• Best Pay-Per-Call Networks
  • Best CPA Networks
  • Best CPS Affiliate Networks
  • mThink Digital
  • Thought Leadership
    • White Papers
  • About
    • Content Marketing
    • Content Strategy
      • Web Content
      • Social Media Strategy
      • Webinars & Video
      • Thought Leadership
    • Performance Marketing
    • Portfolio
      • Revenue Performance
      • Accenture
      • Microsoft
      • Java Detour
      • Our Process
    • Contact Us

mThink

Blue Book Logo

BlueBook Logo

The Trusted Name in Performance Marketing

Revenue & eCommerce Blog

  • Home
  • Blue Book
    • About Blue Book
    • Blue Ribbon Panel
    • Interviews
    • Research Methodology
    • Back Issues
    • Advertising
      • Website Creative Specifications
      • Newsletter Creative Specifications
  • Best CPA Networks
  • Best CPS Affiliate Networks
  • Best Pay-Per-Call Networks
  • eCommerce

What’s Driving The Creative Destruction In Affiliate Marketing?

January 24, 2019 by Chris Trayhorn

One of my biggest takeaways from Affiliate Summit was that we are well and truly into an era when VC and private equity money dominates the industry. If a network hasn’t brought in new owners or investors already, there’s a good chance they’re out there looking. And if investment funds are already in place, then it is likely that they are actively searching for new acquisitions. The affiliate marketing M&A sector is hot right now, and it’s going to get hotter because there are at least four factors driving the influx of money:

  1. The existing MarTech and AdTech investment sectors have been saturated and are already starting to consolidate as weaker players fall away and the platform companies like Adobe and Salesforce eat up market share. The venture capital and private equity funds have been piling into biotech but even there the new opportunities are thin on the ground. Affiliate marketing represents relatively virgin territory to these perennially hungry investment groups.
  2. It is estimated that the Trump tax cuts allowed companies to repatriate around $500 billion previously held offshore. In an economy in which profits were already at near record highs and wages have been flat for years, this additional influx has contributed to a flood of cash for shareholders during 2018. Goldman Sachs estimated that stock buybacks and dividends would hit almost $1.3 trillion through 2018. Those stockholders now need to reinvest all that extra income, and VC and PE funds are significant beneficiaries. The result is that the need for these funds to find new opportunities has effectively been supercharged. Funds have a ton of cash currently and few places to invest it that will give them the returns they need.
  3. Display advertising is broken, Google has extracted most of the profit out of search, nobody trusts Facebook or their metrics, and fraud is rampant. That sounds over-dramatic but I’d be happy to defend it as a statement of where things are in digital media currently. A good illustration of just how bad things are is that there’s a big switch back to television – one of the least measureable, trackable media around – among the largest brands as brand owners recognize that digital advertising doesn’t build brand equity, and that behavioral targeting doesn’t add incremental sales. Affiliate marketing addresses a lot of concerns in this regard. The costs are predictable and scaleable by revenue, and the risk of fraud is largely transferred to media-buying affiliates. Performance marketing can and should be a refuge for CMO’s seeking real results.
  4. GDPR is already biting behavioral marketing companies in Europe – Google was find $57 million just this week – and with the Democrats winning the House we are likely to see increasing pressure for privacy reforms here in the USA. Again, affiliate marketing allows brand owners to pass the risk down their marketing supply chain. GDPR and privacy regulations are good for performance marketing. 

These four trends are creating a situation in our industry that will generate what used to known creative destruction. Networks with new investment will invest in new technology and growth and will extend their lead over smaller, less-well-funded competitors. Some networks will try to grow too fast and will flame out, while others will enter into M&As that may or may not succeed as they struggle to integrate brands, staff and technology.

2019 may be the most interesting and dynamic year we have yet seen in the performance marketing industry. Watch this space.

Related posts:

  1. Push Notification Traffic: Why it Works and What Platforms to Use As seen in the MaxBounty blog Like Native ads a...
  2. The Lead-Gen Pay-Per-Call Opportunity Is Now The new BLUE BOOK Pay-Per-Call network rankings have generated a...
  3. How Tequila Helps Business: ClickDealer’s Event Strategy They say success comes with true passion to one’s craft....
  4. In Defense of Networks One thing that becomes obvious as you look through the...

Filed Under: Blue Book, Featured, Revenue Tagged With: Affiliate Marketing Tips

Search

ROS Column 2 High – 300×250 (Global)

ROS Column 2 Mid – 300×250 (Global)

ROS Column 2 Low – 300×misc (Global)

Subscribe to our newsletter!

Lowest Ad in Column 2 – 300×250

Recent Posts

  • TCPA Alert: Court Rules that Transactional Text Messages Not Advertising and Coverage Developments
  • A New Kind Of Affiliate Marketing Management Agency: Vibrant Performance To Focus On The Fin-Tech Space
  • What’s Driving The Creative Destruction In Affiliate Marketing?
  • CrakRevenue Introduces the ACH Payment System for Its Affiliates
  • FTC Absorbs Multiple Blows to its Enforcement Authority
  • CrakRevenue Announces Partnership with BlueChew, Chewable Alternative to Viagra & Cialis
  • Blue Book 2019 Top 20 Revealed!
  • FDA Position on Cannabis-Derived Compounds
  • As Oath Writes-Down $4.5 Billion Yahoo/AOL Acquisition, Performance Marketing Thrives
  • Push Notification Traffic: Why it Works and What Platforms to Use
  • As Google and Facebook Answer Questions, Performance Marketers Can Make Hay
  • TCPA Alert December 2018
  • The Power of the Content Publisher
  • FTC Attorney on Recent TCPA Litigation Developments
  • Four Advertisers On How To Grow & Win In Performance Marketing

About mThink

mThink is a specialist digital marketing company based in San Francisco. We focus on media buying, Facebook marketing, direct response, social and mobile. In addition mThink produces the annual Blue Book Rankings of major performance marketing networks. Read More »

Copyright ©2019 · mThink. All rights reserved.
3053 Fillmore Street, Suite 325 | (415) 787-0250
Disclaimer | Privacy Policy