MAM
Affiliate marketing: The new rage in the post-Covid2019 world
The Covid2019 outbreak has affected the marketing budgets of brands. The situation, despite being difficult, throws up opportunities to be innovative and get aggressive on new-age marketing strategies. While digital marketing has been in vogue for some time now, within this domain, several brands are redefining their marketing space by dedicating a large chunk of their budgets to affiliate marketing.
The new strategy is in line with companies’ plans to conserve cash and focus on result-oriented marketing channels. Brands like ‘The Man Company’ have taken the lead by shifting a huge pie of their budget to affiliate marketing for their online business.
“Affiliate marketing as a channel has helped us acquire new customers at a lower cost as compared to paid ads, helping us to get a better ROI. This channel gives us dual advantages. On one side, we are able to acquire new paying customers and pay only for sales. On the other hand, we get visibility across multiple publishers without spending much advertising money. With a network in place, we are able to outsource our affiliate management task which helps us reduce our overhead costs, without any compromise on the scale. Thus, it helps us to reach out to new customers in a cost-effective way. As a brand, this helps us to reach out to the new users through multiple publishers,” says The Man Company business head Atul Jain.
Some of the key roles of the affiliate networking/industry in the success of a marketing campaign are as follows:
How does affiliate marketing help?
Affiliate marketing is a commission-based marketing model wherein the online sellers pay publishers for every purchase made through their affiliate link. The vital factor of this marketing segment is that it works on the cost-per-acquisition model where the brand will be spending money once they acquire a customer.
Customer acquisition at a lower cost: Traditionally, marketing has been a cost-heavy proposition. In the pre-Covid2019 world, when cash flows were good, companies seldom focused on ROI. But now, every penny matters, and there isn’t a better way to get the maximum out of your marketing investments. The commission is paid to the publisher only when the desired conversion takes place. Also, you need not incur an overhead cost for creating a marketing campaign to enter a relatively new market. The entire process of customer acquisition and sales becomes a low-cost affair. An effective affiliate program ensures that customer engagement leads to conversion.
Targeted customers: A successful brand always looks to penetrate into newer markets and acquire new customers. With Covid2019 induced lockdowns, there’s a large number of people spending time online, especially in tier-2 and tier-3 cities. With an effective affiliate marketing campaign, brands can reach out to new customers like housewives and older people who were hitherto not available online. Categories like online games, health and care product, OTT services, e-learning are giving encouraging results to brands. Affiliate marketing channels also contribute to increased brand awareness, allowing companies to have a larger customers base resulting in higher revenues. Moreover, because the payouts are linked with performance, it gives brands the flexibility to scale the numbers through this channel without any financial risks.
Offers a variety of traffic inventories: It is never a good idea to put all eggs in one basket. Affiliate networks work in the same way by working with multiple publishers and traffic inventories and then scale the numbers with the inventory which is performing the most.
You can use a variety of traffic sources like coupon, cashbacks, email marketing, SMS, push notifications, price comparison and also the new-age affiliate channels such as influencers, social media groups, messengers, affiliate stores, etc. It helps brands reach out to their target audience, ensuring that the potential customer has converted not into a lead but a sale. Running your campaign through different sources simultaneously also ensures that if one stream on generating the audience collapses due to any external factor, the other stream keeps functioning.
Technology build: Affiliate marketing has a big role in technology as well. Optimisation models and AI can help brands in promoting their services and products. Moreover, the best analytics tool built by affiliate networks gives support to analyse the traffic and provides a transparent picture to brands for their investment. To provide better experience Admitad also offers a solution of universal tracking which brings app and web tracking under one roof. The tool helps in saving costs for brands who invest more money on app-specific tracking platforms. The main feature of this technology: real-time tracking helps in analysing which affiliate program and marketing campaigns work for you and which one of them need to be changed to generate profitable results.
Also, affiliate networks keep affiliates a step ahead by providing them with the best technology which makes it easier for them to share the content with their audience. Tools such as Admitad Еxtension help influencers and content site owners to maximise their earnings. Through Admitad telegram bot, publishers can easily generate links to reach out to their customers and earn money.
Saves on internal manpower cost: A successful affiliate program does away with the need of having a large in-house team to take care of their promotions and affiliate program. Brands get tech support and a dedicated account manager from the affiliate network that allows them to integrate their operations from different platforms for tracking and technological requirements.
Businesses need to adapt to new realities to remain relevant. The world of business is undergoing unprecedented transformation at a breakneck speed. Brands that make strategic changes as per the changed behaviour of customers will flourish and grow in the coming years.
Are you ready with your new marketing strategy?
(The author is country manager of Admitad India. The views expressed are her own and Indiantelevision.com may not subscribe to them.)
Brands
Jubilant FoodWorks faces Rs 47.5 crore GST demand, plans appeal
Tax authorities flag alleged misclassification of restaurant services
MUMBAI:Â Jubilant FoodWorks Limited has landed in a tax tussle after receiving a GST demand of Rs 47.5 crore from the office of the additional commissioner of CGST and central excise in Thane, Maharashtra.
The order, issued under the provisions of the Central Goods and Services Tax Act, 2017, relates to an alleged incorrect classification of certain services under the category of restaurant services. According to the tax authorities, this classification resulted in a short payment of goods and services tax for the period between the financial years 2019-20 and 2021-22.
The demand includes Rs 47.5 crore in GST along with an equal amount as penalty, in addition to applicable interest. The order was received by the company on March 13, 2026.
In a regulatory filing to the BSE Limited and the National Stock Exchange of India Limited, the company said it disagrees with the order and believes its arguments were not adequately considered.
The company is preparing to challenge the decision and plans to file an appeal. It added that once the redressal process is complete, the demand is likely to be dropped.
Despite the sizeable figure attached to the notice, the company said it does not expect any material impact on its financials, operations or other activities.
The disclosure was signed by Suman Hegde, EVP and chief financial officer, who confirmed that the company received the order at 19:06 IST on March 13 and has already initiated steps to contest it.
The development places the quick service restaurant major in the middle of a tax debate that could hinge on how certain restaurant-linked services are classified under GST rules. For now, the company appears ready to take the matter from the tax office to the appeals desk.
