Affiliate Tools

Above the Fold:
The place on a Web page that is visible when the page first loads. It is what the user can see without having to scroll down.

Affiliate:
A Web site that places a merchant's links on their site. An affiliate earns a commission for each sale or referral that is sent to the merchant through these links.

Affiliate Agreement:
A legal document between the merchant and the affiliate. It outlines the terms of the affiliate relationship.

Affiliate Manager:
A person who works for the merchant company. He or she manages all aspects of the program. An affiliate manager can offer you suggestions on how to make more money from their program. They are here to help you, and are your main point of contact.

Affiliate Program:
A marketing program in which websites register to work with a merchant in order to promote that merchant's products online. The merchant pays the affiliate web sites a commission for each sale or referral that is sent through the Affiliate Program links. The links offered are usually in the form of text links, banners, logos and graphics.

Affiliate Solution Provider:
A company that offers software services to the merchant. These services enable the merchant to manage their affiliates, track purchases, deliver links and pay commissions.

Banner (or banner ad):
An image or graphic placed on a site to advertise another product or service. These graphics can be static (just one image) or the picture can change, in which case they "rotate."

Bounty:
A term used to describe a flat fee commission. This can be for a sale, ($5 bounty on any sale) or for sending a user to a merchant site ($2 for each registered user).

Click-through:
When a user clicks on a link and is taken to the merchant's site.

Co-Branding:
A Web page, or pages where both the merchant and affiliate site's have their logos and/or other branding materials together.

Conversion Rate:
Depending on the type of program it is, conversion rate is the rate of people that purchase the merchant's product compared to how many people are sent to the site, from a particular affiliate.

Cookie:
A piece of software that is placed on a user's computer. It says which affiliate site the user came from. This is what allows the merchant to associate a particular sale with a particular affiliate site.

CPA:
Cost-per-action. Cost to the merchant for each sale or lead generated by an affiliate site. The cost is the commission to the affiliate site.

CPC:
Cost-per-click. Cost to the merchant for each click of an affiliate link, by a user on an affiliate site. The cost is the commission to the affiliate site.

CPM:
Cost per thousand (M in Roman numerals). Cost for each thousand impressions of a merchant link on an affiliate's site. This is a common term used by the online marketing industry to describe all costs per thousand impressions of a link.

Email link:
An affiliate link that you place in an email you are sending out. This can be a one-time email, or in a newsletter.

FAQ:
Frequently Asked Questions. Most sites have a list of FAQ's and their answers. This can be very helpful in learning about a site or a program.

Flat Fee:
A fee paid as a commission to an affiliate when a certain action on the merchant's site has been completed.

Impression:
When a banner, text link or graphic is viewed by a user.

Individual Product Link:
A link on an affiliate's site that highlights a specific product from a merchant. This link can be a text link, a graphical representation, or both.

Merchant:
A company who sells things over the Internet. This company allows other Web sites (affiliates) to place links on their site and market the products. The merchant pays a commission to the affiliate for all products that are sold through the affiliate's site.

Opt-in:
When someone chooses to receive information from you, emailed to them, they are said to "opt-in" to your email list.

Opt-out:
When someone notifies you that they do not want to receive any more emails from you, they have chosen to "opt-out" of being on your email list.

Pay-per-click:
When a merchant will pay an affiliate for each unique user who clicks on an affiliate link and goes to the merchant's site.

Pay-per-lead:
When a merchant will pay an affiliate for each unique user who gives their information to the merchant. This can be in the form of registering for the merchant's site, entering a giveaway, or requesting to be on a mailing list.

Pay-per-sale:
When a merchant will pay an affiliate for each sale that is generated by a user over the course of a designated amount of time.

Spam:
Email that is sent to a user without the user asking for it, or wanting to receive it.

Storefront:
A page of HTML that contains several of a merchant's products. These can be automatically placed on an affiliate's site to promote the items and contain the affiliate's links.

Text Link:
A word or line of text that when a user clicks on it, links to a merchant's site. These are the most effective links as far as affiliates generating revenue.