What are Affiliates and What are the Best Programs by Mel Feller

Mel Feller
Sep 7, 2018 · 8 min read

An affiliate network acts as an intermediary between publishers, affiliate marketers, who sell products and services and the merchants who create those products and services and their affiliate programs.

For merchants, affiliate network services provided often include reporting, tracking, payment and refund processing, affiliate management, and most importantly — access to a large base of publishers affiliate marketers.

For affiliate marketers, network services include a central database of available affiliate programs organized by category and popularity to choose from, a simple registration platform for those programs, reporting tools, analytics, and payment processing.

While affiliate marketers are generally able to join affiliate networks free, merchants usually have to pay a fee to participate in the network. Affiliate networks usually charge an initial setup fee for each merchant and often a recurring membership fee. It is also common practice for affiliate networks to charge merchants a percentage of the commissions paid to affiliates. This percentage is known as an ‘over-ride’ and is payable on top of the affiliates commissions. However, make no mistake about it, despite these fees, the benefits to the merchant for joining these networks is well worth the price. Here is why…

There are several payout models used by affiliate networks including the two primary models: CPS and CPA.

(CPS)Cost-Per-Sale

CPS, also referred to as PPS (Pay Per Sale), is a low-risk, high-profit, revenue-sharing model used by marketers to lure an unlimited number of new customers to their product or service. Cost-Per-Sale pays a set commission to the affiliate marketer who refers a lead that result in a purchase. Marketers love the CPS model since they only pay a commission after they are paid first by the purchasing customer. It is in essence free marketing and advertising since the affiliate is the one who produces the lead without any up-front cost to them. This is also, why CPS payout commission percentages are so high. Incidentally, the CPS model is primarily what we focus on here at highpayingaffiliateprograms.com.

(CPA)Cost-Per-Action

CPA marketing programs pay affiliates when a specific action is taken by the referral or lead. Common actions include clicks, impressions, form submits, sign-ups, registrations, or opt-ins. Since Cost-Per-Action models do not necessarily involve a direct sale and involve more risk taking, the payout percentages are far smaller than they are in Cost-Per-Sale.

Best Affiliate Networks For 2018

Terraleads

1. Terraleads It is the world’s first CPA Hub and a direct advertiser of nutra offers represented in the following categories: beauty, diet, health, and adult. TerraLeads works by a COD model and provides the highest approval rates thanks to the local call-centers with native speakers on-board. TerraLeads distinguishing features are the in-house production and local warehouses in unique geos in Europe and Asia. After becoming TerraLeads partner, one gets 24/7 multilingual support, free translation services, possibility to track leads in real time, use the cutting-edge technologies, and withdraw money daily via multiple e-payment systems.

Clickbank

2. Clickbank Clickbank is huge. And it’s been in the game for over 17 years. ClickBank’s focus is digital information products. As one of the largest online retailers, ClickBank has a vast library of over 6 million unique products in order to reach 200 million customers around the world.

Wide Markets

3. Wide Markets Wide Markets Ltd, provides a unique cross-channel advertising solution for eCommerce businesses. The company owns Wide Markets Media™ , Wide Markets Fashion™, Wide Markets eTickets™ and Wide Markets eStores™. Advertisers can sell their goods and services through the native products created by Wide Markets, receiving outstanding User-Values. In the other hand, publishers benefits from a native method to monetize their online assets finding higher conversion rates. The company supports the Performance Marketing Association and is an active Champion Member.

CJ By Conversant

4. CJ Affiliate by Conversant Formerly Commission Junction, CJ Affiliate by Conversant reaches millions of consumers shopping online through their affiliate marketing network. The Conversant, Inc. companies include Commission Junction, Dotomi, Greystripe, Mediaplex, and ValueClick Media.

