How to set up affiliate marketing for your SAAS business? Step by step
Affiliate marketing and referrals are a marketing tactics that are really slept on, especially in the SaaS world. If it's done correctly it can easily add 30% to your revenue.
Here is a 4 step plan that I made and executed for the companies that I worked with and helped grow revenue through affiliates & referrals
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Create an affiliate page on your website where you can explain the benefits of joining your program. This is way, potential influencers and marketers will get a good idea of what your program offers (Here are some good examples: Bannerbear, ContentStudio)
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Set up an affiliate ecosystem to keep track of your commissions. You can use platforms like Reditus or Rewardful. It's really easy to set it up if you are using Stripe or Paddle
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Get your product in front of marketers by listing it on Affiliate Networks. Some of the platforms you can use are Affistash or PartnerStack. These platform are dedicated for software products, so there is a big change to hit your target audience!
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Start promoting your program by sharing it with your community and displaying it on your landing page.
PS: I am one of the co-founders of Affistash, so if you want to list your program on Affistash, you can apply here and if you want to get a 50% discount, make sure to hit me up on my Twitter ;)
Hope this helped ✌️
Setting up an affiliate marketing program for your SaaS business can be a great way to increase sales and visibility. Here’s a step-by-step guide using the affiliate marketing software you’ve mentioned:
Step 1: Choose Your Affiliate Marketing Software
Here's the list of top affiliate marketing softwares for Saas you can choose from:
Reflio: A robust affiliate marketing tool that could integrate well with your SaaS, offering customizable options to fit your business model. With its user-friendly interface, Reflio might be a good choice if you’re looking for ease of use and flexibility.
Link: https://reflio.com?via=xqgbf2hrv39fdvxpq0hy
Rewardful: Directly integrates with Stripe, which could be beneficial if you’re also using Stripe alongside Paddle. It’s designed to turn your customers into affiliates quickly, which can be a great way to leverage existing relationships.
Link: https://www.rewardful.com/?via=khadin
LinkMink: Focused on helping SaaS companies grow through affiliate partnerships, LinkMink could be a strong contender if you’re looking for a platform that specializes in SaaS growth.
Link: https://linkmink.com?lmref=fXQoiQ
LeadDyno: Known for its simplicity in setting up and managing affiliate programs, LeadDyno could be a good match if you’re after an easy-to-use solution that still offers comprehensive tracking and management features.
Link: http://www.leaddyno.com/khadin?afmc=8wy
TrackDesk: Offers a detailed affiliate tracking solution that could provide you with deep insights into your affiliate program’s performance, which can be crucial for scaling your efforts.
Link: https://trackdesk.com/?linkId=lp_413822&sourceId=khadinakbar&tenantId=affiliates
Step 2: Set Up Your Affiliate Program
Sign up for the software of your choice using your affiliate link.
Configure the settings to match your business model, including commission rates, payment terms, and cookie duration.
Step 3: Recruit Affiliates
Reach out to your existing customers and invite them to join your affiliate program.
Promote your affiliate program on social media, your website, and through email marketing.
Step 4: Provide Marketing Materials
Create banners, text links, and promotional content that your affiliates can use to promote your SaaS.
Ensure that all materials are branded and provide clear calls to action.
Step 5: Track and Manage Affiliates
Use the dashboard provided by your affiliate software to track affiliate performance.
Communicate regularly with your affiliates, providing them with updates and incentives to perform better.
Step 6: Pay Out Commissions
Set up automated payments to reward your affiliates for their successful referrals.
Keep track of payments and ensure transparency with your affiliates to maintain trust.
Step 7: Optimize and Grow
Analyze the performance data to identify the most successful affiliates and strategies.
Continuously optimize your affiliate program based on data-driven insights.
Remember, the key to a successful affiliate program is active management and support for your affiliates. Provide them with the tools they need to succeed, and you’ll see your SaaS business grow as a result.
Good article, thanks!
After some experience building affiliate marketing for some services and "gray-hat" products, let me add one piece of advice: always check your competitors and their affiliate traffic sources. It will help you choose the right strategy for acquiring your affiliates with specific skills.
Find how your competitor's affiliates generate traffic, ask if they have any issues, and if they want to try split traffic with your brand.
It's a great source of information before and while launching your affiliate marketing.
