4 PPC Strategies to Improve Leadgen in Financial Services

The best PPC strategies for high performance — like knowing your user intent and targeting audiences accordingly — are evergreen practices. That, of course, is subject to change due to the constant evolution of ad schemes, policy updates, and customer behavior and needs.

The limitations are even more threatening to any given campaign’s success and general ROI for the financial services vertical. I experience this feedback from clients firsthand as the Director of Business Development for Financial Services at Phonexa.

That’s why I wanted to share with you four of the best practices in achieving a successful PPC campaign for your financial lead generation business.

Are you headed to LeadsCon 2022 from March 21 to 23 in Las Vegas? Send Redha a message on LinkedIn to talk about PPC lead generation campaigns for the financial services industry while in Las Vegas.

1. Know Your Target Audience & Strategize Accordingly 

To target effectively with your PPC campaigns, as an affiliate marketer for finance, you must always think about the end-user of your goods or services. If you’re running a multi-dimensional financial business and aren’t sure how to do effective ad targeting with PPC keywords, always remember that you can use LinkedIn website demographics to refine your buyer personas for any given campaign or sales ad. You can then use these buyer personas to narrow them down to interest. Interest will then drive the keywords and other demographics you can target.

When you know your target audience for a given campaign, you can narrow the funnel of your PPC ad by geo-targeting based on the target’s demographics. Then you can leverage your bidding strategy to gear your ROI for success.

A successful keyword model for any given campaign is to include 10% of your own keywords related to your brand’s offerings, 60% generic or other related keywords, and 30% competitor keywords. This PPC keyword strategy will help you rank better without mixing up other aspects of your campaign.

4 PPC Strategies to Improve Leadgen in Financial Services 2

2. Stay on Top of Compliance 

PPC campaigns are often regulated, especially if they’re to advertise for businesses in the financial services industry. To stay on top of your compliance in this vertical, always stay connected with the Federal Trade Commission and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to ensure that you’re not engaging in non-compliance by advertising in ways you’re not allowed.

It’s critical that you closely review all of Google’s advertising policies relating to financial products and services. These policies often pertain to the following:

  • Loan modifications
  • Debt services
  • Payday or personal loans
  • Cryptocurrencies

Additionally, you cannot use personalized advertising on campaigns with:

  • A negative financial status in regard to bankruptcy services
  • Welfare services
  • Homeless shelters
  • Unemployment resources
  • Predatory lending products and services

Getting familiar with what you can and cannot do when shaping your PPC strategy will help you rank higher and stay away from potential non-compliance citations.

3. Create Multiple Landing Pages for Campaigns

This strategy is pretty self-explanatory, but let’s dive deeper into why having multiple landing pages for a given PPC campaign can be beneficial.

Research shows that business websites with at least 10 to 15 landing pages increase conversions by 55%, but on the other hand, businesses with 40 landing pages increase conversions by 500%.

The logic behind this is that landing pages cannot cater to the motivations behind an entire target audience’s clicks — never really hitting that persuasive target either. I recommend having dozens of landing pages for each of your PPC ads for financial services. Here are some of the benefits of having more landing pages:

  • Better customer segmentation according to ads they respond to
  • Better SEO and better ranks on Google
  • More leads and conversions
  • More data to track your progress

4. State Your Conditions

There’s nothing worse than advertising goods or services your business doesn’t offer. This is especially so in financial markets, where every service is specific to a client, and if your company does not offer a service, a sound judgment is to not promote it, despite keyword ranking.

If your PPC ads aren’t making you any money, chances are you’re most likely advertising to the wrong crowd or are targeting keywords that aren’t relevant to your offering. A good indicator of faulty keyword setup is seeing a bounce back when people click on your ad but don’t convert.

Remember, your PPC conversion rate heavily depends on what you offer to the target audience once they’ve clicked on your ad. Essentially, it’s always the people buying your offering that make your ads profitable and nothing else.

Final Thoughts

Remember – the success of your advertisement depends on the reinforcement you get in conversions. To succeed, you should always test your PPC ads for financial services to control your spending and increase the opportunities for success.

PPC ads represent a considerable growth opportunity for your business. So getting familiar with these ad types, ensuring you have a strategy for targeting and compliance, creating multiple landing pages, and never over-promising will help you maximize your earnings and audience reach.

Headed to LeadsCon 2022 from March 21 to 23 in Las Vegas? Send Redha a message on LinkedIn to talk about PPC lead generation campaigns for the financial services industry.

Schedule a consultation to learn how Phonexa can power your next PPC ad strategy for your financial services business. 

10 Best Web Analytics Tools for Your Affiliate Marketing Tech Stack

Important: this article is a part of our affiliate martech stack series, where we shed light on the most effective tools for affiliate marketing.

Knowing where your website visitors came from, how they interacted with your website, and what triggered the conversion is paramount to maximising your sales potential. A killer suite of tools for web analytics can optimise the customer journey and draw more revenues from your marketing campaigns.


If your customers are a mystery to you, you are in trouble. You don’t even know why they buy from you, let alone where they started and how they ended up on your affiliate marketing website or blog. Without the right suite of web analytics tools in digital marketing, you are in the dark, helpless against informed competitors converting leads into paying customers left and right.

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via GIPHY

On the other hand, with the right web analytics tools, you can leave the dark forest to be on par with the most informed market players. The best tools for web analytics can put you in the driver’s seat of your campaigns with on-site data like engagement, demographics, and behaviour.

So why not compile a winning suite of paid and free web analytics tools right now?

Your killer web analytics tools list is just below, comprised of time-tested web analytics software that has delivered insane value to hundreds and thousands of marketers like you.

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When It Comes to Web Analytics, What Insights Can You Gather Using Analytics Tools?

Web analytics tools can unlock on-site and off-site data like demographics, psychographics, traffic source data, interactions across touchpoints, and conversion insights.

In other words, web-based analytics tools can dissect the journey of a particular customer through and through from the very beginning to the end, making you aware of why and how every step was made and what the journey eventually led to – a conversion or a bounce.

Demographics  Web analytics tools can collect almost every bit of demographic data: age, gender, location, employment, income, and more. With these marketable details, you can customise your campaigns to engage the right customers in the right way.
Psychographics  Psychographics includes interests, values, purchase intent, loyalty, and other predictable desires and intentions. Aside from standalone predictions, most web analytics tools can be integrated with CRM software for a more profound analysis.
Traffic Source  Web traffic analytics tools can help you understand where your most profitable customers come from and how to maximise the impact of these traffic channels. At the same time, you can eliminate the traffic sources that drag you down.
On-Site Behaviour  Unlocking on-site behaviour with web analytics tools means knowing how users interact with your content, what content converts, and why. Top web analytics tools excel in spotting and interpreting on-site interactions.
Conversion Insights  Web analytics tools help understand what elements triggered a target action like filling out a form, creating an account, subscribing to a newsletter, or buying from your website.

 

Naturally, not all web analytics tools are the same. From enterprise web analytics tools to off-site web analytics tools to on-site web analytics tools, different tools are good for different types of analysis, but rarely for all tasks at once. As a marketer, you should spot these discrepancies to compile a winning analytics toolkit for your specific business goals.

Web Analytics Tools vs. Web Analytics Software – What’s the Difference?

For practical purposes, there’s little to no difference between popular web analytics tools and web analytics software, as both refer to a system that analyses an on-site and off-site user journey.

That said, web analytics software is almost always a comprehensive solution that unites multiple web analytics tools, each one with a narrow focus. For example, Google Analytics software includes web analytics tools for traffic analysis, user behaviour analysis, and conversion tracking.

But then again, splitting the hair might not give you any advantage. It’s much more important to clearly understand your marketing objectives and how to solve them with the available web analytics tools and/or web analytics software.

With that, it’s time for our list of top web analytics tools.

Your Best Web Analytics Tools List: Top 10 Web Analytics Tools

Google Marketing Platform – a Top-Tier Web Analytics Reporting Tool

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate Direct Traffic Search Traffic Paid Referral Traffic Referral Traffic Social Traffic Mail Traffic
3,500,000 2 69 0.66 35.75% 27.84%  1.49% 34.08% 0.75% 0.10%

 

Google Marketing Platform is the most popular suite of advertising and web analytics tools for data-driven marketing decisions, spearheaded by its Analytics 360 product, a premium version of standard Google Analytics.

Analytics 360 can unlock user demographics, location, device, operating system, and interests and integrate with other Google products and Salesforce. It is an enterprise-level paid suite of web analytics tools, with prices varying depending on the business scale and required services.

However, if you need free web analytics software, you can use standard Google Analytics, which also provides substantial web performance insights, enough for most small and medium businesses.

Google Analytics vs. Analytics 360 – Web Analytics Tools Comparison

 

Google Analytics Analytics 360
Free Paid
24 to 48 hours of delay Real-time data
Basic depth of analysis Deep analysis
Basic Google Ads integration Deep Google Ads integration

 

Even though Google Analytics is missing many features that Analytics 360 provides (data-driven attribution, customer funnels, Big Query integration, unsampled reports, etc.), it still might be the best free web analytics software up your sleeve.

Matomo – the Second-Best Free Web Analytics Tool

 

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate Direct Traffic Search Traffic Paid Referral Traffic Referral Traffic Social Traffic Mail Traffic
302,895 3 157 0.56 36.62% 54.00% 0.03% 6.91% 0.96% 1.48%

 

Matomo is web analytics software focused on data ownership and privacy, allowing you to host analytics on your server for free. This unique feature alone makes the tool worth a shot, on par with the widest range of user metrics you can dig into.

The on-premise web analytics software suite is free, while the cloud-based suite costs €19 for 50,000 hits, with a hit being an instance of even tracking, viewing, downloading, making a content tracking request, or conducting an on-site search.

Mixpanel – a Suite of Free Web Analytics Tools for Event Tracking

 

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate Direct Traffic Search Traffic Paid Referral Traffic Referral Traffic Social Traffic Mail Traffic
2,525,273 8  312 0.36 82.36% 11.77% 0.05% 2.61% 1.12% 2.09%

 

Mixpanel is a suite of web analytics tools for tracking session-based data like sharing, downloading, uploading, and purchasing. Mixpanel doubles down on specific on-site actions, giving you an understanding of how to convert more website visitors.

Mixpanel is one of the freemium web analytics tools that includes all core user journey reports, templates, and integrations within its free version. The paid subscription plans start at $20 monthly and include advanced features like no-code data transformations, data governance control, and group analytics.

Hotjar – Free Web Analytics Software Suite

 

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate Direct Traffic Search Traffic Paid Referral Traffic Referral Traffic Social Traffic Mail Traffic
3,273,648  5 201 0.5 68.26% 24.70% 2.12% 3.04% 0.76% 1.12%

 

Hotjar is one of the best freemium web analytics software suites for collecting and interpreting data on how users interact with a particular website element or feature and why they interact the way they do.

Heatmaps and session recordings help you understand the mechanics of interactions better while surveys, interviews, and feedback make you aware of what users feel when they perform a specific target action.

The free subscription plan unlocks access to 35 daily sessions, automatic data capture, unlimited heatmaps, and HubSpot integration. The paid plans – €39, €99, or €213 monthly or 20% less if paid annually – unlock features like data segmentation, events API, and customer frustration signals.

Woopra – Customer Journey Web Analytics Tool

 

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate Direct Traffic Search Traffic Paid Referral Traffic Referral Traffic Social Traffic Mail Traffic
373,688 7 170 0.52 65.13% 30.94% 0 3.65% 0.28% 0

 

Woopra is a web analytics tool suite that measures on-site and off-site user interactions while tapping into user engagement and data unification through integrations. You can visualise the customer journey and develop an optimal reaction to every interaction at every touchpoint, whether a download, click, view, subscription, or purchase.

Here are some of the insights the web analytics tools at Woopra unlock:

  • Advertising channels and on-site content that drive conversions
  • How customers react after purchasing the core product
  • How different traffic channels, touchpoints, and retargeting impact conversions

Woopra offers a free subscription plan so that you can get the hang of its core web analytics tools without overcommitment. The paid subscription plan costs $999 monthly, and there’s a custom enterprise-level plan for big companies.

Adobe Analytics – Web Analytics Tool from Adobe Suite

 

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate Direct Traffic Search Traffic Paid Referral Traffic Referral Traffic Social Traffic Mail Traffic
1,826,654 3 99 0.57 25.42% 58.06% 0.74% 13.64% 1.58% 0.56%

 

Part of Adobe Marketing Cloud, Adobe Analytics offers tools for collecting and interpreting website performance and online behaviour data. The creativity software giant may not be the most logical choice for web analytics alone. Still, its synergy with other Adobe products might unlock a holistic view of the customer journey.

Adobe Analytics is a paid tool providing around a dozen software packages for different marketing goals, including sheer web analytics.

Chartbeat – a Web Analytics Tool for Content Marketing

 

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate Direct Traffic Search Traffic Paid Referral Traffic Referral Traffic Social Traffic Mail Traffic
1,139,086 4 287 0.35 76.98% 8.38% 0.02% 5.13% 3.62% 5.86%

 

Chartbeat provides web analytics tools for content marketing, helping you understand what content draws attention and why. You can test the performance of headlines, storeys, and other content pieces across devices and operating systems, eventually hitting the right reader with the right content.

The software integrates with Facebook CrowdTangle, Facebook Instant Alerts, and Google AMP to gather valuable off-site data, a puzzle oftentimes missing when recreating a comprehensive customer journey.

The only fly in the ointment is the subscription price. Geared towards medium and large-size enterprises, Chartbeat costs from $7,000 annually alongside a free trial.

Kissmetrics – Top Web Analytics Software

 

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate
37,625 1 44 0.75

 

Kissmetrics is a suite of online web analytics tools revolving around user behaviour. The software analyses customer interactions in real-time, enabling on-the-fly adjustments before the user in question reaches the climax of the journey.

Kisssmetrics does what Google Analytics does, but to a greater depth and width, effectively converting leads into sales prospects into customers while reducing churn. You can see all the friction points and understand how to improve user experiences across touchpoints.

There’s a pay-as-you-go plan starting at $0.00025 per event, a monthly plan starting at $25.99 for 10,000 events, and a free trial. Paying annually saves you 25%.

Open Web Analytics – Open-Source Web Analytics Software

Open Web Analytics (OWA) is a web analytics software framework for tracking and analysing user web and app interactions. Like Matomo (reviewed above), OWA allows you to store the collected data on your own server, which grants you full data ownership and privacy.

Besides that, OWA is quite similar to Google Analytics, enabling on-page tracking, click heatmaps, geo-tracking, session recording, and more. The software is free, and you are not burdened with data storage limitations.

