Affiliate marketing in Canada has become increasingly popular as Canadians explore ways to make money online, and Canadian businesses diversify their income sources. It’s difficult to find affiliate marketing data to guide their efforts, however, which inspired the organizers of Affiliate Summit to survey attendees.
The 2013 Affiliate Summit AffStat report includes survey results from over 1600 affiliates. Attendees came from around the globe, including Canada.
The Personal Profile of Affiliate Marketers
The gender of participating affiliate marketers was just about equal, with 51.2 being male and 48.8% female. 56.5% have children and 43.5 do not.
There is a broad range of affiliate marketer ages:
22-25 ………. 2.5%
26-30 ………. 21.7%
31-40 ………. 28.6%
41-50 ………. 18.6%
51-60 ………. 19.9%
61+ ………. 8.7%
The annual income reported by those surveyed is a reality check. However, we should keep in mind that conferences often attract a higher percentage of those who are lacking in advanced knowledge (they attend to learn). Perhaps next year they could add an “experience level” question to the survey to provide some perspective. It should also be noted that almost half of these affiliate marketers promoted less than 10 affiliate programs.
Annual Income from Affiliate Marketing (90.2% of responders answered this question):
Less than $5000 ………. 39.2%
$10,000 – $24,999 ………. 11.8%
$25,000 – $49,999 ………. 13.1%
$50,000 – $99,000 ………. 5.9%
$100,000 – $199,999 ………. 9.2%
$200,000 – $299,999 ………. 2%
$300,000 – $399,999 ………. 2%
$400,000 – $499,999 ………. 2%
$500,000+ ………. 3.3%
The Professional Profile of Affiliate Marketers
59% of those surveyed work from home, 17.7% commute, and 22.8% do both.
The vast majority have been affiliate marketing for less than 8 years.
More than 90% of respondents were affiliate program decision makers.
The top five methods for finding new affiliate programs are:
- Merchant’s website (51.3%)
- Direct contact from Affiliate Manager (42.4%)
- Search engines (38.6%)
- Affiliate Newtork website (38%)
- Competitors’ website (25.9%)
The 2013 top 11 affiliate networks amongst respondents were:
- Share-a-Sale Affiliate Network (83.7%) Up from #2 last year
- Commission Junction (77.8%) Down from #1 last year
- Linkshare (58.2%) #3 last year
- Google Affiliate Network – Now Closed (47.7%) up from #5 last year
- LinkConnector Affiliate Network
(43.1%) Up from #6 last year
- Clickbank (41.2%) Down from #4 last year
- Pepperjam Network (35.3%) #7 last year
- AvantLink
(21.6%) Up from #10 last year
- Impact Radius (17.0%) Up from #11 last year
- Affiliate Window (14.7%) Down from #8 last year (European. Charges £5 refundable fee to join.)
- Digital River – One Network Direct (13.7%) Down from #9 last year
The top networks would vary somewhat among Canadian marketers due to special terms and conditions that may make some less Canadian-friendly than others. It’s important to read the terms and conditions of each network or you may lose some of your hard earned money. For example, our top choices would be Share-a-Sale Affiliate Network, RevResponse, and MaxBounty.
Affiliate Program Marketing
69% of those surveyed promote consumer product (B2C) affiliate programs, 1.3% promote business product (B2B) affiliate programs, and 29.7% promote both.
Affiliate Marketers ranked the following 12 typical methods of driving traffic to their website:
- Search engine optimization (SEO)
- Social Networks
- Blogging
- Word-of-mouth
- E-mail marketing
- Pay per click (PPC)
- Video/images (YouTube, Google Images, etc.)
- Display advertising
- Offline marketing
- Comment marketing
- Guest Posting
- Other
INSIDER TIPS!
- Free, extensive affiliate training and affiliate marketing tools can be had through the masterminds at Affilorama.
- Free affiliate marketing courses, community and more from The Wealthy Affiliate.
- To automatically embed an affiliate store in your WordPress blog, try Datafeedr.
- To easily manage affiliate links in WordPress blogs (auto-link, cloaking, etc.), check out the Affilink plugin that top bloggers are raving about.
- The link management choice of super-affiliates (like Armand Morin and John Chow) for websites or WordPress blogs is LinkTrackr.
- WordBay Plugin – Bring niche-targeted eBay products into your website or blog post with this easy plugin. Supports the eBay Partner Network, Skimlinks and Viglink.
- If you’re looking for a profitable niche that isn’t too saturated, start with keyword research and competitive intelligence using the acclaimed Long Tail Pro tool that “super affiliates” love.
How would you have answered these affiliate marketing survey questions? Please add your comments below.
Source: 2013 Affiliate Summit AffStat Report
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Melody McKinnon is an internet entrepreneur with 25 years of experience in a wide range of online business models, backed by a formal business/marketing education and enhanced by training and mentorship. She has owned or managed both educational and ecommerce websites. Her book, 7 Recession Proof Online Businesses to Start From Home, is available from all major ebook retailers.
Melody has worked with many businesses in a multitude of capacities. She can often be found on CanadianDigitalMedia.com, CanadiansInternet.com, CanadianFamily.net, and AllNaturalPetCare.com, as well as other quality digital publications. Her content has earned reference links from highly-respected websites, magazines and university textbooks.
I think it’s very useful to find out what one affiliate marketer does and having the combined opinion is even more so. I appreciate the share.
I love to hear what experts are doing, it’s like being given permission to cheat on a test LOL I’m working on a crafting business but I want to diversify my income.
I’m starting to look around now but Shareasale is the network I usually work with. Maybe Max Bounty next? I like they’re Canadian.
That is so interesting! I wonder how well it represents affiliates as a whole? I guess we’ll never know.
Fantastic read, thanks for sharing the numbers.
Great stats!
I agree that there are variables but I do love seeing any stats about affiliate marketing, thanks.
This is great! I’m just starting to feel my way through affiliate marketing and this is great!
I like shareasale best. They have lots of choices and it’s user friendly.