Choose Your Fighter: Direct Advertiser vs Affiliate Network

At the beginning of the affiliate path, there is always a choice to work with an affiliate program or contact the advertiser directly. And which side are you on? Each of the options has its advantages and disadvantages in one way or another. We have analyzed both of these scenarios and shared all the pitfalls of working with a CPA network or with a direct advertiser in this article.

Working with a direct advertiser

Who is it? Usually, it is a legal entity or an individual interested in attracting new users and customers by distributing ads about the company and its products online. In fact, it is the owner of the offer (product or service), who cooperates with webmasters directly without the mediation of the partner network.

Pros

• Higher payout rate
  The reason is that the advertiser is the ultimate authority in your relationship, and you can negotiate individual terms, bumps, and whatever else you want.
• Prompt communication
  When you communicate with a person directly, and you don’t have to go through many third parties with your question, you will get working updates much faster. For example, if there are any changes to the offers.
• Shorter hold period
  Going back to the fact that the advertiser is the final authority on the traffic check, there are no additional departments. While most affiliate networks give an average hold of 14 to 28 days, with direct advertisers it will take approximately 7 days.
• Flexibility in payments
  If you apply your communication skills, you might be able to negotiate an individual payment schedule with the advertiser. In the case of an affiliate program, however, you will have to wait for the appointed day without any movement.
• Unique offers
  Some advertisers are fundamentally unwilling to work with affiliate programs, so you can only work with them directly. If you have found a successful affiliate link with excellent performance in any GEO, take the time to look for direct advertisers, perhaps their offers have a higher conversion rate there.
• Level of earnings
  Some advertisers offer much higher payouts compared to the affiliate program. When it comes to large-scale traffic drives, your final ROI will skyrocket because of this difference.

Cons

• Lack of trust
  Didn’t your mother teach you not to talk to strangers? Be wary of little-known advertisers, the affiliate marketing industry knows hundreds of fraud stories. Also, because individual advertisers have no pre-payment system, no one guarantees you will be paid.
• Lost in translation
  If you are serious about getting into the international market, don’t be surprised if at some point you find yourself with a dictionary, learning a new language. Unusual advertisers with original offers provide technical support in their native language or in English, and you will have to interpret the foreign ideas of your manager yourself.
• DIY (Do It Yourself)
  But still, a dictionary case is not the worst option, because at least this advertiser has technical support. More often, individuals work without intermediaries. In this case, you will have to control all the business processes yourself.

Working with an affiliate program

Who is it? A commercial platform that contains advertising offers and acts as an intermediary between affiliates and advertisers. The so-called CPA network is an independent service and receives a fixed percentage from the placement of the offer. 

Pros

• Sleep well
  If you work with a trusted program, you are guaranteed to get your payouts. The big CPA networks value their brand reputation, so it is not in their interest to cheat you. However, there are still scam programs that cut payouts or refuse any payments for no reason. Check the program’s history and user feedback before proceeding.
• Choice
  Most affiliate programs do not have their own offers, but only resell offers from various direct advertisers. In this way, they act as an aggregator for numerous ad providers. This gives the affiliate a variety of options on any taste.
• Variety of payout models
  Direct advertisers mostly offer only the RevShare payout model. In the affiliate program, you can find the same offer, but with a CPA model available. When you work with an affiliate program, they provide you with opportunities, not you’re asking for convenience.
• Care
  When you work with the affiliate network, you will never feel alone in a difficult situation. The team of support managers is always happy to solve any of your problems 24/7. You can contact them with any questions and get advice, help with creatives and targeting settings, technical developments, support with app rentals, account purchases, and much more.
• High conversion rate
  The affiliate program analyzes advertisers and selects relevant traffic options for each of them. Based on this research, the program suggests allowed sources, taking into account GEO and other individual indicators. This enables the affiliate to work with high-converting offers.

Cons

• High competition
  Affiliate programs provide a selection of offers with the best metrics. Of course, such good deals go like hotcakes, and there is always a great demand for them. The higher the competition, the less opportunity you have to be unique in the market.
• Limited budget
  It is a kind of rare practice to have an extra budget for early payments (for instance, in cases where the advertiser has not yet transferred their funds for leads). So sometimes you may simply not get paid due to running out of the affiliate program budget.
• Additional costs
  Let us remind you that the basic principle of the affiliate program is mediation between the affiliate and the advertiser. Accordingly, the affiliate program charges a percentage for its intermediary services.

Final thoughts

Whether you work with an advertiser directly or use an affiliate network is up to you. We’ve analyzed the pros and cons of both hands and shared our insights with you. A word of advice for the future, before making a final choice, try to think in terms of prospects and convenience of cooperation, because they have as much impact on the profit of the webmaster.