Future of Affiliate Marketing

May 13, 2005
by

Affiliate marketing can be traditionally defined as a subset of performance marketing where a standard set of terms are offered to group of partners who then drive traffic to the merchant via any marketing channel that falls within the merchant’s terms and conditions.

Here’s where we’re going…

More one-on-one deals, which turns an affilate relationship into a bus-dev relationship

Higher standards for affiliate partnership: A smaller number of affiliates means the channel is easier to manage. However it also results in lowered revenue from the affiliate marketing channel. Some companies could eliminate this marketing channel b/c it can be argued that it would be more cost-effective to allocate resources working on larger bus-dev deals.

About Carolyn Tang Kmet

Carolyn Tang Kmet is the director of affiliate marketing for Groupon.com, a site that features a daily deal on the best stuff to do, see, eat, and buy in a variety of cities across the U.S., Canada, Europe and soon beyond (read: Space). Prior to joining Groupon, she led the client services team at ShareASale.com, an award-winning affiliate network. On the merchant side, she’s managed affiliate programs at Orbitz.com and CollectiblesToday.com; and on the affiliate site, she helped build the MyPoints Shopping portal. Carolyn is also an adjunct lecturer with Loyola University of Chicago, where she teaches both undergraduate and MBA level e-marketing courses.

Carolyn received her MBA from Loyola University Chicago. She holds a Masters of Science degree in Journalism from Northwestern University and a Bachelor of Arts degree from University of California, Berkeley.You can find Carolyn on Twitter @catango.

Filed under: Affiliate Marketing
  • Wayne Porter

    Carolyn,

    Are you telling us the days of mass affiliation are almost over? That is good news!

  • http://www.molanderassoc.com NoCookie

    Carolyn:
    Please do not forget the core producers.

  • http://NoCookie Carolyn Tang

    The core producers are my bread and butter because that is where the trust and elbow grease are…that's what's I work to build. However, I worry that by losing focus, some affiliate programs get re-defined in management eyes. Affilate programs, in my opinion, should always be about those core producers.