Aaron Conant  0:18  

My name is Aaron Conant. I'm the Co-founder and Managing Director here at BWG Connect. We kicked this off six years ago, just as a way for brands to work together, to network, share knowledge, and tackle those biggest topics that are out there. I spend the majority of my time talking with brands. Startups to Fortune 100 of every vertical, would love to have a conversation with anybody on the line today. Shoot me a note at Aaron@bwgconnect.com. We'd love to jump on the phone with you and just figure out, hey, what's going on? What are the next topics for calls? And obviously, if you need any recommendations across the board on service providers or strategies, more happy more than happy to provide that. If you have questions today, drop them in the chat or in the q&a, we will get them answered in real time if we can. The other thing is we're starting this a minute after the hour, we try to wrap up at least a minute left in the half-hour here as well. But with that, I want to kind of like kick this off. Because you know, we've had a lot of questions around affiliate marketing, everybody's looking for growth. Everybody's looking for ways to drive new traffic, more traffic, new customers and everything else. And so we've got some great friends, partners, supporters of the network over Acceleration Partners. Just they're working with a ton of brands in the network that come highly recommended. And so I reach out to them and say, Hey, would you like to jump on? And kind of go through a strategy session with some of the network? And Amanda said, yes. So, Amanda, I'm gonna kick it over to you. If you want to do a brief introduction on yourself and acceleration partners. That'd be awesome. And then let's kind of jump into the conversation, sound good?

Amanda Jimmerson  1:49  

Yeah, that sounds great. Well, first and foremost, thank you so much for having me. I'm incredibly excited to be here to talk about this very hot and heavy topic. My name is Amanda Jimmerson. I'm a Global Account Director here at Acceleration Partners. I've been with Acceleration Partners for over the last six years, I'd say. And I've worked across a majority of verticals of clients, ranging from all sizes. I've been in the affiliate industry in particular for over eight years. And prior to joining the agency side with Acceleration Partners, I worked primarily on the network side of the business. In terms of Acceleration Partners, we are a global partner marketing agency. We operate across 40 different countries. We have over 300 employees. And we really continue to drive innovative solutions for our portfolio of clients while really building strong partnerships with publishers. That's more so on the publisher development side of the business, now that we maintain upwards of 100 direct relationships with top publishers in the space.

Aaron Conant  2:58  

Awesome. So let me kick it off with this is what affiliate marketing is: it comes up over and over again. What is that? How do you guys define that? How should people be thinking about it? And that's because, you know, there's everybody on the line today, like people just getting started to very, very seasoned. And always just like to set that baseline today about what kind of what we're chatting. And again, if people have questions, drop them in the chat or drop them in the q&a, and we'll get them answered.

Amanda Jimmerson  3:24  

Yeah, that's a that's a great question. Honestly, the answer varies based on the experience level within affiliate marketing. But I like to kind of define it as if I define it to my parents who still don't understand what I do and the honest.

Aaron Conant  3:39  

But yeah, so when everybody on the call is nodding their heads like Yeah, exactly.

Amanda Jimmerson  3:43  

Yeah. So we are on a pay-on-performance model. So we partner with publishers is the blanketed term. They are, they vary from various ways of how they promote the business, whether they're loyalty or content or coupon partnerships. And we it's it's really brands partnering with those partners to really like, extend their brand, through like those 30 party sites. And everything is commission based. So you'll hear me say a lot today probably about us being a controllable channel. Because of that commission model, you're able to control the return on ad spend. Because every sale is tied to like revenue is directly tied to the cost that you're pushing back to the partner.

Aaron Conant  4:30  

Yeah, awesome. Love it. So, you know, with what's going on today, I always like to get a real-time cap on things that are going on, you know, the economy, people trying to figure out what's going on. I know, Wall Street's like, Hey, we're way up. Everybody else is like, you know, it's like almost like this area of uncertainty that's going on. Like that doesn't make sense based on what I'm seeing happen. What what are you seeing as general insights trends, we'd love to hear that

