Everything you need to know about affiliate marketing for advertisers first quarter

The Complete Guide to
Affiliate Marketing & Lead
Generation for Advertisers
Setting up and running a successful Affiliate
channel from an Advertiser’s perspective, and
being the best Affiliate Manager you can be

Creator of ‘The Complete Guide to Partnership Marketing’ Book &
Udemy Course

Introduction to this course
Introduction to Affiliate Marketing
Types of Affiliate Marketing
Understanding Affiliate Tracking, Networks & Agencies
Understanding Lead Generation
How to set up an Affiliate Marketing Channel
How to run a successful Affiliate Marketing Channel
What is the best Affiliate Strategy for Advertisers
How to be the best Affiliate Manager you can be
Tips and Advice from a Professional Marketer
Contents

Introduction to this course
01

Why Affiliate Marketing for Advertisers?
Why a course on Affiliate Marketing for Advertisers – Lead-Gen, Agencies, Strategy?
• There are so many courses out there (Udemy) on how to be an affiliate, clickbank, an
Amazon affiliate and passive income via affiliation…
• But, what about the perspective of an affiliate manager at a major brand?
• What about the view of ‘the client’ or ‘the advertiser’?
• What about affiliation as one of the pillars of digital marketing and vital marketing
channel for most online business nowadays?
• It’s time a course covered this – teaching affiliate managers how to be the best they
can be and the strategies that accompany that
The industry needs to change the perception of affiliation to one of the Advertisers perspective

The most important area of digital marketing (I think)!
• If you think about digital marketing, it’s
now the most important area of any
brand’s marketing strategy…
• Affiliation therefore sits alongside PPC,
Display and Social as one of the core digital
marketing channels…if not, the most
important
• For most brands I’ve worked for, it
accounts for up to 20% of their overall
conversions
• With the influx of the newly formed
‘Influencer Marketing’, Affiliation is back at
the marketing forefront

Every major brand utilises Affiliate Marketing!

What will you get out of this course?
This is the only course (at the time of creation) focusing purely on the perspective of
the Client / Advertiser rather than the Publisher, Agency or Network
• Getting to know the affiliate landscape and the different type of affiliates
• Getting to know Lead Generation, a vital part of any affiliate marketing strategy
• How to set up an in-house affiliate channel and the tactics and implementations to
make sure it’s a successful one
• A complete round up of client-side affiliate strategy and planning what’s best for your
businesses
• Finding new affiliates and getting the most out of your existing ones
• Making sure you are the best affiliate marketing manager you can be
• And keeping an eye on the future of affiliate marketing so you’re fully prepared

Introduction to Affiliate
Marketing
02

What do most people think Affiliate Marketing is?
Many blogs, courses and forums portray affiliate marketing as an easy, passive
form of income, a rogue online technique that tricks consumers. A form of
marketing that can’t be trusted.
Fake Coupon
Codes
Clickbait
Clickbank
Easy
Commission
Amazon
Tipsters

Define Affiliate Marketing
Good-old Wikipedia
“Affiliate marketing is a type of performance-based marketing in which a business rewards one or
more affiliates for each visitor or customer brought by the affiliate's own marketing efforts.”
Refined Definition
Affiliate Marketing is a performance marketing technique where websites, otherwise known as
publishers, will promote your product or service in return for a monetary reward.

Lets clarify some interchangeable terms
AdvertiserPublisher
Client-side
Network Agency-side
This course focuses on the perspective of the client and the decisions of the
advertiser

Then what is Client-Side Affiliate Marketing?
If you work for an advertiser you are considered to be working on the client-side.
This is a term agencies use to describe their affiliate marketing counterparts at the
client. Individuals who work at a agency are considered agency-side.
Affiliate
Marketing
Managers
Affiliate
Marketing
Channel
Decision
Makers
The Advertiser
CommercialsNot the
Agency or
Network

Advertisers & Publishers
Advertisers Publishers
PokerStars
Amazon Prime
Samsung
Marks and Spencer
Booking.com
Audi
Thisismoney
Moneysavingexpert
Confused.com
Skyscanner
Freebets.com
Quidco
Bet365

There is also Agency & Network-Side Affiliate Marketing
As described, the alternative to Client-side is Agency or Network side. Those
individuals working in affiliate marketing but from the perspective of the agency /
network.
Account
Managers
Works at
agency or
network
Awin
View of agency

