Admin Manual

Audio

Frequently Asked Questions

Affiliate Marketing is one of the hottest trends to reach the Internet.  It is a way for your members (or affiliates) to recommend your online group to other people and get compensated for it.  It is a revolutionary way of marketing that has made the Internet what it is today.  With iGrOOps, you can be a part of this success.

Affiliate Marketing is just one of the many ways to build your online group membership.  Activating this program in your group can have a significant impact on membership growth.

About the Affiliate Program Module: This application is a module that does not come standard with the pro package.  This module, as with others, must be ordered.  Check the iGrOOps home page for current prices.

How the Affiliate Program Works

This is a program for YOUR iGrOOp that allows your members to refer other members to your group using a unique URL assigned to them, and get paid as a result.  You set the affiliate commissions, the payment cycle, and the terms and conditions.  You, as the site admin, also pay the affiliates.  iGrOOps takes care of the tracking and the reporting.

Features

• seamless integration within iGrOOps
• two tier affiliate program
• user and admin areas
• custom terms and conditions
• define one time commission on yearly full access memberships
• define one time commission on yearly limited access memberships
• define recurring commission on yearly full access memberships
• define recurring commission on yearly limited access memberships
• define one time commission on monthly full access memberships
• define one time commission on monthly limited access memberships
• define recurring commission on monthly full access memberships
• define recurring commission on monthly limited access memberships
• define pay cycle (every month, quarter, when in the month, etc)
• define who on your team has admin access to this feature
• affiliates can have custom HTML on their landing page
• landing pages are really your group's homepage -- affiliates do not have to create any pages to get started
• affiliate e-mail notifications
• creates PayPal masspay files for fast and simple affiliate payments

Benefits - More Paid Members which equals more revenue!

How to Activate the Affiliate Program Module in Your iGrOOp

1. If you did not select this module when you ordered your new iGrOOp, you can add it at anytime by clicking the "Add Services and Modules" link at the top of your iGrOOp.  This will walk you through the process of adding the module.
2. Go into you administration settings and select the applications and permissions.  One there, check the "Affiliate Program" application that should be at the top of your list.  Here you decide if you want limited and full members to participate, or just full members.

Only the administrator of the group can see this link.  It is invisible to members and guests.

At this point, your affiliate program is "activated" and members will be able to see the "Check your Affiliate Commissions" link at the top of your iGrOOp.

Setting Up Your Affiliate Program

Getting this program going is easy, but you are not there yet.  Now it's time to setup the specifics of the program like payments, details, etc.  We do this in the administrator options area of the affiliate program.

1. To access the admin options for this application, either enter the application by clicking on the "Check Your Affiliate Commissions" link, then click the icon to the right at the top of the application, or view the application list (application & tools icon in the header) and click the admin options icon for the affiliate program application.
2. Here you enter information about your program that will be shared with the affiliates.  Details and explanations are on this page.

Be sure to setup your affiliate program soon after activating it -- especially if you have an active group.  The "Check Your Affiliate Commissions" link will display soon as the group is activated.

You will notice two columns to input commissions for each action. The column on the left is the first tier, and the column on the right is the second tier.  You can choose to make this a one or two tier affiliate program.  If you choose two tier, enter values in the second column.  This would mean that you are compensating affiliates for the sales of the affiliates that they signed up.  A standard second tier commission percentage is between 5-25%.

A Detailed Overview of How the Affiliate Program Works

So far we have activated and setup our affiliate program.  We are officially ready to go!  Let's go through the process as an affiliate of referring a new member, then we will go through the process as an administrator of paying the affiliate(s).

1. Only your members can be affiliates of your group.  If you don't want to charge affiliates for membership, your best bet is to offer free limited membership.  As a member who is logged in, the affiliate will see the "Check Your Affiliate Commissions" link at the top of every page in your iGrOOp.  They get started by clicking on that link.
2. Here they will see all the details of the program that were automatically inserted when you entered your setup information.  Most importantly, they will see their affiliate URL.  The affiliate uses this URL to share with others and use as a link on their website(s).
3. Once a prospective member clicks on the affiliate link, a cookie is set on their computer that will stay there for over a year or until manually cleared.  This cookie will ensure that if that prospect signs up for membership, the affiliate will get credit.
4. Once the prospect signs up for membership, the affiliate gets a notice by e-mail.  Until the membership is approved by the admin, and showing as active, no commission is awarded, but the order will immediately show in the affiliate's commissions.  Only when active will the commission have a value (if the membership sold was a commissionable action as defined in the admin setup).
5. As the site administrator, you can check your affiliate's commissions by entering the affiliate program area, then clicking the "Admin Area" link.  This area will show you all of your affiliates who have referred members and any money due to them.
6. When you are ready to pay the affiliates, click the "download PayPal masspay file" link and save the file locally.  This is the file that you upload in the PayPal masspay section (at PayPal.com) to automatically pay all of your affiliates.

The affiliate can click on the user preferences icon in the affiliate program application to set custom contact information for their affiliate URL. 

That is it!  The program is very simple from the affiliate's point of view as well as the admin.  This simplicity results in more participation.  For more details on this program and some advanced ideas, see the supporting material links at the top of this page.

Create banners and buttons for your affiliates!  The more choices you have available, the more likely the affiliates will be to market your services.  iGrOOps has a banner design package that you should check out.