Crazy Egg – Web Analytics Tool for Heatmapping

 

Monthly Visits Page Per Visit Time On Site Bounce Rate Direct Traffic Search Traffic Paid Referral Traffic Referral Traffic Social Traffic Mail Traffic
517,424 3 335 0.62 36.68% 56.94% 0.06% 3.14% 1.05% 2.12%

 

Crazy Egg is a web analytics tool co-founded by Neil Patel and known for advanced heatmapping besides the standard web tracking capabilities. With heatmaps from Crazy Egg, you can find out exactly how users scrolled your webpage, where they focused attention, where they clicked, and why some decided to leave without taking action.

Unlike other web analytics software, Crazy Egg provides five heatmap reports, each one for tracking a specific user activity:

  • Heatmap Report – identifying areas of activity
  • Scrollmap Report – interpreting on-page movements
  • Confetti Report – analysing on-site clicks
  • Overlay Report – calculating the clicks on a particular page element
  • List Report – calculating the total of clicks on the chosen webpages

Crazy Egg runs four paid subscription plans at $29 to $249 monthly, a custom enterprise-level plan, and a free trial.

Track Every Step of the User Journey With HitMetrix

Taking the guessing game out of your customer acquisition strategy is real – and it’s much easier than you think. Leverage Phonexa’s proprietary behaviour recording & analytics software HitMetrix, to tap into hidden web analytics and website form performance.

For a comprehensive marketing picture, you can connect HitMetrix to Phonexa’s marketing performance ecosystem within a single software package. Choose your subscription plan now, or schedule a  free consultation to learn more about Phonexa.

Frequently Asked Questions

What are web analytics tools?
Web analytics tools, sometimes called web analytic software, track and interpret on-site and off-site user behaviour. Web analytics tools work most effectively when you’ve set a specific goal and can quantify and qualify the incoming data.

Here’s an example: you want to measure which traffic sources – organic, paid, or referral – bring more users to your product page traffic. For this, you (a) use heatmaps like HitMetrix to determine where users click and spend most of their time and (b) visualise their journey in Google Analytics to understand where these users came from.

In general, when using web analytics tools, you can find customer behaviour insights that will help you improve your sales funnel from start to finish, especially on your website.

What information can most web analytics tools tell you about a user?
Web analytics tools can tell you where users came from and how they interacted with your website before converting or leaving. More specifically, web analytics tools can unlock user demographics, psychographics, on-site behaviour, conversion insights, content performance insights, and other marketable data.

What is web analytics software?
Web analytics software is almost the same as web analytics tools, except that web analytics software is a higher-level system encompassing various web analytics tools. In practise, though, there’s almost no difference between web analytics software and tools.

If a web page visitor clears the Analytics cookie from their browser, what will occur?
Deleting the Google Analytics cookie from a browser breaks the connection: Google Analytics cannot connect the user’s current behaviour to their previous behaviour. In this case, Google Analytics will set a new ID and cookie for a new browser session.

How do I do web analytics software comparison?
Here are the parameters to compare different web-based analytics tools and software:

  • Data collection type, depth (on-site data only; on-site and off-site data, etc.), and representations (reports, visualisation, etc.)
  • Integrations with CRM, lead management, and marketing software
  • Ease of use and the ability to store data on your server
  • Data freshness: real-time or with a delay
  • Scalability-price ratio

If you search for free web analytics software, you will likely have to use a freemium version or store analytics data on your server. Among the best web analytics software suites that allow you to store data on your own server are Matomo and Open Web Analytics.

Pay-Per-Call Advertising: Your Best Source of Qualified Leads

It’s no secret that phone calls are powerful: compared to web ads that only convert around 3% of users, phone calls can convert up to 50% of callers. Pay-per-call advertising has a low entry threshold and enables you to predict ROI based on previous campaigns and historical data. 

No less importantly, it benefits every party involved: brokers, affiliate networks, call centres, pay-per-call networks, and end clients themselves. However, this win-win is only achievable if you’ve managed to set up your pay-per-call marketing campaign properly.

via GIPHY

Without any further ado, let’s dig into pay-per-call advertising and how to generate and convert more leads who come from your pay-per-call ads.

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What Is Pay-Per-Call Advertising?

Pay-per-call advertising is a marketing model in which merchants purchase phone calls from affiliates and publishers directly or – much more often – through a pay-per-call network.

Here’s how pay-per-call advertising works:

The visualization of how pay-per-call advertising works

The only variable in this equation is a pay-per-call network. However, although pay-per-call affiliate marketing networks charge for their services, the benefits of such partnerships usually outweigh the costs since you get access to a large pool of partners, robust security, pay-per-call tracking software, and impartial dispute resolution if required.

Here’s what pay-per-call marketing comes down to for advertisers and affiliates:

Visualization of differences between advertisers and affiliates in the pay-per-call marketing

How Pay-Per-Call Advertising Benefits Affiliates

Limitless Marketing Potential Pay-per-call advertising is a goldmine for affiliates, covering high-ticket niches like finance, insurance, home services, and solar energy.
Ready-Made Promotional Materials Most pay-per-call affiliate programmes provide creative materials and call-tracking software so publishers can get more conversions with less effort.
Higher Revenue Per Lead Since phone calls typically cost more than web leads, affiliates can focus their efforts on the quality of their pay-per-call lead generation.

How Pay-Per-Call Advertising Benefits Advertisers

Driving High-Intent, High-Value Clients at Scale Well-designed pay-per-call programmes almost guarantee a flow of purchase-prone clients who may only need a little nudge. And these high-quality call leads usually bring a higher cheque.
Tapping into Complex Products Complex products like insurance are much easier to sell over the phone than through text conversation.
Predictable ROI Pay-per-call advertising provides an accurate estimate of future earnings, especially if you partner with a trustworthy affiliate network and pay-per-call service provider.

Pro tip: Advertisers and affiliates usually aren’t aware of each other’s customer acquisition costs on a pay-per-call platform, which gives an affiliate network room for manoeuvre. Affiliates can leverage free pay-per-call advertising channels to minimise spending while selling their leads at a high price, whereas advertisers try to minimise the cost per call.

Where Do You Get Leads for Pay-Per-Call Marketing?

The rule of thumb is that marketers who use multiple traffic sources come on top because they can diversify their traffic flows and risks:

  • Affiliates can create Google pay-per-call advertising campaigns using email marketing, in-app promos, and other digital marketing strategies that suit a chosen programme. They can even promote the link on social media through techniques such as pay-per-call Facebook ads.
  • Advertisers can develop detailed campaign guidelines, including preferred promotional methods and traffic sources. 

Speaking of possible affiliate program limitations, as a publisher, you should carefully review the affiliate agreement to ensure your promotion methods and traffic channels are allowed. Some advertisers may restrict social media traffic (such as TikTok or Facebook pay-per-call ads) or traffic from non-compliant affiliates.

Ready to take your marketing efforts to the next level? Select your subscription plan now, or book a demo to learn more about Phonexa’s inbound call management platform.

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Crafting a Pay-Per-Call Advertising Campaign in 5 Steps

Whether you’re an affiliate or advertiser, there’s plenty of work to be done before you can launch a pay-per-call ads campaign. You need to determine your target audience, choose pay-per-call service providers, optimise your traffic, and ensure you can effectively analyse your leads with the tracking software you choose.

Let’s take a look at how you can create a pay-per-call ads campaign in 5 simple steps:

Step 1 – Determine Your Target Audience

You need to be aware of the actual needs of your callers to create engaging advertising for pay-per-call affiliate campaigns. Qualified leads are highly likely to convert, while reaching unqualified and cold leads may take forever.

Start by thoroughly segmenting your customer base into as many categories as possible. Later, adjust campaigns over time to reflect market changes and the insights you gather from your affiliate network or call-tracking software.

Let’s examine a potential real-life example:

Imagine that you are launching a pay-per-call ads campaign for a kitchen renovation business to find out that most callers are simply interested in general information about home improvement. They don’t want to renovate their kitchen, as they are just curious readers.

Situations like this can happen when you miscalculate the demographics or misinterpret client interaction patterns.

To resolve this, reassess your campaign data. You may need to refocus on high-value callers actively searching for kitchen remodelling contractors. Typically, pay-per-call services have tracking tools that help you data in detail to modify future promotional activities. 

Step 2 – Choose the Right Pay-Per-Call Tracking Software

The difference between successful and failed pay-per-call advertising campaigns lies in your ability to track and analyse users’ actions. Use robust tracking software to collect as much data as possible. From the initial ad impression to the end of the call, there is a wealth of actionable data to explore and use to your advantage in your pay-per-call lead generation.

Phonexa offers the exclusive Call Logic product to uncover valuable caller insights

 

Comprehensive call intelligence systems like Call Logic improve the caller’s experience while capturing all relevant data within legal boundaries. You get a fully compliant system that directs callers to the most suitable buyer – whether internal or external – and works coordinates with other marketing channels within Phonexa’s all-in-one performance marketing software suite.

Step 3 – Craft Compelling Pay-Per-Call Ads

When it comes to pay-per-call ads, you’ve got endless options. From Bing and Google pay-per-call ads (AdWords) to social media platforms, a pay-per-call promotion has many ways to connect to potential customers online.

But it’s important to remember that success doesn’t happen overnight. Each success story is the result of careful planning and testing and smooth execution. For instance, what works for B2B might not be the best fit for retail. Viral and fun TikTok posts that work with Zoomers are highly unlikely to show the same results with Gen X or boomers.

Step 4 – Optimise Your Traffic Sources for Conversions

Here’s how you can make them accept the call:

  • Make your content easy to follow: Properly structure the content, demonstrating the benefits of your product. Take a closer look at your CTAs; they should seamlessly fit into content while being memorable and highly contextualised.
  • Appeal to the caller’s emotions: Any purchase is an emotional decision. So don’t be afraid to explain how the product or service will change the caller’s life. To some extent, you can use tricks like FOMO, loss aversion, and reciprocity to nudge them toward a sale.

Step 5 – Track and Analyse Your Pay-Per-Call Campaigns

Once you’ve launched your pay-per-call lead gen campaign, ensure you have the right tools to analyze it inside out. For instance, you may discover that you need to improve ad channel effectiveness, modify agent responses to eliminate bottlenecks, change call timing, etc.

From the empirical evidence, Wednesday is the most effective day for business calls, while the most productive time for calls is between 16:00 and 17:00. On a similar note, it’s a good strategy to wait a little while before calling again – this gives the customer space to decide if they still want to engage, leading to more thoughtful responses later.

Here are some vital metrics used in pay-per-call advertising:

Call Duration With the average client call lasting around 3-5 minutes, you can compare your call lengths with conversion rates to uncover whether shorter or longer conversations are more profitable.
Call Abandonment Rate Call abandonment rate helps you ensure that most of your callers successfully connect to advertisers. The average call abandonment rate typically ranges from 5% to 8%.A higher call abandonment rate can indicate, for example, delays in agent responses, bad call quality, or some other issues.
Caller Data By collecting detailed demographic (age, gender, location, etc.) and psychographics (interests, behaviours, motivations, etc.) data, you can identify your most profitable callers and customise your pay-per-call advertising accordingly.

The great thing about live calls is that you’re always engaging with leads at the height of their interest. With Phonexa, you can also make sure all inbound calls are tracked, recorded, and analyzed deeply so you can get the most value out of every conversation.

Pay-Per-Call Marketing Toolkit To Generate Leads and Sales

Real-Time Bidding Software

As a publisher, your goal with pay-per-call ads is to sell your calls to the most relevant or highest-bidding advertiser. Real-time bidding software simplifies this process.

➥ Real-time bidding software, based on ping tree technology, guides callers to the optimal buyer based on various factors, such as call duration, bid, demographics, etc. As a result, pay-per-call publishers can sell their leads at the highest price.

Real-time bidding is a standout feature for most pay-per-call networks. The distribution process typically takes less than a second, without significantly impacting experience. In the long run, these pay-per-call ads enable the best match for the affiliate, the advertiser, and the caller.

Pay-Per-Call Networks

Pay-per-call networks not only handle call distribution and tracking but also connect you to a network of partners that would otherwise be out of reach for individual advertisers or affiliates. In addition to providing pay-per-call affiliate software, these networks can extend your global reach, save you tons of time, and lower your financial risks.

Here’s how a pay-per-call network works:

Visualization at how a pay-per-call network works

Programmatic Advertising

Ever wondered why two people browsing the same website at the same moment from the same location might see completely different pay-per-call ads? This is usually because the website uses programmatic ads.

Here’s how programmatic advertising works:

  • Advertisers and affiliates leverage a demand-side platform (DSP) to set targeting criteria, such as demographics, interests, location, and bids. Publishers provide ad space, and when a user matches both parties’ criteria, a real-time auction selects the winning ad, which is displayed instantly to the user.

These split-second auctions ensure fully automated pay-per-call advertising processes and wide-reaching campaign capabilities. For advertisers, programmatic advertising offers transparency on ad performance and placement, enabling precise ROI forecasting.

Interactive Voice Response

Interactive Voice Response (IVR) technology guides callers through their journey before connecting them to the appropriate sales agent (e.g., press “1” to connect to a sales agent, press “2” for customer support).

Call processing example with Phonexa

While forwarding all paid calls to the sales department may seem intuitive, you may get better results if you decide to pre-qualify callers and redirect some to customer support representatives instead. Pay-per-call networks and providers also use IVR to direct callers to the most suitable advertisers (e.g., press “1” for a nearby shop, press “2” for a global chain).

How To Grow Your Pay-Per-Call Profits

Screen at least a few pay-per-call networks As a publisher, you can explore how much affiliate programs offer per call and then, all things being equal, choose the most profitable affiliate program.
Leverage your strengths Better call quality, higher conversion rates, or standout caller demographics can all help you secure a better price per call.
Maintain flexibility with call-tracking software Ensure you have your own call-tracking solution to maintain independence if you switch from your current pay-per-call service provider or network.

Supercharge Your Pay-Per-Call Advertising Campaigns With Phonexa

Phonexa is one of the few pay-per-call service providers that does it all, from tracking and analysing to automating all processes while synchronising call and web lead acquisitions. Thanks to tools like LMS Sync, Call Logic, and six other performance marketing solutions working in real-time, your web and call marketing campaigns will be fully covered.

The future of pay-per-call advertising and lead acquisition is at your fingertips:

 

Here are the eight proprietary solutions you get at a single price (online price calculator):

LMS Sync Lead tracking & distribution software
Call Logic Call tracking & distribution software
E-Delivery Email & SMS marketing software
Cloud PBX Cloud phone system
Lynx Click tracking software
Opt-Intel Suppression list management software
HitMetrix User behaviour recording & analytics software
Books360 Automated accounting software

Build your plan now, or take a product tour to see how Phonexa can transform your pay-per-call campaigns.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What is pay-per-call marketing?