Amanda Jimmerson  5:00  

Yeah, that's honestly, it's a great question. And it really has come up a lot in the first half of this year. But I would say, honestly, since the pandemic, there's been an increased focus on just understanding current trends, and also how they're indicative of what's to come. Right. So, consumer, your consumer behavior has really been a bit more unpredictable since 2020. yet and I would say general sentiments from brands are that they're being much more conservative with the economic uncertainty in front in the front half of the year. And obviously, there was that potential threat of a recession. Right. So on a positive note, I would say consumer spending has been showcasing better than expected results in the first half of the year, and where they're either staying flat or, in some cases, increasing the activity there, I would say there's a number of different factors that play a toll in those trends. Like, obviously, what is the vertical or category of your products, and what are the products that are being sold? You know, obviously, if they are needs of a consumer, you're gonna see that spending continue. But if they're more like luxury items, you might see a downward turn of, of performance. But in my experience, I've had clients lean more heavily on the pay-on-performance partnerships, just due to the nature of the business being controllable, like I mentioned earlier, clients are really excited about the affiliate channel, just given the efficiency of it all. We've even seen other teams like influencer teams and PR teams, converge with the affiliate teams, and that's really to give them the ability to measure their success in the space. And historically, those are never teams that were living within the performance partnership go system. And I would say overall, in terms of budget, the majority of my clients' budgets, they're staying flat year over year, but the expectations are that they are going further. So you know, making sure that we're driving growth from a revenue perspective, to really maximize profitability. And that's really where we have to get a bit more creative on how we are incentivizing our partner mix, that in a way that's really driving efficiency, but maximizing those outcomes. So I would say those are like the top trends and insights I'm seeing on my side. Yeah,

Aaron Conant  7:20  

I mean, I think one of the questions that you answer that comes in a lot is there an apprehension around affiliate marketing, that it's just gonna run rogue, and all of a sudden, you're gonna sell a ton of product, it's gonna move really fast at a discount, and it's going to be, you know, margin neutral or negative. There's all these like crazy views, the fact that you can turn it on and off, I think there was a trend that was set a while ago. That's not necessarily true today, right? I mean, technology's advanced quite a bit. We do have a question that comes in from Shawn, for full basket grocery, can you share some examples of where CPG suppliers have successfully leveraged affiliate marketing? CPG is an interesting space when it comes to digital. 

Amanda Jimmerson  8:05  

It is, it is true, I actually worked with some big box retailers in the space, and they actually leveraged the CPG budget to really maximize certain categories of products. And, you know, I would say it is an interesting space, I haven't worked directly with the direct-to-consumer grocery product in the past. But you know, really, there's opportunity to get highly targeted with the affiliate partnerships and how we're promoting specific products or categories of products. But it's really just knowing how you leverage each partner and how you're incentivizing them, while also keeping in mind some specific product margins in particular. But again, because it's on a commission-based model, we can protect those margins and be very strategic of how we go to market in the space.

Aaron Conant  8:55  

Now, how many people do you see just start with a test and learn? And then how rapidly does that expand? Yeah, and how difficult is a test and learn I think, is a lot of people like what does it take to get a program up and running really quickly? And then again, now there's you have questions drop in the chat or the q&a. But obviously, in the last, I would say six to nine months, this affiliate marketing, all of a sudden, there's a ton of questions on it. And it's almost like there's apprehension out there.

Amanda Jimmerson  9:22  

Yeah, I think it's important to build a really strong foundation for your affiliate program. In particular, I think, you know, with the commissioning model is one of the most basic strategies to deploy, and making sure that you're being strategic there, but also like protecting, we're always wanting to back into a brand's KPIs. Right? And like, what are you going against and then building a product of the program off of that? So if you're there's like specific return on adspend targets, if there's a way that you are defining incrementality and making sure that we're leaning into partnerships that are really like, intensified. and like really driving forward, that strategy of the overall brand. We're not a standalone marketing channel, we are really a part of the whole marketing ecosystem and part of that whole pie. So we really leverage the strategy in the affiliate space to maximize those efforts. And then when we're where we can like come in and create efficiency. That's really what we're gold against. Yeah.

Aaron Conant  10:25  

How do you help your clients assess incremental incrementality for a program?

