#20 B2B Affiliate Marketing Pro who built programs for Square, DocuSign, and Squarespace, Amy Crider, Principal Consultant, Parkside Consulting Group LLC

Welcome to another edition of the Always Be Testing podcast with your host, Ty De Grange. Get a guided tour of the world of growth, performance marketing, customer acquisition, paid media, and affiliate marketing. We talk with industry experts and discuss experiments and their learnings in growth, marketing, and life. Time to nerd out, check your biases at the door, and have some fun talking about data driven growth and lessons learned.

Hello, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Always Be Testing podcast. I'm your host, Ty DeGrange, and I am really excited to sit down and talk with Amy Kreider. Hi, Amy. Hi. How are you? I'm doing well. I'm doing well hanging out here in Austin, Texas. The weather has been one hundred degrees most of the summer, as you may know. And, it started to cool down, but it seems to just kinda keep hitting us with these early fall hundred degree days,

which is a little bit of a surprise, which is not rad. I feel you. Richmond, Virginia is very humid, in the summers, which we have come to learn since we moved down here a couple years ago. So Hopefully, you get some of that nice fall weather coming soon.

Hoping. Fall weather, pumpkin spice, pumpkin everything. Yeah. I don't hate that. I'm I'm excited for all the things that are fall as much as we can get them now. I think we're kinda here in in Texas trying to channel as much as much of it as possible. Well, I'm super excited to dive in with you, and I think our audience will be as well. Amy, for

those of you who don't know, has a ton of experience in affiliate marketing. She's a great practitioner, both on the b two b side, which will be fun to dive into as well as d two c ecom retail. So super excited to to dive in there and share. We've worked with great clients like Square, DocuSign, Squarespace, a lot of knowledge, and and I'm excited to dive in. So really appreciate you joining. I'm excited. Yeah.

Maybe just by starting off, tell us a little bit about your background. Yeah. Definitely. So like a a lot of people in in this industry, my entryway into affiliate was by chance. I grew up I played soccer, and I got the opportunity to play soccer at Wake Forest, where I majored in communications. And I thought I would stick with that sports world, do something in sports, most likely sports marketing of some kind. And so after

college, I went down to Florida and I got to work, on in TV marketing. So Fox Sports, Sun Sports, very glamorous, really cool. And, and I thought, wow, this is what this is what I'm going to be doing. I mean, as life always throws us curveballs, I got in, my old coach from Wake Forest was up in Philadelphia working with the women's professional soccer team there and told me to come on up and try out. I did not make the team, but I got

offered a job. And so my sort of real working world started in the professional sports, doing everything, marketing, sales, a little bit of, of everything from there. And my boss ended up finding a digital marketing company in Philadelphia called DMI Partners. And she said, you should come work here. I was able to move into the city, and that was where I first got my exposure to affiliate marketing. DMI specialized in lead generation. And so I started

by building out campaigns. I was placing pixels, finding partners to run, managing budgets. So it was really a great opportunity for me to see what affiliate was from really the foundation of tracking partners, who they are, and, of course, the lead generation quality is really important because you're not paying for sales. So, it was really important to kind of understand the strategy there. I was with DMI for five years, and

I just learned to love affiliate. It almost was like a puzzle to me, sort of figuring out

what the right mix was and what to do. And I wanted to continue to work in the in the industry, and I but I wanted to work directly with clients and get more involved in their strategy. So in twenty sixteen, I was lucky to join the acceleration partners team, and I got to work with amazing brands across all verticals, including the the b two b clients that you mentioned earlier in my intro. And then I got the opportunity also to join our

global accounts team and work with clients across all regions. So really getting exposure to the strategy, not just in the US, but what does it look like in APAC in Europe and even markets within Europe. And all of this just continued to sort of unravel my interest in why I love affiliate marketing and, of course, the client services piece, and just working with people. And I was there for six years. I ended my career at EP on, as an

account director on their global accounts team. And the timing was just right for my family last May where we decided that I would step away from working world to travel and spend time with my daughters. So I just am coming off of sort of eighteen months of doing all of that, an amazing experience, lots of challenges, but would never regret it. And now as I'm reentering the industry, I'm coming back consulting for companies.

So which has been a yeah. It's been amazing that I've gotten to use just a lot of experience and skills, that I've gained across, you know, the multiple roles and companies that I've been

at. I love it. How old are your daughters? Four and a half and two and a half. I'm in the thick of it. I think you and I are in different ways, with a three year old and a seven month old. So it's awesome. Yes. I'm excited to hear. What what was that like taking that time off? I mean, I know we're gonna get to it, but I'm ready to jump right into that part. It was hard to take the leap. It was scary. You think about what does that mean then

coming back? Am I stuck to that? And I just I listened to a lot of part I'm a big self personal development, self development. And finally taking that leap knowing it was sort of the right opportunity in life. Windows can close. And so we took that. We got to go see so many new places. We traveled, saw out west in the US and got to go to Europe