Networks & Agency In-House
TradeDoubler
Commission JunctionAwin
Affiliate Future
R.O.Eye
Monetise
AffiliateTraction
Cake
Impact Radius
Performance HorizonOMG
Webgains
Has Offers
Networks, Agencies, In-House
Google Analytics
Doubleclick

How it all began
From humble beginnings:
The concept of paying affiliates predates the Internet. The translation to mainstream e-commerce happened four years after the
origination of the internet.
In November 1994, CDNOW had the idea that music-oriented websites could review or list albums on their pages that their visitors
might be interested in purchasing. These websites offer a link that would take visitors directly to CDNOW to purchase the albums and
upon doing so reward the referring websites a commission.
Amazon launched its associate program in 1996: associates could place links on
their site for books & link directly to Amazon. When visitors purchased a book,
the associate received a commission. Amazon was the first widely known
campaign & was a model for subsequent programs.

From a simple customer journey…
I’m a typical
guy. Finally
my only pair
of shoes are
destroyed, I
really need
some new
shoes!!”
“But I have
no idea what
shoe I want!
Time to surf
the net….”
“Where to look?
Google’s
showing me
some results
but I think I
need to
research this….”
“This site
seems has a
lot of useful
advice and
they are
popular on
Facebook”
“But the
shoes seem a
bit expensive
though, I’ll
see if I can
get some
money off….”
“Got a bit lucky
here, this
website is
promoting a
10% off voucher
on those shoes,
that’s it, I’m
purchasing!”
Great shoes are
bought at a
great price,
bloke is happy
& everyone
wins!!

Of clicking on a website link…
https://www.website.com/is
as?utm_source=vouchercod
es&utm_medium=affiliates
&utm_campaign=stocksand
shares&utm_content=stand
ard_vouchercodes

To a fully fledged industry…
In-house
Networks
Agencies Consultants
Hybrids

There is also Lead Generation…
More on this in a later
chapter…

Essentially though it’s just this…
It works like this… And, it lives here…

And it encompasses multiple disciplines...
Affiliates
Lead Generation
Aggregators
CPA
CPL
CPA
For every £1 spent in digital performance marketing advertisers receive an average £15 in return
Reference: IAB 2014 OPM study- Published January 2014

We have to talk about exclusive offers & discounts
As referenced in the typical user journey, a user browses the net
and sees a site with information about shoes…
In the old days information and fan sites like these were linking
to the product but found the click through rates and conversions
nothing to shout about…
As affiliates grew in size, and in some instances overtook the
sites they were linking too, they started to push their weight
around. Take Moneysavingexpert for example, with 15 million
newsletter sign ups, compared to many financial / insurance
companies they outstrip them…
So, they started to demand exclusive offers and discounts to give
to their users. From this sprung the birth of voucher and
cashback websites. While nowadays most websites request a
special offer!

FAQ of exclusive offers
What is an exclusive offer?
Exclusive Offers mean that the customer cannot get this offer anywhere else.
Who should get an exclusive offer?
An advertiser is normally happy to arrange exclusive offers but only if performance is at an acceptable level. So, for
large publishers this might happen from the offset, but for longer-tail only when they have seen enough conversions.
How long should be measured as enough activity?
Approx 6 months to 1 year of proven activity.
Why use an exclusive offer?
Special offers often increase conversion through a publisher. But, be aware it will cost and add to your CPA.
How to show an exclusive offer?
In your banner placement, as part of native content, or text ad.
Types of exclusive offers…
Discount, cashback, buy one get one free, limited time
More on this in a later chapter…

Affiliate payment models
CPC
Fixed
Revenue Share Click Floor
Hybrid
CPM

Understanding Commissions
Types of Commission
• Revenue Share – percentage of transaction or customer value.
• CPA - cost per acquisition; a one-off payment for each customer’s initial sale.
• CPC - cost per click; paying every time a customer clicks through to your website.
• Fixed Fee - a fixed price to the publisher.
• Hybrid - a combination of any of the above models.
Understanding Commissions
• Each customer a publisher is tracked via a tracking link you provide them.
• The affiliate program will record each referral and therefore commissions earned.
• The advertiser will take the results from the program and pay you once a month.
Commission example from the advertiser Bet365
What commission to pay? More on this in the Affiliate
Manager section, but the value depends on the publisher.
Sometimes a set amount will be in place on your affiliate
network, that you set. But other times you’ll want a special
rate for that publisher. The CPA point is discussed on the
next slide.