It is a performance-based advertising model in which advertisers pay affiliates or networks to generate phone calls from potential customers. Affiliates use various predetermined criteria to show pay-per-call ads only to interested users. The advertiser pays only when a call meets predefined conditions.

What is a pay-per-call number?

It’s a unique phone number used in performance-based marketing. In this model, advertisers pay for each call generated by ads. By using unique numbers in pay-per-call ads, merchants can track campaign performance, linking numbers to specific affiliates.

Who are pay-per-call leads?

These are potential customers who call a business after engaging with marketing efforts. These high-intent leads are generated through pay-per-call advertising campaigns and are valuable for businesses that want to connect with customers directly.

Lead Flipping: How To Streamline Lead Selling & Lead Buying

Traditional marketing outreach methods such as cold calls or in-person networking are no longer the sole dependable means for brands to generate leads. Many businesses have adopted a more strategic approach to their time and marketing endeavours. Instead of dedicating valuable time to routine tasks, they employ a lead flipping strategy combined with automation solutions to eradicate processing errors and enhance productivity.

While lead flipping is not a novel business concept, it remains among the most favoured methods for streamlining the lead distribution process and maximising profits. Here’s an in-depth exploration of lead flipping and its contributions to businesses.

What Is Lead Flipping?

Lead flipping, also referred to as lead brokering, involves the acquisition and resale of pre-qualified leads subsequent to their passage through a filtering system.

Many businesses lack the requisite expertise or access to a network of buyers, leading to challenges in lead buying and selling. To address this, companies often seek the services of a middleman—known as a lead broker—to facilitate the transaction.

What Is a Lead Broker?

Enterprises, including small businesses, amass substantial customer information, encompassing names, email addresses, and phone numbers. Small businesses may encounter difficulty in selling declined quality leads, prompting the involvement of lead brokers.

A lead broker acts as an intermediary, connecting lead sellers with potential buyers. Brokers typically engage in the purchase and resale of leads generated through various channels, such as email marketing, inbound forms, and live call transfers. While collaborating with a broker is a viable option, it is just one of many approaches to ensuring that leads gain optimal exposure and visibility.

Exploring the Compliance Aspect of the Lead Flipping Process

While lead flipping is an effective revenue-generating method, it comes with several drawbacks. Let’s delve into some of these challenges:

  • Opted-in information: Marketers need to ensure compliance in the exchange of consumer information to avoid potential legal disputes.
  • Risk of misuse: When selling leads online, it’s vital to take appropriate measures to prevent legal violations. Familiarising yourself with regulations such as CPRA, GDPR, and other data protection laws is crucial.

Is Lead Flipping Legitimate?

Whenever a company or broker sells leads, there exists a risk of misuse. Consequently, it is highly advisable for businesses to ascertain the identity of their buyers and understand how the acquired information will be utilised.

Without careful handling, consumer data may fall into the hands of unscrupulous entities. Therefore, completing a sale does not guarantee that leads will receive the desired outcomes; trust in the integrity of buyers or advertisers is imperative.

In today’s market, there is a heightened demand for niche leads. Businesses operating in sectors such as auto loans, home improvement, solar, or finance require a consistent influx of leads to support their growth. This explains the growing trend of companies seeking to use lead flipping while acquiring lists of high-intent lead prospects, such as home service leads or insurance leads.

How To Generate Revenue Through Lead Generation

Lead generation continues to be the lifeblood of marketing, driving demand for a brand’s products and services. Businesses are constantly seeking automation solutions to assist with recurring tasks, including nurturing cold leads, converting them into warmer prospects, and ultimately, transforming them into paying customers.

While not every company specialises in lead generation, many organisations aim to breathe new life into declined leads. Achieving this is nearly impossible without the implementation of the right sales lead software.

How To Acquire and Sell Leads Effectively

When considering the purchase or sale of leads online, it’s crucial to navigate the market strategically. Follow these tips:

  1. Emphasise lead quality and ensure a genuine interest in the specific product or service.
  2. Focus on segmentation based on factors such as age, interests, geographic location, and niche.
  3. Prioritise lead quality over quantity when building your list.

Profitable Industries for Lead Flipping

Not all niches and leads are equal, leading to varying customer acquisition costs. Industries worth exploring for buying or selling leads include:

  • Home services
  • Solar
  • Insurance
  • Healthcare
  • Finance
  • Mortgage
  • Loans
  • Affiliate marketing

Starting a Lead Broker Business 

Entrepreneurs venturing into brokering or lead generation should carefully plan their approach. Consider how leads will be generated, determine service pricing, and ensure leads align with specific advertiser preferences.

Here are the key steps:

  1. Choose a specific niche.
  2. Establish a website or landing page with valuable information to attract potential clients.
  3. Identify companies interested in selling leads or partner with affiliate networks.
  4. Cultivate relationships with potential clients for long-term partnerships.

For businesses seeking an additional revenue stream through lead flipping, having multiple options for lead destinations is crucial. Features like Phonexa’s Ping Post Calls 2.0 enable businesses to deliver leads to various buyers, incorporating diverse criteria, filters, and prices.

Ultimately, incorporating automation software proves to be a wise decision for companies aiming to establish and expand their business while supporting their initiatives with a proficient lead distribution strategy.

Selling Leads to Local Businesses

Selling leads to local businesses poses unique challenges, given their smaller budgets and higher expectations.

Let’s explore ways to enhance your chances of success:

Nurture Leads Before Selling

It’s critical to ensure leads are likely to convert after capturing them. Since selling cold leads is difficult, you must generate interest in your client’s product. 

Nurture leads before selling by implementing well-crafted email sequences to boost engagement. Consider the following example of an email automation workflow if you’re considering an email drip campaign. 

Source: Business 2 Community

Implement a Lead Broker Software

Utilising appropriate sales lead software enables you to pinpoint lead sources, gain insights into the lead journey, and ascertain the value of declined leads.

Employ lead broker software, such as Phonexa’s LMS Sync solution, to track, manage, and distribute leads efficiently. The ping tree service enhances the chances of selling leads by connecting with more interested parties.

Phonexa’s lead management software, featuring white labelling capabilities, enables businesses to expand their reach, capitalise on lead flipping, and refine marketing efforts.

Moving Forward

Establishing a successful lead-selling business requires a robust lead distribution system. Companies equipped with the right automation solutions and lead flipping insights can create more efficient workflows and identify optimal destinations for the leads they plan to sell.

Book a consultation with Phonexa’s experts to explore how LMS Sync can generate high-quality leads and streamline your lead distribution process for successful lead brokering efforts.

Conversational Marketing 101: Everything You Need to Know

As personalisation remains the gold standard in customer service, digital devices are ideal for conversationalists.

Brands always prioritise personalising customer interactions. Whether it’s a review site or a social media platform, individuals expect influential personal connections and prompt feedback from brands.

Naturally, consumers want to feel heard and understood, and conversational marketing can deliver that experience.

Initiating a Marketing Conversation

Businesses aim to seize the moment when people are ‘on goal’ but only have partial attention. Capturing these moments allows brands to provide personalisation, convenience, and quality customer support to consumers.

It’s undisputable that a business with deep and comprehensive insights into its marketing and sales efforts can foster growth and facilitate the conversion of leads into customers. Insights-driven companies experience over 30% revenue growth year over year.

Capturing first-party data, attracting a high volume of qualified leads, and employing a conversational approach across various marketing channels enable businesses to guide prospective clients through the sales funnel and close deals.

Take a product tour

However, before conversions can occur, brands must understand how to initiate marketing conversations and target specific audiences.

Utilise Customer Information

By making use of the data you’ve collected, you can learn which campaigns, channels, or keywords are generating the most leads and sales. For instance, you can gather vital information about your target audience and illustrate how your product can help them achieve their objectives by implementing conversational marketing software and call tracking solutions.

Demonstrate Your Understanding of Your Audience

Grasping your customers’ challenges, needs, and strengths is essential for successful campaigns and personalised marketing efforts.

Optimising your sales lead management process with Phonexa’s LMS Sync can assist you in creating content that resonates with your audience, boosts brand awareness, improves lead capture, and drives high-quality traffic.

Book a demo or take a product tour to learn more about Phonexa’s single operating solution for partner and performance marketing.

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Establish an Information Loop

Businesses often use email marketing to ensure successful conversational marketing outcomes.

If you want to leverage email marketing, consider creating an information loop starting with the subject line. This approach can intrigue your audience enough to open and consistently read your emails.

Identify Trends

With call analytics and conversational marketing software, businesses can contextualise customer data, compare various datasets, and identify trends or blind spots. If you’re looking to streamline the creation of more effective campaigns and access data-analysis resources, these marketing tools are ideal for your brand.

Ultimately, the right technological setup and the introduction of automated conversations are just the starting points for brands to grasp conversational marketing. A successful strategy hinges on prompt and reliable access to customer data, including communication history and detailed customer profiles. For companies aiming to implement conversational strategies, capturing, storing, and organising data effectively is crucial.

Defining Conversational Marketing

Conversational marketing involves having real-time conversations with your customers about your product. However, it’s much more than that. Think of it as speaking with your customer rather than at them.

As an engagement tactic, it helps you construct intelligent response flows, trigger dialogue-driven activities, and determine the best communication methods with consumers to achieve desired results.

Let’s delve into how using a conversational marketing platform and developing a strategy can help you achieve your sales and marketing goals.

What Is a Conversational Marketing Platform?

In this consumer-centric method, customers wield the power. It leverages technology, primarily artificial intelligence (AI) and chatbots. Conversational marketing platforms allow businesses to adopt a personalised approach tailored to customers’ needs and preferences, facilitating one-to-one interactions.

Crafting a Successful Conversational Marketing Strategy

A well-executed conversational strategy can help businesses forge long-term customer relationships and create authentic experiences through chatbots, messaging apps, live chat, and more. This innovative approach guides consumers through the sales funnel, ensuring they feel supported and understood.

Integrating live chat is one way to attract prospects and customers, ensuring your business remains accessible. Studies show that people are 53% more likely to purchase from companies that use live chat.

When developing products and strategies, brands must prioritise the customer experience. Consider the following factors when formulating your strategy:

  • Engage visitors across multiple channels when mapping out the user journey.
  • Implement solutions to better understand your audience, identify trends, and create response flows.
  • Use IVR and other tools to direct interested website visitors and callers to specific representatives.
  • Refine the customer journey by tracking, customising, optimising, and improving lead flow and customer engagement.

A successful strategy relies on quick and reliable access to customer data, including communication history and detailed customer information. To implement effective conversational strategies, it’s essential to capture, store, and organise data effectively.

With marketing automation solutions and CRM systems, brands can create more seamless interactions with their audience, elevate the customer experience, and provide high-level customer support.

Missed our 10-minute guide on call tracking and conversation intelligence? Download it here to learn how businesses utilise these technologies to launch and manage successful call campaigns for your organisation.

Leveraging Automation as Part of Your Conversational Marketing Strategy

Innovative conversational marketing technologies, coupled with automation and artificial intelligence (AI), can enhance the timeliness and relevance of marketing conversations. Consequently, more businesses are embracing these technologies.

The primary outcome highlights the importance of digital interfaces in customer communication. Here, a digital interface is simply a medium for interaction between people and brands.

Another key outcome emphasises the increasing need to invest in automation technologies, as its become an essesntial component in virtual consumer communications. These technologies are not limited to chatbots and messaging apps but also include user behaviour recording, call tracking software, and email marketing.

Popular Solutions and Technologies in Conversational Strategies

Chatbots

Business operations now span multiple time zones and locations, happening every minute around the globe. Companies are increasingly using chatbots to manage the volume of online conversations and provide 24/7 customer support.

Here’s how chatbots can assist businesses in communicating with their target audience:

  • Promote specific products and content
  • Offer answers to frequently asked questions
  • Obtain customer feedback

Social Media

Every day, conversations take place on platforms like Instagram, Facebook Messenger, TikTok, and others. Establishing business profiles on these platforms gives customers a place to express themselves and ask questions about your products or services.

To boost engagement, businesses often ask their audience to share content, run contests, and pose questions. These tactics help build trust and foster connections with customers.

Call Marketing

A phone call remains one of the most reliable sources of data and a crucial part of the conversion journey. Approximately 65% of consumers prefer contacting a business by phone. This preference is natural as people are very accustomed to auditory interactions.

Companies often employ call intelligence solutions like Phonexa’s Call Logic to track call campaigns using dedicated phone numbers, gain detailed attribution on call traffic, and adjust their conversational strategies accordingly.

Moreover, brands can use IVR tools and conversational marketing analytics to refine their sales funnels, create customised journeys, and gather essential information from clients.

Examples of Conversational Marketing

Let’s look at a couple of examples showcasing well-known conversational campaigns.

Sephora

Sephora, a globally recognised beauty retailer, runs several effective conversational campaigns. The company utilised two Facebook Messenger bots for booking appointments, makeovers, shade matching, and other services.

Later, Sephora introduced another chatbot that provided makeup tips, collected customer information, and redirected users to the company website. Here’s what it looks like:

Levi’s

Levi’s is renowned for making “clothes built to endure anything.” The company is dedicated to offering round-the-clock customer service and providing access to product information.

Initially, Levi’s used a Virtual Assistant chatbot, then transitioned to a web-based bot that supports online customer chats and answers frequently asked questions. Today, Levi’s conversational strategy primarily involves social media and email marketing to guide customers towards purchases with tailored recommendations.

Conversational Marketing Benefits

The main objective of a successful conversational strategy is to provide personalised digital experiences throughout the user journey and across marketing channels. Each interaction with a brand is significant, and conversational marketing helps businesses realise and leverage this.

Here are some major advantages of an effective conversational marketing strategy:

  • Customer satisfaction through tailored digital experiences and conversations
  • Enhanced customer engagement, loyalty, and trust
  • Increased brand awareness and differentiation
  • Access to key customer data and insights from active marketing campaigns
  • Campaign scalability and higher conversion rates
  • Optimised customer journey

The Future of Conversational Marketing

While the exact details of what the future holds for brands remain uncertain, the focus on customer-centricity is unwavering. Personalised interactions and conversational marketing are currently at the forefront of customer retention, acquisition, and engagement.

Going forward, conversational marketing is likely to involve the integration of conversational AI and new automated messaging environments. These developments will help businesses stay competitive and use brand-specific conversational tools to create unmatched customer experiences.

Book a demo to discover how Phonexa’s call and conversation intelligence solutions can help you leverage customer insights and achieve maximum profitability.

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Affiliate Commission: Lucrative Models to Consider

How lucrative is the world of affiliate marketing? In the current digital era, where internet collaborations combine creativity and financial potential, entrepreneurs are finding a multitude of lucrative prospects.