for a couple of months. So it it opened my eyes to a lot of patience. To being honest, there there were definitely challenges and struggles, but I think we're instilling in our girls a sense of adventure, which I love to see. They love to pack a suitcase now. So I love it. What's kind of the self development, or was there some development books or podcasts or experts or or people that really influenced you or kind of shed light in areas that really

helped you? Yeah. One of the biggest ones I love, Jay Shetty is sort of my personal development mentor in a sense. But he had done an interview with Gwyneth Paltrow, and she talked about how life is just a bunch of mini experiments that we should do, whether it's a day, a week, a month, a year. And

there's really not a lot of risk. The worst case was it didn't work out, and I needed to go back and find a job. And so I think just hearing that gave me that sense of like, okay, I can't mess this up too much. And it's a risk worth taking. Takes a little bit of the pressure off, doesn't it? And it's nice to clarify. That's so cool. And and I love that you did some traveling with your girls. Can I, what was some of the maybe highlights of the west the west, part of the US?

Oh, man. We got to explore a lot of Utah. Arches National Park, Zion, just beautiful out there. I think one of the things, it's easy to say, oh, we wanna go somewhere outside of the US. There's so many beautiful places inside of our country, to see. Yeah. And, yeah, it was just incredible landscape. I love that. I feel the same way. I feel the same way. Every time

we go somewhere unique or different, there's there's a lot of it that we haven't touched yet. So it's it's kind of exciting. Yeah. So, you know, back to some of the affiliate account management, experience that you've had, which has been extensive. When you think about affiliate account management and you think about, like, best practice, What are some of the things that come to mind for you in the world of affiliate marketing and affiliate client

management? I think two things. The first being relationships. You know, what I've loved about affiliate is it's not transactional. It is important to get to know the partners that you're working with, to understand their goals as much as you're understanding your clients' goals. Because at the end of the day, it is a partnership and we want both parties to be successful. And there are just such amazing people in this industry. So that was really the first, and I

think that's important. And the second is using data. I'm a math person. I almost majored in math. I'm a math person. I'm a puzzle person. But I think one of the things I really learned in my experience is that you gotta look at the numbers. You gotta analyze it. And that is what is your best support for knowing what to do for your clients, what campaigns to run, what commissions to pay, what pay placements to run. All of that is just can be really leaned

on by data. I love that. Definitely resonates. You kinda touched on the puzzle twice so far. It's such such a kind of cool beacon for you, and I feel like it's a good one to hone in on. What are some of those things that kinda need your eyes to light up in affiliate marketing and drew you to the channel and gets you excited about it. And it sounds like perhaps something to do with that, but I'd love to hear your thoughts. I love

that there's not one path to get to a goal. So you could have two clients that are in the same category and have similar goals, but they have a different product, a different target audience. They may have a different budget

to work with. So everything sort of required this different fit. How do, you know, how do all the different partner types fit together? What's the contribution from certain partner types? So I just felt like there was different challenges. So across all the clients I've worked with, I never really been able to say, oh, this worked with this one, so it's gonna work with you. And that is what I think excites me and keeps me going when it

comes to to the strategy. I would have to agree. It's, it's so many layers and so many channels within a within a channel and so many options and campaigns and and levers and mediums to pull that it truly finds it. And there's always something new. It's such an evolving channel. I mean, you have your foundational players, but since I've been in the industry, I mean, there's new ways, influencers popping up, brand to brand. There's just new partners. Buy now, pay later came in. So

it's just, like, constantly learning and figuring out how do they fall in the mix. And so I just I love that evolution of the approach too. Yeah. I love it. Couldn't agree more with you know, you've had a lot of experience in b to b, enterprise SaaS, innovative companies, also direct to consumer e comm, retail. Maybe starting with the consumer side, when you look under the hood of a program, what do you typically see as kind of that the biggest need of improvement or optimization? One of them

is commission rates. I think to say we can pay all the partners or here's our standard commission rate. I think there's so many unique ways to pull different levers with different partners even to say we're gonna pay all loyalty this rate. I mean, they have different capabilities. They have different targeting. So and I think there's a lot of opportunity to be really strategic, in commission rates within a program. I think there's always an opportunity to get

more out of existing partners. We talked about the evolution of new partners coming into the space, but also the partnerships that have maybe been in a program for a long time are constantly evaluating their capabilities and improving how they can target their readers or their audience. And so I just think having those always on conversations to optimize those partnerships is a great opportunity for clients to just sort of grow and and

align. Love it. And then, conversely, love to hear your perspective having worked on some really great enterprise b to b brands. What are some of the learnings there? And when you kind of assess a program, what is often the the need or the or the a what we need to look at, but there you just have to be a little bit more I don't wanna use the word strategic, but targeted in terms of which publishers

you're you're using. The same set of foundational publishers when it comes to retail clients is not gonna necessarily work for b two b. It's a different target audience. So finding the niche of publishers that

