Plenty of merchants use affiliate marketing. It can be a great way to get your product in front of relevant consumers.
The key phrase here, however, is CAN BE. It’s not enough to be part of an affiliate program. You must actively manage your campaign. If you don’t, you won’t see an increase in sales. You’ll just be throwing time and money away on poor advertising.
If you want to learn how to run your affiliate program successfully, this is the guide for you. We’ll start by defining affiliate marketing and explaining the importance of managing your campaign. We’ll also go over different management strategies. Finally, we’ll show you how SaaS affiliate program management increases sales and makes your life easier.
What Is Affiliate Marketing?
Before diving into how you can manage your campaign properly, let’s define affiliate marketing.
Affiliate marketing is when a merchant gets affiliates to advertise on their behalf. Affiliates may promote products, encourage consumers to visit the merchant’s website, etc. This type of advertising is commission-based, meaning the merchant will pay the affiliate for each customer they bring in.
For the most part, merchants will partner with an affiliate network. The network helps connect them to brand ambassadors they can work with. The network also provides management tools (like tracking sales so that the merchant can pay their affiliates accordingly).
Why Affiliate Marketing?
As a merchant, you need to get the word out about your products. You have plenty of advertising methods to choose from. So, why should you choose affiliate marketing?
This type of advertising has many benefits. For one, it lets you successfully tap into the online market. Because more people are shopping online every year, ambassador sites help your products stick out to relevant consumers.
Other benefits of this type of advertising include:
- -It helps you stay within your budget. Before launching your campaign, you get to agree on commission prices. You’ll pay a fixed price for each conversion, sale, visitor, etc. This keeps your brand ambassadors motivated while ensuring you don’t break the bank.
- -It creates brand awareness. Selling products as a brand-new company can be tricky. Because consumers don’t know who you are, they might be hesitant to buy your products. You can fix this by getting reputable affiliates to market on your behalf. Consumers will see that you’re legit and want to try what you have to offer.
- -It capitalizes on foreign markets. Selling in foreign markets can be tricky and expensive. But, with the help of international ambassadors, they are much more accessible. These ambassadors know how to reach local consumers and show them how great your product is.
- -It improves your SEO. Improved SEO isn’t necessarily the goal of affiliate marketing, but it is a nice side effect. Affiliates will inevitably use lots of backlinks, share pages on social media, etc. Search engines will
The Importance of Having a Good Management Strategy
As you can see, there are many benefits to affiliate marketing. But, you will only reap the rewards if you properly execute your campaign with a good management strategy in place.
I’m Part of a Network—Isn’t That Enough?
Many merchants think that joining an affiliate network is enough. But, if you take away one thing from this article, it should be that simply joining a network is not a management strategy.
You should think of an affiliate network as a tool. It gives you access to potential brand ambassadors. It tracks conversions and sales that ambassadors bring in. It provides payment process options.
However, an affiliate network will not do the work for you. It won’t help you choose the best ambassadors for your brand or give suggestions for improving your campaign. Some networks offer these services at an additional cost. But, generally speaking, a standard network contract does not include these services.
So, if you join a network and neglect to manage it, you can’t fault the network for not seeing results. You’ll only have yourself to blame.
What Management Strategies Are There?
If you have an affiliate marketing program, there’s no doubt that you need a management strategy. So, how do you go about implementing one?
There are three types of management strategies merchants tend to use. Below, we go over each one:
1) Doing It In-House
Many merchants choose to manage their programs in-house. Some designate the responsibility to an employee. Others might even take it on themselves. Regardless, you or the employee would have to learn how to:
- -Cultivate relationships with brand ambassadors
- -Track sales and manage payments
- -Monitor promotions
- -Analyze the campaign’s performance and make tweaks
Having an employee manage your campaign can be effective if you don’t have time. However, the time and cost of training still might not be worth it. You must also consider that you might be spreading yourselves too thin.
So, why not hire an in-house affiliate manager? Their sole job would be to oversee your campaigns. Merchants like this option as it puts an expert on the job. However, it can be expensive to create this position.
2) Outsourcing
Another option is to outsource management. This involves hiring a firm that specializes in managing affiliate programs. You get the same level of expertise without the cost of hiring an in-house manager.
However, you should note that outsourcing can still be relatively expensive. You also have to consider that a firm juggles multiple clients at once. This may cause the firm not to give your campaigns as much attention as they need.
3) Using a SaaS Tool
For years, hiring someone in-house or outsourcing has been the norm.
But, thanks to technology, merchants have yet another option for affiliate program management. Enter SaaS tools.
These tools essentially automate the process. They analyze data and give you suggestions for improving your program. Best of all, they tend to be much more affordable than alternative methods.
What’s the Best Tool for Affiliate Program Management?
There are several SaaS tools for affiliate marketing management available. However, we guarantee you’ll find Purply to be the best one.
What Makes Purply the Best Affiliate Program Management Tool?
Purply has everything you need to automate your affiliate management. Merchants love it because:
- –It’s easy to set up. Once you connect your affiliate program to the app, you can start viewing suggestions right away.
- -It helps you improve your campaigns. Purply will help you optimize every part of your program. Suggestions include everything from which brand ambassadors to work with and recommended commission rates to what ad copy you should use.
- –Its data-focused approach. Purply provides you with accurate suggestions thanks to its data-focused approach. It analyzes over 10,000,000 data points relevant to your brand.
- –It uses artificial intelligence. Because it uses artificial intelligence, Purply only gets more accurate the more you use it. It is constantly collecting data to improve suggestions and optimize your campaign.
- –It has a clean, easy-to-use interface. Purply could not be simpler to use. And, if you happen to run into any trouble, our friendly customer service team is eager to help.
One of the best parts about Purply is its daily briefings. Every day, we will provide you with the latest information and actionable suggestions. This makes our app one of the best ways to manage your campaigns. You’ll always be in-the-know and have concrete ways to boost your sales effectively.
How Much Does It Cost?
Seeing how powerful Purply affiliate management software is, you probably expect the tool to cost an arm and a leg. You’ll be glad to know that this isn’t the case.
For only $99 per month, you get total access to Purply. This makes the app one of the most affordable ways to manage your campaigns. And, if you get the annual plan, you’ll save even more! Sign up for a year, and the monthly payments will come out to $83 per month.
Note that Purply does not work by contracts. There are no hidden fees. And, you can cancel at any time, no questions asked.
Perhaps best of all, you can try Purply for free! All you have to do is register for your free trial. This is a great option for those new to managing affiliate campaigns. It’s also great for anyone who wants to see what our tool is all about.
If you decide Purply isn’t for you, no worries! The trial is completely risk-free. But, we bet you are going to love it just as much as our other merchants.
Have More Questions?
Too many merchants make the mistake of neglecting their affiliate marketing campaigns. This wastes time, money, and potential sales.
Take charge of your campaigns with a Saas affiliate program management tool like Purply. This tool is available at a fraction of the cost of other management methods. It uses loads of data to give you accurate suggestions for optimization.
Try Purply for free today!
