Q: I’ve located a merchant that has the perfect product line for my niche audience, but they recently discontinued their affiliate program with a major affiliate network, because they weren’t satisfied with the results. I spoke with the affiliate manager, and after seeing my site, they are interested in working with me. Is there an affiliate software you’d recommend that would allow the merchant to inexpensively set up their own affiliate program without going through one of the major networks?
A: There are tons of options out there. Personally, if I was going to set up an affiliate program today using software, I would one of two options: Groundbreak.com’s Ultimate Affiliate or iDevAffiliate.
Those are two of the most popular affiliate program software packages, and they have the tools you need for a bare bones affiliate program.
So, check those two out and I think either one should suffice.
However, if this company is thinking about scaling up to a big affiliate program, they might want to reconsider going straight back to one of the affiliate networks.
There are a variety of reasons why an affiliate program can fail, and I think them using their former affiliate network as a scapegoat might be convenient, but that doesn’t mean it’s correct.
It could have very well been their management of the affiliate program or a number of other issues.