Affiliate Definition

What is the definition of the word affiliate?

Affiliate has many meanings. When used with regards to “Affiliate Marketing,” and affiliate is another person or entity who assists a company in marketing their products or services. Another word for affiliates is publisher. Affiliate marketing is a marketing method that allows a business to pay commissions for any business or leads generated. Its most commonly used in electronic commerce; however there are programs out their with “offline” marketing as well.

How does an affiliate earn revenue?

The most common ways an affiliate earns money is: per click, per sale, and per lead. With pay per click, most of the risk is passed along to the advertiser because the affiliate publisher doesn’t really care about the quality of the lead, they simply want to earn a commission. Pay per lead has the same issue. If the leads generated are not of good quality, then the advertiser will be paying out to the affiliate for low quality leads and will most likely end up canceling the contract with the affiliate. The best scenario for the advertiser is pay per sale. Why? The affiliate is not paid a commission unless a sale is made. Most affiliate who have high quality, targeted traffic, are promoting these types of programs because they are comfortable that their high quality traffic will convert for the advertiser, thus earn them sales commissions. After all, that’s what the goal is isn’t it? To make money for both parties, the advertiser and the affiliate!

What industries participate in affiliate marketing?

Many of them do! For example if you wanted to promote Sony products, you could add items to your website and earn a commission for each sale. You can start by promoting a product you have an interest in, as it will be easier to market since you understand the product. For those who are in the finance world, and have an interest in promoting credit cards, please do become a credit card affiliate with the “Credit Card Broker Program.”