Today’s consumers spend more time on their phones than on any other device, and that includes when they shop, browse, and engage with brands.

If your affiliate program isn’t optimized for mobile, you’re leaving money and opportunities on the table.

In this post, we’ll explain why mobile matters in affiliate marketing, how tracking has evolved to keep up, and what you can do to make your mobile campaigns shine.

Why Mobile Matters More Than Ever

Mobile now makes up more than half of global web traffic, and users spend nearly four hours a day on mobile apps. That means your customers and your partners are already mobile-first.

If your affiliate program is still designed for desktop, you’re missing the biggest share of your audience. Whether it’s driving app installs, in-app purchases, or clicks through mobile web, mobile touchpoints are defining the future of affiliate marketing.

Apps, Web, and Why You Need Both

A strong mobile affiliate marketing strategy includes both apps and mobile web, as each has unique advantages for partner campaigns.

Mobile Apps

Apps create deeper engagement and higher retention than websites. They let affiliates guide users straight to specific products or offers with deep links, creating a seamless path to purchase. Industries like gaming, e-commerce, and fintech have seen huge growth thanks to app-focused campaigns, and affiliates appreciate the stronger conversion rates that apps deliver.

Mobile Web

Mobile web is just as important. It’s flexible, easy to access, and accounts for around 60% of affiliate-driven traffic. That’s why you should:

• Build fast, responsive pages
• Keep navigation simple
• Optimize load times

Together, apps and web create richer customer journeys that desktop-only strategies can’t match.

Tracking Mobile Performance: What’s Changed?

Mobile isn’t just a different screen. Because of the nature of mobile operating systems, this channel requires different tracking methodologies.

Cookies don’t work reliably in mobile environments, which is why modern affiliate programs rely on cookieless postback tracking and mobile measurement partners (MMPs).

Mobile Measurement Partners

Mobile measurement partners, or MMPs, integrate directly with your app, ad networks, and affiliates to deliver accurate attribution. You’ll know exactly which affiliate drove each install, click, or purchase, and you can reward them with confidence.

Server Postbacks

Server-side postback tracking bypasses browsers completely. It ensures you get accurate, real-time data, even when cookies fail.

With MMPs and postback tracking, you can have confidence in your performance data and help future-proof your mobile affiliate marketing program as privacy rules evolve.

How TUNE Helps Marketers Win on Mobile

TUNE was built with mobile in mind, and we continue to innovate within the space. We also have native integrations with the top five mobile measurement partners.

Here’s how our platform helps advertisers and agencies simplify mobile affiliate marketing:

• Seamless integrations with MMPs, apps, ad platforms, and affiliate networks
• Native postback tracking and cookieless tracking that’s easy to implement
• Real-time dashboards to show what’s working and what needs improvement

In other words: The TUNE Partner Marketing Platform makes it easier to measure, optimize, and grow your mobile campaigns.

The Future of Affiliate Marketing Is Mobile

Mobile isn’t just an option anymore — it’s a foundational part of modern affiliate marketing. Brands that embrace mobile-first strategies see better engagement, stronger partnerships, and higher ROI. With TUNE’s tools and expertise, you can connect with customers wherever they are and give your affiliates the transparency and trust they need to succeed.

Want to learn more about how mobile measurement partners can help to power your program? Check out our MMP vs Partner Marketing Platform Cheat Sheet, or download our Ultimate Guide to Mobile Partner Marketing.

Still have questions? Reach out to us at partnermarketing@tune.com with your questions.

Influencer marketing has been increasing in popularity for years, as more brands discover influencers to be some of their most effective marketing partners. But influencers can also be one of the most difficult partners to measure, since they work across multiple channels and platforms. Luckily for performance marketers, there’s a simple solution: clickless tracking via promo codes.

In this article, we’ll explain how clickless tracking works, where promo codes fit in, and why you should start using promo codes to measure your influencer campaigns. 

What Is Clickless Tracking?

Clickless tracking is a way to attribute conversions without requiring the customer to click on a tracking link. 

One of the most common examples of clickless tracking is the promo code. Promo codes, which are also known as vanity codes, discount codes, and referral codes, are perfect for measuring campaigns where tracking links are ineffective or impossible to use. 

