We go through the various different iterations of Affiliate Marketing on our home page, but for now we just want to lay out a definition of what it is for the benefit of anyone looking at this without any previous experience or background.
"Affiliate Marketing is a performance-based marketing strategy in which a business rewards individuals or entities, known as affiliates, for promoting its products or services and generating sales, leads, or traffic. This system relies on a network of partnerships where the affiliate earns a commission or incentive based on the measurable success of their promotional efforts. The concept, rooted in historical practices of referral and commission-based sales, has evolved to encompass modern digital and e-commerce platforms, enabling businesses to expand their reach through diverse, mutually beneficial partnerships."
The important point to note is that Affiliate Marketing DOES NOT MEAN Affiliate Distribution NOR Affiliate Fulfilment - in Affiliate Marketing the Affiliate is paid for introducing the customer ONLY. The Affiliate never touches the product nor (except in exceptional circumstances) does the Affiliate take payment from the end customer - it is a MARKETING activity ONLY. It is up to the merchant to deliver the product or service. It is important to note, however, as per the case of the Singer Sewing Machine Company (covered in our blogpost A brief history of Affiliate Marketing pre-internet) that Affiliates may be provided with products for demonstration purposes.
These days, for example, a joystick manufacturer may be happy to provide a well-known YouTube gamer with a free demo joystick to make a video about it in order to promote it to his/her subscribers. Unfortunately these days, there are so many already successful bloggers and YouTubers acting as affiliates, it is difficult to impossible to get many, if any, merchants to give new, unknown affiliates free stuff to use for demo purposes. Until affiliates build up a sufficient following to get attention, they will probably have to buy their own demo items (possibly at a reduced cost if they can arrange it with the merchant) to use in their videos. If anyone wants to do this please ask us first, as we do have merchants who will supply new affiliates with demo items at a discount (but not for free unfortunately).
The infographic below shows the basic dynamics of the affiliate to customer to merchant relationship.
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