Better Merchandising Ideas for your Affiliate Interface

Take advantage of opportunities within your affiliate interface to communicate the right message about your affiliate program. Just like any business there is a level of merchandising, selling or whatever you want to call it to ensure you are branding correctly & ultimately converting. The job for your affiliate interface should be to 1) educate, 2) motivate, 3) track lots of actions…

Here are a few things I do to educate & motivate within an affiliate interface:

1) Sell your product! Use Investor Relations, Product information, Media Kits and demographic information throughout your site so affiliates can learn about YOU. This is just another way to stay connected with your affiliates in hopes of a long term relationship.

2) Use Video that talk about your products, tools and FAQ’s. Take a look at the image below, it’s a screenshot of how I have incorporated a Doba overview video in the advertiser information page. This is great within CJ as affiliates that have NOT joined also get the exposure.

Image of how video looks inside of the CJ Program Detail Page. To see it in full action, log into CJ and find Doba in the advertisers section (under Auction).

3) Archive your newsletters. This is an easy way for new affiliates to dig around and learn what you have been up to over the last several months, past contest information and whatever else you may be sharing in your newsletters.

4) Build out an FAQ. I don’t know about you but I get a lot of great of email questions, document them, record your answers and build out a simple FAQ. This can act as a “getting started guide” as well as a first round support tool.

5) The obvious: Focus on your tools, 3rd party tools, have plenty of support options, forums & blogs, communities and other essentials.

6) Visual Aids for your compensation plans. When I was at oneNetworkDirect we needed an easy way to explain our rewards program (see it below) so we built out a nice visual aid. As hybrid compensation plans become more prevalent you need a better way to explain the deal…

If you are relying on an affiliate network that doesn’t support these kind of customizations, then take the time to build out an affiliate portal attached to your main site. You can even rely on a social network such as Facebook or Myspace to host your affiliate portal, a great way to tie in the social aspect and encourage your recruiting efforts.