For example, let’s say you want to promote your subscription meal delivery service on a podcast about cooking. Listeners who are interested in your service can’t click on an affiliate tracking link. Instead, the podcast host reads your ad, directs users to your website or app, and tells them to enter a special promo code at checkout. Whenever a listener uses that promo code to sign up for your service, the podcast partner gets credit for the conversion. 

With clickless tracking, the promo code acts like an affiliate tracking link, letting the advertiser know exactly which influencer drove which conversion. And because promo codes are not restricted to a specific link on a website or app, they offer advertisers valuable access to scale. 

Promo Code Basics

While popular with marketers for measuring influencer campaigns, promo codes can be used virtually anywhere that advertising exists (given you have the technology to implement them). This includes online platforms, offline media, and anything in between. That makes promo codes infinitely adaptable, and allows them to open up additional marketing channels for any advertiser or affiliate program. 

Examples of channels where promo codes can be used to track conversions: 

• Instagram
• TikTok
• YouTube
• Twitch
• podcasts
• brick-and-mortar stores
• billboards
• magazines
• radio
• TV

Influencers in particular are fans of promo codes because they are platform agnostic, making them perfect for cross-channel promotion. An influencer can use the same promo code in an Instagram feed, an email blast, and a YouTube video, and easily track conversions across each of those channels, despite the difference in how their fans consume each medium and message.

To make clickless tracking work across these channels, advertisers need to have a certain level of control over their shopping cart functionality and tracking capabilities. Specifically, you need to be able to add a promo code field to your website or app checkout page. You also need to be able to pass checkout data in a conversion link (i.e., identify what code is used at checkout and send that information back to a tracking platform like TUNE). You can learn more about how the TUNE platform handles promo codes in this help article.

All this sounds great, right? However, it is important to remember that promo codes are a niche solution, not a way of life. If you are an advertiser with an affiliate program, and you have the ability to use link-based tracking, use it — as long as you’re using postback tracking, not pixel tracking. Pixel tracking is an inherently risky attribution method to use, with browsers like Safari fully blocking the use of third-party cookies for marketing purposes and others like Chrome constantly changing their stance and technology for handling them. 

To future-proof your tracking, we suggest adopting server-to-server tracking methods like postback tracking as soon as possible. (Check out this help article to learn more.)

Final Thoughts

Promo codes are a great way for advertisers to diversify their partnerships beyond traditional web-based affiliate marketing. And because clickless tracking does not require cookies to work, promo codes will remain in use for the foreseeable future, even as other tracking methods become obsolete or fall out of favor.

If you’d like to learn more about how to track promo codes in a platform like TUNE, visit our Promo Codes help article. Still have questions? Email us at partnermarketing@tune.com. 

This article was originally published on PerformanceIn.com and has been updated with new data and insights.

The third-party cookie has been on quite the roller coaster over the last few years. In 2017, Apple introduced Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP), a WebKit feature designed to reduce cross-site tracking. A year later, ITP 2.0 killed the third-party cookie in Safari, leaving anyone who still relied on client-side tracking scrambling for a solution. And in 2020, Apple started to block all third-party cookies in Safari and iOS by default.

While all this was going on, Google, Mozilla, and other major browsers made their own promises and plans to phase out the third-party cookie. But in 2024, Google did what no other browser had done before: a u-turn on their third-party cookie plans. They announced that they were giving up on eliminating the third-party tracking cookie in Chrome, shocking the affiliate marketing industry and raising even more questions about the future of privacy and tracking.

The saga above is just one reason we’ve always said to “cut out the cookies” in resources like our tracking guide. Third-party cookies are bad for your health — your tracking health, that is. In the context affiliate marketing, what this means is third-party tracking cookies will compromise your campaigns. First-party tracking cookies aren’t great for them, either, but there are important differences between the two.

In this post, we’re crumbling the tracking cookie to show you what it’s really made of, addressing the differences between first- and third-party cookies, and reviewing why relying only on cookie-based tracking will only hurt you in the end. 

Browser Cookies: A Bite-Sized History

While the internet has been around in some form since the 1960s, it didn’t evolve into the World Wide Web we know today until 1991. The first websites were basic, clunky, and far from user friendly, but their commercial potential was obvious. 

However, unlike brick and mortar businesses, websites had no way of knowing who was walking in the door, so to speak. Every user was anonymous, so websites offered every user the same experience — a poor one.

That all changed in 1994, when Lou Montulli invented the HTTP cookie.

