Affiliate: An affiliate is a remote
salesperson for products, services, or offers by merchants.
Affiliates earn money by placing a program's links on their
websites. They earn commissions or other revenue when their
visitors successfully complete qualified actions (such as
making a purchase). Affiliates are bound by the terms and
conditions set forth in the merchant's affiliate program
agreement.
Affiliate Program: An affiliate program is
the administrative structure that provides affiliates with
links and tracking mechanisms, as well as payment
processing. Most of the mechanisms for issuing affiliate
links and tracking actions/sales/payments are
automated.
Affiliate Agreement: This is a legally
binding agreement between a merchant and an affiliate, and
spells out the terms that will govern payments that are
made to affiliates.
Click through: A click on your affiliate
link that takes a visitor to the merchant's website.
Getting as many "click throughs" to the merchant's site as
possible is one of your most important tasks as an
affiliate.
Merchant: A merchant is a person, company,
or corporation that sells goods or services online. Many
merchants decide to start affiliate programs to increase
their sales in a cost-effective way. Some merchants might
contract with affiliate networks to manage and administer
their affiliate programs. Others, however, choose to invest
in tracking software and develop their own in-house
program; these merchants are often referred to as
"independents" or "independent programs."
Network: The term “network” refers to an
organization that sets up and administers an affiliate
program for a merchant, usually for a fee equal to some
percentage of affiliate sales. Services offered may be as
simple as signing up affiliates, providing tracking links,
and issuing payments. More advanced network services
include detailed tracking and conversion reports and
upload/download areas for banner ads and other promotional
materials.
Opt-in: A sign up to an email list online.
Building and marketing to an "opt-in list" is the primary
activity of email affiliates.
Publishers: In affiliate marketing, a
publisher is a person who publishes affiliate banners and
links on the web. This term is synonymous with "affiliate"
or "affiliate marketer."
Sub-Affiliate: A sub-affiliate is an
affiliate marketer who is brought into an affiliate
marketing program by another affiliate who already
participates in the program. Affiliates are usually paid a
small percentage of their sub-affiliates' sales.
