Acquiring new high-intent customers is a critical challenge for any business, especially in the finance market. Customers rely heavily on word-of-mouth and take many factors into consideration before converting, making the stakes even higher.

Traditional marketing strategies often miss the mark, struggling to hit the sweet spot between ad spend and customer quality. This is where outcome-based marketing (OBM) comes into play. OBM revolutionizes customer acquisition by offering a more effective, performance-based approach, positioning brands to access previously untapped high-intent traffic, all while sharpening their competitive edge in the financial services landscape.

What is Outcome-Based Marketing (OBM)?

Outcome-based marketing (OBM) is a results-driven strategy ideal for financial services marketers. With OBM, you only pay when specific KPIs crucial to your business are achieved, such as acquiring a qualified lead, loan application submissions, or new account openings. Campaigns are tailored around these down-funnel events, enabling you to test performance across various channels and pinpoint the most effective placements for converting traffic into customers.

Overcoming Customer Acquisition Pain Points with Outcome-Based Marketing (OBM)

Discover how an OBM model helps tackle common obstacles in scaling customer acquisition in the finance industry.

High Costs per Acquisition: OBM helps manage high acquisition costs by ensuring you only pay for specific, measurable outcomes such as qualified leads or completed applications. This ensures every dollar you invest drives growth. With continuous optimization, OBM pinpoints where your best customers come from, enabling you to scale effectively without overspending.

Inefficiency in Targeting: OBM enhances targeting by using placement-based strategies across digital channels, geo-targeting specific locations, and dayparting for optimal ad timing. For finance marketers, this means precisely directing ads to high-potential leads. AI-driven optimization further refines targeting, continuously uncovering new customer acquisition opportunities and improving campaign efficiency.

• Working with an outcome-based marketing expert like Perform^[cb] connects you with top-performing partners to reach your ideal consumers. For example, a national mortgage marketer achieved a 481% increase in biannual growth and a 78% boost in conversions in just one quarter by leveraging Perform^[cb]’s expertise in tracking KPIs, managing volume, and analyzing competitive payouts.
• Investing in a performance marketing solution that can accurately track cross-channel conversions while protecting consumer data and complying with industry regulations is especially important for finance brands. A privacy-centric tracking platform like TUNE can ensure that every conversion is measured, whether it takes place in a web browser or a mobile app, without using third-party cookies or storing sensitive customer information.

Regulatory Costs: OBM allows you to work with partners who understand and adhere to financial regulations. These partners handle compliance aspects related to their marketing efforts, reducing the costs and risks associated with regulatory adherence.

• From FTC and SEC advertising laws to content compliance and bank regulations, Perform^[cb] ensures brands’ campaigns are protected through enhanced compliance monitoring, in-depth partner vetting process, and patented, built-in anti-fraud technology.

Measuring ROI: OBM prioritizes measurable results, simplifying ROI tracking even with complex customer journeys and multiple touchpoints. By paying for outcomes, you gain clearer insights into which channels and partners are delivering value, improving your ability to evaluate and optimize marketing effectiveness.

Lead Quality vs. Quantity: OBM emphasizes paying only for leads that meet specific criteria and convert into customers. This is especially crucial for financial services brands, where high acquisition costs are exacerbated by a significant portion of unqualified leads. By focusing on quality over quantity, OBM helps mitigate these costs and ensures a more efficient allocation of ad spend.

How Financial Services Brands Can Get Started with Outcome-Based Marketing (OBM)

Here are a few tips on how financial marketers can begin testing on a 100% performance-based model:

1. Define Clear Outcomes: Set specific goals like acquiring qualified leads or increasing conversions. This helps measure campaign effectiveness and ensures you’re focusing on high-quality metrics.
2. Leverage Data and AI: Use tools like Google Analytics for segmentation, Salesforce for predictive modeling, HubSpot for behavioral tracking, and Perform^[cb]’s PerformSense AI to enhance traffic quality and conversion rates by filtering out non-converting traffic based on extensive data. Choose a tracking platform like TUNE’s that offers real-time measurement and a library of dashboards and reports to get insight into what’s working and what’s not. For finance brands with business intelligence tools already in place, consider using a fully automated event delivery service such as Firehose to live stream data into proprietary systems.
3. Optimizations to Scale Incrementality: Regularly review and adjust campaigns to measure and scale incremental impact. Perform^[cb] uses advanced methods to isolate and test traffic, accurately assessing the impact of your marketing efforts. Set goals for key metrics like conversion rate, then use performance automation tools to automatically optimize campaigns based on those goals.
4. Consider Speaking with an Outcome-Based Expert: Connect with performance marketing partners experienced in financial services who offer robust targeting and transparent reporting. Perform^[cb]’s Outcome Engine leverages a performance-based model to acquire new customers alongside your existing marketing channels. TUNE’s expert team is knowledgeable about the challenges of marketing for financial services and can share learnings and best practices from years of experience.

