Issue 04
Nathan Gibson · about five minutes
Affiliate marketing is a company giving you a tracked link. You get paid when someone uses that link and completes the offer. The company sets the amount, the deadline, and the steps that count. You send the link and you tell those steps as written.
The link is how they know it was you
The company cannot pay a person it cannot identify. The tracked link is the identification. The new person opens that link, starts the account or the order there, and finishes the steps. Then the company can match the new customer to the link you sent.
Copy the link from the company’s own page after your account is open. Do not rebuild it, and do not add your own code at the end. A rebuilt link can still open a website. If it does not record you, the company has no one to pay for that signup.
A click is not the completed offer
The offer is complete when the company’s list is done. For a bank, that is often a new account, a deposit of the size they named, and a card turned on. For a service, it is often the first payment and time remaining on the plan. Opening the page is the first step on that list, not the last.
The steps for each current invite are written on the offers page. Read them before you send the link. If you cannot repeat them, wait until you can. The person you send it to is relying on your version of the list.
You do not set the pay
You do not invoice the company. You do not add your own charge on top of their offer. You do not tell your friend a number the company did not publish. If the person already has an account, or they skip a step, the company can pay neither of you and still be inside its own terms.
Two amounts show up on most offers. The welcome bonus goes to the new customer. The referral reward goes to the person who sent the invite. A click triggers neither one. Both wait on the same finished steps.
Your job is the handoff
Find a person who wants the account or the service. Send the company’s link. Tell them the steps in order. After that, the timeline belongs to those steps. A deposit that has not arrived, or a month of service that has not been paid, is unfinished. Unfinished work is not a late payment.
Check back when the company’s window says the reward is decided, not the afternoon you sent the text. If the friend gets stuck, the useful reply is the next unfinished step, copied from the offer, not a new promise.