An employee of Netscape, Montulli had been tasked to find a way to store incomplete transaction information in a user’s computer, rather than a business’s servers. His solution was a browser-based “cookie,” or a piece of data that could be stored by a web browser on a user’s computer. (He borrowed the term from “magic cookie,” a data file used in programming.) 

Suddenly, cookies made it relatively easy for a website to collect, store, and monetize visitor data. So, naturally, every website started using them. 

Different Types of Cookies

Cookies improve user experience. They make it possible for websites to remember user preferences, store items in shopping carts, and do a thousand other useful things. Cookies also perform essential functions on the web, such as authentication. Some of these jobs are more sensitive than others, or require specialized functionality, so different “types” of cookies exist to handle different tasks. 

(We say “types” in quotation marks because, technically, every cookie is the same type of file. They can contain the same information and functionality. What’s different is how they are created and used.)

Some types of cookies include:

• Session cookies
• Persistent cookies
• Secure cookies
• HTTP-only cookies
• SameSite cookies (of Google Chrome 80 fame)
• First-party cookies
• Third-party cookies

If you’re a digital marketer, you’ll recognize the persistent cookie, just maybe not by name. 

A persistent cookie is simply a cookie that expires after a specific date or time frame. Until it expires, a persistent cookie will share its information every time the user interacts with the domain it belongs to. This interaction can be on the website where the cookie was created, or via a resource belonging to the original website that is hosted by a different publisher, like a banner ad. 

For this reason, persistent cookies are also called tracking cookies. 

Tracking Cookies: First-Party vs Third-Party

Tracking cookies come in two flavors: first-party and third-party. The “party” in both terms refers to the website that sets the cookie. 

First-Party Cookies

First-party cookies are set directly by the website you’re on, either by the publisher’s web server or JavaScript loaded on the website, and only the same domain can access them. The domain of a first-party cookie will be the same as the domain in your browser’s address bar.

As first-party cookies come from a trusted source — the website you’re actively visiting — browsers allow them by default. That’s generally a good thing, because these cookies enable much of the functionality you’re used to when browsing the web. 

If first-party cookies were blocked, you would have to log in to your favorite website every time you visited. You wouldn’t be able to purchase multiple items while shopping online, because your cart would reset with every item you add to it. And so on.

You can still choose to disable first-party cookies in any browser, or delete them at will — just don’t say we didn’t warn you.

Third-Party Cookies

Third-party cookies are not set by the website you’re on. Instead, they are set by an external server (e.g., a tracking platform) via a piece of code loaded on the website you are visiting. These cookies can then be accessed on any website that loads the code from the same third-party server. Since they share information across websites, third-party cookies are also known as cross-site cookies.

Third-party cookies are used in online advertising because they make it easy for marketers to collect data about consumers and use it to serve relevant ads across the internet. Unfortunately, many websites use third-party cookies to collect this data without the consumer’s knowledge, mine unnecessary personal and behavioral information, and track users wherever they go online. These practices have led to increased global scrutiny and mistrust of the digital advertising industry and driven new legislation to protect consumer privacy and data security.

Browser support for third-party tracking cookies is rapidly declining. Many major browsers now block them by default, and others have announced plans to phase them out entirely:

• In Safari and iOS, Apple’s Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) blocks all third-party tracking cookies by default. (Remember ITP 2.0? It started the shift towards cookie blocking in late 2018.)
• In Firefox, Mozilla’s Enhanced Tracking Protection blocks all third-party tracking cookies by default.
• Google announced in January 2020 plans to phase out support for third-party cookies in Chrome within two years, while Chrome’s Incognito mode now blocks all third-party cookies by default.

Should You Use Cookies in Performance Marketing?

We admit it — not all cookies are bad. The internet as we know it couldn’t work without first-party cookies. Tracking cookies, however, are a different story.

When we tell you to cut out the cookies in our white paper, we mean tracking cookies in general, and third-party tracking cookies in particular. But even first-party cookies, when used for digital tracking purposes, have limitations and drawbacks. 

Third-Party Cookies and Pixel Tracking

Third-party cookies and web browsers power pixel tracking, also called client-side tracking or cookie-based tracking. Cookies are simple, and web browsers do all the work of storing and sending information in pixel tracking, so it’s easy to implement and use. Unfortunately, cookies are also easy for browsers to block, users to delete, and bad actors to leverage, leaving marketers and their campaigns at risk. Not to mention, pixel tracking works only on desktop web.