Rakuten

5. Rakuten Formerly Buy.com, Rakuten.com has grown into a monster. Rakuten ranks among the top three e-commerce companies in the world with over 90,000 products from 38,500 shop owners and more than 18 million customers. Among its numerous online properties, its flagship B2B2C (business-to-business-to-consumer) model e-commerce site Rakuten Ichiba is the largest e-commerce site in Japan and among the world’s largest by sales.

ShareASale

6. ShareaSale ShareASale has been in business for 15 years, exclusively as an affiliate marketing network. Their technology receives accolades for speed, efficiency, and accuracy and their reputation as a fair and honest business is well known within the industry.

Amazon Associates

7. Amazon Associates

Amazon.com needs no intorduction. Amazon is an American electronic commerce and cloud computing company with headquarters in Seattle, Washington. It is the largest Internet-based retailer in the United States. It’s affiliate network, called Amazon Associates, allows you to tap into over a million products to advertise to your customers.

Affiliate Partners

8. Affiliate Partners Ltd. Affiliate Partners Ltd. is one of the first affiliate networks in the financial industry and is known as the affiliate network with the highest payouts (CPA) up to $600 for niches like trading, gaming, casino, sales funnels and many more. Working with them makes affiliate marketing much easier for you because of their very professional team which is always reachable in skype and by email. This network assures you the best affiliate network experience in the world with extra fast payouts and a 24/7 support.

CrakRevenue

9. CrakRevenue CrakRevenue is a long-time player in the industry. Since 2010, the CPA network has proved to be one of the most trustworthy platforms for affiliates around the globe. With 700+ quality offers to choose from and big exclusives like MyFreeCams, it’s difficult not to pay attention.

No matter how you slice it, CrakRevenue is a must for affiliates wanting to enjoy some of the industry’s most cutting-edge tools (Smartlinks, Surveys, etc.) and for those interested in joining one huge, caring network (and family) at the end of the day.

Give’em a try — you won’t regret it.

Commission Factory

10. Commission FactoryThe purpose of Commission Factory was to make performance-based marketing available to everyone and not require a steep learning curve in order to get involved and be successful. The platform has been designed to foster a spirit of collaboration between Merchants, Affiliates and Agencies in order to grow mutually beneficial and prosperous relationships. Because they have little to no barriers to entry Commission Factory has an enormously fast growing user base that enables companies of all sizes to discover the power of performance marketing.

Ebay Partner Network

11. eBay Many marketers don’t even know that eBay has an affiliate network. eBay has now been online for over 20 years. The ebay Partner Network provides first class tools, tracking, and reporting.

Avangate

12. Avangate Avangate is a player in digital commerce that you may not be familiar with. Avangate, backed by a cloud platform, focuses on online commerce, subscription billing, and global payments for Software, SaaS and Online Services companies. More than 4000 digital businesses in over 180 countries trust Avangate including Absolute Software, Bitdefender, Brocade, FICO, HP Software, Kaspersky Lab, Telestream, Spyrix and CleverControl.

FlexOffers

13. FlexoffersFlexOffers.com is a premiere affiliate network that builds mutually profitable relationships between strategic, skilled, and trustworthy online publishers and a robust portfolio of 5,000+ popular advertisers spanning all verticals. With over 10+ years of experience in the affiliate marketing industry, they offer unparalleled customer service, an array of optimized data delivery tools, and fast and dependable payments proving that flexibility is the key to affiliate success. FlexOffers.com was recently ranked the eighth overall affiliate network in the Revenue+Performance Top 20 Affiliate (CPS) Network 2015 Blue Book survey.

Avantlink

14. Avantlink Avantlink is the industry-leading technology platform for affiliate referrals. Avantlink works hard to remain on the cutting edge with constant upgrades and updates to the their platform, rapid implementation of new tools and technology, and an unyielding emphasis on quality over quantity.

AdCombo

15. AdCombo AdCombo is a CPA Marketing Network, that uses its own in-house technology, that allows you to customize advertising campaigns to reach your targeted audience throughout the globe. They aim at, and hit their target in, encouraging strategic lucrative partnerships between advertisers and publishers to monetize their traffic. AdCombo has offices and co-workings in 5 cities around the globe.

