Affiliate Software Search: How To Select The Best Vendor

If you’re shopping for affiliate software and are a bit lost on how to vet a vendor, you’re in luck, we can help in your search for the best affiliate marketing partner. Even the most seasoned marketer can be overwhelmed when it comes to adding new technologies to their marketing stack.

Most marketing leaders know that one of their most important responsibilities has little to do with marketing. Instead, a big chunk of their time is spent with procurement — evaluating, buying, and implementing the right marketing technologies and then building strategies around them.

The problem is that choosing the “right” solution is easier said than done. With the evolution of the digital landscape changing and new marketing technologies constantly emerging, it's important to consider which questions to ask when it comes to affiliate software. 

The Affiliate Software Search Worksheet: 20 Questions to Ask During the Vendor Selection Process

We’ve put together a detailed list of key questions to ask during the vetting process because asking the right questions helps you select the best software for your brand’s needs.

1. What’s the average ROI achieved using your platform?

2. What’s the level of satisfaction with the support you provide to clients?

3. Do you have an NPS score and/or client reviews you can share?

4. How has the product evolved over time to better meet evolving needs?

5. How responsive is your Support team to questions and troubleshooting issues?

6. How often does your Success team proactively reach out to clients to coach them or offer best practices?

7. What extra work, if any, will be required to get the technology up and running so that it will fit our needs?

8. Does using the technology require any special skill sets (like coding) that we may not already have on our team?

9. Are any third-party integrations required to get all of the functionality we desire?

10. Can the product be easily customized? If so, will that cost extra?

11. How many people on your team are dedicated to continually improving and updating the product?

12. What is your mobile platform like? Is it a truly native mobile SDK?

13. Does your technology support omni-channel campaigns?

14. Does your influencer platform offer global functionality, i.e., multi-language, multi-currency, etc.?

15. What security measures are in place to prevent fraud, flag fake users, and detect risk?

16. What level of customer support do you offer?

17. Do you offer dedicated account managers to help us achieve our objectives?

18. How happy are your employees? Would they recommend your solution?

19. Do you have any Glassdoor or employee reviews you can share?

20. What's your company culture like? (Is the vendor a culture fit for your team?)

The Right Affiliate Software Can Change Your Customer Acquisition Strategy

Best-in-class affiliate software vendors build their solutions around flexibility, scalability, and extensibility, and their teams are constantly working on new features to make their customers more successful. This allows your business to easily implement new features and functionality on-demand, with relatively little back-end development.

One of the biggest benefits of buying affiliate marketing software from an established vendor is that it virtually future-proofs your program. To learn more on how to scale your affiliate marketing initiatives, check out our definitive guide.