Pros: Easy to set up and share data. 

Cons: Inaccurate, unreliable, prone to fraud, doesn’t work on mobile, doesn’t work in browsers where third-party tracking cookies are blocked (i.e. Apple’s Safari, Mozilla’s Firefox, and soon Google’s Chrome).

First-Party Cookies and JavaScript SDK Tracking

First-party cookies can be used as third-party tracking cookies in certain situations. This can bypass some browser restrictions, but it’s not a panacea for pixel tracking.

TUNE’s version of this tracking method is called JavaScript SDK tracking. It uses a JavaScript code snippet and first-party cookies, and still makes the browser do all the work. Therefore, it’s still susceptible to some of the same risks and limitations as pixel tracking. For example, Safari deletes all first-party cookies (and other script-writable storage) after 7 days without user interaction. If you use this tracking method, then your conversion windows on any Apple device are capped at one week. We go into more detail on the effects of Apple’s anti-tracking measures here.

Pros: Works on desktop web and mobile web, more reliable than pixel tracking, less sensitive to browser restrictions.

Cons: Implementation is more complex than pixel tracking, browser and cookie restrictions still apply, cannot track cross-channel, difficult to troubleshoot.

Conclusion: Cut Out the Cookies, Pivot to Postbacks

We stand by our point: All tracking cookies, whether first-party or third-party, will hurt your tracking health in the end. When superior solutions like postbacks are available, there’s no need to risk your campaign health with either one. 

Postback tracking, unlike pixel and JavaScript SDK tracking, does not rely on web browsers to work. Also called server-side tracking or server-to-server tracking, postback tracking uses direct server communication instead. This frees marketers from cookie-based browser restrictions and provides complete control over campaign tracking. Even better? It works cross-channel on desktop web, mobile web, and mobile apps. 

For the short list of pros and cons, plus how postbacks compare to cookie-based tracking, read “Pixels vs. Postbacks: Which Tracking Method Should You Be Using?”

For a more in-depth look at all of these tracking methods, download our white paper: How to Become a Track Star: Your Guide to Tracking for Performance Marketing Campaigns. 

Performance marketers who continue to rely on the dying third-party cookie do so at their own risk. Whether the same fate awaits first-party tracking cookies is unknown, but we don’t suggest waiting around to find out.

As third-party cookies continue to disappear and session tracking windows tighten, the risk to marketers of overpaying for cost-per-click (CPC) campaigns grows. If your CPC offer relies on cookies, then you could be paying for multiple clicks in a single session. With TUNE’s enhanced session tracking capabilities, customers can rest assured that their CPC offers will pay out only on the first click, saving both budget and time spent manually reconciling clicks at the end of the month.

How TUNE Tracks First Click and Subsequent Clicks in a Session

TUNE now offers a future-proof method to track first and subsequent clicks within a session without depending on third-party cookies.

For CPC offers with postback tracking enabled, TUNE determines the first click by creating a server-side user session that is checked against on every click. When subsequent clicks occur, TUNE forwards them directly to the destination URL and attributes potential conversions only using first clicks.

This method ensures that customers running CPC offers will pay out only on the first click, and all subsequent clicks will be demonetized.

How to Pay Out on First Clicks Only for CPC Offers

This setting is automatically enabled platform-wide for customers running CPC offers. Customers can then apply this behavior to individual CPC offers with postback tracking from the Offer Tracking Settings page (Offer Page -> Tracking Panel).

By enabling this setting, you can easily ensure that you only pay for unique clicks, and demonetize all subsequent clicks in a user session.

We’re always looking for ways to help our customers make the most out of their partnerships. If you have questions or feedback, we’d love to hear from you! Reach out to your dedicated Customer Success Manager or email TUNE Support at support@tune.com.

It has been another productive year for the TUNE Product Team as we continue to focus on our mission to help digital marketers build personal relationships and trust. 

2024 Product Updates and Releases

TUNE Marketplace 

2024 started off with a reintroduction of the TUNE Marketplace and a number of improvements to help make relationship building between brands and affiliates even easier through the Marketplace experience. This included the addition of a robust notification system to help keep brands and affiliates in the loop when key events take place, such as initial inquires. The system also sends reminders when a brand or affiliate may be waiting for a response. Relationship building requires timeliness, and these updates aim to keep the process moving in a positive direction.  