Cutting Costs, Boosting Results

Outcome-based marketing offers a transformative approach to customer acquisition in the finance and insurance sectors. By focusing on measurable outcomes, leveraging precision targeting, and utilizing advanced tracking and analytics, marketers can significantly reduce spend without losing out on qualified customers.

Are you a financial services marketer eager to dive into outcome-based marketing? Connect with Perform^[cb]’s team of customer acquisition experts and get started today!

Email TUNE’s Partnerships Team at partnerships@tune.com to learn more about performance marketing for financial services brands and how the right tracking platform can help.

Welcome back to the Influencer-Affiliate Blueprint series! In the first two parts of our journey, we explored the foundations of building high-ROI creator communities and understanding the nuances of influencer affiliate programs. Now, it’s time to delve into the art of recruiting social media influencers and content creators to supercharge your affiliate program. Keep reading to learn how to recruit influencers and creators like a boss!

Understanding the Landscape

Before diving into tactics, let’s grasp the diverse landscape of influencers and creators:

1. Macro vs. Micro-Influencers: Macro-influencers boast large follower counts, while micro-influencers have smaller, more engaged audiences. Both have their advantages, depending on your campaign goals.
2. Niche Experts: These influencers focus on specific topics or industries, often commanding deep trust and authority within their communities.
3. Content Creators: These individuals excel in crafting compelling content across various formats, including blogs, videos, podcasts, and social media posts.

Platforms of Influence

The digital sphere offers numerous platforms for influencers and creators to showcase their talents. Here are some of the most popular:

1. Instagram: Ideal for visually-driven content, Instagram is a hotspot for fashion, beauty, lifestyle, and food influencers.
2. YouTube: The go-to platform for video content, YouTube hosts a wide array of creators covering topics ranging from tutorials and reviews to vlogs and entertainment.
3. TikTok: With its explosive growth, TikTok has become a powerhouse for short-form video content, appealing to younger demographics and fostering viral trends.
4. Twitter: Known for real-time conversations, Twitter is favored by influencers for its ability to spark discussions and share quick updates.
5. Blogs: Despite the rise of visual platforms, blogs remain relevant for long-form content and niche expertise, attracting dedicated audiences.

How to Recruit Influencers and Creators

There are a few different ways to tap influencers. Let’s break it down into the following:

• Curated (Outbound)
• Paid (Outbound)
• Earned (Inbound)
• Tech-Enabled (Inbound)
• Tools and Partners

We’ll go into details for each of these below.

Outbound Recruitment Methods

Curated Recruitment

Curation is the good old-fashioned approach to list-building. This organic approach is really important when you’re in an alpha or beta version of your program’s build-out. 

Even though this approach requires manual effort, we recommend keeping this in the mix early on. It’s essential for program efficiency and speed to profitability. It’s also important to test a lot of different influencer segments and channels. See what segments work and what segments don’t, then worry about scale and how to execute that scale with your winning segments. This way, you’re not blowing your program budget on paid recruitment tactics, PR, or additional technology only to power up a bunch of influencer segments that don’t work. 

Key Benchmark: Your reply and opt-in rates on cold outbound recruitment are a great indicator of program interest in your pitch. Strong programs clock opt-in rates ranging from 25% to 40%. 

There are plenty of ways to aggregate these cold outbound lists once you’re armed with your segment criteria. Most of the social media channels have started building their own directories of verified creators (TikTok Creator Marketplace, Pinterest for Creators, Facebook for Creators). Additionally, if you have the budget, you can tap any of the creator marketplaces and influencer management tools that are out there. Depending on the platform, you’ll be able to utilize its creator index, social listening tools, and/or done-for-you list-building products. 

Important Note: We recommend carefully considering your cold outbound strategy. As with any outbound campaign, sending mass amounts of email from a single address can create issues for your account, and potentially flag the domain. We recommend a dedicated domain (e.g., www.mybrandcreators.com) with various send-from email addresses that can be warmed up over the first few test cycles as your messaging is dialed in.

Paid Recruitment

In addition to native curation tools, many platforms will also offer CPL/CPA-based recruitment support. Pricing varies widely, but it’s a good thing to keep in mind as you’re signing a software contract. You may be able to negotiate that recruitment rate depending on the length and size of the contract. Third-party recruitment support can be super helpful if you’re working with a small program management team.

In addition to your software partners, you can also use paid strategies to purchase verified lists and tap segment-specific networks. Or, you can put some budget towards building your own program marketing ad creative. This is one of our favorite tactics once you have some momentum behind the program and a handful of successful influencer affiliates that are open to providing testimonial content that can fuel ads for the program itself. Social proof is a tremendously powerful recruitment technique, and we love to use it right at the top of the funnel.