How to calculate CPA
Customer
sign’s up
Set Lifetime
Value
Makes
Purchase of
value x
LTV is
determined by
value x
What are you
willing to pay
for a
customer of
LTV x ?
Profit margin?
Payback
period?
Competitor
commisson
Set CPA or
Revenue share
range
More on this in a later chapter…

Types of Affiliate Marketing
for Advertisers
03

Affiliate Types
Incentivised traffic Non incentivised traffic
Email
Retargeting
Voucher
Cashback
Social currency
Freebie sites
Employee benefits
Loyalty
Social bloggers
Content
Comparison
Shopping channels
Display affiliates
PPC affiliatesCo-registration

Affiliates – Examples - Incentivised

Affiliates – Examples - Non incentivised

Affiliates - Examples - Finance

Affiliates - Examples - Gaming

Types of Affiliate Placement
• Banner Advertisement
• Text Link
• Dedicated Article
• Dedicated Page/Tab
• Promotional Page
• Newsletters
• Comparison
• Email
• Pop Ups
• Native
• Content

Who are they?
Publishers who pass their commission earned from a sale straight onto the consumer
How does their model work?
Examples: http://www.thesuncashback.co.uk/ http://www.quidco.com/how-it-works/
What’s their size?
Cashback sites make up 31% of performance revenue generated. http://www.quidco.com/press/fast-facts/
How do you optimise this type of site?
Be competitive within the space (exclusive CPA’s)
Maximise site exposure
Gaining trust & avoiding complaints (co-branded & additional T’s and C’s)
Peak period competitions
What’s their random fact?
Top earning customer has earned over £100,000 in cashback https://www.topcashback.co.uk/account/earnings/merchant
Considerations:
Brands have to be conscious, can create negative press
Attribution modelling
Lifetime value
Cashback

Who are they?
Similar to cashback they take the commission, turn it into points and pass the points onto the consumer
Similar to cashback although they can skim profits out of the CPA upon conversion to points
Examples:
http://www.nectar.com/NectarHome.nectar http://www.avios.com/gb/en_gb
What’s their relative size?
Second biggest incentive publisher, making up 17% of the overall performance marketing mix
Exclusives
Site exposure
Considerations:
Understand the value of the point
How big are they compared to cashback?
Brand associations
Loyalty

Who are they?
Many advertisers issue vouchers on site, voucher sites are directories for all available vouchers across the net
Many savvy shoppers will search the net looking for money off and when this happens, a voucher site is there to pick up the traffic via SEO. The
advertiser funds the voucher and the publisher takes away 100% of the commission.
Examples: http://www.vouchercodes.co.uk/ http://www.hotukdeals.com/
Voucher sites are huge. The top publishers have approx a 6-10 million database.
Exclusive vouchers- seasonal periods & personalised vouchers
Offering something different (stand out from the crowd)
Considerations:
Monitoring voucher use
Don’t de-value the brand
Mix up the offers
Not all advertisers have voucher code functionality
Voucher

Who are they?
Site which give away free stuff!
Some lead generation campaigns will be focused on free samples or free giveaways for
people to become more interested in the brand, a person registering their interest to
receive a free sample is a valid lead.
Examples: http://www.magicfreebiesuk.co.uk/ https://www.thefreesite.com/
Dependent on the campaign, as it’s niche to a campaign setting, they can only perform
well under certain campaign environments
Understand the value of the CPL
What touch points are reached after the initial free sample?
Considerations:
Don’t give away something for no reason
Freebie

Who are they?
Affiliates who specialise in banner advertising on a CPA/CPL basis.
Otherwise called…
Direct Buy campaigns
These companies have bulk banner inventory and target the best consumers on a CPM basis. They
must be able to provide enough value through the banner in order for it to a viable campaign.
Examples: https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/index.html
Understand the right CPM or CPC equivalent for your CPA
Share customer demographic information
Considerations:
Attribution
Only works with certain partners
Display

Who are they?
Aka the cowboys of affiliate marketing. PPC affiliates will hold the second position in the paid listings of search engines and will protect the brand
from competitors
Search publishers will develop a site to look very similar to the original and bid into a second position strategy. They must ensure that their CR’s and
CPC’s are balanced with the CPA being offered to give them a good ROI.
Examples: http://www.found.co.uk/
Once on a media plan, search affiliates will be the top performing
The number of media plans they are on however is somewhat limited these days.
CPC caps, Growing generics & SEO gaps (unique content)
Considerations:
“Dying media”- increases costs to PPC campaign
Are they incremental volume drivers?
PPC

