What are the benefits and drawbacks of using Shopify's native affiliate tracking app?

Shopify's native affiliate tracking app offers benefits like seamless integration, easy setup, and direct access to Shopify's ecosystem, simplifying management. It provides essential tracking features and centralized reporting. However, drawbacks include limited customization options, fewer advanced features compared to third-party tools, and potential higher costs as your affiliate program scales. Additionally, the app may lack some specialized functionalities needed for complex affiliate strategies, requiring supplemental tools for comprehensive management.

Shopify's native affiliate tracking app is actually called Shopify Collabs. It's a built-in feature within the Shopify platform that allows you to create and manage your own influencer marketing and affiliate programs directly from your Shopify dashboard. Though it's limited in it's capabilities it's an easy app to use. I prefer Social Snowball because of it's 700+ rewards options, fraud prevention tools, integrations with premiere apps like Klaviyo, Attentive, Poscript, Zapier, Creator Commerce, and more, and finally their customer support is phenomenal.

Shopify’s solution is named Shopify Collabs and serves as a solid end-to-end influencer/affiliate marketing platform. It offers gifting, recruitment, multi-tiers, payouts, and integrations with platforms like CreatorCommerce. While a great place to get started it’s main draw back is a lack of new functionality & account management. If looking for a team to support you in affiliate/influencer marketing decisions one should seek out paid apps such as Social Snowball. Inherently because Shopify Collabs is free, it won’t be able to offer hands on support.

Shopify's native affiliate app, Collabs, was formerly known as Dovetale before Shopify purchased the company in 2022. It allows brands to easily spin up an affiliate/creator program including features like signup forms, payouts, collaborations and more. It has 155 reviews on the Shopify App store with an average rating of 2.5/5

Benefits include seamless integration with your Shopify store, real-time tracking, and ease of use for both merchants and affiliates. However, drawbacks may include limited customization options compared to third-party solutions and potential higher costs if you require more advanced features or extensive reporting capabilities.

Access to their marketplace of millions of affiliates. This is all free, so overall your cost to participate in Shopify Collabs is time & margin (to cover commissions & discounts on sales). They offer an array of out of the box tools from gifts, custom tiers, payouts, profiles, listings, etc.

It's easy to use: Shopify Collabs is designed to be user-friendly, even if you're not a marketing expert. It's affordable: Shopify Collabs is included with all Shopify plans, so you don't need to pay any extra fees to use it. It's integrated with Shopify: Shopify Collabs is seamlessly integrated with the rest of the Shopify platform, so you can easily track your affiliate program's performance alongside your other sales data.

It's free which makes it an excellent solution for brands that are just getting started! It also comes with a level of trust provided by being an app owned and operated by Shopify

Shopify's native affiliate tracking app is free and gives you easy access - so might be useful for a first glance into the affiliate marketing for your product

For starters, Shopify Collabs is free. Your affiliate commissions are integrated into your shopify invoice which makes it easier to manage if you are a small company. However, there are many more advantages that enhance the affiliate experience such as: -Quick and simple sign up -Easy to share vanity affiliate links -User-friendly platform -Discount code (if needed) can be automatically created saving time for the affiliate manager. -You can set budgets and/or products for the affiliate to process on their own -Great tracking due to full Shopify integration

The major drawback is there is too much friction in getting an affiliate to sign up, and once they do sign up, there's hardly a way to nurture them via email or other communication channels. It's very one-sided.

In my experience, the marketplace had a lot of small affiliates who applied under the guise of an influencer but were coupon or trademark bidding affiliates. Overall, I was not impressed with the quality of the marketplace I do see Collabs as an influencer focused platform. Without the security of network payment, I don't imagine we will see some of the larger publishers joining Collabs

The major issue with Shopify's native app is the limited nature of the product. This tool feels very much tailored more to an Influencer program than an Affiliate program set up. Whilst there are many similarities when it comes to the activity of a content publisher vs an influencer, there's a far greater level of detail expected by content publishers than that which is offered by Shopify's affiliate app.

It requires creators to create a Shopify account which is often a barrier for signups, and its fairly narrow in its features and functions.

