Does the Affiliate Program functionality actually work?

19-Jul-2010 01:31 PM

Complex Family

Posts: 17

Hello,
I set up an Affiliate Program many months ago and it doesn't work.
I have submitted multiple Support Requests to have this resolved, but to no avail.
Does anyone have the Affiliate Program successfully working on their website, or is this functionality purely smoke and has never worked??

Thanks.

19-Jul-2010 01:51 PM

mt

Posts: 125

I've set up an affiliate program successfully, but there is no working reporting for it, and no way to accurately tell what's gone on with your affiliates so you can pay them appropriately.

It's never worked correctly, and BC has outstanding development tickets for this.

19-Jul-2010 02:46 PM

Complex Family

Posts: 17

Thanks for your post, MT.

Likewise, I've successfully set up an Affiliate Program, but nothing appears to record against it for sales or commissions owing.

Really disappointing, as this was core functionality we were sold on when evaluating alternative CMSs.

19-Jul-2010 03:24 PM

Always Interactive

Posts: 498

Hi Complex Family,

Bail out on the Affiliate Program now. It just plain does not work. Infact not only are the reports insignificant and the commissions impossible to manage and do not have an automated process for managing payouts. The commissions do not even calculate properly, you could find your self loosing a lot of money OR ripping off your Affiliates in either case you'll waste Hours upon hours of time running the numbers trying to figure out where it is all going wrong.

I have a client that runs an excel spreadsheet and 3 differnt BC reports just to manage it all and he only has 30 affiliates.

Further to all this there is absolutly no road map what so ever to make any enhancements to the affiliate program - I know this because I have been told directly from BC.

There may even be a chance that the Module gets pulled from the menu for all futute accounts (at some time). Also I heard this directly from BC them selves.

The Affiliate module is an absolute dead weight and BC's Achillies Heal.

You probably want a solution...

I have been in touch with another BC partner Jason Miller. He has spend coutless hours with a company named Quality Unit, that produce an AMAZING affiliate program called Post Affiliate Pro 4. Jason has been helping this company, with his knowledge of BC, to develope PAP4 into integrating directly with BC http://www.qualityunit.com/postaffiliatepro/#a_aid=3mdcom

We are in the process of integrating PAP4 with BC for one of our clients. We are just waiting on the finished documentation, as it is being updated.

The link I have provided above is an affiliate link for Jason, which he provided me. If you guys do end up using PAP4 please use the link above so Jason can slowly begin earning back the time and effort he put in with Quality Unit to help get it a point that it can integrate with BC - which is no easy feat!

Billy

19-Jul-2010 04:25 PM

Complex Family

Posts: 17

Wow, disheartening news on the Affiliate Program with BC ... but thanks for your insightful response, Billy!

I have been wondering whether it was going to come to this, as BC have been really slack at responding to my requests for support on this!

I will certainly use Jason's Post Affiliate Pro 4 link to use the respective Affiliate Program system once it's finished and integrated.

Thanks again,
Simon

20-Jul-2010 06:57 AM

Always Interactive

Posts: 498

No worries Simon.

Once I have set up our client with PAP4 I'll come back to this forum thread and maybe a few other Affilate related threads and give a reveiw/report on how it all went and any tips and pointers I can give too.

Billy

22-Jul-2010 05:22 AM

Green

Posts: 22

Billy,

When you say "integrate with BC," what exactly do you mean? Will clients be able to access reporting from within the BC back office? I'm very interested...please keep me posted!

BC - Can you respond to this thread? Is what I'm reading true? My clients are VERY psyched about the Affiliate program...do I have to go back now and tell them that I was lying about its capabilities?

22-Jul-2010 08:35 AM

Always Interactive

Posts: 498

Green,

The affiliate system will not be apart of the BC back office. It will be a stand alone system. However you will 1000 times more power than you would with the BC affiliate program, the interface is very easy to work with and your clients customers wil have a far greater experience in their login area.