Google Ads integration 

A great relationship requires transparency. To help cement that concept from a tracking and compliance perspective, TUNE has become certified as an official Google click tracking partner. Customers utilizing the Google Ads platform can integrate with TUNE for a seamless link generation experience to ensure compliance with Google and industry standards.  

CPC First-Click Attribution 

Building on the transparency theme, TUNE has improved our session tracking tools to ensure cost-per-click (CPC) offers only pay out on the first click. For customers utilizing server-based postback tracking, this greatly reduces the risk of overpaying. Read more to understand how TUNE achieves this process.  

 Advanced Device Detection 

While Chromium has begun limiting the amount of information returned as part of its agent string, there may still be instances where marketers want to target audiences based on the operating system or device model they use. TUNE’s Advanced Device Detection feature gives marketers this additional insight into their audience. Once enabled, this additional data is available in reporting as well as the Advanced Targeting features. 

Microsoft Azure SSO Support 

Last year, TUNE introduced new security and trust features, including support for organizations that manage user access through Okta. In 2024, we expanded single sign-on (SSO) support to include Microsoft Azure. This helps IT staff maintain tighter controls and best practices when managing users and their access to third-party platforms. 

Additional Improvements 

Several smaller feature improvements made their way into the TUNE platform in 2024, including the ability to filter reports by partner status for more granularity when seeking program insights. 

TUNE’s Proactive Click Fraud Prevention system now surfaces deeper insight into the reasons behind potentially fraudulent activity. This includes fraud reasons from bot generated traffic to IP addresses being spoofed via VPN. 

We expanded promo code functionality to allow management via the TUNE API. This provides customers a more programmatic path to managing promo codes when integrating with systems outside of TUNE. 

Looking Ahead to 2025 

For the last several months, the TUNE Product Team has been reevaluating our core feature set and workflows with an eye toward improving the overall experience when interacting with the TUNE platform. We have spent a lot of time prototyping, asking customers for feedback, and getting a deeper sense of how our users operate day-to-day. (Thanks to everyone that has talked with us!)  

As a result, we are close to opening a beta version of a new offer experience that we believe will be more intuitive, and faster to navigate. In the end, we want customers focused more on marketing and less on the vagaries of the tools. Keep an eye out for an opportunity to help test that new experience very soon.  

Cheers to 2024 and here’s to an even better 2025! 

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.

Today I’m pleased to announce Blake Cantrell has joined TUNE as our new Vice President of Partnerships. Blake is an industry veteran, working at some of the most well-known companies in the space and interfacing directly with brands, publishers, and agencies alike. As part of his welcome to the team, I asked Blake a few questions about his new role and his outlook on the industry.

Can you give us a rundown of your experience in the affiliate industry?

I have been active in the affiliate space since 2006 when I began my career at CJ Affiliate. While at CJ I managed a large team and high-revenue portfolio spanning multiple lines of business.

From there I jumped to Impact.com where I was a founding member and leader of the Channel Partnerships team. At Impact I created mutually beneficial, revenue generating partnerships with agency and tech partners alike. I was also able to build internal alignment across GTM teams, CS, Support, and more in order to create a frictionless partner path for all parties.

What led you to decide to join the TUNE team?

Throughout my interviews with the TUNE team it was clear that everyone I spoke to is eager to grow the business with a high level of integrity and a spirit of collaboration. It is extremely important to me on a personal and professional level that any work be done in a thoughtful manner while treating both internal and external partners with transparency, consistency, and equality. I believe that this approach aligns with the TUNE approach as well. Simply put … the willingness to be a good partner.

What will you be doing at TUNE?

In my role at TUNE I will be scaling up the marketplace offering. This will include product enhancements, recruiting and onboarding partners of all types as well as helping to facilitate partnership growth. It will also be essential to work closely with all internal teams to gather feedback, establish joint processes in order to serve our partners and have a shared understanding of where we are strong and where we can improve. This is a large undertaking but very exciting as TUNE is nimble enough to create a truly unique partner marketplace.

What are the biggest learnings you’re bringing to TUNE from your previous roles?

