Affiliate Software – which is the best?

[Tonyeynon]

Hi Everyone,

I was wondering if any one could recommend a good third party (off the shelf) affiliate software package.

I’m looking to set up my own program to promote our company directly so once I have set it all up I can get someone to start recruiting advertisers.

My only recruitment is that I would like to customise the front end graphics so when my advertisers sign in, it will all look branded to my own company.

Apart from that I can quite honestly say I don’t really know what else to look for? I bought one a while back and it was impossible to figure out and all the help files were almost illegible, written in very poor English.

Which leads me on to my question of can anyone recommend a good package to buy? Price is not really a concern, just ease of use and a reliable frame work.

Thanks everyone :)

[Malcolm Cooper]

I don't know anything about this software but it might be of use to you.

http://www.affilistore.com/index.php?act=viewCat&catId=1

[INDIZINE]

I have just signed up for idev afilliate, Gold level for now. It was recommended off the forum and also by someone else I know offline who has 8 websites. www.idevdirect.com (http://www.idevdirect.com)

It looks easy to use for both the web owner and the afilliates, to track and view stats, payments, etc.

[Steve2507]

IDev is the one I would go for.

[Tonyeynon]

Thanks guys - Ill check them out!

Any more input welcome :)

Best wishes,

Tony

[scifind]

I would NOT go with iDev, unless it has changed much in the past few years.
I managed an affiliate program for a 'big client' who used iDev. Yes it did its job, but it didn't (in the version I used) have nearly enough features and more importantly reporting for my needs.
Bearing in mind that this client had 15,000+ products 100+ affiliates and in excess of £30,000 worth of affiliate sales each and every month.
For smaller sites - with less demanding affiliates this may not be a problem.
I must also reiterate the version of the software that they were (and still are) using is 2 years old now.

Features it did lack (if these now come as standard please let me know)

1) On the Fly Deep Linking
2) On the Fly extra tracking parameter for affiliates.
3) Tiered commission levels
4) Payment invoicing module
5) Custom reporting for affiliates and for admin.
Plus several other bugs that I cannot remember right now.

Depending on your situation it may be best to use a 3rd party affiliate network. If you give me more details on your business model I could advise further.

[Online Trader]

Indizine.

Can you answer the points raised by Scifind have all of the features lacking now been included in what they are offering?

[Tonyeynon]

I am seeking new arenas to gain traffic and sales which has lead me down this route. Im really not interested in the likes of tradedoubler or affiliate window, I just want to create our own network and add to it as time goes on.

As such my requirements would be not be as demanding as your clients, I just want something easy to setup and easy to manage – oh, and customisable for my merchants.

Do you think this software would meet the criteria?

[Steve2507]

1) On the Fly Deep Linking
2) On the Fly extra tracking parameter for affiliates.
3) Tiered commission levels
4) Payment invoicing module
5) Custom reporting for affiliates and for admin.
The version of Idev we used was 4 years old and had all of these features and more in it. Sorry but I don't think your client tried very hard to find them (even though they were easy to find and use).

We used the software for all of the above purposes and more, very easily.

[Online Trader]

Thanks Steve, this looks good.

[scifind]

The version of Idev we used was 4 years old and had all of these features and more in it. Sorry but I don't think your client tried very hard to find them (even though they were easy to find and use).

We used the software for all of the above purposes and more, very easily.

The version of the software they are using did not alow affiliates to generate deeplinks - they had to use pre determined deeplinks generated by admin (not good when there are 15,000 products). Also affiliates could use extra tracking IDs but they had to pregenerate these through the affiliate area and not add a parameter to the link.
As such my requirements would be not be as demanding as your clients, I just want something easy to setup and easy to manage – oh, and customisable for my merchants.

If you are using multiple merchants you might want to consider Post Affiliate Pro - http://www.qualityunit.com/postaffiliatepro/
Low cost - can be run 'off the shelf' and full access to source code for customisation $99