How to Create an Affiliate Link for Your Shop

This guide is designed to help shop owners navigate the process of creating an affiliate link, whether you're using affiliate software, looking for a one-time link, or need a solution for regular use

Introduction

Creating an effective affiliate link is crucial for tracking the performance of your affiliate campaigns and ensuring your shop benefits from affiliate marketing. This guide is designed to help shop owners navigate the process of creating an affiliate link, whether you're using affiliate software, looking for a one-time link, or need a solution for regular use. Plus, we'll cover the importance of UTM parameters and naming conventions for seamless integration and tracking.

Your Attribution Objectives:

By leveraging standard UTM Tracking parameters alongside specific affiliate partners, you will be able to fulfill your attribution objectives such as:

1. Measure the effectiveness of your affiliate marketing partners as a channel and / or specific affiliates partners.
2. Measure these performances alongside your other marketing channels (paid media, organic search).
3. Compare customer behaviors by channels
4. Build custom audiences across your marketing channels based on the affiliate marketing channel.

Step-by-Step Guide

1. Determine Your Needs

Before creating an affiliate link, ask yourself the following questions:

• Do you use affiliate software to manage your program?
• Is the affiliate link for a one-time promotion or regular use?
• Do you need to send conversion data to an external platform?

Your answers will guide the approach and tools you'll use to create your affiliate link.

2. Setting UTM Parameters

UTM Parameters common mistakesUTM parameters are vital for tracking the effectiveness of your campaigns. their values are collected by anytrack, [GA4] Google Analytics and 99% of marketing platforms.

Here’s how to set them:

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Note:

The tokens set in the below example are just examples. You need to either manually set the names or id

• utm_source: Identify the affiliate program or network (e.g., affiliate_name).
• utm_medium: Use a constant value like referral.
• utm_campaign: Use the offer or campaign name (e.g., affiliate_campaign).
• utm_id: Include the affiliate ID ({affiliateId}).
• utm_content: Mention the promotion name, if any ({promotional_content}).

Example Template

?utm_source=affiliate_name&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=affiliate_campaign&utm_id={affiliateId}&utm_content={promotional_content}

3. Utilizing Affiliate Software

If you're using affiliate software:

• Integrate UTM parameters as described above.
• Add affiliate program dynamic values/macros in the relevant UTM parameters to personalize links.

Example with Hasoffers affiliate platform:

1. Affiliate id token: {aff_id}
2. Offer id token {offer_id}
3. Offer name: {offer_name}

Hasoffers UTM Tracking Template

?utm_source={aff_id}&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign={offer_name}&utm_id={offer_id}{aff_id}&utm_content={offer_name}&offer_id={offer_id}&aff_id={aff_id}&transaction_id={transaction_id}

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Good to know

Each affiliate platform provides the values through their knowledge base or directly in their platform.

4. Adhering to Naming Conventions

Establish a clear naming convention for your links. This practice not only helps in organizing your campaigns but also in analyzing data efficiently. If possible, generate IDs for values to track individual affiliate performance accurately.

5. Regular Review and Optimization

Regularly review the performance of your affiliate links. Use the data collected through UTM parameters to optimize your campaigns, improve affiliate performance, and increase ROI.

Conclusion

Creating an affiliate link for your shop involves understanding your needs, setting appropriate Custom UTM parameters, and following best practices for naming and management. By adhering to these guidelines, you can effectively track and optimize your affiliate marketing efforts, leading to increased sales and successful partnerships.