Affiliate Ad Networking is now an inseparable part of Digital Marketing. Most of the advertisers agree that Affiliate Marketing is important or very important part of their marketing strategy. Not only this, they also agreed that their 20% of annual sale was driven by these affiliate partnerships.
As publishers or any other individual who is somewhere and somehow related to digital marketing should be updated about every in and out of affiliate marketing. One such term is trends and myths of affiliate marketing. In this blog, we will talk about the common myths and trends related to
affiliate ad networks:
Current Affiliate Ad Network Trends:
1. Influencers: Under this trend, marketing is done by appointing an influential to promote a product or service. These influencers have so many potential buyers (followers) who get influenced by them. Hence, it becomes easy to target them without actually making any efforts towards them.
2. Driving the in-store purchasers to shop online: in this trend, an offer is given to the buyer who comes to buy things from a usual brick and mortar shop. The offer could be anything like getting a 10% off on our online store, or a code is given to buyer via a blog etc. which he/she can redeem while online shopping.
3. Tracking Performance: Gone are those days when cross-device tracking was in trend. Now, with the growing trend of the affiliate ad networks, performance tracking is playing a vital role. Now, the brands are preferring to have a dedicated app for themselves, they are asking influencers to encourage app downloads and in-app purchases. For this entire process, they keep a professional tracking link to capture the performance of publishers.
4. Discounts! Discounts and More Discounts: some things are have always endured the test of time. Some things never get old. One such thing is the art of selling products in the name of discounts, best price, cash-back etc.
5. Say Hello to Mobile: With the historical rise in Mobile phone usage, this trend is not going to fade anytime soon. Every brand is now associated with mobile apps, or soon going to be. Publishers all over the world are looking forward to monetizing their apps, in such scenario imagine the revenues associated with mobile apps.
Now Let’s Bust Some Common Myths Related to Affiliate Marketing:
1. Consumers primarily use their mobile devices on the go.
It is generally said that people use their smartphones while they are on the go. Believing the same, most brands approach their consumers at the same time. But, the fact is entirely different, as per a survey was done in University of Virginia School of Engineering, the consumers did not get engaged only when they were out and about, in fact, a whopping 75% of total mobile impression was made while the users were at home!!
So, if you want to tap audiences on a large scale you need to understand the fact that they will tap the ad only if they require it. Simple. However, you can direct them to react by generating an interesting content with a call to action involved.
2. My mobile campaign must be a great success as it is getting tons of impressions.
Yes, a large-scale audience is very important. Probably, that’s the reason why brands keep bragging about the number of impressions that they get, but that is not always the fact. You cannot comment on the quality of traffic unless you get an accurate report. For example, candy crush received millions of impressions on its ad but out of that million, there was a great percentage of 5-7-year-old kids who clicked on that ad while using their parent’s phone. So, it is always smarter to invest on the consumers who will turn into leads rather than on those who are not interested.
3. Longer visits means better engagement.
Another tool that the advertisers look upon is the session depth. Yes, it is important that the user should not bounce back from your page. But judging their interest based on the number of pages they are visiting can be wrong too. Recently a survey done in Manchester shows that the major chunk of leads was generated by the users on the very first page of the content. It kept declining with the increasing number of pages!! So, it is always better to work on the Ad placement strategy and quality content.
4. Programmatic inventory is low on quality.
If we look back in the time, the statement might be correct. But, today the scenario is completely changed. The programmatic inventory is a synonym of efficiency, effectiveness and everything else that turns a data into a buy. With the rise of programmatic inventory, many ads get sold even before a flick of your eyelids leaving the scope of “premium” buying that requires higher biddings! Today’s programmatic inventory is defined with rich media that includes, display, mobile, text, video, native and what not.
5. Ad networks offer efficient reach vehicles.
It is a game of understanding the market properly. We live in a myth that affiliate network cannot be reached by the right audiences or even if it happens, the frequency can be low. But the fact is, the larger networks know when to target the audience or when they are available. They are likely to fulfill the term and buy the bid. However, it is still not possible to find scale everywhere but these networks are still the best scalable advertising opportunities available.
As mobile market is growing like anything, the growing number of pains along with it is inevitable. But, the marketers need to separate the myths from reality and keep updated according to the trends of affiliate ad networks.
Author Bio: Nikhil Reddy is a tech savvy content writer by passion and associated with a Mobile Ad Network – Apps Discover Technologies. Nikhil writes for numerous blogs and gives useful tips for bloggers, start-ups, and marketing professionals. You can follow him on Twitter and Facebook.