Affiliate marketing has skyrocketed, going from a 2016 business worth $13 billion to one worth more than $17 billion by 2023. However, what is ahead? Experts in the field anticipate a significant increase to $40 billion by 2030, highlighting the positive trend of the business.

Explore the worldwide income from affiliate marketing niches, as reported by affiliates who contributed to the generated earnings.

A graph showing the global revenue from affiliate marketing niches

Source: Statista

The topic of the optimum compensation rate is at the core of affiliate marketing. It’s critical to strike the correct balance. Marketers need to provide rates that are both financially sustainable over the long run and appealing enough to encourage recommendations.

As we explore the different payment models that partner marketing companies use, we’ll uncover everything from conventional revenue sharing to innovative strategies. When compared to performance-based incentives, how effective are multi-tier systems? How can we increase profits while cultivating long-term relationships?

In this article, you will learn how affiliate marketing companies compensate their partners with affiliate commissions and how to adapt to the ever-changing industry. In affiliate marketing, knowledge is power, and success is paved with well-informed choices.

The Principles and Role of Affiliate Marketing

Imagine for a second if you could turn your enthusiasm for things you like into a source of income. Affiliate marketing is a new and exciting way to make money online that is changing the game.

What is online affiliate marketing, though? Individuals use this performance-based digital approach to market products or services on behalf of businesses, receiving commissions for each sale they bring in via this digital approach.

Commission affiliate marketing’s main participants are:

A graphic representation of key players in affiliate marketing

In what ways does this ecosystem work? To increase brand exposure and reach a wider audience, brands collaborate with affiliates, who are often influencer marketing representatives. 

Affiliates increase the brand’s internet traffic in exchange for commissions on leads or purchases. In the meanwhile, affiliate marketing networks act as intermediaries, handling tracking, commission payouts, and reporting. Advertisers and affiliates benefit from the system’s reliance on high-intent clients and effective leads.

What is driving the popularity of this model? First of all, it provides prospective marketers with a low barrier to entry. Affiliates don’t require high-end stores or a big budget to promote products or services. They may reach a wide audience, generate leads, and earn big incentives by using a variety of channels, such as blogs, social media, or even emails.

As you explore affiliate marketing, you will discover that it is a win-win situation. The companies get more customers, clients discover better solutions, and affiliates earn commissions for recommendations.

But what makes affiliate marketing truly appealing? Consider these key advantages:

1. Businesses may minimise financial risk using a performance-based strategy that entails businesses only paying when the desired actions are generated.

2. Affiliates frequently have preexisting audiences, which opens up new markets for firms to approach.

3. When new affiliates generate conversions and join the program, the possibility of brand visibility grows and the potential for enhanced sales.

4. Affiliates use a wide range of marketing strategies, including email marketing, social media marketing, and content marketing, to increase brand awareness for their clients.

5. Online affiliate marketing has the ability to help companies grow worldwide, even if they don’t have a physical presence in other countries.

6. Businesses face a minimal risk of ineffectual investment, as affiliate marketing operates on a pay-for-performance basis, requiring payment only when conversions occur.

7. Affiliate managers require advanced tracking instruments to estimate the effectiveness of affiliate marketing campaigns. In order to improve outcomes, this includes monitoring the efficacy of diverse affiliates, traffic sources, and advertising strategies.

8. Partner relationships between affiliate parties strengthen through affiliate marketing, which facilitates collaboration on other projects and cross-promotions.

9. Backlinks and affiliate-generated content can be advantageous to a business’s search engine optimisation efforts.

Be much as it may, with great opportunity comes great responsibility. While all parties involved gain from affiliate marketing, affiliate fraud is causing unproductive businesses to fall short of fraud security requirements. Affiliate networks must provide a fraud-free environment and engage advertisers and affiliates with compelling value propositions. But what exactly does this involve?

1. Operators should use advanced fraud detection and compliance algorithms to counteract this phenomenon.

2. In order to prevent affiliate fraud, it is necessary to comprehend the numerous types of fraud and to implement automated affiliate marketing software.

3. Networks and brands must track, validate, and monitor affiliates’ efforts in order to eliminate or avoid affiliate fraud.

4. The integration of fraud detection software can substantially improve the protection against affiliate fraud.

Affiliate marketing compliance is essential for the prevention of fraud. It is beneficial to adhere to regulations such as the GDPR, FTC, PCI DSS, CCPA, CAN-SPAM Act, and intellectual property rights in order to establish trust and protect against legal issues.

Compliance encompasses the following:

  • Initial screening
  • Predictive modelling
  • Monitoring
  • Fraud detection
  • Reporting mechanisms
  • Audits
  • Penalties

Affiliate commission rates are among the main benefits of affiliate marketing. They encourage affiliates to promote the merchant’s services and products and foster mutually advantageous outcomes.

What Is a Commission for Affiliates?

Affiliate commissions are remuneration given to dedicated affiliate managers in exchange for their effective advertising campaigns. Affiliates get payment from merchants for any leads, sales, or other conversions that they bring in. However, what does a normal affiliate commission consist of?

Actually, there isn’t a universally applicable solution. Factors including product value, industry standards, and the competitive environment may cause affiliate revenue rates to fluctuate substantially. These rates may be structured as:

  • A percentage of the sale amount
  • A fixed amount per lead
  • A combination of both models

Companies can accurately attribute sales or leads to specific affiliates by tracking affiliate commissions through codes or unique affiliate links.

Which affiliate commission is considered good? To find out, let’s have a look at the many benefits of affiliate commissions in digital marketing:

  1. Cost-effective advertising: Affiliate marketing businesses profit from a performance-based strategy as they only have to pay for real outcomes. 
  2. Motivated promoters: Affiliates put their time and energy into the program because they are motivated to make money. More successful advertising efforts are generally the result of these interests aligning.
  3. Data-driven insights: The affiliate model shows you which affiliates bring in the most money. In what ways may businesses benefit from this data? They may use it to improve their promotional strategies over time.
  4. Mutually beneficial partnerships: Affiliates may build solid connections with companies whose products resonate with their audience, leading to mutually lucrative collaborations. Better, more genuine advertising is usually the outcome of this kind of collaboration.
  5. Passive income potential: By allowing affiliates to monetise their online presence or audience, this approach has the potential to provide a consistent flow of passive revenue.

 

The result? It is a win-win scenario where businesses have increased exposure and sales, and affiliates are paid for generating successful conversions.

Effective Affiliate Commission Models for Long-Term Development

Affiliates should evaluate their skill set, company objectives, and the services or products they are advertising to determine the best commission structure for them.

A graphic representation of key players in affiliate marketing

Percentage-Based Commissions for Affiliates

A percentage-based commission in affiliate marketing allows for a dynamic earning potential to develop in relation to performance by rewarding affiliates with a piece of each sale they bring in via their marketing efforts.

In contrast to fixed-rate commission schemes, which pay affiliates a set fixed amount for each sale or action, percentage-based models link profits to the value of each sale. 

How much is the percentage paid by affiliate programs?

The exact percentage that an affiliate receives is determined by the conditions of each program negotiated between the affiliate and the business, agreements that have been signed, and the affiliate’s connection with the merchant. 

Affiliates have an incentive to target high-value sales and engage with eligible clients because of the percentage-based structure, which increases the likelihood that these customers will make large purchases.

Recurring Commissions

What if affiliates could earn not just from initial sales but from ongoing customer relationships? Under this scheme, affiliates get commissions on both the first sale and follow-up payments or renewals made by the client they recommended. 

In subscription-based businesses, where keeping customers is crucial, recurring commissions are common. Here are some common uses:

  • Software subscriptions
  • Membership sites
  • Ongoing service providers (e.g., web hosting, email marketing platforms)

The advantages of recurring affiliate programs include:

  • Commissions may be earned by affiliates for months or even years following the first recommendation, allowing for a passive income stream.
  • Affiliates in this model are financially motivated to market products or services that provide excellent customer satisfaction in order to retain subscribers for the long haul.
  • The potential for increased client lifetime value

Nevertheless, one must take into account potential challenges:

  • Income may begin slowly and increase gradually as customers renew.
  • The process involves tracking client subscriptions and handling potential cancellations.

Tiered Commission

This approach offers different commission rates, with higher-performing affiliates receiving larger percentages.

Commission rates are increased for affiliates who accomplish superior performance levels, such as generating more sales or referrals.

Affiliate commissions promote affiliates to excel and optimise their promotional efforts. The tiered commission structure is particularly effective for affiliate marketing programs that:

  • High-ticket affiliate marketing products
  • Offerings that are subscription-based
  • An opportunity for affiliates to influence sales volume significantly

It is of the utmost importance to adhere to fair and transparent standards when establishing performance criteria and commission rates for affiliates.

One-Time Affiliate Commissions

One-time commissions are payments that affiliates receive for each sale they generate without any additional incentives. Further commissions are not earned by the affiliate after the initial sale, even if the consumer makes subsequent purchases or subscribes to a service.

When is this model typically employed?

  • Non-subscription products
  • Single-purchase services
  • One-off transactions

The primary benefits for affiliates include:

  • Commissions are received as soon as a sale is completed.
  • Since each sale only receives a single payment, tracking is made simple.
  • Commission computations are made easier by the clear-cut structure, which promotes transparency.

Disadvantages to Consider:

  • Limited revenue potential from a single sale
  • There is less motivation for affiliates to preserve customer ties

One-Time vs. Recurring Affiliate Commission

Selecting one of these most common commission types relies on a number of variables, such as your strategy and the kind of product or service you’re marketing.

a graphic representation of the key differences between recurring and one-time commissions

The decision you make should ultimately be in line with your marketing goals, the products or services you are advertising, and your plan for creating a steady affiliate revenue stream.

What Does a “Super Affiliate” Mean?

The term “super affiliate” is applied to an affiliate marketer who has reached a high level of success and development and who is able to produce a sizable volume of sales and referrals for the products or services they advertise.

Due to their exceptional performance, super affiliates frequently negotiate exclusive commission rates or terms with paying affiliate programs. The popular term “super affiliate commissions” is frequently used to describe these exclusive rates.

Commissions paid out to super affiliates by affiliate programs and merchants might vary greatly depending on the terms agreed upon by both parties. Super affiliates bring exceptional value to the table; hence, their commissions are higher than average sales commission rates.

Here are some points to consider regarding super affiliate marketing:

  1. Special agreements with affiliate programs are common among super affiliates. Bonuses, commission systems with tiered commission structures, or higher commission percentages can be in store for them.
  2. In order to be eligible for super affiliate commissions, super affiliates may be required to meet certain performance requirements before distribution. Sales volume, referral volume, or other performance indicators may serve as the basis for these thresholds.
  3. Affiliate programs recognise the long-term benefits of having super affiliates as partners and are prepared to reward them with even larger commissions. The higher commission rate is advantageous to both parties since a terrific affiliate marketing blog regularly brings in significant cash.
  4. Super affiliate commissions may be contingent upon their ability to sustain a specific level of performance. However, if the super affiliate’s performance declines, the special commission rate will most likely be re-evaluated.
  5. Showing your marketing strategies, past successes, and ability to influence the affiliate program’s sales are all important when negotiating super affiliate commissions.
  6. Some affiliate programs celebrate and reward their “super affiliates” in public. This gives them more visibility and respect in the affiliate marketing community.

 

Becoming a great super affiliate takes a lot of effort, expertise, and unparalleled dedication. Being proficient in all aspects of marketing enables super affiliates to:

  • Have a thorough understanding of their target audience
  • Use cutting-edge advertising strategies
  • Invest a substantial amount of resources and time in affiliate marketing efforts

As you reach exceptional levels of results, you can look for ways to negotiate better super affiliate commissions with affiliate commission programs that recognise your efforts.

What Is the Average Commission Rate for Affiliates?

The affiliate program’s terms, the products or services being advertised, and the industry all have a substantial impact on the average sales commission rates per industry. As a result, it causes a wide range of average sales commission rates.

How much does an affiliate marketing commission usually cost? Take a look at how the charges rate depending on the niche:

Product Category Commission Rate  Additional Information
Physical Products 5% – 20% Rates that are higher for high-margin products and top-performing affiliates
Digital Products 20% – 50% or more Higher rates as a result of reduced production and distribution expenses
Subscription Services 20% – 50% Recurring commissions for SaaS products and memberships
Financial/Hosting Services Flat fees or a combination Varies from $50 to over $200 per referral or a portion of the initial purchase
Travel and Luxury 2% – 10% Commonly used in the travel industry for the purpose of reserving flights and hotels
Fashion and Beauty 5% – 20% Cosmetics, skincare products, and clothing
Health and Fitness 5% – 30% Fitness equipment and supplements
Insurance Varies by category Health (5% – 40%), life (20% – 100%), home ($30 – $150 per policy), auto ($25 – $200 per policy), travel (10% – 50%)

In order to stay informed about the most recent commission rates, affiliate marketers need to keep an eye on the programs they’re interested in.

To grow your affiliate business, you need to make sure you have the right stack, which includes a comprehensive affiliate marketing solution. Lynx, an affiliate software for tracking clicks, is one example of Phonexa’s single operating solution that focuses on lead-employing and optimising customer paths.

1. Its easy-to-use dashboard consolidates conversion rates, affiliate progress, campaign ROI, and impressions, thereby offering a panoramic marketing view.

2. Performance tracking lets you look at affiliate traffic and advertiser offers in real time, facilitating quick adjustments to get the results you want.

3. Precise Targeting is another noteworthy highlight, as it employs location data and demographic insights to secure leads that are consistent with the preferences of advertisers.

 

By incorporating data-driven insights and streamlined management for scalable success, Lynx redefines affiliate marketing efforts and equips businesses with control and insights.

Commissions From Affiliate Programs: Factors to Consider

Affiliate commissions are an essential component of affiliate marketing, and when affiliate marketers look at and choose affiliate commission schemes, they should consider some points.

Explore a top-notch lead management system if you are a merchant or affiliate marketer seeking to gain value and insights from every lead. Some of the main features of Phonexa’s LMS Sync include:

  • Lead analytics: Leverage web campaign data with advanced analytics to boost revenue and business growth.
  • Lead tracking: In order to increase revenue, distinguish your business by attributing inbound leads.
  • Lead distribution: Automate lead-to-customer conversion to cut down on wait times and streamline workflows.
  • Real-time reporting: Make informed decisions by accessing reports that are clear, concise, and accessible.

 

LMS Sync software is the preferred choice of modern businesses for its ability to increase earnings, automated distribution, multi-channel marketing suite, and in-depth lead traffic and campaign performance statistics.

