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Top 10 Affiliate Programs - November 2005
Report on Affiliate Management Software

Report on Affiliate Management Software - 2005 edition

Do you need to purchase affiliate management software so you can set up an affiliate plan or compensate lead generation referrals? If so, you'll begin to salivate as I describe this book.

There are a lot of software choices in the marketplace these days. I wrote the first book designed to guide online business people in selecting affiliate software in 2001. Since then we've seen a number of changes:

  1. Many companies have entered the market; nearly all the major shopping carts provide an affiliate module. In this book I've summarized the website descriptions of 48 affiliate program systems and 55 shopping carts that contain affiliate modules. But with the plethora of programs out there, I can see why merchants and lead generation businesses can throw up their hands in confusion.
  2. While most companies have maintained the status quo, a few have kept pushing forward with improvements. What was excellent software in 2001 is now only a bit above the average.

I see three generations of affiliate software:

  • The first generation covers the basics only, and is adequate enough for the small merchant without many demands. Most of what is on the market today is in this first generation.
  • The second generation has added much greater flexibility to the commission structure, the ability of the merchant to offer incentives to new or high-performing affiliates, and top notch customer service for its merchant clients. Some in the ASP hosted software group are in this generation.
  • The third generation is found only in the network model, designed to server the larger, more active retailers only . They have focused on flexibility, security, and providing excellent, comprehensive service for their retailer clients. Since these larger merchants are most prone to fraud, third generation software includes a number of security features to keep fraudsters out of the affiliate pool, if possible, and detect them if they slip in.

My goal in this book is to help you understand how affiliate management software works, which features are important, let you know as much as possible about the programs themselves, and then make recommendations to guide you in the selection process. At the end I award four software programs the Web Marketing Today Award of Excellence in Affiliate Management Software.

I trust that you'll find this book the tool you need to decide which affiliate management software to use for your online organization.

Here are the affiliate management software programs detailed in the book:

Ad Server Solutions
Aff_Manager
Affiliate Fuel
Affiliate Network Pro
Affiliate Tracking Network
Affiliate Window
Affiliate Wiz
AffiliateClicks
AffiliateGuerrilla
AffiliateShop
AllAffiliatePro v4.5
AssocTRAC
ClickAffiliate PRO
ClickBank
clickXchange.com
clixGalore
Commission Junction
Decentrix AffTraq
DGM Australia
DGM UK
DH-MLM v3.6.0
DirectTrack
FloppyBank
Friendly Affiliate
FusionQuest
IAHBE Toolbox
iDevAffiliate v4.0
Income Access
Interneka Affiliate v3.0
iSalesForce v2.0
Lead to Sale Tracker
Leadhound Network
LinkShare
Little Salesman
Managed Affiliate Program
My Affiliate Program (MyAP)
MyReferer
PartnersManager.6.0
Performics
Post Affiliate Pro
ProTrack Professional
Referral Software
SalesDoubler
Sharasale
TradeDoubler
Ultimate Affiliate 2.3.0
Your Own Affiliate Program
YOURaff v1.02

Here's the table of contents for this 135-page book:

Preface

2

Table of Contents

4

Chapter 1. Introduction to Affiliate Marketing Software

7

  How Affiliate Management Software Works

7

Chapter 2. Types of Affiliate Management Software Programs

9

  Integrated into Shopping Cart

11

  Custom Programming

11

  Network, Commission Based

12

  ASP Hosted, Monthly Flat Fee

13

  Licensed Software on Merchant's Server, One-Time Fee

14

Chapter 3. Features of Affiliate Management Software

15

  Basic Characteristics

15

  Domain to which the Affiliate Link Points

16

  Categorizing Affiliates into Various Groups

17

  Ad Tracking Capabilities

18

  Check Writing and Mass Payment

19

  Links to Multiple Product and Landing Pages

19

  Tiers of Affiliates

20

  Commission Flexibility

20

  Manual Entry of Commissions

23

  Multiple Sites from Same Software

23

  Banner Display

24

  Administrative Reporting

24

  Replicated Affiliate Pages

24

  Fraud Detection

25

  International and Language Flexibility

25

Chapter 4. Recommendations and Awards of Merit for Excellence in Affiliate Management Software

26

  Network Model

26

  ASP Hosted Model

27

  Licensed Stand-Alone Model

27

  Integrated into Shopping Cart Software

27

Appendix 1. Detailed Descriptions of Dedicated Affiliate Management Software

29

Appendix 2. Detailed descriptions of Affiliate Programs Integrated into Shopping Cart Software

73

Appendix 3: User Feedback on Affiliate Management Software

96

  Stand-Alone Affiliate Programs

97

  Affiliate Programs Integrated into Shopping Carts

119

  Custom Programmed Affiliate Management Software

127

About the Author

133