Afilliate Payouts?!?!

[KellyTaylor]

Hmm just wondering what is exactly fair to price your affiliate programs at!
I went to Www.LucasEntertianment.Com and there payout is about 35% and then I went to other such places and I saw things like 50% even 60% percent....

I mean what do you think is a good payout for affliates that is fair and will give people incentive to join?!?

I was wondering to myself if that.. Some put there affilliate payouts reallys low cause they really have no need for affiliates cause they already have means for really good traffic they have created for thereselves or are they just are "GREEDY" LOL...

Im all about affilliates and that is why I ask.. I mean I already have a pretty good Idea of what I would like to offer and what I think is fair .. But doesnt always mean that is the best way to do it!!

I wanna be making sure the affilliate is happy and Im making the GOOD money I should be .. you know what Im saying!?!?

[Lee]

IMHO, as a program owner, you should never make more than the affiliate, affiliates are, for the most part, the life blood of a program, without them, the program and sites are relatively useless.

Regards,

Lee

[JustBryce]

I saw a new program launching the other day actually that was offering 35%. They are new to the industry, have no brand, and are trying to make inroads. They wanted us to give them a try, but we had to refuse. I know they are just starting out, but there is a threshold that has to be met ir order to get us to sign-on.

We will only promote affiliates that offer at least 50% or preferrably a pay-per-signup model. There are too many sites out there offering $50+ PPS (top bucks, blueloot, etc) for a program to try and compete only offering 35%.

When making an affiliate program, you have to think like an affiliate. I could send a sale over to Randyblue.com and make $55 or I could send that same sale over to xyz affiliate paying out 35% on $24.95 ($8.73, my cut). There's no doubt that I'm going to promote Randy Blue.

That having been said... We do have a couple of advertisers that have those low percentage programs or no affiliate program at all and we promote and blog about them because they are scratching our back by advertising in our magazine.

So there are a few ways to this affiliate's heart. Scratch my back or offer me high PPS and/or large percentages. There are too many great sites offering high payouts for an affiliate program to truly compete otherwise.

my .02

[HotMaleVideos]

VOD sites have the lowest I've seen. 20-25% is the going rate. I've grown less loyal to them. Lots of work for a weak payoff. What's the deal? High overhead costs or what?

Anyway... 50% revshare or a $25+ PPS gets my attention. But I may go slightly lower for programs with really strong conversion rates, which is my primary interest.

[JustJohn]

VOD sites have the lowest I've seen. 20-25% is the going rate. I've grown less loyal to them. Lots of work for a weak payoff. What's the deal? High overhead costs or what?

No, I think its because there's another hand in the pot. Rather than license content outright like a traditional paysite, they pay the content providers a percentage of every sale. The business model is a bit different but there is money to be made there.

[HotMaleVideos]

No, I think its because there's another hand in the pot. Rather than license content outright like a traditional paysite, they pay the content providers a percentage of every sale. The business model is a bit different but there is money to be made there.

That's what I figured. Content owners probably get a good % of sales, putting a squeeze on the program and affiliates. I agree, there IS some money to be made in VOD. I've been doing it for over a year. But I wouldn't recommend it as a primary method for anybody.

[FisHY]

LOL I got 11% on one Outpersonal sale.

[Chilihost]

VOD and live sex show upsells are low payouts because they can get away with it due to lack of competition in these areas. if and when there is more competition in these industries, you will see payouts increase.

cheers,
Luke

[Lee]

One thing that we all need to remember though, payouts, ultimately, mean very little, id much rather be promoting a site that paid out 10% and converted at 1:100 than promote a site that paid out at 50% and converted at 1:1000

Ultimately, its not how much you will get paid for each and every sale that should dictate who we promote, its how much we are actually making with the program.

Regards,

Lee

[robin]

One thing that we all need to remember though, payouts, ultimately, mean very little, id much rather be promoting a site that paid out 10% and converted at 1:100 than promote a site that paid out at 50% and converted at 1:1000

Ultimately, its not how much you will get paid for each and every sale that should dictate who we promote, its how much we are actually making with the program.

Regards,

Lee

That's basically how I feel. I promote a lot of different types of sites and programs with various payouts.

For instance, when it comes to promoting products, (underwear and sex toys come to mind) I know that the commission rate is going to be much lower for a variety of reasons.

But that's not going to stop me from promoting them because I know there's a good market for those goods. And by now, I've made some really good money promoting them.

The same goes for porn site affiliate programs -- It's going to depend on how well I think I'll be able to promote any given site or roster of sites.

Having said that I tend to go for the porn aff programs that have higher payouts or a variety of payout options. (as long as they're simple enough to understand mind you.) .

Affiliate programs should be a partnership where you're rewarded. Not a one sided deal where the site owner just cares about getting a bunch of essentially free traffic (from their perspective.)

Good affiliates tend to really work hard to get the traffic going to the places that treat them right and pay out good.

[BananaMan]

50% recurring is the industry standard for membership sites and that's what we expect them to offer. 20-30% is the standard for VOD services - which we accept because we know that they are paying out to the studios as well.

[basschick]

50% minimum for me. what lee said would be true until you add in recurring. that changes the picture a lot. i would only consider 40% on a site with NO traffic leaks and a scarce niche, but mostly i see the really scarce niches by amateur webmasters pay 25% or something like that - and i'm not interested.

[HotMaleVideos]

One thing that we all need to remember though, payouts, ultimately, mean very little, id much rather be promoting a site that paid out 10% and converted at 1:100 than promote a site that paid out at 50% and converted at 1:1000

Exactly. Of course, it's nice when you can get both. I'm lucky this month since most programs I'm plugging are converting in the 1:50 to 1:60 area with a $25 PPS option. That means Merry Christmas, Mike.

Re: VOD again. 20% on a typical $10 order doesn't earn much, even with good conversion. I've found it to be OK as a traffic-back option when you can't convert them on a full paysite.

[Lee]

Patti,

Yeah recurring is a double edged sword though.

Again, you have to take the chance that on a 50% basis, converting at 1:1000 is going to recurr whilst, on the 10% basis converting at 1:100 you have 10 times the chance of at least 1 of those sales recurring.

It really is a numbers game, the more chances you have at making a sale, the more money you'll make, as i say, for me, id much rather have 10 potential sales recurring at 10% each and every month than the chance that my single 50% sale is going to recurr.

Ultimately, it comes down to what the individual feels comfortable with.

Mike,

I have to say im not a big fan of VOD, we normally use those types of programs as a last ditch effort at a sale on our consoles or, as upsells within an AEN site.

The usual traffic flow for us, specifically for consoles, is PPS > Revshare > VOD > PPC.

Remembering that every console we launch to our surfers, the chances of them actually joining a site on the console gets cut by up to 50% so on the PPC we at least have a 12.5% chance they are going to click on one of the links LOL

Regards,

Lee

[desslock]

Hi Kelly

Yes - LucasEntertainment has that cruddy 35% payout. Another bad culprit is Colt Studio, which is 30%. On the other hand, they produce very good products, and they have dedicated fans. So I am in their programs....

One thing I see is there is not a very good understanding of the role of affiliate marketers. And producers rightly ask "why am I paying this webmaster 50% of my membership revenue?"

If I sell a membersip to NetFlix, I just make $9. Nothing recurrs. If I refer a new member to Rhapsody music service I make $12. Nothing recurrs. Amazon pays me 6% if I sell the pots and pans in their kitchen store.

Ever wonder why marketing adult products are necessarily so much more lucrative? I think that could be amplified better, and then more companies would constrict more effective, high-paying programs.

Steve