Amanda Jimmerson  10:31  

This is the question we get a lot. I've done a lot of work with it in incrementality. In particular, I would say when I came into the space early on incrementality was probably the one word I despised the most, because what I came to reality at that time was, brands define it differently. So it really depends on what you view as incremental activity for your brand. And then how do we leverage that in affiliate, I've had a program in the past and a retailer where they didn't have a definition of what incrementality meant to them. When we went through, it was honestly a year long process, we came to the conclusion that what they define is incremental in the affiliate channel specifically, was a sale that was referred by an affiliate where no other channel or partnership was involved within that conversion line. But then that obviously had to evolve as the affiliate space grew, and digital marketing became such a large piece of their strategy. And the consumer conversion funnel gets really muddy, right, there's a lot of different interactions now in the space. So I actually had done my due diligence and building and incrementality 2.0 is what I called it. And it was really an internal like multi touch attribution model where I applied a weighted points system to the data we had available on their network. And that would spit out a percentage, which was technically their incrementality percentage, and then apply that percentage to the revenue that a partner referred, and putting that over the total cost of that partner. So really defining if that if our partnership wasn't involved within that click pack, would that customer ultimately convert? So making it measurable and able to evaluate and lean into certain partnerships that did drive those like higher incremental value sales?

Aaron Conant  12:34  

So what can you do? Can you maybe define partnerships?

Amanda Jimmerson  12:39  

Yeah, so partnerships? That's a really great question. Like I mentioned in the beginning, there's, I would say that the affiliate space now as a full funnel solution, and we have very different partner types. So there are the traditional, probably what you've heard of, or your first instinct around affiliate is coupon partnerships, and do partnerships, where those are those sites that are just listing promotional, promotional calendars, technically, by brand, and they're converting, there's loyalty partnerships that are usually are like the Rocky Mountains of the world, where you can go and make a purchase through that site and get cash back for that purchase. There are content partnerships that are creating content, including brands, and then through that clickable link, they are getting a commission for the products that are or the consumers that are referred from that site. So it could be partnerships. There's a lot of various nuanced categories that have come in the fold over the past couple of years. But, you know, they really run the gamut.

Aaron Conant  13:44  

Yeah. And they're there. I mean, that's what drives it. Right? So correct. If I say, you know, are they a strategic lever to pull and then we got other questions, and people keep asking questions in the chat and the q&a will keep getting to them. So the strategic lever to pull for sure.

Amanda Jimmerson  14:00  

Absolutely. Yeah, the short and sweet answer is yes.

Aaron Conant  14:06  

Or no. What is the healthy thanks, Tyler. First, Thanks, Brittany, for shooting in the incrementality. Question, Tom, thanks for shooting in what is a healthy slash average commission percent?

Amanda Jimmerson  14:18  

It depends on the brand, the product your margins internally, so I can't necessarily say one commission model fits every brand. But I would say if we think about like the category of those partnerships, like I mentioned, we say that they're a full funnel solution. So really, it tagging a commission structure to the partner type is a great strategy and where they fall within that funnel, so thinking about content partners who usually are on the top of that funnel, they normally request a higher commission rate, whether that be 10, 15, 20%, depending on the brand category. And that's really to offset the concern version rate of this partner, right? So like, they're not going to convert every single consumer that comes to site and clicks through that link. However, on the flip side of that, when you think about a coupon partnership, or a loyalty partnership, they normally are more down on funnel activity, they're going to be the ones who are driving that volume. So that's where you're going to want to be a bit more conservative with that commission structure, maybe being two to 5%. Again, it really depends on the brand and the goals and the margin. I need to understand your business a bit further to get critical, but Oh, you guys get engaged, you help them tackle that, right? 

Aaron Conant  15:33  

Yes, we do, we are going to be a grind. Right?

Amanda Jimmerson  15:37  

If there's an existing we're digging into the brand to understand what your goal against and building that strategy out.

Aaron Conant  15:43  

So no, that's, that's awesome. Again, people chat q&a, drop more in another question that I get routinely is around coupon codes, the coupon websites, this drives people bonkers, I, you know, I don't want to say that everybody's done it. But I know a lot of people have done it, you get to checkout. And they have that blank space for a coupon code. And so people go out and they click, you know, they open up a new tab, you know, coupon codes for XYZ. Like, again, I'd love to know a little bit more about this channel. That's, I guess what I'm saying? Like, how can you carve that out? You know, how effective is it seems like it could be, but we'd love to hear, give us a better idea around like this, what this channel really is and how it operates?

