personal relationships with your largest partners, and using technology to help you communicate with the “long-tail” partners, you can keep interest in your programmes strong. Further, generate excitement and interest by creating special promotions, power periods, custom programmes, and other merchandising programmes that will rekindle partner investment and passion.

3. Put your data to work

More and more advertisers are learning that by analysing and sharing some of their programme data with their largest partners, they identify actionable insights to improve results. Perhaps the best example of this is when travel brands share metadata from consumer searches with partners so that these companies can deliver dynamic creative that drives higher response rates. For example, a user who has searched for flights to Hawaii is more likely to respond to Hawaii-specific hotel offers than general category offers.

4. Think real-time

Many affiliate marketers rely on weekly and monthly reports from their networks. While that means that programme management is easier, it also means that they may learn about trends and developments quite late. The best time to respond to positive or negative performance changes is in real-time, right when they are happening. Time is money. For example, our company is now using AI to identify data anomalies and send immediate alerts to clients and their partners. Changes in performance that are greater than the expected “data noise” we see in all marketing programmes are quickly brought to everyone’s attention.

Such alerts can help brands quickly recognise tagging errors, see and respond to dramatic changes in sales performance, and communicate with partners to get changes eliminated quickly.

5. Keep your partners close and your best partners closer

Affiliate marketing is a relationship-driven business. Companies get behind the people and programmes they know and trust best. Find ways to get feedback from all partners, so you can identify issues and opportunities that can help drive future growth. Survey your partners and respond to their challenges.

And your largest partners warrant direct, personal attention to identify new opportunities and help them get maximum sales for you. Listen to the needs, respond to issues quickly, and you will find that your sales can continue to climb.

The post How to Avoid a Set-It-and-Forget-It Mindset with Your Affiliate Programmes appeared first on PerformanceIN.

A few days back in Amsterdam, I attended the annual PMI Europe conference. One of the first sessions of the conference started with – “Should Brands Offer 0% commission for Existing Customers?”.

Chris Johnson from VoucherCloud led the discussion with a room full of traditional networks, agencies and publishers. It was an evenly contributed debate with strong concern (not surprisingly) from publishers – nervous that it could become an industry-wide habit and frustration with the lack of underlying data and reasoning as to why brands are doing this (outside of budget cutting). 

Advertisers are increasingly lowering their commission offering, sometimes to 0% on existing customers. The tactic does seem to be picking up pace within the industry especially in the retail vertical, where repeat purchases occur within a shorter timeframe than other verticals such as Telco or travel.  

So, why would a brand want to do this? Judging by publishers’ views from the PMI talk, the tactic tarnishes relationships with publishers and can make the brand less competitive in the space. One example and plausible challenge I heard from an advertiser was that the customer would have converted anyway (i.e. the perceived value is certain types of publishers are adding little influence to the conversion path – especially partners who demonstrate repetitive bottom of the funnel positioning). 

The major flaw in this type of commissioning is of course Google. I’m sure brands do pay them, repeatedly in fact, for existing customer sales. Indeed the thought trail of “they probably would have converted anyway,” could be applied to retargeting or brand PPC for example. So, the real question is, are affiliates just easier to push around?  

For advertisers to make the right decision with their commission strategy, they must understand the real value a partner contributes in the conversion funnel. To truly understand that value, the brand and the partner need access to coherent, accurate data and the ability to conduct appropriate analysis.

If you start looking at value of partners, traditional and non traditional ones, in this light, I would recommend you ask yourself the following questions:

Are you sharing existing versus new customer splits with your partners?

You need to share this information with partners and allow them to understand how the ROI backs out and what impact changing the commission would have. Publishers cannot segment traffic that comes into their site – but you can work together and understand how you can target their customer base more efficiently. Once you’ve done this, you’re better positioned to remunerate fairly for the customers they drive.

Are your customers repeatedly going through the same affiliate or marketing partner before converting?

Often short click-to-conversion times and repeatedly being at the bottom of the funnel can drive a perception of adding little influence to the conversion process. But is it? Let’s consider the following: 

• Are AOV’s lower or higher when this partner is involved in the conversion process?
• Is this customer being targeted by the partner’s newsletter – are they playing an important role in triggering brand affinity?
• Do customers from this partner traditionally turn into repeat purchase customers versus other publishers and channels?
• How many other partners were involved in the path to conversion – was the consumer actively looking around and being influenced by your partner’s base? 

