The Good Guys Affiliates Program

Affiliate marketing, rewards websites who refer consumers to purchase products from a particular website. The reward typically is a type of commission for each purchase made via a referral link.

How it works …

Affiliate marketing works as a partnership between three different groups – the Advertiser, the Affiliate Publisher and the Consumer.

• The Advertiser has something to sell – typically a product or service.
• The Affiliate Publisher advertises that product or service to its audience of consumers.
• The Consumer makes a purchase of the product or service by clicking on the affiliate link provided by the publisher.
• The Advertiser then pays a reward (typically a commission) to the Affiliate Publisher for the referred purchase made by the Consumer.

In our case the Advertiser is The Good Guys.

Publishers love Affiliate Marketing for many reasons, in particular it is a great way for them to boost their income or revenue and build a loyal audience.

There are many different types of ‘Publishers’ – from bloggers to businesses with huge loyalty programs. If you’ve seen an influencer on Instagram – with a ‘link in the bio’ to get a great discount on a product, or received an email with fantastic products from your favourite loyalty club – it’s likely that is Affiliate Marketing.

An affiliate platform is a third party that is responsible for tracking transactions and attributing the correct affiliate to the sale. For example, The Good Guys use an affiliate platform called Partnerize.

The benefits of using an affiliate network include:

• Tracking is done by the affiliate platform, which means an advertiser doesn't have to build a system themselves and the affiliate doesn't need to worry about tracking sales because an impartial third party does it.
• Affiliate payments are processed by the affiliate platform which takes away some of the work from the advertiser, and it makes it easy for the affiliate to track successful payments.
• Affiliate platforms act as a third party in case of disputes.
• The affiliate platform has a vast marketplace of affiliate publishers ready to promote on behalf of advertisers.

The affiliate platform attributes the affiliate to the sale using a link, a pixel which gets installed on the advertiser’s website, and a cookie.

The link

The link allows the affiliate platform to accredit the correct sales to the right affiliate. When an affiliate is logged in and accepted into the advertiser’s program, they will have access to a library of creatives or products that may be uploaded or utilised in a text link.

The pixel

Installing the pixel onto the advertiser’s website ensures that the affiliate platform is notified whenever a sale is generated via an affiliate. This pixel is activated once a customer reaches the purchase confirmation page and the transaction is confirmed. From this point, the transaction is traced back, and a commission is paid to the affiliate that drove the sale.

The cookie

Cookies are files stored on the user’s computer, and they hold a small amount of data like login information, shopping carts or the language used to view a specific website.

You might notice that when you have been browsing a website looking for something, (for example, a toaster), then you will start to see ads for those toasters when you're browsing the internet. The reason this happens is the cookies on your computer. Cookies are also used when you want your browser to remember login details, and you clicked 'yes' when prompted.

Different sites collect different types of data within a cookie, but a cookie doesn't collect any personal information, for example, photos or bank information.

When you're browsing the internet and go to a website, your web browser will automatically reference any cookie data that exists for that website on your computer.

A cookie is created when you visit a new website. Some cookies delete automatically after a period of not visiting a particular website, and some automatically expire after a period of time has lapsed.