Amanda Jimmerson  16:32  

Yeah, so I'd say we're way more than just the coupon sites, I think everybody's gonna have their concerns around coupon specific sites and the incrementality around that, right. So there are some checks and balances, you can put in place there to consider to, you know, conserve budget when a coupon code goes rogue. And there's an analysis to really understand what the fatality is of those. And that could honestly be a whole other hour long call. But I would say, like testing and learning is really important, right? If you're trying to drive volume at low cost, coupon partnerships are great. But if that's not your strategy, there's so many other partner types that you can lean into. I think in terms of like the topic today, around turbulent times, we've seen a lot of different partnerships come into the space, but one that's really hot and heavy right now, our Buy now pay later partnerships. And we've really seen them take off over the course of the last two years, I would say. But they've been scaling significantly due to the you know, turbulent times and consumers being a bit more conservative with their spending, and just needing to be a bit more strategic. But on top of coupon partners, there's there's a lot more niche partnerships that you but having that like healthy partnership, next is really what's going to take the program further, not just focusing on one specific vertical.

Aaron Conant  17:55  

Yeah, I mean, the Buy Now pay later solution, we're ramping up and then had some rocky times and now are coming back, I think they finally figured out the profitability issue and everything else. But oh, definitely from a partnership, but just going down that that path, you know, it takes me back to the, you know, part of the start of the conversation was around the full funnel approach. What is, you know, if you can just clarify that a little bit? What does that look like in your world? When you I mean, you're dealing with all these different brands, you guys are pretty much the leaders in the space? What does that full funnel approach look like? As people are piecing this together?

Amanda Jimmerson  18:30  

Yep, yeah, so every, again, every brands gonna have a different perception of the channel. And specifically, like individual partner verticals like those loyalty content, and so on. But each one of those verticals really provides a different set of values that can help brands hit different goals. And each partner type really interacts with the consumer at different points within that conversion funnel. So driving results in walking the consumer through that full purchase process, from introducing them to your brand to influencing them in the middle of the funnel to then ultimately converting the affiliate channel and partnership channel is really one of those you can lean into.

Aaron Conant  19:11  

When we think about, like more traditional partnership strategies as a whole, you know, what is? What does that look like? Like? Is there examples? I think people are trying to, I think people as a whole have over simplified, including myself, the affiliate marketing world and what it means and they originally are just thinking as coupon codes and driving traffic and but, you know, I think of like, it's so much more complicated than that, as we're kind of like teasing out here. And I think maybe we should have this an hour long call, as I have 15 More questions myself. But if we think about like a traditional partnership strategy, what would that look like? Is there an example or somebody could walk us through that would be that'd be awesome.

Amanda Jimmerson  19:57  

Absolutely. So I think you know, we touched on it little bit about the Commission's strategy of where they fall within the funnel. So I think your commission strategy is going to be the backbone of the program. But I think taking a partner centric approach is incredibly important, right? So you might want to, you're not going to be optimizing your program, all at once, you're gonna get your top performing partners, you're going to, you're going to lean into specific partners based on the value that they drive. A good example of this, I've done a lot of, I did a lot of product gifting and with one of my retailers, and the goal was really to get increased third party reviews. So that was one specific strategy, I did SERP analysis of who was ranking organically for some key keywords within that vertical, and really sought them out for sending product for them to conduct a review, because what we found is consumers really trust that third party review site to really drive forward the channel and they saw it is very successful. But that's one good example of being a bit more

Aaron Conant  21:07  

traditional in nature. So question here, What verticals are you working in and doing well, what type of publishers are in the network?

Amanda Jimmerson  21:18  

I work across many verticals of clients, I would say for some of the big box retailers, I like to like lean into them a bit more because they have more insights across categories. But I would say fashion is always doing quite well. collectibles are also up there electronics, any type of beauty products. Shoes are also hot and heavy right now. In terms of partners, we're seeing a uptick, again, I mentioned by now pay later partnerships, they are hot and heavy right now, thinking about, you know, influencers are starting to emerge within the pay and performance model. And that's that's a trend that we are seeing increase over the course of this year and something we anticipate to be strong heading into 2024. But then there's also those traditional rambutans and loyalty partnerships of the worlds that are really driving the volume and an efficient pace are some retailers

Aaron Conant  22:27  

I mean, I can see the influence your side just ramping up to be almost completely affiliate. I mean, you always have the, you know, the high end ones, right Kardashians, they're in demand a high dollar figure up front. Absolutely. But developing more of a relationship with influencers, micro influencers in creating an affiliate program that way where it's, you know, pay on performance. I can see a big portion of the influencer networks or the influencer revenue stream coming from affiliates as a whole. Is there a good resource to reference a list of top affiliate partnerships that businesses can look through? Yes, go ahead. No, no, I'm just thinking like, that's your list, right? Yes. That's your you'd do the analysis? My guess is it depends. But I don't want to.