As far as asking whether or not you will need to go back to your client and disappoint them with the news that the BC affiliate system won't work for them... the answer here is yes you will. Don't wait for BC to tell you because it is their job to 'sell' this system - they'll dance around its limited capabilities but will never say 'yes go else where for a 3rd party program'. I don't say this to put BC down, I LOVE BC. but we have gone through some major heart ache because we promised our client an affiliate system and the BC one just does not work. If you tell your client now about the affiliate system they may be disappointed, but if you develope their business into the BC affiliate program they will be majorly pissed off in ways I can't discribe. Do Not Use The Affiliate System from BC.

I hope to have some more news here in the next day or so.

Billy

22-Jul-2010 10:06 AM

Complex Family

Posts: 17

Yeah unfortunately I tend to concur with you on this, Billy.

I've received the run-around from BC with the Affiliate Program and very conflicting feedback from different BC representatives. Just today I've received an email from Brett stating that the Affiliate Program functionality does indeed work as planned. However, for the last 2 months I've received emails from Mario and Daniel stating it doesn't work and that they are trying to get it working ... go figure.

What I can say is that I managed to set up the Affiliate Program fine, but the issue (apparently) is that your website domain's affiliate link (eg. http://www.complexfamily.com/AP.aspx?ID=788&EID=3490678) differs to the secure checkout domain name (https://complexfamily.worldsecuresystems.com/OrderRetrievev2.aspx?Step=13&OrderID=261142), and if you're using a non-seemless payment gateway, then BC are experiencing problems recording the sale against the appropriate domain name (ie. your own domain) upon return from the gateway.

So yup, possibly better to disappoint your clients now … or join forces and continue submitting Support Requests with BC to bump this up the priority list.

Like Billy, I too love the BC system … and typically find BC's support to be fairly good too.

26-Jul-2010 10:12 AM

N97

Posts: 202

Could BC please respond to this openly and honestly, and elaborate on this accordingly.

As a premiulm partner presell it was understood that Affiliate program was a component of The Online Business Solution, and while it had limited functionality it is reasonable to expect "the Online Business solution" to be enhanced. Affiliate programs are a fundamental component of an online business and if this component is to be a fundamental flaw in BC then BC can not be considered a serious player going forward.

BC please respond to these rumours about Affiliate program module being removed and or not on road map etc.

Because BC manage this forum a nonresponse to the thread from BC will be taken as an indicator that Affiliate module is dead in the water.

Thanks in advance.

26-Jul-2010 11:24 AM

mt

Posts: 125

Hi guys -
We use a seamless payment gateway so URLs aren't a problem for us. Where the affiliate program let us down is on reporting.

When my client does reporting for affiliates, the commissions owed and order numbers in the top section are correct, but the list of orders below does not reflect all of the orders.

I was given a development ticket for this by Daniel.

26-Jul-2010 11:47 AM

Complex Family

Posts: 17

Thanks for the feedback, MT. As we use a non-seemless gateway, it appears that even if BC get this side sorted, then we're still up for the next hurdle with incorrect order reporting.

N97, I've been in communication via Support Tickets with several BC people, and unfortunately I've made very little headway ... I've tried escalating this issue to BC management, but have had absolutely zero response. You may want to look into Billy's post (Always Interactive) regarding alternative Affiliate Program options...

Simon Darcey
Complex Family

26-Jul-2010 11:01 PM

Green

Posts: 22

MT - Does that mean your clients ARE able to pay the correct commission amount to each affiliate? And that the only issue is that there is a glitch in the line-by-line listing of orders?

Thanks.

27-Jul-2010 08:25 AM

Always Interactive

Posts: 498

Green, I can see what you are doing, you are hoping that the Affiliate system with in BC is going to work for you, you're sniffing out a glimmer of hope that it will do what you want it to do. I have nothing to gain or lose if you choose to use the BC affiliate system or not, in fact I will be losing time and money by updating this post with more info on PAP4. But this will be the last time I warn you that if you do choose to use the BC affiliate system you will regret it.

Forget about the BC affiliate module.

Billy

27-Jul-2010 08:48 AM

mt

Posts: 125

No Green,
There's no way to pay correctly. We're actually using the affiliate program for doing fundraising programs. It's a small operation and we can bungle our way through with the BC program.

