What should you look for in an affiliate management agency?

Tired of managing your entire affiliate marketing program?

If you’re struggling to keep up with all of the components, or just haven’t achieved the results you want, it might be time to outsource. However, before you rush out and sign up with just any old affiliate management agency (we promise you, there are thousands), make sure you’re finding a top affiliate marketing company, for they’re not all the same!

If you get stuck with a mediocre company, things can get bad, fast. They’re simply going to list your products on a big open database for anyone to promote, and guess what? There goes your brand-message as it gets shuffled through tens of thousands of hands and consumers recoil at the images that finally reach them. It can take you months to undo the damage.

Top affiliate marketing companies on the other hand have already invested years cultivating the right relationships with reliable and competent sales partners. These affiliates are people who have proven successful at marketing your products just the same way you do, and driving real results!

In short, top agencies offer value that others just can’t! Here are 3 services must-haves in an affiliate management partner.

1.       They vet affiliates

Aim for quality over quantity. You don’t want a company that accepts any and all applications to become an affiliate. You want the best, and the ones that best fit with your brand.

2. They monitor their affiliates

When you associate with affiliates, you want to make sure they’re treating your brand like their own. Top affiliate marketing companies monitor their affiliates to check for things like paid search violations and questionable sales and leads.

3. They provide useful reports

If you don’t know who’s doing what, you won’t know where to double-down on your efforts. Look for a company that offers detailed reporting so you are always kept in the loop when it comes to your affiliate’s performance.

Affiliate marketing can be a magical sales boost, so long as it’s done right, by the right people.

Top affiliate marketing companies will have your best interest in mind and provide the services you need to run a successful affiliate program.

Versa Marketing is proud to be ranked among the top affiliate marketing agencies,affiliate management agency in the nation, and we’ve built our business around our reputation for quality. So what do you say?

If you’re interested in getting started, contact us today at 1.800.940.8780 for your free consultation!

Affiliate marketing alone? Don’t sail without a map! Here’s everything you need to know

Setting off on any new adventure feels amazing, right?

Setting off to add a new sales channel to your business without the time, resources or guidance? Well, that’s more like terrifying.

Especially when it comes to affiliatemarketing.

If you’re not a top affiliate marketing agency or a trained affiliate marketing professional, navigating the affiliate marketing space can feel like sailing to revenue island without a map.

That is, you might get close, but you’ll probably just row in circles for months before you actually find land (or give up trying!).

That sort of risk isn’t a great idea when you’re in the middle of the ocean, and it certainly isn’t a good idea when your business is mid-flight.

To really appreciate what this journey is like, let’s take a step back and figure out which resources are required for running a successful affiliate program.

Managing an affiliate marketing program requires a completely different skill-set than any other marketing campaign.

Overseeing an effective program requires attracting, vetting, monitoring and communicating with affiliates or affiliate networks. These can comprise thousands upon thousands of people of varying (and sometimes dubious) intentions, so unlike most marketing, you have to be good at spotting scam artists and hiring people.

Once you have your affiliates set, running a successful program also takes up a lot of time. You’ll need someone to field requests for banner changes, monitor and pay their commissions, keep an eye out for fraud, and create reports. In this way, you’ve become a full-blown product manager, and pretty far from your marketing sweet-spot.

For a small business, this can become overwhelming, to say the least.

Now, let’s take a look at the other side of the fence. If you choose to work with an affiliate marketing agency, outsourced affiliate program management we can handle the entire sales channel for you. We recruit networks, vet applications, monitor progress, update media, send detailed reports, and more. Our systems are effective, so you get the best ROI you can (without the stress), and best of all, we’ve been doing it for years and already have that oh-so treasured map!

So, when you’re hopping into a boat to sail off to revenue island via affiliate marketing,affiliate management agency, don’t go it without a map! Instead, join us for a first class, direct flight. It’s much faster and arrival at the destination is much more certain.

