Proven Strategies for Managing Affiliate PPC

David NaffzigerCEO, BrandVerity

Affiliate PPC is Universal

* Data on subsequent slides from a BrandVerity study of the top 100 e-commerce programs

As an E-Commerce site, the question is not IF, but HOW you should manage affiliate

PPC

Measure Beyond the Last Click

Google Analytics doesn’t cut it.

• Understand the contribution of all channels to a sale

• Measure and value the steps in the purchase process• First click• Intermediate clicks• Final click

• Bucket affiliates by contribution share. Reward those that contribute the most.

Create Clear Policies

PPC policies that are simple and clear have lower rates of abuse

• Easy to understand• Easy to communicate

• Verbally, email, onsite, etc.• No room for misinterpretation

Examples of Clear Policies

Examples of Unclear & Complex Policies

Examples of Unclear & Complex Policies

• Cannot outbid merchant• Cannot outrank merchant• Must uses negative keywords

in campaigns• Ad Text must contain ‘AFF’• No automatic redirects• Cannot copy merchant ad text

One or more of these policies are often combined:

Communicate Consistently & OpenlySimple policies are easy to communicate.

Do so.

• Putting your policy in the fine print is a quick route to failure• Put it on the website• Put it in the affiliate newsletter• Put it in other marketing materials

• Document what exceptions you allow

Respect Affiliate Secret Sauce

Merchants should not expect to know the details of an affiliate’s PPC campaign

• Affiliates invest significant time creating and managing their campaigns

• In some instances they compete against in-house PPC teams

Quick Enforcement

Keep your program clean

• Dirty programs: • Attract abusers• Deter super-affiliates• Cost money

• Not all abuse is intentional• Quick responses discourage further abuse• No, you cannot detect most abuse manually

Proven Strategies

Top affiliate programs utilize several strategies to manage affiliate PPC

• Expert Analytics• Simple Policies• Open, Consistent Communication• Respect Affiliate ‘Secret Sauce’• Quick Enforcement

Thank You!

David NaffzigerCEO, BrandVeritySearch Ad Monitoringdavenaff@brandverity.comwww.naffziger.net/blogwww.brandverity.com