Who are they?
They aggregate information into to make a more informed decision of their purchase
within finance
With simple comparison (finance), the model is CPA based on most occasions.
Examples: http://www.uswitch.com/ http://www.moneysupermarket.com/
Stand alone they are the largest affiliates in affiliate marketing. Often referred to as super
affiliates as they often work directly with the advertiser due to their size and commercial
agreements.
Lead Generation strategies
Product lead strategies
Conversion floors
Considerations:
FSA regulated
Don’t become overly reliant on aggregators
Aggregators

Who are they?
Comparison engines that specialise in specific shopping items that compare merchants by price
The only affiliate type to work on a CPC model only. This is still relatively low risk as they convert well. The model is due to the traditional way
in which they buy traffic and work against their competitors
Examples: http://uk.shopping.com http://www.kelkoo.co.uk/
Very large within the retail sector only.
Expect top ten in terms of size of a campaign.
Ensure that the feed is fully optimised
Optimise by shopping engine and allocate budgets accordingly
Considerations:
Managing the feed
Shopping Comparison

Who are they?
The most traditional affiliate, offering advice and detail of a product which is extremely useful for a
consumer when purchasing requires research.
Traditional affiliate model- CPA based.
Examples: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/ http://www.mumsnet.com/
MSE has over 13million email recipients a week
Exclusive offers and content
Good relationship
What’s their random fact?
MoneySavingExpert was owned by Martin Lewis. His site began in 2003 and got big through promotion
on TV, he sold MSE to MoneySuperMarket for over £83 million in 2011.
Considerations:
The editor is the boss
Content

Who are they?
Social Bloggers grew out of content based sites into the social landscape and have developed from there. Publishers are becoming increasingly more
aware that they can build trust and a dedicated following through social media.
Straight CPA, although some sites also offer subscription service to their users
Examples: http://terrytipster.com/ http://www.shopstyle.co.uk/ http://www.instragram.com/
Not a top affiliate but if the approach is done well, they can be a top ten affiliate in a campaign.
Offer affiliate days
PR content
Optimised feed
Considerations:
Can make or break your brand- treat them with respect
Social Bloggers / Vloggers / Influencers

Who are they?
Specific sites which hole a very specific purpose on the net
Straight CPA traditional model
Examples: http://www.studentbeans.com/
http://www.petrolprices.com/
Generally quite small, make up the long tail in most instances
Provide with up to date information on products and details
Considerations:
Limit the amount of time you spend optimising with them- generally
speaking they know best
Niche Sites

Industry Approach - Finance
Size
• 45% of online performance marketing spend by far the largest
sector for online spend
Approach
• Largely dominated by comparison sites who bid heavily on
PPC generic terms as well as having a strong brand presence.
• Some brands have moved into incentive sites but its not
widely used.
• Email and content sites can create volume when approached
correctly.
Considerations
• Specialised subject- monitored by regulators
• Competitive on price
• January & Tax Year represents the peak period

Industry Approach - Retail
Size
• Second biggest sector accounting for 20% media spend
Approach
• Cashback and voucher sites will make up the majority of sales
• Social bloggers will make up an integral part of the campaign
• Shopping channel’s revenue will largely come from this sector
Considerations
• Highly competitive on brand and promotions
• Peak period is in December with other peaks depending on
brand (school terms, valentines etc)

Industry Approach - Telecoms
Size
• Third highest spenders in online performance marketing- 10%
Approach
• PPC affiliates can be useful in competitive space
• Cashback offers are huge within the sector
• Comparison is the largest affiliate type
Considerations
• Specialised subject- monitored by regulators
• Competitive on price
• January represents the peak period

Industry Approach - Travel
Size
• 9% of online performance marketing spend
Approach
• Comparison, comparison comparison!
• Supplemented by incentive sites
Considerations
• Highly competitive on price
• Low commissions- low margins

Industry Approach - Automotive
Size
• Smallest of our sectors but one of the fastest growing for
online media spend
Approach
• Email is the bedrock of the campaign
• Content and niche sites make up a key area
• Co-registration can depend on campaign type
Considerations
• Not an online purchase- cost per lead considerations
• Huge marketing spends on generating leads

