Balancing Coupons and Creators for Affiliate Success

Q: Why do brands need content creators in their affiliate programs?

While coupon sites are excellent at closing sales at the bottom of the funnel, content creators act as introducers. They reach new audiences and tell authentic stories that build brand awareness and consideration early in the customer journey before a discount is needed.

Q: What is the risk of a coupon-heavy affiliate program?

Programs that rely almost entirely on coupons are often fragile and struggle with long-term sustainability. While they may deliver high sales volume, they often fail to acquire net-new customers and can strain a brand's profit margins over time.

Q: Are influencers and social media creators considered affiliates?

Yes. As the industry has evolved, creators have become a crucial part of the performance-based affiliate ecosystem. However, to work with them effectively, brands often need to use custom commission structures, such as hybrid deals or new-to-file bonuses, rather than standard flat payouts.

Q: How do you measure the success of an affiliate creator campaign?

Because creators often influence the early stages of a purchase decision, relying solely on last-click attribution is insufficient. Brands should measure creator success by tracking metrics like new customer acquisition rates, repeat purchase behavior, and overall lifetime value (LTV).

This post is part of our 10-part series: Resilient by Design: A Strategic Guide to the Past, Present, and Future of Performance Marketing. Over the next quarter, we are breaking down exactly how the channel is evolving and how your brand can stay ahead of the curve. Read the full guide here, or if you are ready to stop reading and start building a more resilient program, schedule a strategy session with our team.

Affiliate marketing in the mid-2010s was a lot like grocery shopping with coupons. Your cart looked full, the discounts stacked up, and the receipt at the end made you feel like you had won the day. But underneath the surface, brands were starting to realize they hadn’t actually bought the ingredients they needed for sustainable growth.

At the time, loyalty, cashback, and coupon partners dominated the space. According to a 2022 PMA study, more than half of the industry’s budgets were tied up in these partner types. They were easy to measure and incredibly reliable at pushing transactions over the finish line, but they were not always great at introducing new customers to a brand.

To build a truly resilient program, the industry needed to shift. We had to stop relying solely on discounts and start driving full-funnel affiliate growth by bringing in storytellers.

The Treadmill vs. Pizza Dilemma

Balancing a program meant bringing in bloggers, niche publications, and social media creators who could reach entirely new audiences and build authentic consideration before a discount code was ever needed.

But pitching this shift to executives wasn’t always an easy sell. On paper, content creators often looked expensive and slow. They required product samples, creative briefs, and sometimes higher commission rates to get started. Furthermore, their results didn’t spike overnight the way a massive coupon placement did.

We often joke in client meetings that investing in creators is a lot like buying a treadmill. It feels a lot more expensive in the moment, and it certainly requires more effort than simply ordering a pizza. But in the long run, only one of those options is actually going to make you healthier.

The customers you acquire through creators might take a little longer to convert, but they are often brand new to your file. Because they were introduced to your brand through an authentic story rather than a steep discount, they tend to stick around longer, engage more deeply, and ultimately drive much better lifetime value (LTV).

A healthy affiliate program needs its closers, but it also desperately needs its introducers. Together, they make a program that is both immediate and enduring.