Chapter 17. Affiliate Programs

Welcome to performance-based marketing. An affiliate program provides merchants with an online sales force that's paid a commission only for the products or services they sell. Affiliates use a variety of Internet marketing tactics to drive sales to merchants ' web sites. An additional benefit to search engine marketers is that the same technology that tracks their affiliates ' sales can be used to track their paid listings.

Be Free and Commission Junction are examples of well-recognized Application Service Providers (ASPs) in this industry who boast a large, built-in affiliate network. Merchants who enlist one of these providers will unleash a marketing-savvy team on the Internet immediately. As shown in Figures 17.1 and 17.2, both support an array of services designed to increase performance-based sales.

Figure 17.1. Be Free's additional services include search engine marketing and an automated merchandising assistant that serves real-time product recommendations.

Figure 17.2. Commission Junction's additional services include agency and channel partnerships.

Important

In December 2003, ValueClick completed its acquisition of Commission Junction, which will be combined with its Be Free affiliate marketing subsidiary.