Understanding Affiliate
Tracking, Networks &
Agencies
04

What is Affiliate tracking?
When a publisher / affiliate website promotes an advertiser they place a banner or text on their site to do so.
An advertiser needs to record the impact their feature is having, how many customers click on it, come through
to your site and make a purchase, and the value of that purchase.
Multiply this by 100's of affiliate sites and an advertiser needs a robust system in place to record all results
coming from a publisher site.
https://www.website.com/isas?utm_source=vouchercodes
&utm_medium=affiliates&utm_campaign=stocksandshare
s&utm_content=standard_vouchercodes

Why is it important?
Tracking is arguably the most important element of affiliate marketing. For you the advertiser it's that link
between the advert or feature on a publisher's site and the impact it's having on your sales.
The tracking should provide everything you need to know about what customers are clicking on, of which the
more granular the better - to show what products they purchase, the value, the commission it's cost you, all
spread across 100's of affiliate sites.
You'll need tracking that doesn't fail, especially if there is a discount involved, because customers will want to
know they are tracked accordingly to receive their discount.

So how does it actually work?
Some young advertisers simply provide a UTM code, a small snippet of code added onto the end of their site
URL, which has the affiliate's name as part of it. This is then tracked via Google Analytics in it's rawist form.
Larger advertisers tend to use Doubleclick to wrap a UTM code around - this allows for greater attribution of all
your digital marketing through DCM
Other advertisers tend to use their affiliate program partner or network, such as Awin, to generate tracking
links. They input their UTM code into their system, it provides a unique link for that affiliate and this is the link
to provide to the affiliate - this allows for greater efficiency of multi affiliate tracking all through the Awin portal
Once the preferred tracking link is created it should be sent to the publisher site to place in their content or
behind an ad
Customers will then be tracked effectively by the advertiser when they click through the affiliate site - and all
results will appear on their chosen platform, whether it Google Analytics, Doubleclick or Awin
The Advertiser generates a tracking link using their in-house software or 3rd party network / agency software…
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Man management Tech - SaaS
TradeDoubler
Commission Junction
Awin
Affilinet
Affiliate Future
Tradetracker
Linkshare
Zanox
Cake
Impact Radius
Performance HorizonOMG
Webgains
Has Offers
What options are available?

In-House / Client-Side Tracking
All advertisers can utilise the most basic UTM tracking through to Google Analytics to run their affiliate program,
it works like this…
UTM’s should be used regardless of tracking approach, but viewing through GA can bring problems. It is not a
unified affiliate platform, and free version samples. So many in-house teams run their tracking via a tech provider
as shown.
https://www.udemy.com/isas?utm_source=vouche
rcodes&utm_medium=affiliates&utm_campaign=c
hristmas&utm_content=article
• utm_source=vouchercodes
• utm_medium=affiliates
• utm_campaign=christmas
• utm_content=article

Utilising a Network
What is a Network?
• Think of a network as a marketplace for affiliate
publishers and advertisers.
• They advertise publishers to advertisers, while also
advertising advertiser affiliate programs to publishers,
so they can promote their products or services.
• The network allows both parties to login and see their
stats.
• From a client-side / advertiser perspective it’s a great
way to advertise your affiliate program, attract new
publishers and analyse all your affiliate results with
one login, in one place

Networks
Publisher support
Tracking performance
Publisher recruitment
Payment managementPublisher logins
Automated reporting Link optimisations
Quality control
The role of the Network

Man
Managed
SaaS/Tech
“49% of publishers would prefer to work with the agency/advertiser directly than through a man managed network”- IAB 2012 study
“Clients can expect up to 75% in cost savings using the SaaS model”- Impact Radius research
Technology Decisions

Technology Strategy Considerations
• What are the costs involved in the technology?
• Does it show attribution modelling?
• How automated can we get? (automated
reporting & validating)
• How granular can we get? (in analysis- by the
minute, in promotion- by product type)
• What’s happening with our data?

Utilising an agency
What is an agency?
• Lets firstly mention that a network can also be an agency.
• Some networks, like Awin and OMG also offer an agency
service to their advertiser community.
• With this they tend to sell their account management and
strategic skills to help grow your affiliate program.
• Agencies will charge a commission for this, what they call an
override.
• Depending on the complexity of your affiliate program an
agency can be highly valuable to an advertiser.
• A lot of what we cover in the strategic section will include the
assistance of an agency. Whether it be from a fully-fledged
strategic plan to simply negotiating placements or recruiting
new affiliates on your behalf.

