Is Your Affiliate Program Sputtering? Try These 8 Ideas to [bring it back to life].
Successful affiliate programs make it look so easy. Flip a switch and BLAMO! Hundreds of new customers and sales.
Firstly, that never happens without a ton of work and effort.
Successful affiliate marketing takes time, patience, listening, and resources (aka money). It’s like SEO but with less exciting acronyms.
But gosh dangit, you have numbers to hit this month!
Well no worries, we put together these time-tested, ready-to-go 8 awesome ideas to get some activity in your program.
And, if you need or want more help, talk to us about your affiliate program.
Make sure everything is working:
If you have noticed conversion rates are rapidly going down, and less affiliates are starting to promote you, first double-check that all pixels and transactions are firing. If not, fix that, like – yesterday! If everything is technically working, make sure your landing pages look and function well and nothing changed with a recent code push. Small changes can have adverse effects on program performance.
Run a “Bottom” Tier Promotion:
Segment the bottom 80% of your affiliates and offer a double-payout incentive for a limited time (at least 1-2 weeks). Provide at least 30 days notice, with at least 3 emails reminding your affiliates about the deets. Send an email when the promotion starts, halfway through, and when there is just a few more days left.
Run a “Top” Tier Promotion:
Segment the top 20% of your affiliates and offer a triple-payout incentive for a limited time on all incremental sales (compared to their previous month average). Provide at least 30 days notice, with at least 3 emails reminding your affiliates about the deets. Send the same emails as mentioned above.
Go After the Competition:
If your competitor has an active affiliate program, go find their top performers off network and find out what it would take to promote your offer instead. Be sure to offer a contingency plan in the event your offer doesn’t convert like the old one.
Let Affiliates Refer Affiliates:
Adding some new affiliates in your program is a great thing to leverage for future efforts. Send a competition to your base to refer new affiliates. Once their referred affiliate sends at least one valid sale, reward both with an extra incentive.
SWOT the Competition:
Nothing on the internet ever stays the same. Check out what your competition is offering for payouts and incentives – perhaps it’s substantially different or better than what you are offering. Be sure to look for things like first/last touch attribution, cookie length, payout types, and payouts themselves.
Recruit Off Network:
Roll up your sleeves, and start Googling! Find new affiliates by searching for keywords that your best affiliates are using. Don’t be afraid to go deep – like Page 5 or 6 Deep. These small blogs and sites will cumulatively create an affiliate army.
Ask One Simple Question:
You should already be in constant communication with your affiliates to remain top of mind. Send an email or give a call to affiliates and ask them – “What do you need in order to drive more sales?” You’d be amazed at the answers.
Bonus Idea:
Ok, Ok, this is a cheap shot (buuuuut you didn’t pay anything for this checklist, so we don’t feel bad). If your affiliate program is not growing at a rate that keeps you awake at night in excitement, give us a shout. We will be happy to dig in and take a look to see if there are any major red flags – and yes, offer some insights on how we can help. We are an outsourced affiliate management company after all.