Inbound Recruitment Methods

Earned Interest

Earned interest can result from both organic and paid effort. Once a program has been dialed in, we see a lot of success with a coordinated PR effort. The creator economy continues to be a hot topic, and major brands have launched these influencer affiliate communities with abundant fanfare. 

We caution that this approach can generate a huge spike in inbound interest. If your team isn’t prepared, these are wasted dollars. Once influencers churn, they’re exponentially more difficult and expensive to win back.

With that said, once an influencer affiliate program is humming, managers can expect an uptick in inbound interest. Influencer communities are very collaborative, and word spreads quickly around well-managed programs — and around poorly managed programs. When creators see their category’s top influencers and their peers utilizing a brand toolkit, they’re apt to hop on board!

Tech-Enabled Recruiting

This recruitment strategy involves investing in additional technology and a willingness to hook these influencer affiliate programs into your brand’s central customer journeys. We’re starting to see e-commerce brands of all sizes include a program sign-up offer in their post-purchase flow with tremendous success. 

How does this work?

• The brand includes a simple pop-up that introduces the affiliate program and invites customers to submit their social media information in exchange for a discount. These pop-ups can be introduced after a first purchase, upon return to the site, or at the point of sale.
• The integration generates a list of potential influencers who are also, most importantly, your customers first. 
• On the back end, program managers build a segmentation strategy or leverage technology like Gatsby.ai to filter these inbound social media handles by follower count, verification status, location, channel, etc. 
• Once everything is in order, you can create a system of rules and onboarding flows that automatically funnel your customers into the program with tiered logic. Customers with verification marks or massive social media followings follow one path with personalized communications and generous offers; meanwhile, other customers can follow another set of paths that are tailored to their degree of influence. You can also create a flow that gracefully exits customers who aren’t a fit for your brand at this time.

The beauty of this strategy is that it automatically scales as sales grow. As more and more influencer affiliates are onboarded, more sales are generated, and an entirely new crop of potential affiliates hit the system. 

Tools and Partners

Finally, tools like Publisher Discovery and partners like those available in the TUNE Marketplace can help brands of all sizes find the right influencer affiliates for their programs. Some helpful partners and tools:

• Publisher Discovery
• MagicLinks
• Aspire IQ
• Find Your Influence
• SARAL
• Gatsby: Growth From Community
• CreatorIQ

How to Engage Influencers After You Recruit Them

No matter how good of a communicator you think you are, it’s smart to spend time testing recruitment and messaging strategies. The key paths to consider during recruitment are program qualification, program onboarding, and program decline. 

Program Qualification

With program qualification, you’re going to be focused on dialing in your pitch and tailoring it to your influencer segments. We recommend taking small segments and A/B testing subject lines, core copy, and follow-up sequences. Optimize these communications over the course of your first few months and then go wider with the winning segments and their winning communications. 

Other tactics during program qualification may include invite-only webinar events, one-to-one discovery calls, and a content drip that includes social proof, case studies, and program success narratives. 

Program Onboarding

The same test and learn strategy goes for your program onboarding flow. You’ll want to hit new sign-ups with a very simple welcome that includes an easy to digest onboarding checklist. We also recommend building a video-driven welcome series that helps orient new influencers. In both cases, approach your creative with an MVP (minimum viable product) mindset, and then expand and refine it as you start fielding real-time questions. 

A variety of issues you didn’t anticipate will arise during your alpha and beta launch phases. As you go, make sure you leave yourself some time and flexibility to figure out the resources and processes needed to address these issues. Until your influencer affiliate program is a well-oiled machine, the approach should remain agile.

Finally, don’t forget to take time to understand the why behind the “no.” When an influencer declines program participation, it’s important to try to understand why. A couple ways to do this are with a simple, personally directed follow-up question, or an incentivized exit survey that thanks them for their time. Gathering data on why someone decided not to join can help guide your outreach to future partners. 

Get Started with Influencers and Creators

Recruiting social media influencers and content creators for your affiliate program is a strategic endeavor that requires careful planning and execution. As you think about recruitment, you’ll want to build A/B testing strategies for your communications that address cold outbound recruitment and qualification stages, the onboarding stage, and an exit stage. Start small. Test over two-week sprints. Optimize. And expand! 

To learn more strategies for recruiting today’s top content creators and influencers, download the Influencer-Affiliate Blueprint: Building High-ROI Creator Communities or watch our on-demand webinar.

Check back soon for Part 4 of our series!

Need a tool to measure your influencer-affiliate programs? The TUNE platform is your go-to solution for flexible, affordable partner management and tracking tools. With in-platform payments, creative asset management, campaign automation, and more, it’s your one-stop shop for performance-based influencer marketing. Request your demo today.