The role of the Agency – account management
Agency
Upskill & Learnings
Strategic Direction
Publisher recruitment
Payment managementTracking tech
Automated reporting Publisher Optimisations
Weekly Analysis

What an agency should provide - analysis
Funnel Reporting across the journey
Publisher performance down to
decision type
Product performance to publisher level Completely customisable raw data

Major affiliates already
integrated
Funnel tracking
integration set up
Agency team fully
trained on platform
Processes Advantages
Set up and launch
program within 3 weeks
All reporting made
within their interface
All payments made
directly through agency
What an agency should provide – processes & strategy
Strategy
Affiliate recruitment
Growth and
optimisation
Analysis and tech
advancements

Understanding Lead
Generation
05

“A lead is a person who has actively requested to be contacted by an advertiser to promote their
products or services without an associated sale.”
What is Lead Generation?
“Across the digital
landscape, £1 of
investment in lead gen
creates £8 ROI…”
““Lead gen in the Auto
vertical made up over
£8m of total media
spend in 2012…”
“Since 2008, lead
generation as an industry
has grown almost 250% in
size.”

Lead Generation Publisher Types
Types of Lead Generation % of total revenue
Email
Content & Blogs
Co-registration
Display Networks
40%
12%
20%
12%
Other – Hotkey, Freebie
16%

Email
Who are they?
Email publishers specialise in optimising email sends
Work to an ECPM, they must be able to yield a profit from
the CR% and CPA in order for it to be viable. This is why for
the most part publishers work to a CPL basis in
performance media.
Within lead generation they are by far the largest
publishers.
Considerations:
Must fully comply to the IAB standards and regulations
Avoid spam, avoid complaints
Opt out functionality
Use first party data- avoid the spider’s web!

The why and how of Email Lead Gen
Reach vast amounts of potential customers with a direct
marketing campaign that puts your brand at the front of their
minds.
• Targeting: Define the type of leads you want and work with
the partners to source the right audience
• Design: Strong call to action and imagery is best. Capture and
retain the viewers attention.
• Opt-out is key: the lead should be able to unsubscribe from
any further marketing communications at any time he or she.
• Lead lifecycle: You can populate emails with customer
reviews to keep customers engaged with ‘top-rated’ or ‘deal
of the week’ product emails. Get more value from your leads.

The best and worst of Email creative
Clear call to action
Unclear call
to action
Hi Res Images
Small unclear
images
“What Car?”
headline clear
and standout Headline does
not standout
Large spaces
dedicated to
small print
Straight to the
point editorial
Good Creative Example
Refresh creative
regularly
Small unclear
text
Not-So Good Creative Example

AB Testing in Email Lead Gen
Creating True
Learnings
Challenger
Templates
Brand vs Product
Text vs Visual
Aspiration vs
Logic

Co-Registration
Who are they?
Someone registers an interest in various brands whilst at the same time entering competitions to win prizes
Consumers have to enter their basic details and confirm that they’d be happy to be marketed to by the brands of
their choice. Upon completion of this action, it’s counted as a valid lead.
Examples:
http://topfox.co.uk/
http://www.myoffers.co.uk/
Within the lead generation sector Co-reg make up a
sizeable area of activity. Second only to email.
Considerations:
Quality? How does it back out to a CPA?
When to use them?
Who are their consumers?

The why and how of Co-Registration Lead Gen
• Volume: High levels visitors and repeat visitors who
are interested in offers
• Customer type: Pushing FMCG’s through co-reg
makes sense due to customer alignment
• Times of use: If you want to increase customer
database and quickly this is a good method. Free
samples and competition entries also work very
well in this sector
• Cost: Usually very cheap to run- in the pennies per
lead. Make sure that number of fields capturing is
small as to drive volumes and quickly.