Amanda Jimmerson  23:21  

I mean, it really does depend. But acceleration partners, we obviously have been in this space for quite, quite a number of years. And we have a lot of those resources made available to us. We also have a proprietary reporting system that we are able to see overall trends across our portfolio of clients and who are those like top publishers within the space? Yeah.

Aaron Conant  23:48  

This is the next one. Oh, this is the I mean, this is new and ramping up now with the TikTok affiliate, what are some best practices you suggest?

Amanda Jimmerson  23:56  

You know, we have we're navigating this as its as it's rolling out, you know, making sure that we're being thoughtful of tiktoks approach and you know, I haven't necessarily worked directly with with tick talkers in the space we've more so than focused on you know, Facebook, Instagram, even some YouTuber and Snapchat influencers. But best practice is really like understanding that they are fitting to your brand, their content is healthy, it's not going to be controversial, and making sure that you're sitting close to that relationship, right. And I think partnership marketing the backbone really is around building these strong relationships out of the gate and sitting close to any type of influencer because they really appreciate that partnership and they are ultimately an extension of your brand. So you want to ultimately make sure that they are they are a true reflection of who you are.

Aaron Conant  25:00  

How does a brand know? When to reach out? Or when to start an affiliate program? Are there key indicators where somebody is on the line today? And they're like, Hey, I don't know if this makes sense for me or not like when do they, when they talk start making steps in the direction of set up a program, essentially, when did they reach out for you?

Amanda Jimmerson  25:21  

Yeah, good question. So I think first and foremost, if you want to test in the affiliate space, and you really are just like, I don't know where to start. That's the number one indicator, I work alongside some amazing people who are the true experts in this space. And our services are really built on results and experience. So that's, that's a benefit of having an agency. I would also say another indicator to reach out is if your current program, you're seeing it become quite stale, or there's a lack of growth or or there, you don't know where to turn for, like new and innovative strategies. Again, another great opportunity for acceleration partners or any agency to step in and be that leading indicator, right? Because we're always evolving, we're really educating ourselves on what's, what's to come in the next quarter or a year, and planning ahead of that, and, you know, paving the way of a really strong journey for your product.

Aaron Conant  26:14  

Awesome. Is there anything else we kind of get to last, like, minute and a half or so here? I mean, we only only had a half hour? Sure, we could do this for two and a half hours? Probably just to have you on the podcast for sure. Anything else people should know? Before we wrap up today, things we missed? We didn't get to bring up?

Amanda Jimmerson  26:38  

Great question. Honestly, like when I think about some of the I know, we talked about, like the economic uncertainty and where do we go from here. I'm really niche making sure that everybody has contingency plans in place during these turbulent times. They are a critical piece. Following the pandemic. And everything that has followed, it's quite evident that consumer behaviors consistently evolving and it could ultimately surprise us. So being able to adjust strategy quickly, while also driving that efficiency for the brand is critical. No matter if we see a downturn or an upswing in the coming second half of this year, we're acting quickly and nimbly, and efficiently to write the ship. But I definitely would recommend if you aren't leaning into performance partnerships, or the affiliate space, this is a really good time to do so. Or if you're coming in under goal for the remainder of the year, the affiliate channel is a great leveraging tool to really make up for any lost ground. Yeah. Awesome!

Aaron Conant  27:38  

Well, Amanda, thanks so much for your time today. Thanks, everybody, for dialing in. Thanks for the great questions and make this time go by incredibly quickly. Again, look for a follow-up email from us. I'd love to have a conversation with you around digital strategy. If anybody's looking for any kind of help with partner selection across the digital space from direct consumer to Amazon to paid media, don't hesitate to reach out in this space, obviously, Acceleration Partners, leaders across the network as a whole here working with a ton of brands and it's worth having a follow-up conversation with Amanda and the team over there. I want to encourage everybody to do that. And with that, we're going to wrap up this webinar today. Thanks again, Amanda. Everybody take care, stay safe, and look forward to having you in a future event.