Virality Boost is the original influencer content syndication network, helping brands to increase visibility, spark interest, inspire action, and drive purchases at scale. They focus on crafting syndication strategies that cover the entire customer journey and aim to break barriers in influencer marketing that traditionally haven’t worked for advertisers. Their approach is researched for maximum viral impact and cross-platform actions, leveraging the natural customer journey to deliver incremental performance.

Q: Can you give us a high-level overview of Virality Boost?  

A: Virality Boost is a transparent influencer content syndication network, specializing in large-scale influencer campaigns. We deliver campaigns that impact the bottom line and help brands achieve larger business objectives with quality, category-relevant influencers and advanced social strategies that leverage social media algorithms to increase visibility and impact.

Q: What are the top ways you promote brands?  

A: We run 25, 50, to 100 or more influencers in a single campaign within a specific time window to drive virality — demand and awareness for the brand across two platforms, depending on brand — Facebook, X, Instagram, Youtube, and TikTok.

Q: What is the total reach of your audience?  

A: Over 30 million.

Q: Can you share some insights about your audience and demographics?  

A: They span 23 categories: both male and female influencers in lifestyle, web3, auto luxury, fashion, sports, travel, auto lifestyle, family, personal finances, kids under 10, kids over 10, and more!

Q: Which verticals perform the best with Virality Boost?  

A: It depends on the brand, but generally wellness, fashion, beauty, lifestyle, unique offerings and products, sports, watch TV, and more.

Q: Can you tell us about a successful campaign you ran in the last six months?  

A: SenseofSelf.Life – we’ll have a case study ready in a couple of weeks. See a sneak peek below.

Q: What’s something unique about Virality Boost?  

A: Each campaign is spearheaded by our influencer captains. These captains are experienced influencers themselves, representing various niches within the influencer community. We diligently test our strategies, placing a strong emphasis on achieving measurable results. 

Q: Any industry trends or insights to share with brands?  

A: In today’s rapidly shifting digital landscape, where third-party cookies are being phased out, brands must prioritize and refine their attribution strategies to make well-informed budgeting decisions. Google is enhancing its AI-driven ads and testing Google’s Circle on Android, all to master social media imagery. Amazon is not lagging behind, with its decisive move towards influencer collaborations and image search features. Meanwhile, Meta’s robust pixel technology continues to set a high benchmark.

For businesses focused on driving growth and seizing market share, understanding the customer’s journey across diverse channels and platforms, particularly social media, is critical. Brands must focus tirelessly on stimulating demand, elevating awareness, and nurturing purchase intent. Clear attribution allows companies to allocate their resources effectively, ensuring each touchpoint resonates with their audience and contributes to a coherent brand narrative that fosters business growth.

In short, investing in full funnel campaigns and solid attribution models is not just about adapting to the new cookie-less era — it’s a fundamental approach to sustainably capturing consumer interest and propelling your brand forward in a competitive marketplace.

TUNE customers who would like to work with Virality Boost can request an introduction directly in the TUNE Marketplace.

Questions? Click here to chat with one of our experts.

Paylode is a leading customer perks platform helping companies launch and manage perks programs without the burden and expense of building one in-house. Paylode is like having an entire partnerships team in your corner. They vet and pre-negotiate thousands of perks offers from top consumer brands, and provide easy, no-code tools to save companies massive amounts of time and overhead. Perks programs increase conversion rates, retention, engagement, and satisfaction, while also unlocking a new stream of revenue for your company. Read on to find out more about this TUNE Marketplace Partner and how their perks platform could benefit your brand.

Q: Can you give us a high-level overview of your company?  

A: Paylode is a powerful perks platform driving customer action and retention. It’s the fastest way for companies to launch, manage, and monetize a customer perks program that rewards customers who engage.

Q: What are the top ways you promote brands?  

A: Brands are invited to apply to our marketplace and if accepted, they join 1,000+ other household names and local businesses. We then work with our clients to promote right-fit perks that are exactly what their audience wants and needs. Brands can be featured in our persistent perks centers, as well as in client-specific marketing campaigns.

Q: What is the total reach of Paylode’s audience?  

A: Our clients have a total of over 23 million users in the United States and Canada (with some of our audience in Australia, South Africa, Indonesia, and Portugal). Interestingly, nine out of 10 perk redemptions are from customers who start and end their journey within the Paylode perks center, indicating that perks customers are not coupon hunters but rather shoppers and browsers.

Q: Can you share some insights about your audience and demographics?  

A: We work with a wide range of companies, but the ones that get the most value from the system are the ones who have a lot of customers and want to give them reasons to take action — whether that’s to complete a purchase, sign up, or any other action that’s valuable to your company.

Q: Which verticals perform the best with Paylode?  