Content
Who are they?
The most traditional affiliate, offering advice and detail of a
product which is extremely useful for a consumer when
purchasing requires research.
Traditional affiliate model- CPA based but some do work to
CPL
Examples: http://www.carkeys.co.uk/
MSE has 13million email recipients per week
Considerations:
The editor is the boss
How many content affiliates are useful from a conversion
point of view?
They are very niche within lead generation

The why and how of Content Lead Gen
Leverage the rational and emotional element of purchasing
a car by putting your best foot forward and existing in a
space where users feel they are getting impartial advice
• Trust: High levels of trust due to specialist nature of the
partner
• Repeated visits: Customers tend to frequent these sites
repeatedly due to communal aspect
• Key info: More opportunity to place key information
on-site that could not necessarily feature in emails
• Content flexibility: Place video content on-site and
drive engagement in a multitude of ways
• Pull: The user is attracted to the product because their
interest level

Industries
AutomobileFinance
Travel
Longer consideration products are where most lead generation campaigns are
found
Luxury

GDPR
2018 Data Protection
European Legislation
The 2018 European legislation of protecting individuals data is called GDPR.
This introduction is why you see so many ‘do you accept advertiser cookies’
notifications whenever you first enter a website. The USA is lucky and yet to
have this rule introduced.
What it means is that users should have the option to not have their cookies
tracked when visiting their website. Although this has repercussions more-so
across digital marketing and online display, it also effects Lead Generation.
As well as 3rd party cookie protection and it makes legislation tighter for
companies to share customer data between each other. In the case of Lead
Gen, that feedback loop where email addresses or other significant unique
identifies are sent back to the advertiser has become more stringent.
Publishers need to make it fully explicit where their data will be used and who
it will be passed to, and consent in doing so. Although it is a simple tick box
selection when they share their email address, it still creates an additional
barrier for Lead Gen publishers and has effected the channel as a whole.

Lead Gen – Tactics & Techniques
Techniques Utilisation of technique
Competitions
Surveys
Email Capture
Gather leads through prize giveaways
Ask for feedback and feed back into lifecycle
Each publisher should have a unique phone number
Create a buzz / viral to sign up to
Offer something of value / learning
Phone
Social Media
Downloadable

Lead Gen – Campaign Planning
Enquiry
Form
Data
Centre
Lead Gen Sources
Validation
Real Time Conversion
Feedback
There are also 3 considerations to look at when planning a lead gen campaign:
1. What metrics to use?
• Completion of an enquiry form
• Drive to a call centre
• Drive traffic through to a sign up page.
• Valid lead upon download
Depending on the value of completion depends on the pay out of a lead, it may also be
best to pay out by supplier depending on the quality of lead being produced
2. Ensuring Quality of Leads?
• Technology
• Double opt ins
• Publisher types
• Increase number of fields
3. Accessing Data?
• Once validation has been completed this then gets provided to the advertiser and
affiliates in real time to ensure that real time optimisations can occur:
• A tiered CPL structure can be built from this

Lead Gen – Campaign Success
Understanding KPIs
• Volume: what benchmarks need to be
reached?
• Quality: how is quality measured? What is
deemed a quality lead?
• Balancing Quality & Volume: understanding
how important each factor is and how to
balance the two appropriately when setting
goals
Understanding the role Lead Gen plays
• In an attribution model, how does lead gen
stack in for path to purchase?
Look beyond the CPL, what other
metrics are essential to the success
of the campaign?
• Open rates
• Click through rates
• Conversion rates
• Impression count
• Broadcasting schedules
• Frequency of engagement
• Depth of engagement
• Device behaviour

Lead Gen - Best Practices
Transparency
• A client should know the name of every publisher
working on the programme and avoid blind networks –
creating accountability
• Clients should have a view where their brand is being
presented – and in what format
• Publishers must use 1st party data only so robust tests
can be launched
Fostering Innovation
• Regular meetings and conversations held with the
relevant publishers, this way brands can be part of a
publisher’s fundamental growth, or even help shape
the way their business works to better suit the brand
Testing
• Campaigns should be created with testing budgets into
media plans to better understand what can be
achieved with further investment
• Robust tests must be performed to help inform spend
decisions; these can be based frequency, volume and
creative.
Process
• Clear working practices make for better relationships.
With no ambiguity as to who is responsible for what
actions, how success is reported and how actions are
managed is key for relationships to grow.

Lead Gen – Summary
Client’s product capabilities
Great for brands that don’t traditionally convert online
Media Costs
Cheap media for driving awareness
ROI
Transparency of ROI on data driven campaigns
Control
Limiting publishers to keep campaign quality
Beyond the funnel
Nurture customers to keep them active or upsell

Everything you need to know about affiliate marketing for advertisers first quarter

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