How do you evaluate the success of an affiliate program?
1. Track Revenue and Return on Investment (ROI)
- Measure total sales or subscriptions generated through affiliate links
- Calculate ROI
- Compare earnings to other marketing channels like PPC or email
- Monitor monthly revenue trends for growth or decline
- Identify top-performing products or services in affiliate sales
2. Analyze Cost Per Acquisition (CPA)
- Measure how much you spend to acquire one customer via affiliates
- CPA
- Benchmark against your other acquisition methods
- Helps optimize commission structures and improve profitability
- Lower CPA with high lead quality is a sign of strong program health
3. Evaluate Affiliate Performance Metrics
- Track metrics such as clicks, leads, conversions, and average order value
- Identify top affiliates based on conversion rate and revenue contribution
- Monitor affiliate churn and retention rates
- Assess how different content types (blogs, videos, etc.) perform
- Use dashboards from platforms like PartnerStack, FirstPromoter, or Impact
4. Monitor Lead and Sale Quality
- Check if leads are qualified, engaged, and converting to paying customers
- Analyze refund rates, trial-to-paid ratios, and churn among affiliate-sourced users
- Coordinate with sales or customer success teams to validate lead value
- Helps prevent fraud or low-quality traffic from affiliate sources
- Refines targeting and improves lifetime value (LTV) predictions
5. Measure Program Growth and Engagement
- Track affiliate recruitment rate and total active affiliates
- Measure content output and promotional activity levels
- Monitor response to program updates, emails, and bonus campaigns
- Collect feedback through surveys or affiliate groups
- Evaluate the scalability and market coverage of your affiliate network