A: We focus on verticals such as insurance, residential real estate, travel & hospitality, fintech, utilities, membership apps, and e-commerce. Each of these niches come with their own audience and nuances of reaching them.

Food, travel, and home furnishings offers do well with Paylode perks customers. Users browse and search from hundreds of offers and select what’s right for them. We also match offers to campaigns, to gift customers the best deal on the web in exchange for their engagement.

Q: Can you tell us about a successful campaign you’ve run in the last six months?  

A: There’s no campaign too big or too small — there are infinite ways to use perks. One hospitality brand created a perks page specifically for pickleball tournament goers, adding another way to thank audience goers with a creative bundle of deals specifically for the pickleball fans.

We’re working on an upcoming movie launch with a themed perk center for the main character’s biggest fans. Collectibles, merchandise, and movie ticket deals all promote the movie.

And though it seems small, the most impactful way we help companies is by helping their customers save, both on things they need every day and in that current moment.

For example, our residential real estate clients create move-in bundles for new tenants that can help them save hundreds on moving costs like truck rentals and cleaners, making it a little easier to settle into a new place. Our insurance clients provide auto supply deals and discounts that help their policyholders save, showing them gratitude even when it’s not renewal time.

Q: What’s something unique about Paylode?  

A: “Every single company right now is figuring out how to retain their customers while driving down costs, especially in this economic environment,” said Leo Polovets, Founding Partner at Susa Ventures. “Paylode’s approach to perks programs not only addresses the rising challenges of customer acquisition costs but also provides a seamless solution for businesses to drive deeper engagement and unlock additional revenue streams.” 

Q: Any industry trends or insights to share with brands?  

A: We live in an incentive-driven economy. Customers expect rewards and personalization in 2024. Working with Paylode means taking your customer engagement program to the next level in terms of both. Paylode is building a product based on the core value of delivering measurable impact to companies for a fraction of the cost it would take to do it in-house.

Q: Why should brands want to work with your company?  

A: The magic is where we link together brands and customers at scale, and we’re adding new and better no-code features every day to enable any marketer to run a perks campaign. We have a team of 15 industry veterans and engineers building the platform, many with a decade or more experience in the partnerships, affiliate marketing, and rewards industry.

TUNE customers who are interested in working with Paylode can request an introduction directly in the platform via TUNE Marketplace. Questions? Click here to chat with one of our experts.

In an evolving digital landscape, affiliate marketers need to stay ahead of the game to maximize reach and drive conversions in a crowded field. One tool that can help is artificial intelligence (AI). AI offers immense potential to optimize and automate aspects of affiliate marketing, from streamlining workflows to creating content.  

Among the many AI-powered solutions available to the public today is ChatGPT, an advanced language model developed by OpenAI. In January 2023, it set a record as the fastest growing consumer application in history, gaining more than 100 million users in just two months. If you’re wondering how you can join the movement, keep reading — we’re exploring a few of the ways marketers can leverage the power of ChatGPT in their affiliate marketing strategies.  

How to Use ChatGPT in Your Affiliate Marketing Program

Get Help with Content Creation and Optimization 

Nobody reads a blog post or watches a video on TikTok because they want to be served an ad or have a product pushed on them. They’re looking to be informed, entertained, inspired. Which is why compelling content lies at the heart of successful affiliate marketing campaigns.  

ChatGPT can be a powerful ally in creating high-quality, engaging content. Its ability to generate human-like text makes it an invaluable tool for producing both long- and short-form copy — product walkthroughs, comparison articles, informative blog posts, creative ad copy, you name it. With some detailed prompting and a bit of human editing, affiliate marketers can use ChatGPT to save time and effort creating written and visual content.

A quick note on the visual content process: ChatGPT’s visual AI is DALL·E 3, which is technically separate from ChatGPT even though they can be used in conjunction. There are numerous other visual AIs available for free or as a paid subscription, based on your needs and the amount of images you’ll be generating. We’ve been most impressed with Midjourney and Stable Diffusion.

ChatGPT can also be a valuable addition to your current content optimization process. Provide the language model with a set of keywords, and it can generate optimized titles, meta descriptions, and relevant subheadings. You can also reverse-engineer old, unoptimized blog posts by feeding them into ChatGPT and asking for the top keywords and suggested updates. These practices can all help improve SEO and boost organic traffic to brand and affiliate websites. 

Make More Personalized Recommendations 

Understanding and engaging with customers on a personal level is crucial for affiliates — it’s why they’re so good at what they do. ChatGPT can help in offering personalized recommendations based on user preferences, browsing behavior, and previous interactions. Prompt the AI model to analyze purchase and engagement data and look for patterns; it may be able to suggest tailored product options that resonate with individual customers. This level of personalization can significantly enhance your users’ experience, upping the chance they eventually engage and convert. 

