Let’s be honest—the media publishing industry has been hit hard since 2022. Display advertising budgets have been drying up, leaving many publishers scrambling to replace what was once a steady stream of income. With ad revenues nosediving, the need to find alternative revenue streams is more urgent than ever. If you're a publisher feeling the pinch, you're definitely not alone.
The search for new revenue sources
The days of relying solely on display ads are behind us. Publishers need to start thinking about new ways to monetise their content—ways that actually make sense for their audience. That's where affiliate marketing comes in. You might know it as commerce content, but whatever you call it, it’s one of the most underutilised revenue streams out there for publishers. If done right, it can be a serious goldmine.
Affiliate marketing: the hidden opportunity
So what is affiliate marketing, and why should publishers care? In simple terms, affiliate marketing allows you to earn a commission by recommending products or services through your content. When someone reads your article, clicks your link, and makes a purchase within a certain timeframe, you get paid. Sounds like a win-win, right?
It’s perfect for publishers because it builds off what you’re already doing—creating valuable content that engages your audience. Whether you’re writing product reviews, how-to guides, or curated lists of recommendations, you can integrate affiliate links seamlessly into your content.
The challenges of commerce content and affiliate marketing
But here’s the catch—affiliate marketing isn’t as easy as throwing a few links into your posts and watching the money roll in. There are real challenges, and if you’re not set up for it, it can become a full-time job that eats into your time and resources.
Manual, time-sucking processes: Managing affiliate content, tracking and optimising for conversions, and keeping up with content engagement, takes up a lot of time. If you're manually updating and optimising content and checking performance, it’s never going to grow into a significant business.
Leaving money on the table: Without the right optimisation tools, it’s easy to miss out on revenue. Most publishers rely on their CMS for their affiliate content which is not ideal. This prevents publishers from promoting the content that monetises best and it limits performance insights significantly.
Lack of scalability: Trying to scale your affiliate marketing programme without the right systems in place is tough. As your content grows, managing hundreds of affiliate articles becomes unmanageable and it's impossible to dedicate your traffic to best performing automatically.
The good news? With the right tools, you can automate a lot of these processes and take your affiliate marketing from clunky to smooth, scaling it in a way that’s sustainable and profitable long term. We see that publishers embracing this approach, are able to build highly profitable business units that are less sensitive to macro economic challenges in the advertising industry.
Comments