Listen to partners. They are always happy to tell you what they want and need. There is no need to guess or to have the most advanced tech or build AI in to every function. While highly advanced features are always exciting the majority of the players are dependent on easy to navigate and dependable tracking, reporting and payouts in order to build high growth partnerships.

How has affiliate marketing evolved since you started out?

When I began, affiliate was the Wild West. Trademark bidding rules were not in existence, cookie stuffing was rampant, and in many ways the entire industry was still figuring itself out. It is now 18 years since I started and the level of sophistication in technology and partnership types has advanced by light years. Brand-to-brand partnerships, the rise of influencers, sophisticated tracking and attribution have all changed the game for the better. That said, the core remains the same in that only mutually beneficial partnerships brokered by thoughtful players on all sides will be able to continue to push the industry forward.

How do you see the growth of influencers and creators changing the industry?

Content creators have been pegged as “the next big thing” in our space for the last five plus years but are just recently starting to make a significant impact across the industry as both the technology and understanding of how to work with this new partner type has evolved. Moving forward, I expect that there will be a day of reckoning as large brands see diminishing returns on massive influencer spends with relatively limited reporting outputs. Robust tracking and payment based on value is at the core of affiliate, and when applied to the influencer category could help provide additional insights, control, and value to brands while helping to expand reach and influence.

What’s the next big thing in affiliate marketing?

For better or worse, AI will be the next big thing in all of digital marketing. From content creation, analytics, marketing, and even creating company mission statements … AI will soon be pervasive. For even the casual observer who has played with ChatGPT it is easy to understand how AI could help shorten research times, automate a number of functions, and level-up the affiliate industry across the board.

That said, it is concerning that the transparent and creative partnerships that are currently brokered today by thoughtful players in the space could begin to look more like programmatic ad buys or other campaign-based strategies that are pay to play. Why is this concerning? Because it will stifle innovation. Some of the most powerful partnerships in this industry have and will continue to be brought about by intelligent people speaking to each other one-to-one. If AI can support those conversations without eliminating them, then I am all for it.

What’s the top challenge you see in affiliate marketing today?

The biggest challenge I continue to see is setting correct expectations for advertisers both big and small about how affiliate can add value. Many small and/or new-to-market programs with little brand equity expect to launch high-revenue programs by only using influencers. On the flip side, larger established brands are seeing the value of the affiliate channel being chiseled away by internal attribution tools. The last-click attribution model based on sales revenue only will never allow for a true read of the contribution of affiliate. Not only is a full-funnel strategy a requirement (both in the affiliate program and coordinated across all digital marketing teams), but so is a flexible, collaborative attribution method. Affiliate partnerships contribute in so many more ways than bottom-of-funnel sales that need to be tracked, recognized, and rewarded in order for brands to see the full value of the channel.

How can TUNE help the industry address this challenge?

TUNE is in a unique position to help guide brands on the best way to create meaningful partnerships based on their business needs. TUNE is not a massive, one-size-fits-all solution for partnerships like many of the players out there. Rather, TUNE is a nimble organization that is eagerly soliciting customer and partner feedback and continuing to iterate their product, process, and people practices in order to service ever-changing client needs

What are some of your immediate goals as you join the TUNE team?

I am extremely eager to do a deep dive on the product and existing partnerships, as this will help me to understand where to focus my efforts first. While I have some strong ideas about where to begin, I am eager to hear from the TUNE team and our partners directly about what they feel is needed to help elevate the TUNE Marketplace.

What gets you the most excited about the future of partner/affiliate marketing?

There is always something new around the corner that you can never predict, which keeps the industry exciting. A new advertiser vertical, a new promotional method, or even a small change from Google that completely upends all previous best practices. The challenge now is to not only navigate these external changes but do the best we can to try and drive the industry toward new best practices so that all players can benefit.

I’m excited to see how Blake can help supercharge TUNE’s partnership efforts in the coming months. His first opportunity to represent TUNE in the market will be at PI Live in Miami from April 16th through the 18th. You can reach out to Blake at blake.cantrell@tune.com to schedule time to meet with him and the TUNE team!

Every day, something crazy and new happens in the world of affiliate marketing. But who has time for that? We’re backing up a few steps to take a wider look at the industry in 2024. With two months down, what big trends and topics have emerged to lead us through the rest of the year? We asked colleagues at TUNE and around the industry to share their top predictions with us. Here’s what they said.

