Average Affiliate Conversion Rates

[bfree74]

What is an average conversion rate range for affiliates to be reaching. Is 5% average, or lower?

[Linda Buquet]

Conversion rates LARGELY rest on the merchant - not the affiliate.
If the merchant site is not designed to convert well even a good affiliate will not get decent conversions.

Average merchant conversion rates are around 2% but it varies by industry.

So IF the merchant converts at 2% some affiliates that do PPC or have super targeted traffic could convert a little better than that but the average affiliate that just sticks a banner on a general non-targeted site could get horrible conversion rates.

So then if you look at average conversion rates for your program specifically your overall conversions could have LOTS to do with how well you manager your program. If you have lots of strong partners and give them the right tools your average comversions could be high. If you accept anyone under the sun and have crappy banners that just go to the homepage, no datafeed
and don't pro-actively manage your affiliates then your average conversion rate could be pulled WAY down even if you have some good affiliates.

Affiliates can certainly impact their conversions by doing good ad placement, good pre-sell, using testimonials and all of that FOR SURE. But if you have tons of affiliates just throwing up a home page banner it will water down your overall conversion average. Make sense?

You like the way I put most of the conversion responsibility back on you, the merchant?
That probably wasn't the answer you wanted!

[AffiliateGuild]

What you really want to know is if your website converts.

I'm looking at denverfabrics.com ... somewhere you should provide affiliates
a link directly to the site to review it ... although, I'm not overly fond of
the site's design.

What happens when someone phones the 800 number? Do they ask "How did
you hear about us?" Does the affiliate get paid even when someone phones
in the order?

I had to go an average of 5 clicks into the site before I was shown images
of the fabrics. That's a lot, so that's a very low conversion rate as a result.

The use of secured site banners is good. That adds buyer confidence. So,
that helps conversion a lot.

I'm not going to do the whole site's conversion for you, but you should get
the idea of what to look for from just these few tips.

Good luck with it!

[bfree74]

The 800 number is for customer service, we place very few orders by phone, and the ones we do take by phone are tracked and affiliates are given credit. I agree with the site design comment, which is why we are doing a total overhaul on our site to increase easy navigation through our site. Also we are changing our shopping cart in a hope to decrease cart abandonment rates.

[AffiliateGuild]

Originally Posted by bfree74

The 800 number is for customer service, we place very few orders by phone, and the ones we do take by phone are tracked and affiliates are given credit. I agree with the site design comment, which is why we are doing a total overhaul on our site to increase easy navigation through our site. Also we are changing our shopping cart in a hope to decrease cart abandonment rates.

I would imagine your abandonment issues will decrease significantly with one or two clicks to the buy process.

Awesome re phone ... I know shareasale has a little app that will pop the affiliate's info for the call taker too. Might be worth your time.

Site redesign is a good move. I will say I liked the fabric samples I looked at.
They gave me a real sense of the fabric ... and that ads buyer confidence.

Looks like you guys are doing the right things. Ping me again when the site redesign is done.

[Teli]

To add just a small comment to what's already been mentioned (all great advice), I will say that in the redesign, attention to page loading speed should be at the top of the list.

Currently, on DSL, it took more than a while for all of the images to load on the front page and someone on a slower connection may abandon the website before it finishes. That could have a negative impact on conversion rates as well.

Good luck,
~ Teli