Any single affiliate programme is as likely to include behavioural re-targeting, site abandonment-triggered emails or downloadable software as it is to number traditional affiliate stalwarts such as blogs and incentive-based sites
This is a good thing. Affiliate marketing should be as focused on targeting as any other online marketing channel and it is a sign of the health of the industry that new methods can find a place in an environment where the focus has always been on customer acquisition
But while the affiliate channel has always been hospitable to new and innovative methods, two questions have to be asked
Firstly, how can such methods get recognition for their respective activities in bringing about those acquisitions; and secondly, how do these activities impact the work of a programmes existing affiliates?
In this context, we see the re-emergence of issues that characterised the debate about whether the last click should win full credit for the sale
Just as the debate around multi-attribution within the affiliate channel had at its core the desire to attribute better, so the same questions are being raised concerning new types of affiliates that have arrived in the channel in the last couple of years
This time however, the emphasis is on the click itself rather than its place in the chain
Whereas setting differential commission rates was the traditional lever that advertisers would pull to attribute value to affiliates activity, being able to control the priority given to certain cookies has, until now, been underexplored
What options are available to advertisers and where might they want to apply them?Hard and soft cookies
Traditional post-click cookies are now sometimes referred to as hard click cookies and can only be overwritten by another hard post-click cookie
They are by far the most common that affiliates will drop and currently the vast majority of sales will be accredited using these cookies
By contrast, a soft click cookie will not overwrite any existing hard post-click cookies. If an advertiser is concerned that certain types of affiliate activity has an overly high chance of overwriting another affiliates post-click cookie they may wish to employ this option
Browser Helper Objects (BHOs) such as add-ons or plugins triggered to remind the user that a product they are looking at is available cheaper elsewhere
Toolbars urging a user to collect cashback on a product; or remarketing emails triggered by site abandonment are three examples of activity that some advertisers have so far chosen to set on a soft cookie
A post-view cookie is one that is dropped by an affiliate after an impression has been served. These are very helpful for advertisers wanting to run some form of display activity remunerable on a CPA rather than a CPM or CPC basis
Nowadays advertisers can gain access through the affiliate channel to behavioural retargeting providers or ad networks, behind which sit premium display inventory, whilst still only paying when a sale is made
When behavioural retargeting providers entered the channel 18 months ago, the eight member networks of the UKs Affiliate Marketing Council of the IAB collectively agreed to implement a cookie hierarchy for this activity which privileges cookies dropped on a click above one dropped on an impression
The click, it is argued, is a better measure of engagement on the part of the user than a view, and therefore should take credit for the sale where both post-click and post-view cookies are present
Advertisers might want to check therefore that their affiliate network is compliant with this practice. They may also want to question their network about other aspects of post-view display activity
Transparency on where ads which drop post-view cookies are appearing, the length of the post-view cookie, and what frequency caps are in place to guard against over-exposing the user to these ads are some examples
Moreover, advertisers might wish to ask their network what checks they have in place to assess the type of activity that could warrant a different type of cookie, and how the network makes this transparent
The flexibility in the conditions around which different types of cookies can overwrite each other has two major advantages for advertisers
Firstly, it is no longer necessary to run all activity on a hard post-click cookie. Advertisers can become more sensitive to how their different affiliates impact one another and take steps to safeguard or ring-fence the work of their existing affiliates from negative impacts or false attributions
Secondly, it makes their affiliate programmes appear much more inviting to those that have previously worked outside affiliate marketing, allowing advertisers to run more activity on a CPA basis through the affiliate channel at zero upfront risk
