An affiliate network is a platform that connects merchants and affiliates, allowing them to promote products and services and earn commissions for successful sales. Affiliate networks provide tracking and reporting tools to help merchants and affiliates track the performance of their campaigns, as well as payment processing services to ensure that commissions are paid out on time.
Affiliate networks exist to act as a platform to connect publishers to advertisers. We work with all the major ones. A few examples you may have heard of include ShareASale, CJ Affiliate (formerly Commission Junction), Awin, Rakuten Marketing, and Pepperjam to name a few.
The networks make money through fees charged to the merchants they work with. These fees are agreed to with each individual advertiser and are usually paid as a percentage of each sale made. At Advertise Purple, we negotiate the best deals with the networks because they know we are bringing them lots of business.