ReviMedia

16. ReviMedia ReviMedia is an online lead generation network specializing in owned and operated campaigns for insurance, home services, and financial verticals, as well as exclusive advertisers campaigns both focused in the US and international markets. They also own their own proprietary lead management platform called Px.com, which offers quality scoring of every lead and insights into performance by key demographic info. ReviMedia is extremely flexible to run campaigns with many different integrations. They pride themselves on their transparency with clientele as well as having flexible payment terms. ReviMedia also offers advertising partners access to their vast direct publisher network of over 2,000 publishers. They consider themselves a one-stop-shop.

RevenueWire

17. RevenueWireRevenueWire is a global ecommerce platform specifically designed for companies that sell digital products online (just like Clickbank). Combined with industry-leading services like AffiliateWire, their ecommerce platform is a player in more than 120 countries.

Olavivo

18. Olavivo Olavivo is a boutique affiliate network, with a focus on E-commerce, Health and Beauty and Cryptocurrency verticals. Our network promises dedication, transparency and unique technological capabilities with the highest level of personal and professional service. Join us today and get more bang for your buck. When you succeed, we succeed.

AffiBank

19. AffiBank AffiBank is a comprehensive and categorized affiliate programs marketplace. Most of the offers pay affiliates a whopping 75% commissions on sales. Most of the affiliate programs listed in AffiBank’s marketplace use AffiBank’s in-house tracking system.

Which Affiliate Networks Should You Choose?

The choices I have listed above are the affiliate networks that I am most familiar with. Most I use today or have used in the past. It is hardly a complete list of all the good affiliate networks that are out there since there are so many. If you would like to share a network that you really like working with please list it in the comments section at the bottom of this page.

High End Product Launches

One of the very best ways to earn big-ticket commissions is to promote high product launches. But there’s definitely a fine art to its so if you’re new to affiliate marketing I would encourage you to NOT focus on promoting product launches until you know more.

The product launches I am referring to are targeted toward other internet marketers and they attract the very best online entrepreneurs in the world. It’s extremely competitive and requires a lot of work. It helps a lot to have a sizeable list of followers that are also interested in affiliate marketing.

JVZoo

Affiliate Commissions: Depends upon which launch you promote. Major launches can pay $1000+ per sale.

Signup Link To Sell On JVZoo: Click Here

Affiliate Platform Description: Get paid instant commissions direct to your PayPal account by promoting any of the products in the JV Zoo marketplace. JVZoo incorporates everything you need in one convenient place so you don’t need any third party sales tools.

Here’s A Peek Inside:

JVNotifyPro

Affiliate Commissions: Depends upon which launch you promote. Major launches can pay $1000+ per sale.

Signup Link To Sell On JVNotifyPro: Click Here

Affiliate Platform Description: The primary goal Of JVNP 2.0 is gain and attract potential JV partners for relationships of mutual benefit by providing both the tools and environment conducive to joint success.

WarriorPlus

Affiliate Commissions: Varies by promotion. Major launches can pay $1000+ per sale.

Signup Link To Sell On WarriorPlus: Click Here

Affiliate Platform Description: Since 2006, WarriorPlus has brought together the leaders in online digital product creation and marketing. We’ve established a thriving and dynamic community where great minds share great products for greater success. We are committed to serving you and being a part of your journey to help others build their own profitable online business.

The above are the more popular ones, but here are a couple of other top affiliate marketing programs that I’ve heard great things about too:

Shopher — Monetize your website audience with America’s most popular consumer brands and retailers.

Magiclinks

RevenueWire

Activate by Bloglovin

Impact Radius

Mel Feller

Written by

I love business, property and coaching. Helping people realize their potential, overcome their obstacles, and attain their goals is what motivates me.