Can I change a perceived value problem into an opportunity?

How can you work with publishers to drive a higher basket value from your existing customers – stretch goals – offering a higher threshold than you would normally before a discount is triggered? Can you work with smarter optimisation tiers rather than the traditional blanketed volume-based tiers. 

It seems to me there are some very data-driven decisions being made by brands that see the impact of driving existing customers far wider than just the affiliate channel. As the new customer pond becomes smaller and smaller, there needs to be a more balanced view on the role publishers play in driving existing customers. Working together and sharing information is the best way forward for both parties. 
 

The post Should Affiliate Advertisers Pay for Existing Customers?  appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Time to review the small print in your affiliate network relationships? 

Successful ecommerce thrives on working with the best business partners that ensure you stay one step ahead of your competitors. Over the last decade things have become pretty stagnant in the affiliate channel when it comes to service provider choice. Large brands tend to review their affiliate network provider every two to three years and differentiation between service providers has become harder to see. A worrying trend has arrived driven by a lack of innovation. In order to lock in market share, contracts have been increasing and the small print surrounding notice periods has been growing.

Recently in a PerformanceIn Q&A, the CEO of a popular European network explained that their strategy is to negotiate three to five year deals with their most important clients, acknowledging they will take lower margins over the contract lifetime.

In a channel which is growing quickly, underpinned by major technological advancement, this feels short-sighted. In the area of service provider choice the performance marketing channel has got into somewhat of a rut.

So, when looking to extend or renew third party partnerships, how do you ensure that you are future proofed for the long term? How do the world’s leading brands choose the best performance marketing solutions to deliver growth? Here are some factors to consider before you commit to any service provider.

Innovations

There doesn’t seem to be a day go by in performance marketing without the release of some new technical innovation, or a different way of doing business coming to light.  No other sector offers such a myriad of specialisms all clustered beneath one umbrella – from search, to content, to mobile…. New and existing publishers are all developing creative and interesting new ways to drive growth and revenue for the brands they work with. 

Technology is increasingly being engineered using the latest database infrastructure to facilitate customer scalability and visibility. Turning big data into meaningful data in a real time environment is the CMO’s dream. Understanding the full landscape and the options available and what they really mean for your business is essential in making such an important decision.

On the flip side there is value in long-term partnerships, where your partner demonstrates the flexibility and adaptability that your business may need as the market place evolves. 

Within a technology-driven ecosystem, price will (and should) also play its part in your decision-making process. However, is this most import factor for you? What about:

• The features and benefits of your service providers technology?
• Their ability to innovate?
• Their approach to servicing your requirements, (and those of your customers)?
• Their expertise in the performance marketing sector?

I’m sure we all have stories of situations where cutting costs in the short-term has ended up costing more in the mid to long-term.  If generic reporting and tracking can deliver you the incremental growth you seek…as if it can…why hasn’t it so far?

A Broader Industry Knowledge Base

As brands continue to capture increasingly wider data sets, it seems prudent that your service provider can offer a fully scalable infrastructure, as well as offering different ways to consume and present that data. Whether that’s managed in-house, agency partner or network.  One size definitely does not fit all! 

Of course, investment in strategy and affiliate acquisition needs to be addressed and, until relatively recently, it was one of the areas where traditional networks led the market. However, this is now an area where online influence solutions such as Linkdex can help.  There is also a much broader industry knowledge base for the affiliate channel compared to just two years ago and increasingly, brands have been capturing the knowledge to manage partners in-house or through their media agencies (who can provide wider digital channel insight outside of the affiliate channel). Just look at how successful Amazon and eBay are at running their own direct partner channels.

Continuity and costs do have a value, but they’re not the only factors to consider. At a minimum we’d suggest asking at least the following technical questions, particularly if you are looking to RFP:

• How will you help me to scale?
• How will you centralise all of my performance marketing activity?
• Can you customise the experience for partners and internal stakeholders?
• Do you have an extensible rest API?
• If we want to go global how would you manage this?
• Why did your last client leave and where did they go?
• Can you track, report and analyse data in real time and how does this change with volume
• What will your solution look like in three to five years time?

The post Affiliate Network Relationships – Stuck in a Rut? appeared first on PerformanceIN.