In order to identify the most exceptional affiliate program that offers considerable rewards, it is crucial to consider the following key factors:

Aspect Considerations
Product quality and fit There is a greater likelihood of successful conversions and customer satisfaction when high-quality products have a positive reputation.
Conversion rate A product that resonates with the target audience and increases the likelihood of sales is indicated by a high conversion rate.
Commission rate A higher commission rate may be more appealing; however, it is important to consider the overall value of the product or service you are promoting.
Affiliate program recurring commissions Think about programs that provide recurring commissions for subscription-based products or services in order to generate passive income.
Average Order Value (AOV) Bigger AOV results in a higher commission per sale, which is especially significant for one-time affiliate affiliate commissions.
Competitive landscape In order to ascertain whether the market is oversaturated or has room, conduct research on affiliate competitors in your selected niche.
Promotional materials Select paying affiliate programs that offer efficient marketing materials, including banners, text links, and product information, to streamline promotional efforts.
Program reputation Research the program’s history and reputation, and steer clear of those with a track record of delayed or non-payment.
Payment schedule It is important to be aware of the payment schedule for affiliate marketing, as some options provide monthly payments while others have more extended intervals.
Payment methods Check to see if the program provides financial options that are convenient for you, such as wire transfers, direct deposit checks, or PayPal.
Affiliate support Be on the lookout for affiliate commission programs that provide robust affiliate support, such as responsive communication, technical assistance, and a dependable point of contact.
Market demand Conduct an evaluation of the necessity of the product or service you are promoting. Decide on niche industries that have the potential for sustained interest and a growing market.
Extended use Take into account the affiliate program’s potential for the long term. How probable are the products or services to remain pertinent and in demand in the future?

Profit Margin Calculation for an Affiliate Program

The profit margin for an affiliate program is estimated by considering the affiliate commission and the costs associated with generating the referred sales.

Here’s a step-by-step guide to profit margin calculation for affiliates:

  1. Obtain the affiliate program’s commission rate, which is typically a fixed amount for each referral or a percentage of the sale price.
  2. Learn how much the product or service you’re advertising costs through the partner program.
  3. To determine the Gross Commission for each transaction, multiply the product price by the affiliate commission rate.
  4. Consider any expenses that are associated with the promotion of the affiliate product, such as website hosting, advertising, and content creation costs.
  5. To ascertain the Net Profit, subtract the total costs from the Gross Commission. After expenses are taken into account, this represents your actual earnings.
  6. To represent the profit as a percentage of the affiliate revenue, compute the profit margin using the following formula: (Net Profit / Product Price) * 100 = Profit Margin.

 

Positive profit margins suggest that the affiliate program generates substantial profit, while negative margins indicate that the affiliate receives less than it expends.

Skilful Affiliate Marketing: Unleash Your Business’s Full Potential

Affiliate marketing continues to be the most effective approach for promoting products and services. Phonexa offers an effective solution for businesses in a variety of industries to achieve remarkable success through the use of adept automated affiliate marketing software.

Entry to an economical solution is available for a mere $100 per month, which includes a variety of state-of-the-art products, such as:

LMS Sync  Lead tracking and distribution
Call Logic  Call tracking and distribution
Cloud PBX  Cloud phone system
Lynx Click tracking
E-Delivery Bulk email and SMS marketing 
HitMetrix CRO and user behavior recording
Opt-Intel  Email suppression list management
Books360 Automated accounting

The Selection of Affiliate Commission Models in a Dynamic Market

Affiliate marketing remains a multipurpose opportunity for entrepreneurs in the constantly changing landscape of online partnerships and income generation. Exploring a variety of affiliate commission models, in turn, functions as a compass, directing individuals towards sustainable development and maximised ROI.

There are a multitude of opportunities to connect, collaborate, and profit in commission affiliate marketing, from the traditional revenue-sharing model to the innovative multi-tier and performance-based structures.

Through the application of knowledge and comprehension, individuals can effectively navigate this ever-evolving industry, leveraging the potential of affiliate commissions to establish a mutually beneficial relationship between businesses, clients, and affiliates.

Success in digital entrepreneurship is based on innovation and teamwork, and as we progress, affiliate revenue structures will change.

 

Maximise your affiliate marketing output with Phonexa’s single operational solution, which is specifically designed for partner and performance marketing. Book a demo to investigate the potential of improving your affiliate marketing endeavours and participate in a Product Tour today.

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Frequently Asked Questions

What is an affiliate commission, and how is it gained?

The compensation affiliates receive for effective advertising efforts that result in desired actions, such as sales, leads, or visits, is referred to as an affiliate commission.

How does a commission operate in affiliate marketing?

Affiliates earn commissions through the promotion of products or services for businesses and the generation of conversions through distinctive tracking links.

What payment models are the most profitable for affiliates?

Several affiliate commissions are commonly encountered, such as:

1. Percentage-based commission: Affiliates receive a percentage of the sale amount for each referral.

2. One-time commission (fixed amount): Affiliates receive a predetermined sum for each referral, irrespective of the selling price.

3. Tiered commission: Increases in commission rates are contingent upon affiliate performance levels.

4. Recurrent commission: Affiliates receive a percentage of the recurring payments referred consumers make.

What are the advantages of recurring and one-time affiliate commissions?

Affiliate commissions that are paid once offer immediate earnings for each sale and simplified tracking while recurring affiliate commissions provide ongoing passive income from customer subscriptions.

Recurring commissions are used in subscription-based services, while single-purchase products are more suitable for one-time commissions.

When evaluating affiliate programs, what factors should affiliates take into account?

During your search for the most profitable and appropriate affiliate commission programs, it is important to take into account the following:

  • Rate of commission
  • Quality of the product
  • Conversion rate
  • Duration of cookie
  • Value of the Average Order
  • Promotional materials
  • Support for affiliates
  • Reporting and tracking
  • Schedule for payment
  • Payment methods
  • Program reputation
  • Policies and terms
  • Market demand
  • Landscape of competition
  • Long-term viability

What Is a Call Tracking Number, and Why Use It?

Now that everyone has smartphones, the way the average customer shops has completely altered, leading to an increase in use of mobile devices as research tools.

According to recent research, 52% of mobile advertisements and 70% of mobile searches end in a phone call. This is why it’s crucial for companies to learn about the touchpoints within a single customer shopping session that led to the inbound call.

Brands can enhance the client experience and capture crucial call data using call tracking software. Every business needs a call tracking phone number to successfully tie phone calls to the digital campaigns, understand the customer journey better, and get more actionable data.

What Is the Meaning of a Call Tracking Number?

One of the features that tracking solutions and apps offer users is a call tracking number. It lets clients keep track of a personal phone number by showing where it is located and giving carrier information.

Numbers that are used for call tracking are unique and assigned to marketing campaigns or sessions. Your company phone line receives all incoming calls via a trackable phone number, which makes it simple to access the different call-tracking data related to the specific digital campaign and strategy.

Find out how brands can measure the value of inbound calls and capture critical data by reading more in-depth details about call tracking systems here.

When businesses use call-tracking phone numbers, prospective customers engage with them through various campaigns, which include both online and offline interactions. Any local, vanity, or toll-free number may be used as a trackable one.

When a customer dials up a call, the trackable number forwards the call to the business number, enabling a brand to record information about the customer journey and activities made while on the phone. Tracking calls keeps the data trail going even when a customer hangs up.

 

The level of data granularity that call tracking systems provide is frequently contingent upon the level of service sophistication. You can capture and use different types of data with Phonexa’s Call Logic, like keywords, dates, call details, time, and call outcomes.

Analytics of Conversation Detailed Campaign Data Information about Real-Time Calls Contextual Data
Conversation patterns and keywords Source campaigns Area code, ID, phone number, caller’s name, etc. Emails, chats, previous customer calls, and other communication
Purchases, appointments, quotes, etc. Channels of marketing Duration of the call, date, time Purchase behavior
Analysis of sentiment Advertisement groups Recordings of calls Customer interaction insights
Transcription from voice to text Partner IDs (Adobe, Google, etc.) Keypresses Psychographics

From this data, you can discover and assess the effectiveness of your marketing campaigns, get detailed attribution, and identify the resources your company needs to increase conversion and retention rates.

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Local Numbers

Businesses are connected to a specific region or community via local phone numbers. These numbers work very well for brands that want to reach customers who like to buy from small businesses. On top of that, marketers running local campaigns can benefit from local tracking numbers.

Toll-Free Numbers

Toll-free tracking numbers create the idea that your company is global and professional. Customers who call these numbers—even those who call from various regions—don’t incur any costs since they are toll-free.

Marketers frequently use toll-free (800) telephone numbers with landing pages and paid search campaigns on Google Ads. Companies that don’t track 800 numbers often have trouble optimising their campaigns and risk misinterpreting the results because they don’t have enough data.

Brands find it considerably more difficult to assess the effectiveness of each digital campaign, which takes much longer to identify statistically significant patterns that lead to a rise or fall in retention or conversion performance when they have just half the data. However, when 800 number tracking is in place, companies can assess the impact of their multi-location marketing on sales and use the best marketing experiments in their regular ad campaigns.

Conventional offline marketing campaigns that involve billboards, TV, or radio ads may also make use of toll-free vanity numbers. Additionally, until the trackable phone numbers are available on the website, marketers may use toll-free numbers for digital marketing.

Vanity Tracking Numbers

In order to stand out and increase brand awareness, brands use vanity numbers. Such numbers are primarily highly valued due to their memorability and the fact that they may be associated with certain marketing campaigns.

Some of the most important benefits that vanity numbers give to brands are:

  • Increased call volume with memorable phrases or words are incorporated into distinctive phone numbers
  • Increasing presence on a national and local scale
  • Better brand awareness

Why Implement Call Tracking for Marketing Campaigns

Marketers may learn more about the influence of referral, organic, and search traffic on call conversions by tracking telephone calls. For instance, if a PPC campaign leads to calls, it’s important to know which keywords drive these results.

With the use of call tracking software, brands may learn more about the customer journey. In order to close the gap between the leads generated online and offline, businesses must comprehend the events that transpire during the call and online.

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Call tracking providers assist businesses in enabling Dynamic Number Insertion (DNI) on their landing ads, pages, or websites. In addition, they assign a dedicated number to each visitor based on the medium (e.g., organic, referral, paid search, email).

This way, marketers are able to get detailed information on the callers who clicked on a certain advertisement or SEO listing and examine how a particular journey led to the callers dialling your actual company number.

Dynamic vs. Static Call Tracking Numbers

There are still some brands that still use static call number tracking. It lets marketers assign specific phone numbers to both conventional and online marketing channels, such as billboards, flyers, and TV ads.

So now, let us take a closer look at how static call number tracking works.

Businesses that employ static number tracking assign specific phone numbers to each advertising source.

A graphic representation of how static call tracking works

When a customer calls a company, the software routes calls to the business phone line. After that, the system will match the dialled number with the advertising source.

Following that, the advertising source is shown in the call log along with other caller details such as name, phone number, audio recording, call length and time, and so on. In the final step, the provider of call tracking services sends data to Google Analytics or another integrated solution.

This process becomes somewhat more intricate with the implementation of dynamic call tracing. With the help of call tracking codes, websites can utilise multiple phone numbers and swap them for each user who visits the site. It is utilised by businesses for call tracking at the session-level, channel-based, and campaign-level.

A graphic representation of how dynamic call tracking works

Here’s how it works:

  • Visitors arrive at a landing page or the company’s website
  • They observe various telephone tracking numbers
  • Details about these visits are gathered by the system, which then compares them to phone numbers that can be tracked
  • The call log shows keywords, campaigns, channels, ad sources, and other valuable information
  • The information is transferred to another integrated system if any

The main distinction between the two methods is that, unlike the static technique, dynamic call number tracking correlates calls with users’ sessions rather than the ad source.

In the end, it helps brands obtain a comprehensive understanding of every individual customer journey by transmitting call data to the analytics system, which allows them to view the conversion history of visitors.

How a Dynamic Number Pool Is Determined

Determining the appropriate size of a pool of toll-free tracking numbers to acquire all the necessary data is a common challenge for marketers. However, because analytics accuracy is dependent on the quantity of numbers reserved for the tracking pool, paying attention to this issue is essential.

Trackable phone numbers, as you already know, forward incoming calls to whatever numbers you choose for your company. Services may vary in the quantity of numbers providers offer as part of a bundle, and the cost of additional numbers is typically an additional expense.

You might consider reserving or leasing additional phone numbers in case your website traffic unexpectedly surges. Knowing how to calculate the pool of phone numbers you need is, therefore, essential.

Here is one way to determine the number of phone numbers that need to be reserved based on consumer interest and traffic:

1. Find out the average number of visits to the website over the last 72 hours

2. Plug those numbers into the subsequent formula

The number of visits for the last 72 hours / 3 days / 100

Suppose that the number of website visits is 6000. The following result is obtained when the formula is applied:

6000 / 3 / 100 = 20

So, this means you need to reserve about 20 numbers for your business tracking pool. In some cases, service providers will even permit you to automate your service pools.

What Are the Pros and Cons of Tracking Numbers, and What Are the Alternatives?

There are benefits and drawbacks to using a phone tracking number, which is not a secret. Even though dynamic number insertion helps businesses improve their digital marketing performance, there are also specific drawbacks.

Now, let us examine in more detail the advantages and drawbacks of tracking telephone call interactions with dedicated numbers.

Advantages:

  • Increased marketing ROI
  • Access to more detailed caller information
  • High retention and conversion rates
  • Capability to optimise media spend
  • Upgraded marketing messaging

Drawbacks:

  • Customers may be confused by multiple phone numbers
  • Having too many numbers could affect SEO rankings
  • There are additional costs for toll-free, vanity, or local tracing numbers
  • DNI requires that marketing materials be updated often
  • Not having enough reserved numbers in the tracking pool could make it harder to track leads

This approach continues to be the most prevalent among brands, in spite of all the disadvantages. If you’re searching for alternatives, however, you may want to use Google’s services to track inbound calls and ad conversions.

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Making sure that your brand is equipped with the appropriate solutions is crucial for the success of your marketing endeavours. So, the best approach is to integrate call tracking data with other martech solutions, such as HubSpot, Google Analytics, or Salesforce.

Best Practices for Implementing Call Tracking Numbers

In order to assess marketing effectiveness and successfully recalibrate marketing strategies, including caller information and other things, the majority of businesses that are customer-facing need to use the right call intelligence solution and monitor toll-free numbers.

Here are a few of the most effective practices for implementing trackable phone numbers:

  • Niche marketing: Companies that serve customers in the healthcare, insurance, home services, or legal business can identify top-performing advertising campaigns, record phone calls, enhance the customer experience, and create a seamless customer journey.
  • Financial companies: Customers often have a lot of questions about insurance, mortgages, and loans. By employing trackable phone numbers and a call intelligence solution, financial companies can build trust, provide personalised customer service, and obtain the necessary caller information.
  • Travel companies and hotels: With call tracking features, such as trackable phone numbers, businesses can optimise their marketing expenditure, deliver personalised customer experiences across all touchpoints, and identify the channels that generate the most calls.

