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So you’ve got a product that you’re convinced will be flying off the shelves – just as soon as you start an affiliate program. So what’s standing in your way? First, you have to find the best affiliate management software, then learn how to use it, and then actually build your program from scratch.
Sound stressful? It usually is.
That’s why 40-60% of people who sign up for a free trial use an online software once and never return. It’s often too hard or intimidating to learn a whole new product, especially when you aren’t sure if it’s going to be the right choice for your business.
At LeadDyno, we’ve decided it’s time to reverse that statistic with our newly streamlined and simplified onboarding checklist. Launched in May, this new affiliate onboarding process was designed to help users set up their affiliate marketing software easily and efficiently.
Before getting started, we took time to gather feedback from current and past customers, paying particular attention to trial users who didn’t end up adopting LeadDyno for their affiliate software. Then we removed unnecessary steps, simplified instructions, and made the tough parts easier.
Now, enjoy an easy 5-step process that simplifies the learning curve and covers all your affiliate program setup requirements, so you can start growing profits fast. In this article, we’ll walk you through the new LeadDyno onboarding checklist, showing you why it’s easy to learn, easy to use, and easier to adopt than other affiliate programs on the market.
Once we’re finished, you’ll see why LeadDyno is the best affiliate marketing software for launching and growing a high-quality affiliate program – without the hassle of endlessly complicated setup tasks!
Table of Contents
- Why do so many people struggle to follow through with starting an affiliate program?
- Create a high-quality affiliate management program in 5 easy steps
- Launch your affiliate marketing program the easy way with LeadDyno
Why do so many people struggle to follow through with starting an affiliate program?
There are so many benefits to starting an affiliate program for your online business. So why doesn’t everyone have one? Two primary reasons. First, building and maintaining a robust affiliate program can be quite a complex undertaking. Many business owners end up feeling so overwhelmed that they get stuck at the starting line.
For busy entrepreneurs, it seems like one more complicated marketing tool to add to their business workflow, without guarantee of worthwhile returns. To top it off, many online affiliate software programs are highly difficult to learn and implement, consuming valuable time and causing frustration, which often leads business owners to abandon the process.
The second reason that entrepreneurs and business owners fail in their affiliate marketing efforts is that they launch their program without setting it up properly. A half-baked affiliate program won’t get a business far, especially one hoping to eventually scale to hundreds of affiliates.
Not only does our updated onboarding checklist help avoid both of these issues, but we also have configuration specialists available for extra 1:1 support with setup and implementation. So even if you hit a snag while creating your program, you can count on assistance from our support team to get you up and running fast.
Create a high-quality affiliate management program in 5 easy steps
The affiliate marketing industry is continuously growing, with a 10% annual increase and a total of 5 billion clicks on affiliate marketing links each year. In 2023, businesses using LeadDyno made more than 188 million dollars in revenue while their affiliates made a total of 38 million dollars in commissions.
If you’ve been on the fence about whether to invest time and energy into launching an affiliate marketing software, the returns on a successful affiliate marketing campaign can be quite convincing. And with our updated checklist, creating a fully automated affiliate tracking program takes much less time.
You can also skip a step to complete a later one or return to a previous step to make changes easily. This checklist is meant to make your onboarding process as smooth and painless as possible. Let’s go!
Step 1: Add Commission Plan
The first step is to determine what you’ll pay affiliates by creating an Affiliate Commission Plan. Start by adding at least one Commission Plan to your affiliate program. Each plan will ask you to specify:
- Payment for - Is this commission for a Purchase, Lead, Visitor or Line-item?
- How much - Are you paying a percentage or a set amount?
- When - How quickly do affiliate commissions get sent out?
- Who - Which affiliate group(s) is this specific Commission Plan for?
More advanced options include settings for Commission Tiers, Price Range, Custom Payouts, Multi-Level Marketing, Time Boxed Commissions, and Recurring Commissions.
Don’t worry if you haven’t determined your full Commission Plan just yet. You can easily return to edit or update your plans and create as many customized plans as needed. To complete this first step, simply add a single Commission Plan.
QUICK TIP: You can also ask the Support Team at LeadDyno to set up a full Commission structure for you, either for an additional fee or as part of our Unlimited Plan Custom Setup.
Once your affiliates start earning, there are three primary ways to pay them:
- Mass Payout - Use our PayPal MassPay integration to easily pay hundreds of affiliates in seconds!
- Webhooks - Use a payment webhook to set up a custom payment mechanism in LeadDyno.
- Manual Payments - Easily process payments by hand or export a CSV file to process bank transfers.
