Imagine you’re choosing a dentist for a root canal. Dentist A has performed 20 successful root canals, and Dentist B has performed 200. You’re leaning toward the more experienced option until you learn that the second dentist has attempted the procedure more than 1,000 times. Any second thoughts?
Success rates matter. They can be an indicator of future outcomes—critical information for dental patients and business owners. Affiliate conversion rates are one example. Businesses use them to measure affiliate marketing performance, optimize affiliate strategy, and identify tactics that drive revenue with key audiences.
Here’s what affiliate conversion rates are, why they matter, how to calculate yours, and six strategies to help you boost your affiliate marketing conversion rate.
How to calculate your affiliate marketing conversion rate
An affiliate marketing program is an arrangement where an influencer or someone with a large online following touts a product and is paid when a consumer buys or takes some desired action as a result of the affiliate’s promotional efforts. The conversion rate is what percentage of consumers take a desired action after clicking on a unique affiliate link, typically on the affiliate’s website or social media profile or post.
In other words, your affiliate marketing conversion rates indicate the percentage of referred visitors (potential buyers from affiliate traffic sources) that fulfill your campaign objective (known as the campaign’s conversion goal), like making a purchase, subscribing to an email newsletter, and clicking an affiliate marketing link.
To calculate your affiliate conversion rate, divide the number of consumers from affiliate sources who completed your desired action—known as your affiliate conversions—by the total affiliate-driven traffic eligible to take that action. This total is typically the total traffic to an affiliate landing page or the overall website traffic generated by affiliate sources.
Then, multiply the result by 100 to arrive at a percentage. Here’s the formula:
Affiliate marketing conversion rate = (Affiliate conversions / Total affiliate-driven traffic) × 100
What is a good conversion rate for affiliate marketing?
“Conversion rates in the affiliate channel vary from 1% to 3%, meaning that for every 100 people who click on an affiliate link, one to three of them will make a purchase,” says Jerrid Grimm, head of publisher marketing at influencer and referral marketing platform impact.com. “This may sound like a small number, but compare that to display ads, where only one in every 1,000 people who see an ad even click on it, and then an even smaller fraction of those clicks lead to a purchase.”
Jerrid suggests tracking sales conversion rate alongside return on ad spend (ROAS) and average order value (AOV) for a full picture of affiliate program success. “Benchmarks for each of these metrics can vary widely depending on the product, the consumer, and where the promotion is happening,” he says. “For instance, a browser extension that adds a coupon code to your cart when you’re buying laundry detergent is likely to have a very high conversion rate, but a low order value,” while “a purchase that requires more thought and consideration—such as planning a family vacation—may not convert immediately, but will likely have a very high order value.”
A business with a high AOV might expect a low sales conversion rate and focus its affiliate marketing efforts on giving more customers that opportunity to convert, choosing site visits or newsletter sign-ups as their affiliate marketing conversion goal.
Jerrid suggests targeting an affiliate program ROAS of at least 400%. “In general, a 4:1 return on ad spend is considered a solid benchmark for advertising,” he says. “The affiliate channel has shown to have a 12:1 ROAS, meaning for every dollar you spend, you can expect to return $12 in sales.
How to improve your affiliate marketing conversion rate
- Offer coupons
- Streamline the purchasing process
- Join an affiliate program
- Build your online presence
- Use landing pages
- Track performance
Optimizing conversion rates can help you boost targeted traffic to your site, convert more visitors into paying customers, lead to more sales, and boost total revenue. Here are six strategies that can increase conversions:
Offer coupons
If your conversion goal is affiliate sales, coupons or discount codes can help you earn more conversions.
“Ninety percent of consumers say they are looking for a discount, coupon, or cash back reward,” Jerrid says. Coupon codes can also increase affiliate link click-through rates and drive more potential customers to your site by giving your affiliates something specific to promote.
Jerrid suggests offering limited-time promotions to maximize the boost to conversion rate: “You can give the consumer what they’re looking for while creating a sense of urgency around a purchase.”
Streamline the purchasing process
A user-friendly checkout process is critical to boosting your sales conversion rate. “A whopping 70% of consumers abandon their cart at the point of purchase,” Jerrid says. While you can expect some attrition, a high abandonment rate can indicate friction in the buying process.
Look for a checkout and payment provider that accepts multiple payment forms and makes it easy for customers to complete purchases. You can also boost your conversion rate with fast, free shipping and trust badges. Jerrid advises against requiring users to create accounts and encourages following ecommerce checkout best practices to build trust. “The feeling of an untrustworthy transaction can lead to elevated cart abandonment rates,” he says.
Join an affiliate program
Affiliate programs (or affiliate networks) are services that connect businesses with affiliate marketers. They can help recruit, manage, and pay affiliates, making it easy to track conversion rates and identify opportunities to improve performance. Some programs also help participants screen affiliates and identify the best strategies or partners for a specific niche audience.
Affiliate programs vary in services offered, scale, and cost to advertisers, so research affiliate programs to identify the best partner for your business.
Build your online presence
Affiliate marketing is powerful, but it doesn’t exist in a vacuum—a strong overall online presence is key to a good conversion rate.
“The consumer journey is multi-faceted,” Jerrid says. “Your potential customer may find out about your product from an influencer they trust, then compare it to other options on their favorite review site before finally finding a great deal through a cash back or coupon site and making the purchase.”
Maximize positive touchpoints on the affiliate marketing journey by publishing compelling content and providing social proof. Create content that provides value to your target audience, publish it on social media platforms or your company’s blog, request and share customer testimonials and online reviews, and use social media to encourage audiences to post user-generated content.
Jerrid recommends working with a range of affiliates to increase the chances of potential customers encountering multiple promoters of your product. “Your affiliate partners work in concert and are truly greater than the sum of their parts,” he says.
Use landing pages
A landing page is a stand-alone webpage optimized for a specific goal, like encouraging visitors to sign up for free trials or purchase particular products. Landing pages typically contain minimal text and a single call to action, like “Register now” or “Add to cart.”
Using affiliate links to drive traffic to a customized landing page gives you greater control over visitor actions, which can boost conversion rates. Tailor your landing pages for specific audiences: If you sell whole-food nutritional supplements, you might configure a beauty influencer’s affiliate link to a landing page emphasizing your product’s cosmetic benefits, while a fitness influencer’s affiliate link might go to a landing page highlighting its impact on athletic performance.
Track performance
Use Google Analytics or your affiliate network’s performance-tracking features to monitor your affiliate marketing strategy’s results. Analytics tools can calculate overall conversion rates and track ROAS.
Some tools help identify top-performing affiliates or track individual affiliate marketerconversion rates, providing valuable insights into the marketing materials, channels, and outreach strategies effective with your target audience. Use this information to improve your efforts and share key strategic insights with your affiliate partners.
Affiliate marketing conversion rates FAQ
What’s a good conversion rate for affiliate marketing?
Affiliate conversion rates vary by program and conversion goal. According to impact.com, the average affiliate conversion rate for a purchase-focused campaign falls between 1% and 3%.
Why is it important to calculate conversion rates for affiliate marketing?
Tracking your affiliate marketing conversion rate helps judge the effectiveness of your affiliate marketing program. Use it to project your program’s return on investment (ROI) and identify opportunities to improve performance.
What is the difference between conversion rate and click-through rate?
A click-through rate is the percentage of users who click a link out of the total number of people who view the link, and a conversion rate is the percentage of users who take a desired action (like making a purchase) out of the total number of people who could take that action.