Utilise Call Tracking Software to Track Calls

Nowadays, marketing experts cannot afford to overlook how crucial it is to track inbound calls. It is an efficient way of data collection that may help brands create customisable journeys, understand the performance of different marketing campaigns, and boost revenue.

Book a demo to learn how Phonexa’s Call Logic can assist you in capturing phone call data, streamlining your campaigns, and boosting your conversions.

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Frequently Asked Questions 

How can I find out where a call tracking number routes to?

When you get a trackable phone number, you need to assign it a destination number. The phone number can be any of your business numbers. This ensures that each customer who calls one of your local or toll-free tracking numbers will be directed to the destination number of your choosing.

How can I obtain a phone number to track calls in Google Ads?

The quantity of call tracking numbers you may get will vary depending on the call tracking service provider. Customers are usually not required to purchase phone numbers; instead, they may lease vanity, local, and toll-free tracking numbers and use them for a variety of campaigns, such as Google Ads.

If you are a Phonexa client, the following brief guide will provide you with the necessary information to integrate our Call Logic platform with Google Analytics.

Is it advisable to add a hard-coded call tracking number to the website or landing page?

The addition of hard-coded telephone tracking numbers to landing pages or websites is not recommended. DNI can, however, evaluate the referring URL, landing page, or website to ascertain whether it is necessary to substitute the hard-coded number with one from your tracking pool.

Are you unfamiliar with the concept of call tracing as a whole? View this 10-minute guide on Conversation Intelligence & Call Tracking.

Affiliate Network vs. Your Own Affiliate Programme: Making the Right Choice

Аffiliate marketing is one of the most effective ways to keep a steady stream of high-intent leads besides earned media. The numbers don’t lie: affiliate marketing spending in the United Kingdom reached £1.1 billion, where UK publishers see an incredible 229% sales boom from affiliate marketing.

Thus, many marketers want to join this lucrative opportunity. However, one question constantly weighs on the minds of merchants: should I create an affiliate programme on my own, or should I join an established affiliate marketing network and draw customers from there?

Without any further ado, let’s review both options.

Learn affiliate marketing through and through with Phonexa’s Affiliate Marketing Podcast.

Affiliate Network Definition and Operating Principles

An affiliate network, or affiliate marketing network, is a platform that connects businesses willing to buy traffic (known as advertisers or merchants) with companies willing to sell traffic (known as affiliates or publishers). These platforms act as intermediaries, facilitating the partnership and tracking the performance of the affiliate marketing campaigns.  

There are various platforms: B2B affiliate networks, B2C networks, and even B2D platforms. The general process of joining a network (whether it is a health affiliate programme, retail, real estate or any other affiliate) looks the same:

  1. Advertiser joins network: A business looking to promote its products or services joins a global affiliate network. They create an affiliate programme, setting terms like commission rates, payment methods, and tracking cookies.  
  2. Affiliate joins network: Individuals or entities interested in earning commissions by promoting products or services join the same network. They can browse available programmes on affiliate network platforms and choose programmes that align with their interests or audience.  
  3. Affiliate promotes products: The affiliate creates content (e.g., blog posts, social media posts, videos) to promote the advertiser’s products or services. They include unique affiliate links within their content. These links track clicks and conversions.  
  4. Customer makes targeted action: When a customer clicks on the affiliate link and makes a targeted action, the affiliate CPA network tracks it and attributes it to the affiliate.  
  5. Affiliate earns commission: The advertiser pays the affiliate network a commission based on the agreed-upon terms. The network then pays the affiliate their commission.  

 

A graphic representation of an affiliate marketing ecosystem

Source: Understanding Affiliate Marketing Ecosystem

The Pros of Joining an Affiliate Marketing Network

Unlimited Choice of Affiliates Top affiliate network programmes unite hundreds and thousands of affiliates, so you can tap into a constant stream of leads while getting the target lead quality at the predetermined price. On the other hand, if you decide to start an affiliate programme on your own, you will have to start from scratch and gradually grow your network.
Cost-Effectiveness Joining an affiliate network is free, and you only pay a commission from sales, leads, or clicks on affiliate links. You pay for what you get with little to no upfront costs and no risk. Choose a desired action and look for a CPA affiliate network where you only pay once the action is done.
Unlimited Reach An affiliate programme network gives you access to advertisers from various related niches, allowing you to tap into untapped markets and test specific audiences. Meanwhile, you can set your own precautions, like a budget limit or lead quality screening.
Access to Affiliate Software Most affiliate marketing networks will provide you with affiliate network software that tracks your affiliates, analyses your campaigns, and issues payouts.Some networks will even provide white label affiliate marketing software you can brand as your own proprietary software.
Fraud Prevention and Compliance Affiliate networks use sophisticated fraud prevention measures like traffic quality control, conversion validation, payment verification, and more, maximising the performance of leads, clicks, or conversions you pay for.Top affiliate networks comply with the FTC Guidelines, the CAN-SPAM Act, and other nationwide and local compliance requirements.

An advanced affiliate marketing network allows you to pinpoint target audience characteristics (demographics, psychographics, etc.) and run an affiliate programme to collect perfect leads for your case.

The Cons of Joining an Affiliate Marketing Network

Joining an affiliate network is the easiest of the options, but you should still be aware of potential challenges along the way: 

  • Fierce competition: There are dozens of advertisers in the same network. All things being equal, the highest price per lead wins a competition and gains a potential customer. It can lower the cost-effectiveness even of the best affiliate network. 
  • Lack of control: Despite the strict screening most affiliates undergo, you may not always guarantee the quality of the traffic source. Muddy schemes like cookie stuffing, brand bidding, or cookie dropping might harm your potential campaigns.
  • Commission costs: Affiliate marketing networks can eat away your profits quite significantly, charging up to 30% of the affiliate’s commission earnings. For every $1,000 paid in affiliate commissions, you might have to leave $300 on the table.

Finally, it may not be the best idea to rely on a single affiliate marketing network as your primary traffic channel. Marketing is a constantly changing industry, so what could work today may become irrelevant tomorrow.

Why Choose Joining an Affiliate Network Over Creating an Affiliate Programme?

Running affiliate programmes will work best for small businesses with limited resources, companies under time pressure, those unwilling to spend their resources on affiliate programmes, and those trying to figure out how things work before committing to an independent affiliate programme.

The list of advantages and disadvantages of partnering with affiliate networks for advertisers and affiliates

Source: Understanding Affiliate Marketing Ecosystem

Can You Start Running an Affiliate Programme on Your Own?

Creating your own affiliate programme is challenging but still possible. Top affiliate marketing networks like Amazon Associates, Awin, and ShareASale unite hundreds of thousands of affiliates, with smaller brands also running independent affiliate programmes.

Affiliate programme management is easier than you thought. Many platforms offer automation features that can streamline tedious tasks like tracking sales, paying commissions, and generating reports.

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Affiliate Network As A Way to Grow Your Brand Name

Starting your affiliate programme is a great, affordable way to increase brand awareness and generate leads. By leveraging the efforts of affiliates who promote your products or services, you can tap into new audiences, increase visibility and enhance your company’s credibility.

 Affiliates often include backlinks to your website, which can improve your search engine rankings. It’s easy to scale up or down your affiliate programme based on your marketing goals and budget.

Use this guideline to keep track of affiliate programmes to ensure you’ll get the most out of this marketing practice.

Step 1 – Set Your Goals

The first thing you should do is decide what you want to achieve. Base your decision on your value proposition, the current state of the market, and the analysis of your affiliate network.

Whether you are to tap into complex markets – say, an insurance affiliate programme or less competitive markets like digital goods or beauty, you must quantify the numbers in the first place.

Here are some statistics that might help you choose the right affiliate market, according to the Affiliate Marketing Benchmark Report from Influencer Marketing Hub:

  • The three most popular affiliate markets are retail (44%), telecom & media (25%), and travel & leisure (16%).
  • The most rewarding affiliate categories are SaaS affiliate programmes (up to 70% commission from the sale amount), finance (up to 40%), eLearning (up to 30%), and beauty & health (up to 30%).
  • For 67% of marketers, affiliate fraud is a concern, with 69.1% having experienced it at least once in their career.

Wonder how well you are protected from affiliate fraud? Complete this fraud prevention quiz.

A graph showing the affiliate commission rates by industry

Source: Affiliate Marketing Benchmark Report

Step 2 – Choose Your Payment Model

Once you choose a preferable network, it’s time to determine your payment model. The most common are the next 4:

  • Pay-per-lead
  • Pay-per-sale
  • Pay-per-click
  • Pay-per-action

Depending on your business objectives, you are free to combine multiple commission types and objectives, from cost-per-lead programmes to pay-per-call affiliate network programmes to hybrid programmes where every affiliate can choose what they are paid for.

A graph showing the commission types in affiliate marketing

Source: Affiliate Marketing Benchmark Report

Step 3 – Choose Your Affiliate Software

With affiliate marketing SaaS software growing increasingly popular – 73% of marketers prefer it to affiliate network software – there’s almost no viable alternative to renting your software from a third-party provider.

Even though you have less control over such software because you don’t own it in the background, white label affiliate software appears as your own proprietary platform on the affiliate’s side while perfectly serving your marketing goals.

The market offers affiliate software of any type, from simple open-source affiliate tracking software that helps you monitor links to multi-tier affiliate software to comprehensive solutions like Phonexa’s Lynx that synergise affiliate programmes with your other marketing efforts.

 

Book a demo to learn more about Lynx and how it blends into Phonexa’s performance marketing ecosystem, or order your all-encompassing affiliate marketing software suite if you already know the tool’s benefits for your case. 

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Step 4 – Design Creative Materials

Promoting through an affiliate programme goes far beyond placing a link on the publisher’s website. You should look for affiliates whose promo channels suit your strategy. At the same time, you need to ensure that their content fits your strategy and use approved promo materials.

For instance, Instagram and Pinterest users are more likely to react to quality images, whereas TikTok audiences are most susceptible to visual storytelling.

The graph showing popular affiliate marketing channels apart from social media, like blogs, review and coupon sites, newsletters, etc.

Source: Statista

To stand out from the crowd and increase the quality of inbound affiliate traffic, develop creatives for every type of affiliate you are going to partner with. It could be links, banners, product images, email templates, landing pages, infographics, case studies, testimonials, product data feeds, etc.

If you want to build an affiliate network and simplify things for your publishers, let them use your affiliate software and assign a dedicated affiliate programme manager to help them set up and properly run a promo campaign for your business.

Step 5 – Launch Your Affiliate Marketing Programme and Onboard Affiliates

Double-check the agreement of the white label affiliate programme before you kick things off. You need to ensure that all parties understand all peculiarities of the collaboration, including affiliate programme compliance with all regulations. Pay attention to the following:

  • Definition & interpretation of the terms used in the agreement
  • Application process and acceptance
  • Payment terms and commission structure
  • Affiliate programme compliance
  • Consequences of programme violation

Some niches like healthcare, business, finance and insurance need special attention. With those industries, one wrong word may lead to huge charges. As an advertiser, you need to ensure that an affiliate agreement is enforceable, clear, and comprehensive.

Write down penalties for an affiliate programme violation. It might be a good idea to consult with a legal professional to make sure you are on the safe side.

The graphic representation of how the affiliate marketing process looks like for brands

Source: Understanding Affiliate Marketing Ecosystem

The Hard Choice: To Create an Affiliate Programme, Or To Join an Affiliate Network? 

Those who want full control over their affiliate marketing campaigns or are looking for more direct relationships with affiliates will appreciate the idea of developing their affiliate programme. However, you need to be sure that you have enough resources to manage the programme.

Lastly, owning an affiliate programme and enrolling in third-party programmes run by affiliate network platforms are not mutually exclusive. You can combine both strategies to boost your exposure and leverage your online promotion strategy.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is an affiliate network?

An affiliate network is a platform that connects businesses (advertisers) with entities (affiliates) that promote their products or services. As an advertiser, you join the network and ask affiliates to promote your product. Affiliate joins the same network, agrees on your terms and starts to create content to promote your product, earning commissions from leads’ targeted actions.

What are network affiliates?

Network affiliates are individuals or entities that promote the products or services of businesses within an affiliate network. They earn a commission for each sale or lead generated through their efforts. The most common affiliates are website owners, content creators, influencers, and email marketers.

Can I use my own affiliate link?

In most networks, you can use your own link to track performance. But it’s rare that you can earn commissions from using your own affiliate link. However, in some networks, this practice can be considered a violation of network rules. So, we recommend you to read its terms and conditions.

How to create your own affiliate programme?

The first step in developing an affiliate network is to define your goals, choose a niche and select a network where you can create your own programme. The next step is to set rules, commission rates, tracking methods and develop marketing materials. Later, recruit affiliates by offering attractive incentives. Track program results and provide constant support to affiliates.

What are sub-affiliate networks?

These are networks where affiliates can recruit additional affiliates ( “sub-affiliates” or “downline affiliates”) to promote products or services. When a customer makes a targeted action through a sub-affiliate link, the multi-tier affiliate software tracks it and both affiliate and sub-affiliate earn a commission.

Mastering Pay-Per-Call Facebook Ads: Best Practices, Tips, and Tricks

Pay-per-call ads on Facebook offer a unique opportunity to deliver marketing messages to the right audience and ensure that the qualified leads are just one click away from direct communication with your sales team. Of course, this technique also has some limitations, but most of them can be mitigated by using additional software.

Learn the advantages of running pay-per-call offers on Facebook, prepare A-to-Z to set up click-to-call Facebook ads, dive into how to target the right audience, and see examples of call-only ads.

Understanding Facebook Ads for Pay-Per-Call

Now, to the nuts and bolts of the Facebook ads of pay-per-call – let’s see what some of the best types of ad campaigns are, and how to choose the proper campaign objective. As expected, choosing the right type of campaign and objective is not unimportant, since both have a direct impact on how your audience will engage with your ads to convert into phone calls.

Facebook Ad Campaigns Using Pay-Per-Call

The key objectives of pay-per-call campaigns include generating calls and website visitors locally with just a single click on the caller’s end. The speed of lead acquisition is also very important, considering that the majority of customers are now mobile users.

A graph showing the popularity of devices used to access Facebook in the UK
Source: Statista

Other ad types are designed to trigger specific actions on your website, but adding the “Call Now” CTA on your website can prove helpful to drive more high-intent call leads. This way, Facebook ad campaigns can be used to generate more traffic by affiliates and pay-per-call networks. 

Setting up the right campaign objectives will help you align your Facebook advertising strategy with the purpose of creating calls. Objectives allowing integration of a “Call Now” button will also refine the audience to not just browsing but ready to talk, which makes spending on advertising much more effective.

