When you are aware of what is AffiliateWP, the next thing affiliate marketers need to know is how to use AffiliateWP. AffiliateWP is one of the must-have WordPress plugins if you want to run an affiliate business for your brand. There are many benefits of using AffiliateWP for your WordPress website.
This WordPress plugin can seamlessly integrate with popular platforms. Whether you are running an eCommerce business or B2B business, AffiliateWP suits every industry. There are many successful businesses that are using AffiliateWP and have scaled huge growth.
Businesses have started realizing the importance of affiliate marketing, launching their own affiliate marketing program is one of the best ways to expand your business. It also helps in doubling your revenue and increasing your customer database across the globe.
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How to use AffiliateWP?
AffiliateWP is popularly used by business owners who launch digital products. It is also beneficial for websites that are into e-learning and e-commerce products. Here are some of the steps that you need to follow for using AffiliateWP.
1. Brainstorm for an affiliate program idea
Before you begin using the AffiliateWP WordPress plugin, you need to have a strong business blueprint and the roadmap for your affiliate program. Because without an action plan, there is a less success ratio of gaining returns from this platform.
Brainstorming for affiliate program ideas can be done in many ways. You can do a quick competitor analysis or reach out to your audience for analysing the pain points faced by them. Based on that analysis, you will get an idea of what solution that you need to introduce in the market.
If you haven’t built an audience for your brand, there are even other ways for getting ideas. You can reach out to your colleagues, friends, and relatives. Ask their opinions and check reactions based on the solution that you are going to offer.
When you have brainstormed for an idea, you need to create ways that you can reach out to your affiliates. Decide the payout and cookie expiration which is important.
2. Installing AffiliateWP on WordPress website
The best part about using AffiliateWP for the WordPress website is its convenience of installing and setting up.
Firstly, you need to visit the official website of AffiliateWP.
On the homepage of AffiliateWP, you will find the buy now option. When you click the buy now button and insert all the required details, you need to process the payment. The AffiliateWP after verifying the successful payment will allow you to download the WordPress plugin.
You need to then visit your website and find the plugins section on the left menu of your WordPress backend.
When you click the plugins menu, it will ask you whether to add a new plugin by searching through WordPress or uploading a new plugin. You need to select upload a new plugin and upload the file from your downloads section.
After uploading the WordPress plugin, you need to hit the install button. Wait for a few seconds for the files to get installed and then click the activate plugin.
Now you are ready to use AffiliateWP for your affiliate program.
You can also upload the plugin using FTP or directly the cPanel section of your website.
3. Customizing AffiliateWP settings
This is one of the most important sections in using AffiliateWP for your WordPress website. There are some of the attributes that need to be configured that will be beneficial for your affiliate program.
A. Integrating the license
After successfully installing the WordPress plugin, the next step that you need to do is activate the plugin using the license code that you have received. The license code will be received when you make a purchase. This is usually found in the AffiliateWP account and where you need to check the menu space for a license.
When you click the license from AffiliateWP, you will be able to find the license code below the item column. You can also see the license details with the status and expiration details.
When you have copied the license code from the AffiliateWP dashboard, the next thing that you need to do is go to the WordPress backend. When you visit the WordPress backend, find the plugin name and click AffiliateWP. You need to then go to the settings section, insert the license code that you have copied and click the activate license button.
B. Customising the pages
When you activate the AffiliateWP plugin, the next thing that you are going to notice is the pages section. This is basically the affiliate page area that the plugin will automatically display when you click the view button.
The main intention of creating this page is to let affiliate marketers access your products and services. They can also create and log in to their account using this page.
You might see an error message, it is because there are no affiliates registered on the platform. When you create a new one, you will see the section filled with details.
Here the affiliate marketer will find all the tools that are required to manage their accounts. It can be their name, password, profile picture, and other search details.
C. Configuring the referral option
After the affiliate area has been activated, you need to create an affiliate link for the products or solutions that you want the affiliate marketer to promote. This is one of the most crucial steps that help you in tracking the performance of affiliate marketers and the payout that needs to be released for them.
The affiliate marketer can also create a new unique URL using the generate URL button through this section. They can also see how many referrals they have made for your brand, the payments that they have received, the conversions that they have made, and other affiliate metrics.
The referral details are based on the reference code, the total amount of sales they have made, the description of the affiliate product, the status of the transaction, and the date.