2024 Affiliate Marketing Trends

AI Expansion Will Continue

This is a no-brainer, which is why it’s first on our list. The AI expansion into every corner of the digital world continues following the explosive introduction of ChatGPT in January 2023. According to recent surveys, when it comes to marketing, generative AI has seen the most growth in content marketing, sales enablement, business intelligence, video marketing, and chatbot applications. We don’t see this trend slowing anytime soon.

“In 2024, integrating AI in affiliate marketing programs and strategies will grow in popularity — for content creation, content promotion, analysis, and much more.”
—Yakir Gal, Head of Sales, EMEA & APAC

“AI is going to be big, big, big this year. I see lots of discussion ahead on how partners will use it to optimize ROI for brands, and how brands use it to identify new opportunities and automate their ongoing evergreen ads. And beyond partners and brands, will groups like Publisher Discovery use AI to keep better hygiene and pull in new, unique traffic sources? We’ll have to wait and see.”
—Matt Miltenberger, Head of Sales, East Coast

Brand-to-Brand “Barter Marketing”

We see plenty of pairing up in brands’ futures for 2024. By partnering to promote each other to their respective audiences, brands that barter can save money and access new markets that are a solid fit. And once a relationship proves successful, there’s no telling how far it could take both brands.

“I predict that brand bartering will become more of a mainstream partnership type this year. With costs rising across the board, brands can explore promoting non-competitive brands with similar demographics by essentially ‘trading’ placements, for example, on each other’s email newsletter list.”
—Dan Buontempone, Business Development Specialist

Influencers and Creators Catch Fire

Influencers are still a hot trend after rising in popularity over the last several years. Content creators and social influencers, especially those with small but engaged followings, are proving just how valuable they can be for brands trying to cut through the noise. And yet, many advertisers are still confused on the best ways to attract and reward them.

Luckily, we’ve got just the thing to help: our newest e-book, Influencer-Affiliate Blueprint: Building High-ROI Creator Communities. Created in partnership with growth agency ZeroTo1, it’s a guide on why and how to add influencers to an affiliate program. Download it here to learn how to create your own community of brand ambassadors.

“The rise of creator-affiliate and influencer-affiliate programs as a brand’s foundational channel. Influencer-affiliate is a wellspring that can feed most other channel marketing efforts, all while spinning off new revenue streams.”
—Meredith Singer, VP, Marketing & Operations at ZeroTo1

Customer Experience Will Evolve

In addition to incorporating AI tools into their customer service platforms, brands in 2024 are changing the way they interact with customers by meeting them where they are: in their chosen communities. Social platforms like Reddit and TikTok are thriving thanks to the self-made niche communities found there, where like-minded users gather for advice, entertainment, and authentic connections. Smart brands are joining and participating in these communities to engage with their users — not to sell to them.

Accurate Data for Optimization

Without optimization, there can be no improvement. And without accurate data, there can be no optimization. We’ve heard recently from some marketers and partners who are starting to distrust the accuracy of their data on traditional platforms. Whether this is a result of changes to how web browsers collect and report data, like GA4’s transition to data-driven attribution, or because traditional platforms tend to move slower when it comes to advanced tracking methodologies, remains to be seen. Either way, having access to accurate, reliable data remains top of mind for marketers in 2024 (as it should).

“Right now, everyone is focused on optimizing resources and excluding unnecessary costs. Thus, I foresee marketers optimizing their programs in 2024: cleaning up, keeping only highly performing partners and influencers, and focusing on Tier 1 markets.”
—Iana Starostovich, Head of Customer Success, EMEA

Privacy and First-Party Data

Speaking of accurate data … first-party data and privacy-centric practices are no longer optional for marketers in the performance space. It’s the way of the future, period. We’ve already seen efforts around SEO make a big comeback in 2024 thanks to AI and the proliferation of sub-par content splashed across the web. Any business that doesn’t make an honest effort at upholding consumers’ privacy and security while they look to improve their digital presence won’t be in business for long.

What’s Next

Whatever the rest of the year has in store, we’re betting that the trends and topics above stay in regular rotation. Good luck!

If you’re looking for new ways to scale your program while maintaining a strategic edge, we have news for you: the TUNE Marketplace is now open to all customers! Read about what makes our marketplace different from the rest in this blog post, or check out our website for more information on partnering through TUNE.