Enable Always-On Customer Support 

Thanks to its conversational, human-like language model, ChatGPT can be integrated into chatbots or virtual assistants to offer support services. These could include answering common questions, providing product information, or completing purchases. This automation frees up human resources for more complex interactions and tasks that can’t be replaced by artificial intelligence. 

Get Granular in Analysis and Reporting 

Accurate data analysis is vital for optimizing affiliate marketing campaigns. ChatGPT can analyze vast amounts of data and provide valuable insights for marketers in a fraction of the time it would take a human.  

For example, some agencies have started using ChatGPT and other AI models to transcribe, digest, and summarize the key points and next steps on calls with clients. Other affiliate marketers leverage ChatGPT to perform sentiment analysis on social media platforms and forums, gauge public opinion, and identify potential influencers for collaboration. 

One important note: ChatGPT’s knowledge base used to be limited to information shared on the internet before September 2021. This limitation was one of the biggest headaches for its users. However, it can now search for and provide real-time information thanks to an update in fall 2023.  

Master Management and Workflow Automation 

Managing affiliate partnerships and networks can be time-consuming and challenging. ChatGPT can automate several aspects of network and program management for the individuals who are working within them every day. For example, it can help to identify potential new affiliates, evaluate applications, write introduction emails, or proofread terms and conditions. This can all streamline the affiliate recruitment process. (We should note, however, that this aspect of affiliate marketing will always require constant attention and a human touch.)

Get Started with ChatGPT and Affiliate Marketing

Artificial intelligence, even in its early stages, has the industry abuzz with its potential to change the game. However, AI models like ChatGPT are only as good as the prompts that drive them. You’ll need the right marketing-focused prompts to effectively use any of the strategies above. More than likely, you’ll need to experiment and iterate to figure out what those are.

If you’re not sure how to get started, google the AI model you’re using plus “prompt for [the task you want to accomplish]” — you should find plenty of examples to choose from. You can also check out AI prompt-based communities on Reddit, Twitter, and most other social media platforms.

And, in case you’re looking for guidance on your overall strategy, head over to our Ultimate Guide to Partner Marketing to learn more.

June’s featured partner Perform^[cb] is a leader in the outcome-based marketing industry. Their mission to “Think Bigger” and a streak of exponential organic growth allowed the company to make several strategic acquisitions over the years. Today, they provide marketers and publishers with the unique solutions their businesses need to succeed. Read on to find out how they could help your brand grow today and into the future!  

Q: Can you give us a high-level overview of Perform^[cb]?  

A: Founded in 2002, Perform^[cb] is a 7X winner of best in class in the outcome-based marketing industry, offering a comprehensive range of services through our Outcome Engine and affiliate program management. Enabled by proprietary, patented technology that seamlessly integrates with TUNE, Perform^[cb] allows marketers to optimize customer acquisition and maximize return on ad spend (ROAS) by only paying for tangible, high-quality customer outcomes. 

We work with brands such as Walmart, LendingTree, FanDuel, Robinhood, Capital One Shopping, and Hungryroot to grow their customer base and lifetime value at scale.

Q: What are the top ways you promote brands?  

A: Our extensive ad inventory gives marketers access to major and emerging digital channels, such as mobile, search, contextual, display, and pay-per-call (just to name a few), ensuring broad customer reach across the entire buyer journey. We provide brands with flexible payment models tailored to their specific objectives, including CPA, CPL, CPI, CPE, and CPC. 

Q: What is the total reach of your audience?  

A: We work with a diverse range of clients, spanning small businesses, mid-sized companies, and enterprise brands across various industries and niches. With our versatile solutions, we cater to the unique growth needs of each brand, whether it’s providing strategic support for individual campaigns or full-funnel affiliate program management. 

Q: Which verticals perform the best with Perform^[cb]?  

A: Our team has extensive experience scaling and optimizing campaigns across a diverse set of key verticals, including but not limited to:

• Downloads and Security Software 
• Entertainment, Streaming, and Lifestyle 
• Finance and Fintech 
• Beauty, Health, and Wellness 
• Electronics and Gaming 
• Apparel and Accessories 
• Subscription Services 
• Grocery and Alcohol Delivery 

Q: Can you tell us about a successful campaign you’ve run in the last six months?  

A: A popular finance marketer seeking to acquire qualified consumers through valuable, long-term partnerships turned to Perform^[cb]‘s Outcome Engine team for assistance. We established a strong foundation with the fintech marketer, emphasizing compliance transparency, open communication, data-driven feedback, and strategic optimizations. Through collaborative A/B testing of landing pages, product bundles, pricing, payouts, and sub-ID tracking, we leveraged insights to optimize performance across top channels. Our recruitment of high-quality partners and streamlined creative reviews by our in-house compliance team further expedited the campaign launch process.  

