Dropping Network Links Was Never This Exciting!

It’s been a fascinating few days in the cashback affiliate marketing world. Quidco announced to their members (after telling merchants) that they’ve made a “hard decision” and from 1st September are removing merchants from their site who are on the Affiliate Window platform. Awin have posted indepth responses via their blog whilst discussions have popped up on consumer and affiliate forums.

Dropping network links was never this exciting!

A great deal of this situation doesn’t make sense.

The catalyst for Quidco to email merchants indicating their departure from Affiliate Window seems to surround the SureShop system - a guarantee if you like for user cashback transaction inquiries. Awin aren’t happy about this as it “offers no protection to merchants” and have therefore decided to opt out of the agreement.

From an affiliate point of view if I’m not happy with a network then I’ll seek alternative links for merchants on other networks - I’d pretty much guarantee every major affiliate does that! So, I really can’t see why Quidco haven’t done this, perhaps even flagging up to their users that “these merchants are not on our SureShop system”.

That leaves bridges loosely in place to resolve the situation with that network or if and when the opportunity arises switch merchant links to an alternative network. This also means the consumer has the choice. Everyone remains, at least on the surface, happy.

Quidco’s response since their email informing merchants of their Awin departure, at least in the affiliate world, has been incredibly low key - although interestingly on their own blog they’ve said that they will “continue to remove any comments here which are intended to formulate an Affiliate Window smear campaign against us” like this one.

I’m not so sure that encouraging their users to support their decision (and therefore go on an offensive against Awin) was particularly sensible. Site users will usually always have loyalty to what they know and not always understand what’s truly happening (and if one party is earning you ££’s and another one isn’t it’s amazing how that can influence your loyalty regardless).

Furthermore, by removing network responses Quidco are also not offering a fair right to reply. This means facts become lost or misconstrued. If you’re going to rally your users for support, then you need to demonstrate that you’ve nothing to hide and have conviction in your actions.

Deletions and selective answering just results in more questioning!

From an affiliate perspective the situation also raises more questions than it offers answers!

For example, if Affiliate Window are concerned about SureShop - why aren’t other networks?

What if other networks (and merchants) are concerned but are perhaps not in a position to overturn the apple cart and publically fall out with the UK’s primary cashback affiliate?

And how do merchants feel about the situation - regardless of the network they’re on? Do they feel the same as Paul Smith (I Want One of Those)?

Building a brand online is hard work, so imagine if you’re a merchant trying to develop consumer loyalty via fair prices and good customer service only to find that future purchases and loyalty are based on cashback? No longer are people shopping at Merchant X they’re shopping with Cashback A and quite possibly your brand loyalty is shunted into second place.

I’m in full support of Awin’s decision, based on the information that they’ve posted, as after all business between merchant, network and affiliate need to be mutually beneficial to all involved. Boundaries can be bent, but there’s only so far over a barrel you can push things, and reading through the lines it seems Awin have had enough of being pushed!

So what’s next?

Which Awin merchants will open up onto dual networks? Will other networks take advantage of the situation? Will content sites benefit? Is this the end of 100% cashback? Will Quidco open their own network? Will a network open their own 100% cashback site?

100% Cashback sites are like The Hydra. One leaves the spotlight and another appears, so we’ll now see, courtesy of Awin’s blog, promotion of other 100% sites as alternatives for merchants who won’t feature on Quidco! Oh goody - how great is that!

Perhaps several similar sized sites will be better for the cashback industry as a whole, but the new kids on the block have got to go some to match up to the market leader.

Other networks, who Quidco are happy to work (at least until they question SureShop), will no doubt utilise the situation to try and pick off new business from Awin when bitching, i mean pitching, for new clients.

The fallout from this public fall out is still to come.