Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are the starting point for most marketers. Certainly, it’s the most straightforward way to measure whether your program is effective. Perhaps you have other metrics you typically review, measures such as traffic levels, lead generation, email signups, and the like.
You can’t judge affiliate program health solely based on the obvious KPIs, just as you can’t measure your own health solely by the numbers on the scale.
Types of Affiliate Partners
A multichannel approach is common in affiliate programs. If your performance is dependent on just one or two publishers, it can affect your results differently than if it is spread out among many partners.
Like any unweighted investment portfolio, investing too much in certain publishers or affiliate models can be detrimental. It is important to keep your program flexible in case a partner decides to change things in a way that does not benefit you.
Make sure you have publishers, newsletters, YouTube creators and complementary businesses as partners.
Make Your Conversion Funnel as Effective as Possible
You should understand each channel’s full potential regardless of which channels you choose.
Your brand’s story may be told by people at the top of the funnel through content. It’s possible to have some mid-funnel marketing where people post reviews or unbox videos, and at the bottom of the funnel, you see how others facilitate the sale by assisting.
Even if you’re getting great returns from only bottom-funnel activities, it makes sense to include top- and mid-stage activities.
You should leverage all publisher types, all publisher models, and all stages of the funnel to keep your program healthy.
Explore opportunities for lookalikes
From an agency standpoint, if you’re having success in a certain area, you should do more of it. If for example you have a family blog affiliate that sends sales, consider recruiting more family oriented publishers, A move like this helps expand your program and brings the product in front of a larger, yet similar audience, thereby amplifying demand.
The popularity of sites fluctuates all the time. Even though those sites still exist, people are constantly evolving. They change their preferences over time. We try to protect our clients from these types of shifts. To do this, we can help our clients be everywhere their lookalike customers are.
Perform a competitor gap analysis
Keep track of your competitors affiliates. See who publishes reviews of their products, where they give interviews. Approach those sites with your proposal.
Ensure compliance with program requirements
Compliance oversight is crucial for a program’s success.
In affiliate marketing, compliance can mean two different things. When it comes to financial services, compliance means staying within the guidelines of regulatory agencies and consumer protection laws. Aside from that, it’s also ensuring the program is as clean as possible: ensuring coupon codes are correct, giving credit only for actual sales, enforcing terms and conditions, and ensuring accurate information is available.
The value of an agency comes from combining all of the above and adding confidence.
AffiliateBee can help you evaluate the health of your affiliate program and ensure sustainable success.