If you’re ready to discover the world of affiliate marketing and add a new revenue stream to your growing business, call us today at 1.800.940.8780 for a free consultation! 

What do affiliate program management and football have in common?

You wouldn’t send your athletes out onto the field without any footballs, padding, or equipment would you? Of course you wouldn’t! Yet this is precisely what happens every time that a company leaps into affiliate marketing without considering its affiliates. They’re more than numbers; they’re your players, and individuals to boot. Affiliates have lives outside of your program, replete with hobbies, fears, loves, and interests. And just like players, if you send them out onto the field without a game plan or equipment, they’re going to get crushed by the competition. 

So put your coaching cap on and let’s review the 4 plays you can use to manage your affiliate marketing program to victory: 

     1.       Provide a game plan: Make life as simple as possible for your affiliates and when they’re out there on the field running around promoting your service and driving sales, they’ll need a quick-reference guide so that they don’t have to keep looking up the elevator pitch or the product details.

     2.       Produce the media for them: What would football be like if players had to sew their own footballs? Unless they were exceptionally talented at sewing they probably wouldn’t have a lot of time left for training, and wouldn’t be very good. Your affiliates likewise don’t have the expertise (or time, frankly) to make their own footballs! By developing Media like banner ads, graphics, FAQ’s, and taglines, you save your affiliate team time and allow them to focus on what you want them doing: selling. 

     3.       Ongoing contests and engagement: Getting started is only the first play of the game! Your team needs to stay motivated and focused. If you’re now thinking of your affiliates as players and people, you’re realizing that they have families to take care of, DMV appointments to get to, and dinner to make. By running contests, checking in, updating materials, and sending helpful emails, you help them stay focused and on-track in a  world where they also have their own busy lives!

     4.       Recruit super-affiliates: When the data comes back on your outsourced affiliate program management and you crunch the numbers, it’s going to be very clear who your top players are. Reward them and bring them closer into the fold! If they’re producing 10x the results of half of the people on the list, they deserve a better deal and to be treated as an MVP so that they continue to perform even better. These are the affiliates who are going to take you to the Super Bowl!

Now, just watch out for the cooler full of gatorade, because you’ve just about won! Keeping your team in play quarter after quarter takes game-plans, check-ins, strategy sessions, and the right media to make your affiliate management program a stellar success!

Looking for help getting started? 

Versa Marketing is among the top rated affiliate management companies because they’re exceptional at supporting the affiliate players that lead their customers to victory. 

Danger! Affiliate marketing and rocket science have more in common than you think

Affiliate marketing is like putting a man on the moon

How do you think a NASA mission to the moon might function without a mission control? You would have contractors around the world building their separate rocket stages without communicating and if one happens to work in the metric system and the other uses imperial inches and feet, you've got yourself some serious trouble brewing. And then you’d have Congress, who is funding things, pretty excited for the space mission but juggling hundreds of other projects (the economy, anyone?) and far too busy to double check things. And of course you would have the brave astronauts who, once launched, might have an emergency question but then nobody at home monitoring the cobweb encrusted radio. Can't you almost hear the screws rattling off as this cobbled-together rocket roars off into space? What odds would you give it for returning?

Sounds like a nightmare, right? Well this is exactly what we see time and time again when companies start their own affiliate marketing programs without hiring an affiliate marketing agency or “mission control,” if you will. 

Houston, we have a digital marketing problem

Affiliate marketing consultants come with the expertise of having launched rockets before. They have all of the relationships with all of the contractors (affiliates), they keep everyone on one standard of measurement (success metrics), and they know exactly what results the American public (their client) wants. And maybe most importantly, they’re there to take responsibility when the astronautes (your programs) call home and need advice (or need instructions on how to 3D print a wrench. True story).When everything comes together just like you want it to, that rocket returns home with a positive ROI. 

So as you're rolling put the schematics and designing your own affiliate marketing,outsourced affiliate program management and program management, you are most likely asking yourself, “can I really afford to involve an affiliate marketing agency?" But as someone about to perform the marketing equivalent of putting a man on the moon what you really need to ask yourself is can you really afford not to?