The campaign surpassed its consumer enrollment goal, achieving a remarkable 74% increase in enrollments during the first quarter. The success continued, with an impressive 355% increase in revenue and a 274% increase in enrollments year-over-year. 

Check out the full case study here!

Q: What’s something unique about Perform^[cb]?  

A: Our commitment to delivering impressive ROI, developing cutting-edge technology, and fostering a vibrant culture sets us apart. One of our standout features is our Outcome Engine, a world-leading full-funnel digital customer generation tool kit. Powered by our patented customer acquisition platform (CAP), the Outcome Engine revolutionizes growth by integrating AI technology, expert services, and a curated partner marketplace.  

Our CAP secures all campaigns with 24/7 compliance and the anti-fraud software, PerformSHIELD. This powerful tool proactively and continuously protects brands from suspicious activity, providing them with peace of mind and maintaining their brand integrity. 

Q: Any industry trends or insights to share with brands?  

A: The future of outcome-based marketing is likely to be shaped by several key factors. Technological advancements and data analytics will be pivotal. The ability to gather and analyze vast amounts of data empowers marketers to make informed decisions, optimize campaigns, and deliver personalized experiences to targeted audiences. The impact of AI and machine learning technologies is already profound as we’re seeing within our own platform capabilities, facilitating efficient targeting, automation, and performance optimization. 

We have also witnessed a rise in influencer partnerships, emphasis on transparency and compliance, focus on personalization and segmentation, and diversification of programs with niche partners. These trends provide valuable insights for brands seeking to optimize their strategies and succeed in a dynamic marketplace. 

At Perform^[cb], we remain committed to ongoing investment in research and development, staying ahead of industry trends, and adapting strategies to meet our clients’ evolving needs.

TUNE customers who would like to work with Perform^[cb] can request an introduction directly in the TUNE Marketplace.

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Affiliate marketing is a low-risk, high-reward channel that has seen its popularity skyrocket in recent years. However, low risk isn’t the same as no risk. With more than 80% of advertisers and publishers including affiliate partnerships in their marketing strategy, fraud is an unfortunate and unavoidable fact of life. 

As affiliate marketing grew into what it is today, so did bad actors and their numerous technologies to “game the system.” Some of these practices fall into a gray category where they aren’t necessarily illegal, while others are a blatant breach of contract.

Below, we’ve outlined the practices that account for why this channel has historically gained a bad reputation in the marketing industry. Here are the top ways we see publishers break the rules, how they do it, and how you can identify affiliate fraud like it in your own program. 

What Affiliate Fraud Looks Like 

Pop-Unders 

The opposite of a pop-up, a pop-under is an ad that pops open behind (or “under”) a browser window. 

When It’s OK  

A number of publishers still utilize pop-unders as a part of their advertising efforts, and that in itself is relatively benign. However, this practice is considered old school and typically does not add value to the user experience. How often have you seen a pop-under and said, “Oh great, I can’t wait to click on this!” Instead, it’s more like, “Where the hell did this come from?”

Some advertisers may not want this experience to be included as part of their program, while others might not mind, so it’s best the parties involved discuss this practice upfront.   

When It’s Bad 

Pop-unders can be set up to assist in cookie stuffing without the user knowing. It’s bad practice if the pop-under is for something completely irrelevant to what the user is searching for, or if the user did not take an action (click) to cause the ad to fire. 

A common practice for very large retailers or campaigns is to force an affiliate click on a pop-under where there is no immediate relevance for the consumer in the hope that they will purchase (think Expedia) or sign up (H&R Block). A red flag for this type of tactic would be an extreme spike in clicks from a masked referring URL with low conversion rates. 

Cookie Stuffing/Cookie Dropping  

Also known as attribution theft, cookie stuffing is always fraudulent. 

When It’s OK 

Never. 

When It’s Bad 

Cookies are little data bites that capture the parameters we all use in our tracking links. These data bites include important values like your affiliates’ information (name, ID number, etc.), and they track the touchpoints in a consumer journey.

Cookie stuffing happens when a third party, such as a publisher or CPA network, drops multiple cookies on a user’s browser before they take an action so the third party can get continuous credit for a sale. You may be able to tell if one of the partners in your program is doing this if their actions spike but they have very few clicks, behavior that TUNE’s Time-to-Action Report can help you identify. 

TM+ Bidding 

TM+ stands for “trademark plus,” or when a third party bids on your branded name(s) plus additional keywords. 

When It’s OK  

Trademark plus campaigns, when run through the affiliate channel with trusted partners, can help bolster performance and support advertisers by pushing competitors lower in search results. They also offer a means to get supplemental media in exchange for TM+ rights, which can be a win/win depending on the goals of a particular partnership.  

