The Ultimate Guide to Affiliate Networks for Fashion Bloggers

So you're a blogger looking for ways to monetize your site through affiliate links or do it better? There are a myriad of affiliate programs out there and all have their pros and cons. As a fashion platform for bloggers, we've had first-hand experience with quite a few of them. Here's a breakdown of 4 affiliate programs that have proved most rewarding to us.

ShopSense

ShopSense is a pay-per-click program, which means that you earn commission from clicks on products that you link to. This affiliate network is appropriate for your blog if your readers tend to just look instead of buy.

Registration: 5/5
The registration in ShopSense is very easy and will take just a few moments.

Analytics: 5/5
As advertized, the analytics on ShopSense is user-friendly and not scary.

Payment: 3/5
There's a $100 payment threshold in ShopSense which means that you have to earn $100 before they transfer the revenue to you. When your balance reaches $100, you will be paid on the 20th of the following month.

Payment methods: 5/5
PayPal

Customer Support: 1/5
The only way to get in touch with ShopSense customer support is to email them at shopsense@shopstyle.com. Don't expect to get a quick reply though. Sometimes you won't get it at all!

Total: 3.8/5

Skimlinks

Skimlinks is a pay-per-sale program. It means that you'll get commission only if your reader buys the product you're linking to. If you want to use Skimlinks on your blog, you have to add their Javascript code to your site's template. After that, Skimlinks will turn all links to eligible merchants on your blog into affiliate links. In other words, if your reader follows a link to a product of a Skimlinks affiliated brand and buys this product, you'll get a portion of that sale (between 4% and 20% depending on the brand).

Registration: 4/5
After you apply to Skimlinks, they will review your application which will take a day or two. One of the things Skimlinks look at when reviewing an application is whether the blogger has any outbound links to products on their site.

Analytics: 5/5
Skimlinks analytics is intuitive and detailed providing you with basically anything you would want to know. When checking your commissions, be prepared to see sales deducted sometimes. This means that the product that was bought through your affiliate link was returned after all.

Payment: 4/5
There's a $10 threshold on payments and the revenue is transferred with a 60-day delay. For instance, the revenue you accrue in May will be paid at the end of July.

Payment methods: 5/5
PayPal

Customer support: 5/5
The wonderful customer support adds up to the positive experience from Skimlinks. When your application is approved, you get a welcome email from your personal account manager. That's the person you can email if you have any questions.

Bonus: +1
Skimlinks has a referral program where if you refer a new user to them, they'll pay you 35% of what they earn during the first year.

Total: 4.8/5

Viglink

Viglink is a pay-per-sale program too. Just like Skimlinks, it operates via a Javascript code on your site. The difference between Viglink and Skimlinks is in the brands they affiliate. There are some brands that Viglink doesn't work with, but Skimlinks does, and vice versa. Also, different brands offer different commission rates in Viglink and Skimlinks. For instance, Nordstrom has a 12% commission rate on Viglink and 10% on Skimlinks. Note that because Skimlinks and Viglink use a very similar technology, you can't install both on your site.

Registration: 3/5
The registration in Viglink is instant, meaning that there's no approval process like with Skimlinks. However, there are some restricted brands in Viglink that are not available by default. To start affiliating these brands, you need to create a request in the Viglink help service listing those brands.

Analytics: 3/5
Viglink analytics is a bit counter-intuitive. You'll have to make a few clicks to get to the graphs.

Payment: 5/5
The minimum amount for the payout in Viglink is only $1 and the commissions are paid out with a 60-day delay.

Payment methods: 5/5
PayPal

Customer support: 4/5
For customer support you can create a ticket in the Viglink support service (http://support.viglink.com/home) or email them at support@viglink.com. They usually respond very quickly.

Bonus: +1
Viglink also has a referral program and they'll pay you 35% of their commission for a year for each new user.

Total: 4.2/5

Amazon Associates

Amazon Associates is a pay-per-sale program. Amazon commission rate varies from 4% to 8.5% depending on the number of closed sales. For instance, you'll get a 4% commission for 1-6 sales and a 8.5% commission for over 3131 sales. Another thing to take note of (and this falls into the cons category) is that you won't get commission for purchasing through your own affiliate links.

Registration: 4/5
The registration in Amazon Associates includes identity verification by mobile phone.

Analytics: 2/5
The Amazon analytics is very basic (or as we refer to it, 'old school'). Amazon doesn't visualize earnings reports in graphs, hence 2/5.

Payment: 4/5
The minimum payment threshold is $10 if you're paid by a gift certificate or direct bank deposit and $100 if you're paid by check. The revenue is paid out with a 60-day delay.

Payment methods: 1/5
Amazon doesn't do PayPal transfers. If you have a US bank account, you can choose direct deposit as your payment method. If you live outside the US, your options are Amazon gift certificates or checks.

Customer support: 4/5
The available support channels are by phone and email. During office hours you can also chat with the help service.

Bonus: +2
The cool thing about Amazon Associates is that if the visitor you referred ends up buying a TV set, for instance, within the following 30 days after using your link, you'll get a portion of that sale too!

Total: 3.4/5

How you can increase your affiliate revenue

The downside to using affiliate links is that products you're linking to go out of stock within several weeks. It means that you don't have live affiliate links in your old posts which are usually the ones ranked highest by search engines. But what if you could always have a load of affiliate links even in your old posts? That's when Lookastic comes in.

Lookastic unites ShopSense, Skimlinks, Viglink and Amazon Associates and provides product widgets that you can embed on your blog posts. Clicks from these widgets will be distributed between the said affiliate programs in the most efficient manner. For instance, clicks on low-priced products will be sent to ShopSense and clicks on more expensive products will be sent either to Skimlinks or Viglink depending on in which of them the brand in question offers the highest commission rate.