[Software publishers] How to generate web traffic with affiliation?

[ Exclusivité]
Several experts enlighten software publishers on web traffic acquisition levers

The B2B Agency had the pleasure of participating in the latest study on web traffic acquisition and software publishers: 6 levers seen by 6 experts. The results showed that only 27% of software publishers use affiliation as a source of web acquisition. And yet affiliation is the principle by which a brand offers a network of partners(blog, magazine, social networks, emailing base...) the opportunity to promote its products or services in return for a defined fee.

See all software Affiliate Marketing

Affiliation: multiple acquisition levers

Affiliation is a technique that enables advertisers to rapidly acquire notoriety, leads or sales thanks to the multitude of publishers on which a brand is positioned.

All acquisition levers can be integrated into an affiliation strategy: emailing, price comparison sites, social networks, retargeting, content sites...

The advertiser sets a performance-based budget for remunerating affiliates (a network of partners) according to the actions they perform (impressions, clicks, leads, sales, etc.).

However, it's not easy to find the right partners for your target market, so the advantage of working through an agency or affiliation platform is to capitalize on your network.

On the other hand, if you're a software publisher, it's essential to define your personas before launching into web acquisition. Without this essential exercise, you're going hunting without a gun!

So what is a persona?

A persona is a profile, an archetype of your buyers. We associate a typical profile with each customer to better identify and communicate with them.

In B2B, the creation of a persona can be used to develop usage scenarios for a product or service, or to refine a positioning or promotional strategy. It's a description of your typical buyer, but it also gives you a glimpse of the environment and behavior they adopt in a context that links you.

As you'd expect, the buying decision in B2B is slightly more complex than in B2C, especially in the software sector. Clearly, the more complex the purchasing process, the greater the importance of your solution.

The more complex the purchase, the more expensive it is, and the more people are involved in the decision-making process. Fear of change is also a factor. It will be more complicated to sell a solution to a company that already has one than to a company that doesn't yet have one.

B2B segmentation focuses on the target company, whereas personas concentrate on an individual. Even if the target individual has the same function (CIO, for example), his or her behavior will differ according to a number of factors (age, workplace, company, etc.).

How do you create a B2B persona?

So, when it comes to creating a B2B persona, we need to take care to identify its role in the purchasing decision.

We can start by giving them an identity. Base this on your data and CRM. Is it a man or a woman, what's their average age, their professional environment?

Next, you need to identify 3 main roles in a purchasing committee: the decision-maker, the influencer and the user. The larger the company you're targeting, the larger the number of people on the purchasing committee. Conversely, in very small companies, one person may assume several roles.

The role of the decision-maker :
In most cases, the decision-maker holds the keys to the safe and controls the budget. The decision-maker doesn't necessarily know the technical details of the purchase; what interests him/her is the ROI.

The role of the influencer:
Generally speaking, this is a person from within or outside the target company. Their role is to provide advice and expertise to guide the decision-maker. You need to convince them of the benefits of your solution. Emphasize the innovative aspect, the differentiating element that will set your solution apart from the competition.

The role of the user:
Often overlooked in an acquisition strategy, the user has a vital role to play. Most of the time, they are internal to the company, and are an unavoidable link, as they are the only ones aware of internal needs. It's not uncommon to ask the user for his opinion before making a decision. If the user isn't satisfied with your solution, you have no chance of extending the contract.

See all software Affiliate Marketing

Personalize the message to each persona

So, once you've done this identification work, you know who to communicate with. Now all you have to do is figure out how to make it work for your marketing strategy.

Which message will be best suited to your personas, how to address them, how to reach them and on what medium? If you can benefit from customer and prospect feedback that matches your personas, you'll have more complete and concrete profiles.

It's then up to you to use the best communication medium to reach them, and to build it around the message best suited to your personas. Our experts are here to help you and listen to your needs.