Digiday+ Research: Publishers need to diversify their affiliate commerce businesses

Affiliate commerce has grown into a small, promising revenue stream for many publishers. But a lot of publishers might be able to significantly grow their commerce revenues just by diversifying the way they generate them, according to new Digiday+ research. 

In September, Digiday asked 82 publisher professionals a series of questions about how their organizations make money and how they expect the 2021 holiday season to differ from last year’s. The 51 respondents who indicated they made money through affiliate commerce were asked a distinct set of questions. 

Asked how they thought their affiliate commerce revenues would change in the next year, around 60% of respondents said they thought those revenues would go up, both on the direct partnership side and on the network side, with larger percentages expecting a significant boost to their direct deals in 2022. A slim percentage of respondents said they expected their direct partnerships revenue to go down.

Significant percentages of the publishers with affiliate commerce businesses are only making money in one way. Among publishers that generate affiliate revenue through direct partnerships, for example, close to 30% do not make any money through affiliate networks. 

Conversely, among the publishers that monetize their affiliate content through networks, an almost identical share do not make any money through direct deals with advertisers.