Our Affiliate Program Wish List
After speaking with many of you who operate affiliate programs on your sites, and reviewing dozens of programs, I have put together a little wish list for what improvements I, and many other affiliates, would like to see from affiliate vendors.
The affiliate program concept continues to make huge strides in the online industry, and has become an important marketing advantage for many affiliate vendors. Many of the more generous affiliate programs have fairly shared these spectacular results with their affiliates. Unfortunately, many others have not. However, almost every affiliate program available today still has room for improvement.
So, below I present to you what I feel, as a reviewer, are the most significant aspects of affiliate programs that need to be addressed.
1-Improved tracking of sales
2-Opportunity for follow-up business
3-Improved commissions
4-More professional site design and ordering processes
5-Reduced minimums for commission checks
1-Improved tracking of sales
Almost any site that has worked with affiliate programs over the last year or so probably has a story about a merchant affiliate program they signed up with, but for which they didn't receive credit for a purchase they or a friend made to test the program's tracking system. Sometimes these problems are purely technical, and accidental. Most affiliate programs have every intention of running a legitimate, honest, beneficial program, but somehow, somewhere, the tracking system failed. Other times, the merchant deliberately set out to create a program that doesn't pay, or that skims some sales from those that it does pay. Luckily, these types of dishonest programs seem to be a distinct minority, with most problems coming from technical issues.
The affiliate merchant should however realize the need to improve this situation. It is potentially more damaging to them then to any one affiliate. Surely, as an affiliate, you could lose commissions, maybe even a few hundred dollars. But, if the program is proven to not work, or affiliates know the program has difficulties with tracking, the affiliate moves on, and it is simply a one-time loss.
However, for the merchant, this can be a more serious problem, as it will quickly lead to the erosion of the affiliate network they worked so hard to establish. Thus, improving affiliate program tracking is beneficial to both parties: affiliates are fairly compensated for what they refer, and merchants are able to retain a productive network of loyal affiliates that work to promote their products. A win-win situation.
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