Would love to connect and learn more for https://partners.taskade.com/ as we recently launched it on https://www.taskade.com/blog/affiliate-partnership-program/
Please DM or ping john at taskade via email!
Hey John! I replied to you on twitter, thanks for reaching out!
I have some pretty cool ideas about the Taskade partnership program and I think that Affistash can help it grow! Looking forward to your reply :)
With affiliate marketing, since I'm active on Shopify the choice would be Shoffi.
Totally satisfied with the way it works and the statistics are accurate.
Really interesting! What is your startup about?
I am working on making https://pdfinvoices.fordeer.io/ work on Shopify e-commerce platform, we create solution for printing, creating and customizing sales invoices on any Store.
An e-commerce platform you already know? Products or solutions we aim to solve customer problems or platforms that are not yet supported.
Nice article @VicDevelopmently. Explains the concepts well. One doubt -
As a SaaS platform, I need both a affiliate management system and a marketplace right? Affistash is a marketplace or it offers affiliate management also? Thanks
Hey @kkumarkg! Thanks for the kind words. Let me give you a quick run through Affistash.
So, we basically made a platform where any software company can list their program, and marketers can browse the platform to find about new programs they can join and promote. And we even give the affiliates a huge competitive advantage, because we give AI generated unique sales scripts, marketing scripts, media content and more for every product listed on the platform. This way, marketers promote & sell easier, which means that companies make more money! Everyone wins ;)
With all that in mind, we don't handle the management system, and for now we are not planning to implement it, because we want to strictly focus on helping SaaS companies on connecting them to the marketers they need, but also help them recruit the affiliates that engaged with their product in our marketplace.
PS: If a company that wants to join Affistash doesn't have an affiliate program setup already, we have a call with them and help them set up their ecosystem via Reditus, to make things easier for them
Hope I answered the questions as expected, and thanks for running in to the post : )
Cheers
thanks @VicDevelopmently for the explanation. Will check out the platform once we are ready
Super interesting! One question though: what are considered normal % of revenue to give to affiliates?
I saw that both Bannerbear and ContentStudio offer 30% as long as the referred user is subscribed, which seems A LOT.
Is it normal? Or am I missing something?
It's usually normal for software companies, because they don't pay any logistics like amazon sellers for example. Usually the commissions are really high in the SaaS space, usually around 25-50%
Btw, if you have a product I would love to have it on Affistash, maybe we can help you grow your program too. Let me know if it sounds appealing to you and hope I answered your question ;)
Great post! One thing to consider when setting up on an existing network (e.g. Impact / PartnerStack, etc) is their ability to integrate with other channels and networks - look out for API capabilities.
This'll be useful later if you want to extend your deals to other networks, for instance if you want to make your affiliate offer available to a new channel, say newsletters, you can simply extend without having to setup with a new network.
This is what we did at Swapstack.co (newsletter marketing platform) which allowed us to extend the network and almost instantly access hundreds of new deals.
Something to consider for the future, but best setup early!
That sound amazing. This is why in my SaaS, Affistash, I tried to offer flexibility too. You can use any affiliate system, and still easily get listed.
Select a reputable affiliate network. Then decide on the commission structure, product categories, and affiliate rules and guidelines. Offer incentives such as higher commission rates or special promotions + support, marketing materials, and regular updates to your affiliates. Use an affiliate tracking software to monitor sales, clicks, and conversions from your affiliates.
Great tips!
Already using affiliate marketing for my saas and I believe it should be a more well known tactic for new founders.
Awesome to hear Adrian!
I like how platforms like Systeme.io are auto-signing up their users as affiliates. They have an affiliate program built in, so you don't need to sign up twice.
That is a smart tactic too. You can approach your most active users, and try to give the referral benefits, because since they are active, they will know how to make it clear for potential buyers and explain the value of the product.
It's basically "turning your biggest fans into your best marketers" ;D
Thanks for that, was wondering how to set this up today and came across your post!
I didn't understood. If we are already using Rewardful or Reditus then again why we need to list on Partnerstack?
Isn't Partnerstack is just another affiliate platform like Rewardful/Reditus?
Great post!
I am creating TechLinear which is going to be a blog that'll include some affiliate marketing pages. I am looking forward to trying affiliate marketing for the first time ever.
That is amazing, you can hit me up on Twitter @PiticVic if you want I can give you a discount code for Affistash, maybe you find some interesting products and tools you can promote on our website ;)
Cheers!
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