When It’s Bad 

Trademark bidding is part of paid search marketing, which means most brands will have a team that focuses on this and pays search engines to place their ads at the top of relevant pages. When unauthorized parties bid on trademarked terms, it not only drives up costs for your paid search team, but it can also result in completely inaccurate information, stolen sales, and poor user experiences.  

URL Redirection 

This happens when you navigate to a specific URL and instead of ending up there, you are rerouted to a different destination URL. 

When It’s OK 

There are a few reputable auto-redirecting publishers who scrape the web for misspelled domain entries and redirect them to advertisers’ sites. Some notable companies that do this are Resilion, NameSpace, and ProtectedBrand. 

When It’s Bad 

URL redirection is bad if it is set up with the intent to disguise itself and take users away from their intended destination. This can be done in tandem with website cloning, and it is another form of theft in affiliate marketing. Auto-redirecting works by using a protocol that remains hidden and enables click fraud.  

Bots/Web Crawling 

A search engine algorithm that organizes information. 

When It’s OK 

Fun fact: About 42% of internet traffic consists of bots scanning content, interacting with webpages, chatting with users, or looking for suspicious behavior. Some bots are useful, such as search engine bots that index content for search results or customer service bots that help users. A web crawler bot is like someone who goes through all the books in a disorganized library and puts together a card catalog, so that anyone who visits the library can quickly and easily find the information they need. 

When It’s Bad 

Like any technology, bots can be built with bad intent. Because it’s automated technology, bots can assist with most of the malevolent practices mentioned in this post. They can be programmed to break into user accounts, scan the web for contact information for sending spam, set up to perform click fraud, or stuff cookies.

If you have access to a tool like TUNE’s Time-to-Action Report and see an unprecedented number of clicks come through in a short period of time, that could indicate a bot is performing click fraud on a partner’s site.  

Website Cloning 

This practice is exactly what it sounds like: duplicating information and visuals from one site to create a copy of it somewhere else. 

When It’s OK 

Never. 

When It’s Bad 

I’ve seen this happen to brands when a third party purchases similar domain names and replicates the website imagery and content to dupe visitors and get the affiliate payout on those sales. The plagiarized sites abuse the way Google ranks content by sending fake organic traffic to themselves. This is why it’s so important to actually look at potential partner websites and do the research before accepting just anyone into your affiliate program. 

Toolbar Auto-Redirection 

When a toolbar, plugin, or other browser extension takes an action without the user’s knowledge and/or consent.

When It’s OK 

Never. 

When It’s Bad 

Some browser toolbars, plugins, and extensions automatically drop an affiliate click when a user (who has it installed) visits an advertiser’s website in order to generate an action that will give the user cash back. Many times, the consumer doesn’t know they have the toolbar installed and never get the cash back. See the post we wrote about Chrome extensions caught cookie stuffing for an example of this practice in action. 

We recommend requiring that any toolbar or browser plugin adheres to an “affirmative click” policy, where the user has to opt in to receive cash back (and subsequently allow the affiliate to receive commission). The major toolbars that do this are Shop At Home, BeFrugal, and WeCare. 

Tools to Detect Affiliate Fraud 

As affiliate fraud has expanded, so have tools to help brands and program managers fight back. Some platforms offer fraud protection built in, but most charge an additional fee for their solution or a third-party integration. TUNE provides both, allowing you the freedom to use our built-in proactive fraud prevention suite that’s powered by Fraudlogix, or integrate your preferred third-party solution. 

“TUNE’s customers depend on the platform to help them fight fraud and the data we are providing enables them to block fraudulent actions before they affect campaigns,” Fraudlogix CEO Hagai Shechter said in our post announcing the feature. “This saves TUNE’s customers time and has real implications on ROI.” 

Another TUNE technology partner, TrafficGuard, sees that on average across affiliate programs, between 10-15% of commission payouts go to fraudulent affiliate partners. Here’s how they explain it: 

“When we look at ad fraud in the affiliate channel what we are really looking at is misattribution. Tactics like cookie stuffing are designed to misattribute a conversion away from its real origin to a fraudulent affiliate. That means you are then either paying that affiliate for something that you should have got for free, or are paying the wrong affiliate. When it comes to scaling your affiliate program, this can cause you to actually scale into the bad actor, as it appears they are driving the most growth.” 
—Kalen Bushe, TrafficGuard

Keeping Affiliate Fraud Out of Your Program 

These days, affiliate fraud is just a reality brands must face. With the right platform and tools, however, it becomes a manageable part of any program.  

Visit our blog post on TUNE’s Proactive Fraud Prevention to learn more. 

Download our 10 Mistakes to Avoid When Starting an Affiliate Program e-book to get tips from industry experts on what they got wrong — like ignoring the warning signs of affiliate fraud — and how you can get it right in your program.