When you have configured all the affiliate details, the next thing that you need to work on is the referral variable, referral rate type, taxation details, and configuring cookie expiration. These are all the details that need to be configured when you want to decide how you need to pay the affiliate marketer.
The AffiliateWP provides you with multiple customizations so that you can control each and every development of the affiliate transaction. Please pay extra attention when you are configuring the cookie expiration and the referral rate type.
4. Configuring the affiliate area
These functions are solely dependent on the way you wish to create workflows for the affiliate’s action.
A. Log in or sign up area
In the affiliate area forms, you need to configure the settings between the login or sign-up area. If you wish to display both the options for the affiliate marketer, you have the complete power to do so.
If you want to display only the login area and if you wish to make the signup method manually, the AffiliateWP will allow you to perform it.
All the options are found in the dropdown that you find in the affiliate area forms. Respectively you can select the login option then configure the login form as per your requirement.
When you select to display the login and signup area, you need to make some changes in the misc section of the AffiliateWP plugin. When you go to the miscellaneous section, you need to allow the affiliate marketers to create a new account with your brand. You get a notification whenever a user has created an account, and you need to approve it by going to the pending affiliate section.
B. Setting Commission rate for affiliates
This is one of the most important parts that engage the affiliate marketer to promote your brand across digital media channels. Firstly you need to start by configuring the commission rate by visiting the settings of the AffiliateWP plugin.
You need to configure the commission rates whether it has to be processed at a flat rate or percentage-wise. This is usually calculated on the product affiliate that you want to promote. You need to double-check the figures that you have entered as you don’t want to mess up your revenue part.
You can also spice up things a little bit by introducing discounts. These strategies are something that every business looks forward to scaling their business using the discounts. After selecting the discount, you can also edit the margin part. Be realistic with the numbers that you promise your affiliates. Because it shouldn’t happen that you can’t deliver the payouts.
C. Setting up the statistics and graphs
This section is popularly utilized by the affiliate marketer after promoting an affiliate product. They can see the total statistics of their affiliate account which has the popular metrics that are related to earnings that they have made, references that they have generated, and the conversion ratio.
All these details are found in the statistics and graphs section of the AffiliateWP plugin. It also allows them to see the progress of the affiliate marketing journey. These details are essential for the business owner and the affiliate marketer to know where they position themselves.
D. Uploading the creatives
Every business that registers itself on an affiliate marketing program offers creatives for the marketer. This is basically done because of maintaining the same brand guideline of the business across multiple digital media verticals. It also helps the audience to distinguish your brand from the competitors.
The creatives are basically the logo, banners, posters, and other design collaterals that will be beneficial for affiliate marketers to promote. All these designs can be customized and uploaded in the creative section that focuses on your brand. Further, the affiliate marketer will decide whether to use the creatives for promotion or not.
To perform this step, you need to visit the creative section from the affiliate area. Click the add new button and then a new page will open automatically. Enter the name of the creative and give a description of it. Select the URL that the creative needs to have and then you can upload the image.
E. Setting up the payout
The payout for affiliate marketers can be decided in two ways. Whether you wish to give a one-time commission or set up a recurring commission for the successful sale that they make every time.
The best thing about AffiliateWP is that it offers both the options. You can also integrate the popular payment gateway such as PayPal that will make it easy for your business to create a transaction with your affiliate. And it even benefits the affiliate marketer to their target audience if they find that your brand supports popular payment methods.
To configure the recurring referrals for your affiliate is very simple. Depending upon the license type that you have purchased for your brand, the AffiliateWP offers multiple add ons that you can integrate. Some of the popular addons can be the mass payout feature, it will be beneficial when you have many affiliate marketers to pay for. If you wish to do it individually, it will tend to consume more time and effort.
The affiliate marketer will also get a chance to access the payout statement and you can generate the invoice for the transaction. All the details and reports can be exported via an excel file. This can be integrated with your accounting tools to track all the data.
Concluding thoughts
I hope that you got an idea for how to use AffiliateWP and set it up. The above steps that we have discussed are some of the important factors that you need to configure. There can be other settings that haven’t been covered that need to be examined by yourself.
There is no doubt that AffiliateWP is one of the best affiliate program management software that you can integrate into your WordPress website. With the number of features and customization, it makes it more desirable for business owners to expand through affiliate marketing.
Let me know if you have doubts and concerns using AffiliateWP.