Ready to launch?

Versa Marketing is full of rocket scientists (of the digital marketing type) and they'd be happy to chat with you about where your rocket needs to go. Call us at 1-800-940-8780 or request a free proposal today! 

Only the top affiliate marketing agencies can measure up to these 3 things

We’re always striving to be the top affiliate marketing company

You could say that being an affiliate marketingcompany is really living life in the fast lane. The pace at which technology develops, shifts, changes, and updates is extraordinary and while 80% of new American businesses fail within the first year, in affiliate marketing it’s 10x that rate. Out of all of the affiliate marketing companies that were in business in 2013, half of one percent are still left standing!

What this means is that any affiliate management agency that has lasted for more than just a couple of years has to be doing something right. At Versa Marketing, we’ve now been around for four years and we’re both humbled and proud to be called one of the top affiliate marketing companies in the business. We’d like to turn around and share our gratitude by talking about what’s made us so successful in order to help you in your process of choosing your own affiliate marketing agency.

There are plenty of hustlers and scam artists out there but we promise that they won’t measure up to these 3 things:

1. Have they been around long enough? 

This is your first and best line of defense. This industry is constantly both attracting and churning out charlatans who promise the world but can’t deliver. Let time be the test for these folks and don’t engage with an affiliate management agency without at least a few years under its belt. At Versa Marketing, we’ve been an affiliate marketing company for four years and our two principals have been in the industry for more than a decade each. This is the right amount of time to build the right relationships and know if you can deliver on what you say you will. 

2. Can they keep pace with technology?

It can be easy to think you know everything and avoid things that are new. You’ll see this in affiliate marketing when agencies disparage a new social media channel or complain about Google changing it’s SEO rules. Beware these people! They’re resistant to change and this is how you get left behind in when technology leaps forward. At Versa Marketing we’re just the opposite: we’re total neophiles. We’re ravenously reading the best blogs and publications so that when changes happen, we’re the first to know and we guarantee that your marketing programs adapt and thrive. 

3. Do they have a consultative approach?

What you have to ask yourself here is: did they ask me enough questions? For shysters trying to make a quick buck, anyone who’s willing to pay them is a qualified customer. A trustworthy affiliate marketing company on the other hand distinguishes itself by having the experience to know what programs are effective, feasible, and a good fit for their firm. Versa Marketing became a top affiliate marketing company primarily by asking a lot of questions of their customers to make sure that expectations were aligned from the outset so that they knew how to exceed them. 

Ready to get started?

And there you have it, the three things you must know before choosing an affiliate marketing agency!

Versa Marketing has been around the block and knows the ins and outs of the industry and if you’re ready to start your affiliate marketing program,outsourced affiliate program management call us today at 1-800-940-8780 or click here to get your free proposal! 

7 Tips for a Running a Successful Affiliate Program

Running an affiliate marketing company can be one of the most best ways to boost your sales, if you know how to do it right. Here are 7 helpful tips the best affiliate marketing companies apply to their programs. 

1.  Align the program strategy with your internal goals and objectives

Affiliate marketing can be valuable, but don’t let it change the way you do business. You should first consider if an affiliate program is a viable revenue opportunity, and also consider how it can help you reach your growth objectives.  Develop a program that aligns with the business goals you already have laid out.

2.  Select the right affiliate network to launch with

There are many affiliate networks to choose from, so make sure you vet each and pick the one that aligns most with your own goals and efforts. Some are generalized while others specialize by industry, and all of them will have their own distinct advantages and some have drawbacks.

3.  Develop the right affiliate commission structure

You can create custom terms for your individual affiliates, but you also need a default rate for all your standard affiliates. This will include a cut for your affiliate and the affiliate network. Will you have a flat commision structure or will it vary by product category? Is it worthwhile to pay for leads or offer sales incentives? Your affiliate manager can help answer these questions.

