- "I want to implement affiliate advertising to increase sales on my Shopify e-commerce site."
- "I've heard of affiliate marketing before, but this is my first time doing it. I feel a little scared."
- "We are partnering with an agency and would like to make full use of tag management, but we are currently searching for a better way to do this."
This article is for such people. Affiliate marketing is an essential method for promoting with Shopify. However, since it is difficult to embed tags in Shopify, we often receive inquiries from people who do not know how to set it up or how to transfer tags they used before using Shopify.
Even though it is a performance-linked, low-risk method of attracting customers, it would be a shame not to implement it because people don't know how to set it up/embed it.
We will provide detailed explanations so that everyone who uses Shopify can get started with affiliate marketing as easily as possible.
What you'll learn in this article
- What is an affiliate?
- Benefits of using affiliate linked apps
- Steps from installing the app on the app store to submitting an application and distributing the app
I have written the content to answer the above questions. Please read to the end of the article and use it as a reference.
What is an affiliate?
Affiliate marketing is a system in which blogs and large/mid-sized media publish articles introducing or comparing your company's products, and when a user who sees the article visits the e-commerce site and purchases a product, the company pays a commission or success fee to the media that published the article.
Since fees are only charged when an actual "purchase" occurs, this is a very effective method of attracting customers for e-commerce sites that do not want to spend money on unnecessary advertising.
Commission rates vary depending on the product and the purchasing/manufacturing method, but are generally set in the range of 2-15%. Below are the reference rates for each general product.
For example, if a 1,000 yen product is sold and the affiliate commission rate for the media is set at 5%,
1,000 yen x 5% = 50 yen
*This 50 yen will be compensation to the affiliate media.
Above figure is 50 yen x 35% = 17.5 yen * rounded up to 18 yen
*This 18 yen will be the reward to the affiliate ASP.
The total payment from the shop will be 50 yen + 18 yen = 68 yen.
In this case, the commission fee will be 6.8%.
This generally results in a very low cost of attracting customers/gaining new customers. Therefore, affiliate marketing is the advertising method we recommend you consider first when operating an EC site.
Why hasn't it been possible to do this smoothly on Shopify until now?
Affiliate marketing is suitable for e-commerce sites, but until now it has been very time-consuming to get started on a Shopify e-commerce site.
In preparation for starting affiliate marketing, you need to set up something called a "tag" on your EC site, which requires programming knowledge. Because of this, we have received many complaints from EC stores that they wanted to start affiliate marketing but were unable to do so due to the high initial setup hurdle.
Affiliate integration apps make this previously difficult setup process possible without the need for a programmer; simply install the app from the Shopify app store.
This solved the problem of not needing a programmer, and made it possible to start affiliate marketing immediately.
Shopify's "Affiliate Integration" app.
— Grain (@xkgxmcx) November 27, 2020
Before I started this, I connected my own domain to a site I created with Shopify, so I had to learn about DNS records, but thanks to that, it went really smoothly 🥺✨
Actually, it should have been much more complicated to set up tags, but it was easy. Thank goodness...
In addition, this app allows you to submit applications to each ASP from the app's administration screen, and you can complete all applications to all linked ASPs from the administration screen. This is also a convenient feature for merchants with experience in affiliate marketing.
5 benefits of doing affiliate marketing via an "Affiliate Link" app
- 1. Fast and easy, no programmer required!
- 2. Accurate tracking
- 3. Automatically remove duplicates
- 4. No maintenance required
- 5. Campaigns that are only available in Shopify affiliate-linked apps
Those with affiliate experience, web advertising agencies, and e-commerce development vendors will find this useful and beneficial, but we will explain each step one by one.
1. Quick and easy, no programmer required!
Simply install the app, select the ASP from the settings screen, and submit your application online.
2. Accurate tracking
"Tracking" is important in affiliate marketing.
This is a measurement of "Did people who came via the media/article really buy?" If the accuracy is poor, "people who did not buy" will be considered as "people who bought" and vice versa.
Tracking via an affiliate app is the most accurate method, so tracking accuracy is maintained at a high level.
3. Automatically remove duplicates
Deduplication means that if you use multiple ASPs (e.g. ValueCommerce and A8.net), the purchase results may occasionally be counted twice. By automatically deleting duplicates, we can prevent duplicate commissions from being charged to the Shopify EC site you operate.
This accuracy is also one of the attractions of affiliate integration apps. With other methods, you have to manually delete duplicates, which is very time-consuming.
4. No maintenance required
Once you install the affiliate integration and start affiliate marketing, the app will handle all updates on Shopify and multiple ASPs. If you start affiliate marketing using other methods, programmers have to constantly update both Shopify and the ASPs, so this labor saving is huge. From this perspective, it's stress-free and overwhelmingly easy.
5. Campaigns that are only available in Shopify affiliate linked apps
Finally, there are campaigns. A typical example is the "initial fee and monthly fixed fee are free" campaign run by ValueCommerce (which is essentially a performance-based reward, so it is a complete performance-based reward), but there are also special campaigns that are not possible with other methods that are added from time to time.
Steps from installing to applying on the app store
The application procedure is illustrated below.
1. Find it in the Shopify app store and install it (app page here )
2. Submit various applications via the administration screen and wait for approval
*Currently, we are running a campaign limited to the first 10 companies (as of December 10, 2020).
3. Once approval is granted, create an offer in the management screen.
*Screen sample
4. Test and deliver ads if there are no problems
It can be used simply like this.
The features of affiliate linked apps are
- Easy to use without engineers
- Only Shopify can do it
is also guaranteed here.
Installation & Inquiries from shops and dealers here!
As you can see, the affiliate integration is packed with benefits, and you can install it here, so Shopify stores should definitely give it a try. In addition, Huckleberry Co., Ltd., which manages the affiliate integration, also provides lectures and alliances on Shopify's customer acquisition tools for Shopify development vendors and advertising agencies, so if you are an interested development company/agency, please contact us using the form below.
Installation & Inquiries from shops and dealers here