I'd advise against using the affiliate program for anything but the most basic uses. Billy has given lots of info on the affiliate program on multiple threads.

Good luck if you try it!

31-Jul-2010 02:53 PM

chuck

Posts: 29

Billy
Can the PAP4 system be installed on BC or is a hosted system preferable?

Chuck

31-Jul-2010 03:34 PM

Always Interactive

Posts: 498

It can't be installed on the BC stsyem it needs to hosted else where. It needs to run PHP scripts.

Billy

31-Jul-2010 11:26 PM

Green

Posts: 22

Billy - Pardon my questions, but I'm still a bit confused on the affiliate program you're referring. You have said that your friend Jason spent countless hours "integrating with BC" the PAP4 program...yet a few posts later you say that it is not integrated, it is a stand-alone program. I'm confused...is it "integrated" or not? I'd love to give it a try if it works with BC, but I'm not clear how it does...or how its different from any of the other hundreds of standalone affiliate programs out there. Can you help me understand? Also, if I were to refer customers to it, would they be able to set it up themselves or will I have to pay my programmer to do this each time? Thanks so much for sharing your helpful info!!! Really appreciate it!

Everyone Else - I had no problem at all getting a response from BC in a timely fashion. Barry replied to my query within 1 day and this was his response:
The affiliate programs does work, but not with non-seamless gateways (except for PayPal Website Standard). So if you are using a seamless gateway it will track referrals and commissions owing for every order accurately. There are some extra reports that customers have asked for which we are not able to deliver in 2010 and this has been an issue in our community. I do encourage you to look into the feature to make sure it's adequate as is, before promoting. We'd love to enhance it sooner, but currently we are not able to do that.

02-Aug-2010 07:51 AM

Always Interactive

Posts: 498

Hi Green. Sorry I have not been clear on how it works. I'll give a quick run down and I will do my best to keep it accurate...remember i am just relaying what has been told to me from Jason Miller who is another BC partner. I was hoping to have it all operational by now so I could post back here, but I ran into a small hurdle with my particular client that put a pause on the set up. Should have it complete this week.

It operates as a stand alone Affiliate software.
It runs PHP so it needs to be put on a seperate server, the guys at Quality Unit will do the install for you for a very small fee, so you might include that fee in your cost to your clients.
It uses the BC API to be notified when ever there is a purchase, it then pulls all the purchase data from the BC database.
You add a single custom field to the registration buy form and hide it, *a script looks for an affilate ID with in a cookie and embeds the ID into the hidden field. When the all the purchase data is pulled from BC so is the Affiliate ID, hence PAP4 knows who to credit with a commission on the order.

I'll see if I can get Jason to post here and elaborate on my points and add to it.
Billy

05-Aug-2010 08:31 AM

chuck

Posts: 29

Billy

Would you suggest creating a new domain name on the server that will be hosting the affiliate software? For instance, if the BC site is www.mydomain.com should I create a new domain on my affiliate server called www.mydomainaffiliates.com?

Thanks
chuck

05-Aug-2010 10:00 AM

mt

Posts: 125

You can use a subdomain for this Chuck, and point the A record of the subdomain to the other system. :)

05-Aug-2010 12:15 PM

Always Interactive

Posts: 498

thanks MT, either option will work chuck. I suggest setting up with what works best for you.

My client has www.mydomain.com and runs the PAP4 off of www.mydomain.net just because he had that domain already in use hosting other stuff.

Billy

06-Aug-2010 12:46 AM

chuck

Posts: 29

Thanks MT and Billy

Chuck

05-Sep-2010 10:33 AM

chuck

Posts: 29

I wanted to revisit this forum thread to let everyone know that, with Jason Miller's help, I have Post Affiliate Pro 4 working on my most recent e-commerce site. The power and features built into PAP4 makes this affiliate software well worth the reasonable price. And Jason did a exceptional job in building the Adobe Business Catalyst plugin that makes is work so well with BC.

Check it out and see if it's a good solution for you. If you do go with PAP4, please use Jason's link so he can earn something for the time he spent developing the plugin.

http://www.qualityunit.com/postaffiliatepro/#a_aid=3mdcom

chuck