Step 2: Edit Affiliate Settings
Next, take a few minutes to customize the settings for your affiliate program, including whether or not you choose to:
- Reward affiliates for multiple purchases from the same referred customer
- Allow an affiliate partner to earn commissions for their own orders
- Automatically generate affiliate discount codes
- Set the duration of affiliate referrals
…and more. With these settings, you can further customize your affiliate program to your specific business needs and goals by simply toggling yes or no. Easy!
Step 3: Connect Your Site
While connecting your website to LeadDyno’s affiliate software may seem daunting, it’s actually a fairly simple task. First, scroll through our list of e-commerce platforms to find the one that houses your website and click “add”.
Note: If your platform isn’t listed in our integrations, simply reach out to our support team for assistance or follow the instructions in this help doc to install manually.
You can also add your current integration workflow to LeadDyno in this step, including apps for payment, CRM, email marketing, affiliate signups, and more. Once you’ve connected your current business apps to your affiliate dashboard, you can move on to the next step.
Step 4: Configure Affiliate Website
Now you’re ready for the fun part – it’s time to customize an affiliate website to fit your unique branding. Choose one of our simplified design options for a streamlined setup or easily add your branding by customizing the color scheme, logo, favicon, webpage SEO, and more. For those on our Advanced and Unlimited plan, you can also use Custom CSS to add your own styles via code or CSS file. You can customize your affiliate signup page with a unique header, custom copy, and additional affiliate fields.
LeadDyno now offers multi-website capabilities to match your different affiliate groups as well. With these features, you can create different landing pages tailored to different groups of affiliates, so they can easily access all the information they need without having to search through a single affiliate site.
Once affiliates have signed up, they’ll be led to their Affiliate Dashboard. In addition to the Dashboard Homepage, you can add or remove sections from the site. Other web pages you might want to have include:
- Instructions - All the details affiliates need to do their job
- Terms of Service - Your Affiliate Program Agreement
- Invite Others - A page with guidance on bringing in potential affiliates
- Highlighted Links - Pages from your website with customized tracking links for your affiliates
You can also grant your affiliates access to an assortment of useful resources, including affiliate performance analytics, a tab showcasing “What’s Selling?” successfully, edit approval for affiliate links and urls, and access to customer/lead information.
And if you’re feeling intimidated by the amount of copywriting required to create an affiliate website, we’ve got good news for you. Each page includes pre-made copy templates that can be edited and tweaked to match the tone and specifications of your business. Plus, using our copy as a foundation ensures that your affiliates definitely receive the right instructions, since we've got them written for you.
Step 5: Add Affiliates
Well done! You’ve made it to the final step of our onboarding process. It’s time to add your affiliates. Just before adding, you’ll be directed to your affiliate communications page, where you can set up automated affiliate emails and customize communications with your affiliate network. This ensures that your affiliates immediately get the information they need to be successful.
If you’d like to skip the affiliate communications section for now, you can tap the Show Me Around button in the first pop-up, followed by the What’s Next button on the second popup, and you’ll be taken to the Manage Affiliates page, where you can add each one of your affiliates. Just be sure to return to the Affiliate Emails page to set up email automation before adding all your affiliates to your program, so you can properly welcome new affiliates and set them up for success.
The number of affiliates available to your program differ based on your Pricing Plan level. Here’s how many each plan includes:
Lite - up to 50
Essential - up to 150
Advanced - up to 500
Unlimited - unlimited number of affiliates
To manually import one affiliate at a time, tap the Create Affiliate button. If you’re bringing on a large number of affiliates, we recommend using our Import feature, which allows for bulk upload via CSV through our customer support team.
Once you’ve uploaded your affiliates, it’s important to pay attention to which affiliates are active and which aren’t. You can continuously run maintenance on your affiliate list by archiving inactive affiliates that aren’t producing any revenue.
Congratulations! You’ve completed all five steps of our onboarding process, and you’re officially ready to start growing your affiliate program! And remember, if at any time you get stuck or need assistance, our customer support team is readily available to help. Reach out to us anytime at support@leaddyno.com.
Launch your affiliate marketing program the easy way with LeadDyno
As a leading affiliate marketing platform for over a decade, we understand what it takes to launch and maintain a thriving affiliate program. This expertise has earned us 5-star ratings from over 500 Shopify store owners, a perfect 10 for ease of setup on G2, and a 4.3 out of 5 for ease of use from Capterra.
Whether you’re navigating affiliate recruitment, tracking affiliate performance, or simply looking for the best all-around affiliate marketing tool, LeadDyno is one of the best affiliate management software options on the market today. And thanks to our brand new onboarding program, it’s now easier than ever to build, launch, and manage a fully customized affiliate partner marketing platform.
Ready to jump on the referral program and influencer marketing train? If you’d like to see for yourself how easy it is to create and launch your own affiliate program in just 5 steps, sign up for a free trial today!