The affiliate pool may be large, but most users are chasing free gifts. A few brands in the marketplace offer free gifts via automation, which leads to demand to join the marketplace. As a result it can mix expectations and lead to poor habits. Requiring a Shopify account can be a drawback or a benefit given it can show strong intent to promote for you brand given the friction if they do make it through -- allowing you to offer higher commissions. However, this is mostly negative. Finally, lack of account management can crush engagement from brands given it's up to them to carve out strategy and implement themselves. There's also little partner development support for it to be worth an agency's time to invest in promoting Shopify Collabs.

To use this you’ll first need to setup a profile upon setting up Shopify Collabs. This will allow you to outline your preferences for affiliates and promote brand images and copy to attract talent. Then, you’ll need to setup Tiers, these allow you to associate commission rates and discount rates to each affiliate. I recommend 2 Tiers to start: one for default additions (20-30% commission) and one for VIP (30-50% commission). Once complete, promote the generated application form across email and social media & enroll in Collabs network to begin recruitment. No work is needed to setup payouts.

Superfiliate also integrates with Shopify. It provides custom landing pages for influencers as well as community focused elements.

Social Snowball is an improved alternative to Shopify's native affiliate tracking app. It uniquely automates turning customers into affiliates post-purchase, streamlining the growth of your affiliate network. Key features include automated affiliate conversion, effortless bulk payouts, precise influencer marketing attribution, and enhanced security against code leaks and coupon abuse. Additionally, its easy management of affiliates through custom sign-up forms and manual additions makes it a comprehensive, user-friendly solution for scaling word-of-mouth marketing efforts efficiently. One of their latest launches, Safelinks, safeguards brands from affiliate coupon fraud, which is very common in affiliate marketing.

Shopify has a great selection of Affiliate Networks / Solutions in its app catalog, and it's the most cost-effective way to start working with the best Affiliate Networks / Solutions. The integrations are easy, and depending on your niche - you can pick from Impact or other top tier Affiliate tracking apps.

Consider manual management if you have a tight group of affiliates, especially if less than 20. If you are seeing success you can consider platforms like Social Snowball and CreatorCommerce, but there’s others out there if you search “affiliate marketing” in the Shopify App Store”.

Without too much bias, Affiliate Networks/SaaS. These companies are set up specifically to launch and run Affiliate programs. They boast thousands of publishers ready to promote your brand and drive Affiliate revenue at scale. They allow you to track numerous Affiliate activity types, report on different commission types and source publishers that are typically not on the Shopify Affiliate network.

I'd recommend to look at the following: - Are you trying to have a huge affiliate network or keep it tight knit to only a few core influencers? If it's a small base, you might not even need a tracking tool - Are you having issues with coupon fraud? - Do you want multiple rewards options such as cash, giftcards, external partner rewards, etc? Or keep it simple as cash only - Does your tool offer automated tax document prep?

Break this apart into: recruitment, program management, and results. Choose a platform that helps with recruitment. It must contain a dedicated marketplace to recruit from and also ability to convert customers into affiliates. Choose a platform that supports complex programs: custom commissions, discounts, tiering, gifting, etc. The platform should be inclusive of any payment functionality you need to offer. Choose a platform that can produce results. Ideally it supports the ability for affiliates to sell with both traditional affiliate links and the ability to sell from their own shops if they want.

Analyze your niche - what competitors are using? Also, look for the affiliate tracking app, that will give you the best quality in reporting, deal set-up, customer support and access to the Partners portfolio.

Break this apart into: recruitment, program management, and results. Choose a platform that helps with recruitment. It must contain a dedicated marketplace to recruit from and also ability to convert customers into affiliates. Choose a platform that supports complex programs: custom commissions, discounts, tiering, gifting, etc. The platform should be inclusive of any payment functionality you need to offer. Choose a platform that can produce results. Ideally it supports the ability for affiliates to sell with both traditional affiliate links and the ability to sell from their own shops if they want.

Consider where you are in your growth journey. If you're working out of your bedroom and your brand is days old, the Shopify native app might be a valid starting point. However as you grow and start to drive tens of sales per day, and this becomes hundreds per day - there are far better suited alternatives for brands. Do your research!