Are you an “Ideal Affiliate Manager”?

Are you an ideal affiliate manager?  We have been working with affiliate programs since 1999 and at times, we made some mistakes.  I know, for those of you who know me personally, that is probably hard to believe (said with my most sarcastic voice), but it’s true.

Many of these mistakes come from simply not knowing what an ideal affiliate manager is, what characteristics she/he has and what she/he does for affiliates.  This past year as we developed the MyAffiliateCoach Program, we asked many affiliates and veteran affiliate managers what characteristics the ideal affiliate manager exhibits.  It helped us create our very first training module – the Ideal Affiliate Manager.  Here are a few of the characteristics that many brought up:

1. Communicative:  I remember when my boss at Coldwater Creek received my personalysis test back the second week I started there.  She had it in her hands laughing at the top of her lungs.  I had thought I’d done something so bad that it was funny to fire me.  I wasn’t expecting her to show the entire team my results.  I was heavy in communication and heavy in strategy.  These were the two things she felt most important in an affiliate manager and they were my highest scores.  Being communicative is vital to a good affiliate manager.  You have to be able to reach them, converse with them and communicate, not only your companies goals, objectives and value proposition, but also with them on a personal level.
2. Strategic:  As I said above, my boss at Coldwater Creek felt this was the second most important characteristic and those we interviewed this year echoed that sentiment.  A good affiliate manager needs to have a handle on the landscape and be able to create and execute projects at a strategic level, planning how things are going to work, working with affiliates to identify new ways they can be successful and helping them do more today.
3. Impeccable Follow Through:  I’ve heard this time and time again and it is probably the most often recited issue with affiliates “that affiliate manager has no follow through”.  “Do what you say you are going to do” – I’ve heard that one many times too.  When you don’t follow through on what you promise and what you say you are going to do, each time that whittles away any trust you have built with affiliates.  Following through as promised, or more than promised, strengthens your reputation and your relationships every single time.

In our first module we cover more than 11 characteristics of an ideal manager, those above are only a start.  What do you think?  What are the most important characteristics of an affiliate manager for you?

If you are interested in learning more about our affiliate manager coaching and mentoring program, please visit MyAffiliateCoach.net (http://MyAffiliateCoach NULL.net).