Knowing how the Facebook ad platform supports these objectives brings us to the fact that it can support targeting and re-targeting in line with users’ behaviours and preferences. This hyper-targeted approach makes sure that your ads show to a tailored audience for maximum reach at high relevance.

Real-World Examples of Click-To-Call Facebook Ads

To bring these points home, consider a set of real-world examples in which businesses have used Facebook’s pay-per-call capabilities.

An example of a pay-per-call Facebook ad promoting affordable Chicago living

The structure of click-to-call Facebook ads is simple yet informative:

  • Brief ad story atop
  • Media that best fits the goals of the ad (can be an image, a short video, or several images in a carousel loop)
  • Clear message with the benefits you’re offering from the bottom-left corner, written in business pitch fashion
  • CTA button at bottom right

Basically, Facebook call ads can be helpful for most industries, including high-ticket niches. However, judging from the Facebook click-to-call ads that appear in the feed most often, popular industries would include those offering consultations at the very start of a customer’s journey. Click-to-call campaigns are, therefore, popular with law firms, healthcare, financial services, and real estate – as opposed to retail. These industries can significantly benefit from direct communication.

An example of a psy-per-call Facebook ad promoting the services of car accident lawyers

This lays the foundation for you to create and optimise your click-to-call ads on Facebook, moving you a step closer to your goal of better conversations and conversions.

Benefits of Facebook Pay-Per-Call Ads

Pay-per-call Facebook ads bring together functionality from social media advertising and pay-per-call marketing within one platform. Their salient features and benefits are:

  • Precise targeting: By nature, social media sites have the tendency to absorb, organise, and store a lot of information about users through data voluntarily supplied by users, received from third-party sources, and gathered by analysing the actions of the users. Further, the information is used to categorise users into various target audience segments. The possibility of targeting users with a phone call ad on Facebook includes location, age, sex, household income, hobbies, and more.
  • Streamlined conversions: Although various marketing channels may redirect users to call pay-per-call numbers or take them to other platforms that bear such numbers, Facebook call-now ads can connect businesses in just one click with their users. This reduces the steps of a customer journey to the bare minimum. Pay-per-call affiliates receive their commissions whenever users are converted on the product pages of the advertisers, and this is full-cycle marketing. It is left to the advertiser to bring the lead to a conversion as soon as the user clicks on an advertisement’s button. 
  • Lead tracking analytics: Advertisers run ad analytics on all their ad campaigns on Facebook. Under such capabilities, marketers can understand how effectively ad campaigns are performing at targeting audiences, calculate key metrics in action including ROI, and if the ad content serves the positive response effectively.

Lead tracking is one of the basic instruments for any seasoned affiliate marketer. Facebook call tracking gives the ability to analyse only that part of the campaign that happens on the platform –  meaning, basically, the performance of pay-per-call ads on Facebook. One would require a complete lead-tracking solution for an end-to-end analysis of customer journeys right from the very first touch point to conversion.

Phonexa is the most modern solution for lead tracking, with sophisticated functions of marketing automation, which allow creating profiles of leads based on data from different sources and analyse user behaviour on the website and more.

Build your plan now, or book a demo to find out how Phonexa’s eight-in-one software suite can help you fine-tune your pay-per-call efforts.

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How to Create Pay-Per-Call Facebook Ads [Step-By-Step Guide]

Now, let’s dive into the basics of running a Facebook pay-per-call ad. The straightforward steps below will have you launching your first click-to-call campaign in no time – no additional pay-per-call software required.

Step 1 – Creating a Facebook Business Page

Set up a Facebook business page. Fill in relative information to let users find your business. Business pages have access to the Facebook features for creating and tracking ad campaigns.

Step 2 – Identify a Goal for a Marketing Campaign

Facebook allows the selection of six types of campaign goals. Determining these will affect the ads’ structure and features. Choose campaign types that offer a “Call Now” option for a CTA.

Examples of goals for pay-per-call Facebook ads
Source: Facebook

Step 3: Setting up Your Audience

Refine your target audience with different criteria. Choose which information about the users is valuable to conversions, for example: location, gender, relationship status, etc. You also have the option of making a custom audience from the database if you have run previous advertising campaigns.

Step 4 – Select the Placement of Your Ad

There are several options available on Facebook regarding where your pay-per-call advertising can appear: News Feed, Stories, Messenger, and also the option to make ads appear in another Meta application – Instagram.

Step 5 – Establish a Budget and Bid Strategies

You can choose to spend a certain amount of money per day or longer. We recommend selecting a monthly option since a day-long campaign may not be representative of consistent data. Besides that, you need to select a bidding strategy which will be effective for acquiring pay-per-call leads. The most effective model for that is CRC, or cost-per-click, which allows you to pay only in those instances when users actually click Facebook ads call to action.

Step 6 – Choose Content for Your Home Improvement Ad Format

Begin by making a one-paragraph, quick description of what your business does and place it at the top of an ad below the profile name. Then, select an attractive image or up to five images for a carousel format, showing professionalism and relating to what is being promoted. Lastly, create a bold call to action that explains to the user what benefits they achieve when calling the advertised business.

Tips for Effective Facebook Advertising Campaigns

With all the advantages for the advertising industry and the possibility to connect users directly with businesses, Facebook has managed to establish itself as one of the main platforms for generating pay-per-call leads. Be it for a business that launches its very first advertising campaign on Facebook or professional pay-per-call services; here are the tactics you should follow to make sure you extract maximum value from your efforts:

A/B Testing

Continual optimisation is important in bringing about efficiency in pay-per-call Facebook ads. Affiliate marketers apply A/B testing as a means of understanding what alterations bear positively on the performance of their ads. This involves creating similar ads, changing only one element.

The key variables to test are as follows:

  • Visuals: Try different visuals and test video format vs image format, and single-image vs carousel layout
  • Ad copy: Clearly, your text describes all the benefits of the products promoted, so try testing different product descriptions and also a variety of tones of voice to engage your audience.
  • Targeting settings: Adjust the targeting setting in order to have more calls and to get to know more about your targeted audience.

Key Metrics and KPIs to Monitor

It’s about understanding and monitoring various metrics and key performance indicators as a way to assess your pay-per-call Facebook Ads against other promotional strategies and as a means for determining the optimal ads utilising A/B testing. Pay attention to:

Call volumeMeasures the initial interest your ads receive.
Cost per callMeasures the overall cost-effectiveness of your campaign
Call durationMeasures the complexity of the request, the operator’s performance, and the relevance of the call 
Click-through rateReflects how appealing the ads are to click
Call frequency by dayIdentifies when customers are prone to calling in

Implement Geo Targeting

With Facebook’s precise targeting settings, target an audience that is most likely to purchase from local businesses. To make these ads resonate with the audience’s needs, here are some best practices:

  • Target users living in specific areas as opposed to users showing interest in the locations in question.
  • Let the users know you’re promoting local companies by including geo-specific details in the visuals or ad copy
  • Make sure to utilise a local area code number for the “Call Now” ads on Facebook

A phone number that has an unfamiliar area code might lead to a number of questions on the minds of users, like whether the business is local or not, and prevent them from calling the number. The ability to use different area codes on marketing campaigns is a much-needed feature for marketers, though not all call tracking software offers this.

Phonexa provides DNI as part of its Call Logic tool. In this tool, different ads can be assigned different phone numbers to increase user engagement and make tracking of the campaign engagement simpler.

Build your plan now, or take a product tour to learn how Phonexa’s eight proprietary solutions can make your pay-per-call campaigns work even better.

Take a product tour

Multiple Ad Types

Run diverse ads for your promotions. In one campaign, utilise ads that introduce products, customer testimonials, or brand reputation. The targeted users may not respond immediately after viewing the first ad, but it enhances brand awareness and creates more opportunities for conversion with successive ads.

Similarly, try out various ad types including ads aimed at driving traffic to your website, increasing likes to your Facebook page, or traffic to other marketing channels.

Use Retargeting

Retargeting methods are aimed at showing your ads to users who have viewed your content but never bought. For example, you can target users who have visited your website domain in the last 30 days, but never been on a Thank You page, indicating they never completed a purchase.

Effective pay-per-call Facebook ads are short and straight to the point, thereby not being catchy enough to viewers who are new to the brand. Retargeting attracts people who already have knowledge about your products, offering them a quick means of connecting. It is super effective at converting customers who are almost there but not quite.

Unlock the Potential of Facebook Pay-Per-Call Ads with Phonexa

Click-to-call Facebook Ads are a robust solution for affiliate marketers who can combine all the advantages of pay-per-call advertising —like high conversion rates — along with Facebook’s sharp targeting and analytics. But still, they have limitations and need to be integrated within other marketing channels and platforms also.

Phonexa provides the most comprehensive suite of tools for enhancing pay-per-call lead tracking and analysis, integrating pay-per-call Facebook ads into one system. Each tool is targeted at specific objectives that, together, create a robust digital marketing platform.

LMS SyncLead tracking & distribution software
Call LogicCall tracking & distribution software
E-DeliveryBulk email & SMS marketing software
Cloud PBXCloud phone system
LynxClick tracking software
Opt-IntelSuppression list management solution
HitMetrixUser behaviour recording & CRO software
Books360Automated accounting software

Build your plan now, or book a demo to set the groundwork for your success in digital marketing.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a pay-per-call ad?

Pay-per-call advertising is a performance marketing strategy whereby businesses pay publishers based on the number of calls generated by users who contact promoted numbers through ads.

What are the advantages of pay-per-call ads on Facebook?

The main advantages of pay-per-call Facebook ads include the following:
– Smooth conversion process eliminates the need for users to switch between different platforms.
– Precise targeting based on detailed information that Facebook has about its users.
– Built-in campaign analytics enable tracking user conversions to improve future promotion campaigns.

What are the shortcomings of pay-per-call Facebook ads?

Facebook tends to exhibit somewhat lower conversion rates compared to some other platforms, for instance, Google Ads. This may be due to higher confidence in branded ads on social media platforms. Also, Facebook provides limited management of campaigns compared to full-scale marketing platforms. It is fit to include Facebook pay-per-call and Facebook ads campaigns within specialised marketing automation software, such as Phonexa.

The End-of-Year Checklist for Marketers & Affiliate Managers: Preparing for Success in 2024

As the calendar turns to 2024, we’re focused on assessment, reflection, strategic planning, and buying tons of gifts for our family and friends. 

This comprehensive checklist delineates essential projects and tasks tailored for both marketers and affiliate managers, ensuring a thorough conclusion to 2023 and a well-prepared start to the upcoming year.

For Marketers:

1. Performance Analysis and Reporting

Evaluate Campaigns:

  • Delve into comprehensive performance analysis across your marketing channels – social media, email marketing, PPC campaigns, etc. Identify high-performing strategies and areas that require enhancement. 
  • Craft detailed reports consolidating key findings derived from campaign analysis. Highlight successful tactics, challenges faced, and actionable insights for optimisation in the forthcoming year.

Key KPIs Include:

  • Revenue: 
    • Total Revenue: Sum of all sales revenue generated within the year.
    • Conversion Rate: Percentage of visitors who took a desired action (like making a purchase).
    • Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC): Average cost to acquire a new customer, including marketing and sales expenses.
    • Return on Investment (ROI): Ratio of net profit to the cost of marketing efforts.
    • Customer Lifetime Value and Churn
  • Website and Digital Engagement Metrics:
    • Website Traffic: Total number of visitors to the website.
    • Page Views: Number of pages viewed by visitors.
    • Average Session Duration: Average time visitors spend on the website.
    • Bounce Rate: Percentage of visitors who navigate away from the site after viewing only one page.
  • Marketing Campaign Metrics:
    • Click-Through Rate (CTR): Percentage of people who clicked on a link or CTA in an advertisement or email.
    • Cost Per Click (CPC) or Cost Per Acquisition (CPA): Average cost for each click or acquisition through campaigns.
    • Engagement Metrics: Likes, shares, comments, and other interactions on social media platforms.
  • Customer and Audience Metrics:
    • Customer Retention Rate: Percentage of customers retained during a specific period.
    • Net Promoter Score (NPS): Measurement of customer satisfaction and loyalty.
    • Customer Lifetime Value (CLV): Prediction of the total value a business can expect from a customer throughout their relationship.
  • Content and SEO Metrics:
    • Organic Traffic: Visitors coming from unpaid search results.
    • Keyword Rankings: Performance of targeted keywords in search engine results.
    • Content Performance: Metrics related to blog views, downloads of resources, or time spent on specific content.
  • Email Marketing Metrics:
    • Open Rate: Percentage of recipients who opened an email.
    • Click Rate: Percentage of recipients who clicked on a link within an email.
    • Conversion Rate from Emails: Percentage of recipients who completed a desired action after clicking through an email.
  • Advertising Metrics:
    • Ad Impressions and Traffic: Number of times an ad is displayed.
    • Cost Per Mille (CPM): Cost for every thousand impressions of an ad.
    • Ad Click-Through Rate: Percentage of ad viewers who clicked on the ad.
  • Social Media Metrics:
    • Follower Growth: Increase in the number of followers or subscribers on social media platforms.
    • Engagement Rate: Measures interactions relative to the number of followers.
    • Social Media Reach: Total number of people who have seen your social media posts.

2. Strategic Planning for 2024

Set Goals:

  • Collaborate with stakeholders to establish precise, measurable goals in alignment with the overarching company objectives. Factor in insights garnered from performance evaluations to set realistic yet ambitious targets.
  • Envision milestones encompassing revenue targets, customer acquisition goals, or brand visibility metrics to serve as guiding beacons for 2024 strategies.

Develop Strategies:

  • Formulate comprehensive strategies integrating content, SEO, social media, and advertising, aligned with anticipated industry trends and evolving consumer behaviours.
  • Incorporate innovative approaches such as AI-driven personalisation, immersive experiences, or interactive content to maintain competitive advantage.

3. Budget Planning and Expense Review

  • Review budget allocations across various channels, reallocating resources based on the performance analysis. Emphasise investment in high-performing channels and consider exploring new avenues for experimentation.
  • Assess the potential for adopting marketing technology tools or software to streamline operations and bolster campaign efficiency.

4. Engaging Year-End Campaigns

Holiday Specials:

  • Engineer compelling year-end campaigns leveraging festive themes, exclusive offers, and personalised messaging to resonate emotionally with the audience during the holiday season.
  • Employ a diverse range of content formats like videos, interactive posts, and user-generated content to foster engagement and foster brand loyalty.
  • Make sure gifts for your team, partners, and customers are compiled and sent. 

For Affiliate Managers:

1. Partner Evaluation and Collaboration

Evaluate Partnerships:

  • Assess the performance of affiliate partnerships across the year, identifying high-performing affiliates and scrutinising the quality of traffic and conversions they generate.
  • Initiate dialogues with top-performing affiliates to explore collaborative opportunities for the upcoming year, fostering strategies for mutual growth.

