You’ve almost completed the setup process, how exciting! Step 7 is where the fun happens. Within this step, you can further distinguish your affiliate programs from the others on ShareASale and make your brand pop.
You're currently on the Pending Interface page. This means our team is working hard to review your application in a timely manner for approval to the ShareASale platform, and this generally about one business day.
While you wait, let’s dive into how you can bid adieu to a cookie-cutter program and help affiliates take advantage of all the great features you offer.
Offering creatives
Banner ads, or creatives, are one of the main ways that affiliates will promote your program. While it may be easy to create simple ads that include your company name or logo, it is in your best interest to put some time and effort into your creatives. Ads that are unique, attractive and engaging are the ones that make an impact with consumers.
With ShareASale, we don't limit the number of banner ads you can upload because we recommend offering a diverse range of options and sizes. Why? Affiliates will have many different templates, layouts and themes for their own sites. The more options you can provide, the easier it’s going to be for them to choose a banner consistent with their site.
PRO TIP: Many merchants focus on targeting holidays and popular times of the seasons, which means you should at least be changing out your creatives and/or adding a new batch 3-4 times a year
Additionally, we offer the option to upload text HTML creatives. The HTML creative is a powerful option as it allows you to provide something more comprehensive than a simple banner or text link. A common HTML creative you’ve probably used elsewhere is an embedded search box. For example, if an affiliate is promoting a merchant that sells books, they can include the search feature on their website to populate a customer’s search results on merchant’s site.
Lastly, the Mass Upload tool is a great way to expedite this process and get your creatives in front of affiliates as soon as possible. If you’re thinking ahead and uploading banners for future products, deals, and sales, you can always choose the “Schedule for Later” option. This ensures the creatives will be ready for affiliates once it's time. be there once you’re ready to let them be promoted!
Read through more best practices for creatives in this article.
Using datafeeds
Before skipping datafeeds, did you know that they account for about 5-10% of all conversions tracked on ShareASale?
Besides being a cool fun fact, let us tell you what this means for your merchant program.
We believe it's in your best interest to create and upload a datafeed to make the most of your affiliate-referred sales. Click on “View Datafeed Requirements” and “Download An Example” to get an idea of what you’ll need to add this amazing selling point to your program.
You can read more on how to create your product datafeed, as well as best practices, in this guide.
Implementing Commission Rules
Commission Rules make a significant impact on ShareASale affiliate programs, and its in your interest to implement these. Why? They are a great way to create flexible, custom and creative payouts to your affiliates based on conditions that you have full control over.
Merchants use Commission Rules in numerous ways, whether it’s getting affiliates to promote their products/services as soon as they join their program or providing performance-based commissions - it’s a great way to keep affiliates excited and engaged.
You can think of your own rewards and conditions, but we’ve also done a lot of the work for you by providing you with Predefined Rules. This means that you can add a commission rule to your program with the click of a buttonL
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Looking to get affiliates promoting you as soon as possible? Try adding “Double Commissions for the first 30 days”
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Want to really reward affiliates on their first sale? Click “$50 First Sale Bonus”
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How about incentivizing affiliates to get started right away with a performance-based reward? “$100 bonus for 10 transactions in 30 days” is surely a way to get their attention
There are endless amounts of rules and rewards you can put into place to keep affiliates active, engaged and promoting your brand. You can also create your own rules beyond the Predefined Rules. These rules don’t have to apply to all affiliates within your program, either. Once live, you can tag your affiliates and setup rules that only apply to an individual or select group.
Once you've finalized Step 7, there's only one thing left to do...
Account activation!
You’ve been approved, now go activate your ShareASale account.
You have the option to choose within those 30 days which date/time you'd like to go live on ShareASale, if not immediately. If you haven't selected a date or activated your account within those 30 days, please note your program will be set to live by us.
Once the account is activated, we’ll feature you in our New Program category for the first 20 days and also announce you via our New Program RSS feed. You can expect to start receiving affiliate applications within a short amount of time.
We wish you all the success on ShareASale! And remember, we're here to help if you need us.