4.  Put in place the right program policies restrictions

To some extent, your affiliates are representative of you, so it’s important to have clear restrictions, such as banning offensive websites. Develop other guidelines for working with your company, such as limitations on paid search and coupon usage.

5.  Develop high performing media

Different content types speak to different audiences, so it's important to develop a wide variety of high performing media to reach the most potential leads. Banner ads are the most common option, but you should also develop text links, email creative copy, and product data feeds to gain the most reach.

6.  Develop an affiliate recruiting strategy

Depending on your industry, there are certain types of affiliates who will bring more value to your business. You should work to target these specific affiliate types, and develop outreach messaging to draw in the most valuable recruits.

7.  Align the necessary resources, expertise and experience to properly launch and grow your affiliate program

Many businesses have begun affiliate marketing, though few have the knowledge and expertise to gain exponential returns on their own. Working with experienced outsourced affiliate program management is the perfect way to ensure you make all the right choices for success from the beginning.

Versa Marketing Incis an expert affiliate marketing consultant with years of experience launching and managing existing affiliate programs.

 We leverage our experience affiliate relationships to develop the most effective performance based marketing strategy for your business

The Value of an Affiliate Management Company

There’s no denying that there is incredible money to be made in affiliate marketing. According to Forrester, affiliate marketing will be a $6.8B industry by next year and it’s vastly outpacing the growth of competing technologies like pay per click (PPC) primarily because it is outcome based, which nearly guarantees a return.

That’s pretty appealing but most companies are being left behind simply because they lack the time, access, consulting, relationships, and resources that they need to develop a successful affiliate marketing program. 

Hence, the recent boom of affiliate management companies and consultants.  They introduce their clients’ program to the thousands of bustling affiliates and plug them directly into all that revenue potential. 

Here are four of the greatest advantages to working with affiliate management services: 

Excellent pre-existing relationships: A reputable affiliate management company will have a large database of affiliate relationships that can be leveraged for your program.  These bonds don’t form overnight but rather come from years of work. You can tell a top affiliate management agency right away because they’ve been around at least several years and that time in the channel is need to build the relationships that can drive real results for your program. 

Fully managed service: If you had a nuclear engineer on your team, would you ever consider taking night and weekend classes so that you could take over their job? Heck no! You’d trust them to do their thing because they’re highly specialized and their training guarantees that you avoid a meltdown.

This is exactly the sort of relationship that you’ll have with a really stellar affiliate management company. They'll fully manage the fantastically complex and nuanced affiliate marketing system that drives explosive revenue growth. You’re free to tourthe metaphorical nuclear reactor any time of course, or check-in on how the affiliate program operates, but the reality is that you’re busy and you need an expert running it for you while you sleep.

Top Performing Media: Among the top complaints of marketers who are hesitant to get into affiliate marketing, the number one fear is that their branding or messaging will be lost as it’s handed down to affiliates. Affiliate management agencies put this fear completely to rest by having in-house design teams who can perform quality assurance on your message. They also have access to top performing ads and media based on best practices so that you need to be a design genius to benefit from masterful design.

Optimization and mmaintenance: Getting a program up and running is really only half the battle. People often forget how much ongoing reporting, testing, and optimization goes into dialing-in affiliate revenue. Not to mention, those affiliates are people and have to be kept engaged and the commission structure has to be changed to both keep it interesting and adapt it to the flood of new technology. 

In a nutshell, outsourced affiliate program management allow you to leap from the "merely interested” stage to extraordinary results, fast. They’ve already laid the foundations you need to be successful, from the relationships and creative media to the intuition and ongoing management.

So now that you’re feeling fired up and ready to tackle affiliate marketing hand in hand with an expert consultant, look no further than Versa Marketing Inc. We’re one of the top affiliate marketing agencies dedicated to helping people navigate this complex industry.

Give us a shout at (800) 940-8780 to talk to someone or jump right into a free consultation and let’s get you started!