Network Building:

  • Look back at the industry events, webinars, or forums where you forged connections with potential affiliates or influencers, and outline the great events. Cheque in with key partners to wish them a good holiday.

2. Performance Incentives and Rewards

Incentivise Performance:

  • Motivate and retain top-performing affiliates by offering performance-based incentives or rewards. Acknowledge their contributions with bonuses, exclusive access, or early campaign insights.

3. Analyse Affiliate Programme Effectiveness

Programme Evaluation:

  • Analyse the overall effectiveness of the affiliate programme in driving sales, lead generation, or brand visibility. Identify areas for improvement or innovation in programme structures or commission models across accounts.
  • Solicit feedback from affiliates to comprehend pain points and potential enhancements, fostering a mutually beneficial programme.

Moving Forward: Preparing for 2024

To help arm you with the tools needed for success in 2024, Phonexa extends a special holiday offer to new accounts: enjoy a 10% DISCOUNT ON YOUR SUBSCRIPTION FEE*. Make your business merrier this season by contacting sales@phonexa.com to kickstart your subscription today. *This discount applies solely to the monthly licencing fee for the 2024 calendar year, and the promotion concludes on January 31, 2024.

And to express our gratitude for your continued partnership, Phonexa is pleased to present a 10% UPGRADE DISCOUNT* for our valued customers. Make the most of this festive offering by reaching out to your dedicated Customer Success Manager and commence the upgrade process today. *This discount is applicable exclusively to the monthly licencing fee for the 2024 calendar year, and the promotion concludes on January 31, 2024.

Mastering Email Newsletters: Key Strategies from GURU Conference 2023

Whether you’re a marketer, affiliate, or business owner, creating a profitable newsletter requires actionable insights to elevate its quality and turn it into a revenue-driving engine.

The GURU Conference 2023 provided a wealth of insights into mastering email newsletters during the captivating webinar “Email Newsletters: Strategies for Growing Your Audience & Monetising Content” hosted by Phonexa CMO Talar Malakian and MailCon CEO Kristen Haines.

Email marketing stands out as a powerful channel due to its massive user base, high engagement rates, stability, and low operating costs. It offers control and direct relationships, avoiding the uncertainties of algorithm changes on social media platforms.

Let’s dive into the proven tactics and key takeaways that will empower you to create compelling newsletters, grow your audience, and monetise your content effectively.

Want to further explore the path to email newsletter monetisation? Cheque out GURU and Phonexa’s co-presented e-book, “Monetising Emails: Your Fast Track to Scaling Revenue Through Affiliate Marketing via Email.” 

The Power of Email & Challenges in Newsletter Monetisation

Malakian and Haines dived right into creating email newsletters that captivate subscribers and serve as a lucrative venture.

“Email surpasses social media and is continually expanding annually … it also trumps even the largest social network in terms of engagement,” said Haines. “Facebook’s organic reach is under 5% this year, and Twitter’s click-through rates are around less than 1%, whereas email, on the other hand, has open rates between 20% to 30% and typically is around the 3% range for click-through rates.”

Stability, low operating costs, control, and more opportunities make email a compelling channel. However, there are potential obstacles to newsletter monetisation.

“There is always the issue of CAN-SPAM laws – the digital landscape as a whole is increasingly being regulated with stringent privacy laws,” said Haines. “With the surge in new newsletters and written content paywalls, subscription fatigue is also a concern.”

Haines also cited the difficulty associated with gated content going viral, as people are less likely to share content that leads to paywalls. Overcoming these challenges requires strategic planning. Malakian suggests focusing on engagement over sheer numbers and understanding the unique value your content brings to guide your monetisation strategy.

“Engagement matters more than numbers,” said Malakian. “You have to look at the signals that tell you that the audience you have grown already, even if it’s a relatively small audience, is responding by opening and clicking through – all the KPIs typically looked at for email.”

Content Creation & Finding Your Niche for Newsletters

Building a successful newsletter starts with resonating content. Find your niche by addressing what’s missing, disrupting existing spaces, and offering unique insights. Authenticity and uniqueness will help your brand stand out in the crowded landscape.

“Focus on what’s missing in the world rather than what you think will be popular,” said Haines. “And when you’re determining your niche, anything that you’ve spent an above-average amount of time learning about can be translated into information valuable to the average person.”

Haines recommends answering the following questions when determining your niche:

  • What space can I be an innovator in? 
  • Is it a new space, or can I disrupt an existing space by being just 1% better than the competition? 
  • What have you done that 95% of the population hasn’t done? 
  • What unique insight do you have that 99% of the population doesn’t have?
  • What’s something you would’ve loved to see five years ago that you want now?

The answers to these questions will ultimately reveal what makes you unique, what makes your brand authentic, and what you are a subject matter expert in. Having this knowledge will uncover what makes your perspective so unique that it’s valuable to others, and they’ll be willing to pay for it.

Strategies for Growing an Engaged Newsletter Subscriber List

Malakian then pivoted the session toward discussing strategies for growing an engaged subscriber list.

“When you focus on building trust and creating an emotional connection within your niche, you’re essentially building the foundation for a successful email newsletter. These are your two most valuable components because they establish credibility,” said Haines. “It’s also the key to engagement, loyalty, and growth since people tend to share content from sources they trust and have an emotional connection to.”

Trust and emotional connection are the foundations of an engaged audience. Delivering consistent, high-quality content and prioritising value is key. Leverage personalisation, storytelling, and exclusivity to deepen the emotional bond. Implementing consistent publishing schedules and utilising social media for outreach contribute to audience growth.

Proven Newsletter Monetisation Tactics

There are diverse monetisation paths, including sponsored content, subscriptions of varying pricing models, affiliate marketing, and community subscriptions. 

Haines examined The Skimm’s success storey to showcase the potential of combining these tactics for a multifaceted revenue approach.

“They disrupted an existing landscape by taking bite-sized, digestible news and content for female millennials and giving it to them in a daily email,” said Haines. “Their revenue model is simple – sponsored content, advertisements, affiliate links, and a paid subscription to Skimm Ahead. And their success storey shows what you can do with valuable content and information that’s unique to you and how you can monetise it and translate it into a multimillion-dollar company.”

Malakian then examined the success storey of Morning Brew to underscore the significance of engagement over size for newsletter monetisation.

“[Morning Brew] started by making news digestible, and they took that same premise and applied it to other niches. They didn’t stay in their lane, but they took the format and duplicated it to create a media empire,” said Malakian. “Their monetisation style is also a mix, and as you scale, the one thing to keep in mind is you don’t have to stick to a single monetisation style. Things can be layered, tiered, and added to your media business because that’s essentially what you’re building.”

Layering monetisation styles and exploring additional revenue streams as your newsletter scales are essential for long-term success. Events, product sales, and diverse partnerships contribute to creating a robust media business.

The GURU Conference 2023 webinar demonstrated that mastering email newsletters requires a strategic blend of content creation, audience engagement, and diversified monetisation tactics. 

By incorporating these key takeaways, you can transform your newsletter into a thriving platform that not only captivates your audience but also becomes a sustainable source of revenue.

To continue the discussion of newsletter monetisation, connect with Malakian and Haines on LinkedIn.

8 Things We Loved About 2023

In the fast-paced world of performance and partner marketing, 2023 emerged as a transformative year marked by technological leaps, shifting consumer behaviours, and a relentless pursuit of innovation at Phonexa.

As we bid farewell to another formidable year, it’s time to reflect on the moments that defined 2023 and celebrate developments and accomplishments that made it a year to remember.

From accolades and partnerships to product advancements and more, each aspect paints a vibrant picture of how Phonexa continuously pushes boundaries.

1. Phonexa Celebrates Sign Unveiling & Expansion Into Canada

Phonexa celebrated many milestones in 2023, but the granddaddy of them all was the unveiling of our new brand sign atop the 15-storey building of our Glendale, California headquarters.

In a corresponding move, we also expanded into Canada due to the market demand for our tech solutions throughout North America.

The sign unveiling signified Phonexa’s long-planned expansion in the Jewel City and cemented us as a key force in growing Glendale into becoming Southern California’s next greatest tech hub. The Los Angeles Business Journal even featured us on a cover story outlining all of the details across our global business, which also features headquarters in the United Kingdom and Ukraine.

On May 12, we commemorated the landmark occasion by hosting a swanky soiree attended by partners, clients, and dignitaries, including Glendale’s former Mayor Ardy Kassakhian.

2. iClear Highlights Tech Innovation

Phonexa’s touted tech team tirelessly worked by innovating and building custom solutions across our entire suite of enterprise-grade marketing products with one goal – to optimise and power performance marketing automation.

Key upgrades made to the platform included iClear, a fraud detection and email verification tool.

Other new features include:

  • Basic Phone Number Validation: This service allows users to check the validity of a phone number according to the format, region, type of phone number, and more.
  • Address Validation: Detects if the same IP address was used to submit different information.
  • iClear Manual Check: This feature allows users to create iClear service requests manually. Manual requests can be processed for third-party services such as Email Hygiene, IP Analysis, Litigant Alert, Litigator Database Lookup, etc.

These enhancements mark Phonexa’s commitment to providing advanced tools and features, ensuring our clients have the most effective solutions for their unique needs and goals.

3. UX & UI that’s Better Than Ever

In addition to all of the tech upgrades, we also improved the UX and UI of our platform year-round. Some of the essential ones include:

  • Smart Search: Phonexa introduced a new feature to enhance the search experience.  In addition to providing users with relevant search results, we incorporated the capability to effortlessly access relevant Knowledge Base articles.
  • My Favourites: The My Favourites pin icon allows users to pin frequently used features and tools to the top of their Phonexa dashboard. In addition to placing these features in one convenient location, users can also add any page or report to My Favourites, thus saving time and increasing productivity when using our robust platform.
  • Dark Mode: For Phonexa users burning the midnight oil when reviewing their performance summary, we developed a solution that’s easy on the eyes – Dark Mode! Using Project Settings, users now have the flexibility to set up Dark Mode on a customised schedule or let it automatically adapt to their operating system. Users can also switch the site theme to Dark Mode for a constant nocturnal experience.

4. Product Tour Gives You The Phonexa Experience in Real-time

One of our favourite developments in 2023 was the launch of the Product Tour, allowing users to embark on a self-guided and engaging exploration of our robust and comprehensive platform.

The Product Tour provides an ungated and guided journey through our key offerings, giving prospects better insights into the features that matter most to them. This interactive experience ensures that each demo is more impactful and tailored to individual needs, enhancing the overall understanding of Phonexa’s diverse suite of solutions.

Here’s a menu of the products you can seamlessly explore during the Product Tour:

5. Amplify Webinar Series Sets New Standard For Learning Industry Insights

In a bold move toward fostering a community of empowered marketing professionals, Phonexa proudly launched Amplify – a dynamic hub for thought leadership and industry insights. Amplify goes beyond the conventional boundaries of marketing platforms, offering engaging webinars that ensure the Amplify community stays at the forefront of industry advancements.

At the heart of Amplify is a commitment to empowering marketing professionals with the knowledge and tools they need to navigate the ever-evolving landscape of performance and partner marketing.

Top experts from the likes of Google, G2, Tipalti, IPQS, and Hawke Media were some of the featured Amplify speakers.

Join Amplify here to stay in the know about our next webinar.

6. G2 and Capterra Rate Phonexa With Raving Reviews, Awards

Phonexa once again reaffirmed its position as a leader in the tech industry by garnering a slew of top honours and badges from Capterra and G2.

Phonexa was included in a series of product shortlists across Capterra, GetApp, and Software Advice.

Phonexa also made its mark across G2’s quarterly reports by collecting several dozen badges and ranks across categories, also dominating G2’s Europe, EMEA & Americas markets with top new leader badges.

7. Partnerships We Struck and Love

Phonexa announced partnerships with Tipalti and Corpay to fortify its automated accounting platform Books360. Phonexa partnered with Tipalti to launch an integration for Phonexa clients that makes global payment methods automated, compliant, and easier than ever for affiliate marketers and publishers. The partnership with Corpay facilitates simple and secure commission payments to affiliates across the globe.

Phonexa also partnered with Anura to release an integration for clients and prospects to eliminate ad fraud and reduce spending on fraudulent campaigns, giving Phonexa clients the ability to use Anura within their Phonexa account to identify suspicious activity based on Anura’s offerings and protect against both invalid traffic and human fraud in real-time.

Phonexa also joined Google Cloud Marketplace in order to provide customers with a new enterprise-grade solution for effectively managing and optimising lead generation and performance marketing programmes for inbound web and call campaigns, outbound call campaigns, email, SMS, and more. Google Cloud Marketplace lets users quickly deploy functional software packages that run on Google Cloud, and allows customers to easily start up a familiar software package with services like Compute Engine or Cloud Storage, with no manual configuration required. When customers transact through Google Cloud Marketplace, they can unlock the value of Phonexa and Google Cloud’s partnership and realise key benefits and features.

The partnerships struck in 2023 have bolstered the Phonexa platform with cutting-edge tools and integrations. Keep an eye out for more partnership announcements in 2024.

8. ‘Level Up With Lilit’ Takes Flight

We closed out a spectacular 2023 in Q4 with the launch of Level Up With Lilit, a podcast hosted by Phonexa’s award-winning CEO Lilit Davtyan.

The podcast embarks on an inspiring journey of personal and professional growth as Davtyan invites a diverse group of entrepreneurs, C-level executives, and emerging leaders for thought-provoking conversations.

The launch of Level Up With Lilit continued a remarkable year for Davtyan. The Phonexa CEO was named the 2023 Female CxO Trailblazer Award winner by the independent UK-based Tech Trailblazers Awards. Earlier in the year, the Los Angeles Times also honoured Davtyan with its prestigious “CEO of the Year” award.

Davtyan also received recognition as one of the distinguished honorees at the 2024 Women of Impact Awards presented by Women Impact Tech. The Top 50 Women of Impact accolade celebrates outstanding women who have significantly shaped the landscape of the tech industry.

One More Thing Before 2023 Comes to a Close

We want to make your success a part of our story in 2024.

That’s why Phonexa is offering a 10% OFF SUBSCRIPTION FEE DISCOUNT* to all new accounts! Seize this amazing stocking stuffer for your business by contacting sales@phonexa.com to get started today.

* The discount is only applicable to the monthly licencing fee for the 2024 calendar year. The promotion expires on January 31, 2024.

And as a thank you for your commitment to our products, Phonexa is offering a 10% OFF UPGRADE DISCOUNT*. Take advantage of this amazing stocking stuffer by contacting your Customer Success Manager to get started today.

* The discount is only applicable to the monthly licenсing fee for the 2024 calendar year. The promotion expires on January 31, 2024.