can, you know, have business decision makers is, I think, one of the biggest ones I learned when I took over my first b two b program. There's also different considerations in the sales cycle. So how you're promoting, a lot more research based sites and comparison sites. You know, companies are looking to understand that when there are a lot of options out there and they're making a decision for their business. So those are probably the biggest two when it comes to the differences

with b to b than b to c. Yeah. And maybe kind of broad, but also b to b leaning on this question. How have you seen the partner types evolve and change? It feels like there's been you know, in some ways, some things don't necessarily maybe evolve in a in a affiliate or partner marketing, but in other ways, they certainly do. And I'd love to hear your perspective on maybe how some of those changes you've witnessed in your career

and maybe specifically to to b two b and part the partners themselves. Yeah. I think for b two b at Serted, there are a lot, you know, content sites were a good place to start. You have a lot of the small business sites, and then, of course, you have your comparison partners. I think in today's, it's going to evolve a lot into potentially some influencer. You know, you have LinkedIn. You have a lot of people posting about business, about personal. So it's a

lot more of a social platform or evolving into one. So I can very much see that as an opportunity for business in their affiliate programs, almost kinda taking that to the influencer extent. And then also brand to brand is another, I think, emerging channel. It's been talked about on the retail side or b to c side. But with b to b, it's a great lever and opportunity because you're able to look at more of a complimentary product or

service that would have the similar target audience as you. You know, with b to b, you're looking at, okay, what size business? Not every business has the same needs either. So business may be fifty or less employees or, you know, fifty to two hundred, two hundred plus, like different sizes have different needs. So if you can find another company with a similar target business as yours, doing a cross promotion, and that I think will be another great opportunity to come for the b to b

vertical. Yeah. I I love that commentary. I feel like the the e commerce content is has grown and exploded. There's so much interest there, and that just keeps happening. You see the the influencer opportunity continue to grow, and it feels like a little bit of this, you know, divide between consumer and enterprise, I feel like, is starting to chip away a little bit. It sounds like, you know, you maybe you've seen that

happening a little bit as well. Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. Yeah. Very cool. You kind of highlighted some of the the difference differences that you see in, you know, the b to b affiliate marketing programs that are run well and firing on all cylinders. And when you when you kinda think through, like, what are the characteristics of a great you know, b to b affiliate program just to kinda take it a step further, what are some of the things that you like to see

generally speaking, noting it's it's gonna be a little bit different? I think if for a successful b to b, and I think, you know, you can run into this with, we you know, b to b or b to c. But for B2B, I think brand and product awareness and competitors are two big things to sort of think through as a company when you're looking at is affiliate the direction that we should go or not.

You know, if you have a really strong brand awareness about what your product is, what it does, and you don't have a lot of competitors, most consumers are probably if they know exactly what what you do, what your product is, and there's no one else to go to, the likelihood that affiliate may be as incremental as you think, you know, will be could be a challenge. I'm not saying it will be. It could be. I have

seen very successful programs that have proven these points wrong. So, you know, it's not, again, not an answer across the board. But if you're launching a new product or a new service or you have competitors, you're you're a business that's coming into a space where there are competitors, affiliate can prove really, really valuable because, again, you're going on content sites, education to decision makers, the comparisons for how does

our product compare to this product and the offerings and the pricing and all that. A lot of that b to b we found is, you know, is a different decision cycle. So unlike shopping a pair of yoga pants, there's not quite as much research going into it. You know, they know the brand and but with when it comes to, like, software that a company is gonna be using, they wanna know exactly, like, okay. What are all the features I'm getting

and what level? And if there's a competitor, that comparison site is just invaluable. And to get on there on a performance basis is, you know, a great way to go. So I think that's definitely two considerations, I would say, as a as a company Yeah. To take a look at. For sure. And and, obviously, with, you know, the theme of the pod always be testing, and you kind of alluded to it, you know, in the, Gwyneth Paltrow discussion earlier around the value of doing things as

experiments. But, you know, in terms of maybe some of the career learnings before some of the life learnings we'll get to, but would love to hear maybe what tests or what learnings or what experiments that you felt were maybe super interesting, maybe counterintuitive in your career over the years, whether whether it's, like, personal career learnings or or actual campaign and client learnings from from

some of the various campaigns and tests run on on affiliate partner marketing? Yeah. I think broadly, I think saying, how do we test this but put it within guardrails that you feel comfortable? Right? It's like trying something new, but having that cushion to say, like, okay. Well, we won't go bankrupt because of this test. Right? So a lot of times, the situation with clients and what I've seen, especially on certain comparison sites, testing a CPC. Right?

It's like, okay, that's gonna feel uncomfortable. Right? Because there's more risk on the client side than there's going to be ensuring we're getting a return there. But again, kind of two things, leaning back on the data, right, to do that with a partner that you you have some information on. Okay. How does how do they convert? What is the quality like? And to say, well, we can just improve and get more if we're able to find the right

CPC. Then also saying, you know what, let's just make it up a five k budget or a ten k budget. So then no matter what, like, we have to feel comfortable if that does not back into what we want as the end goal that we have that guardrail. Yep. And then it's like, you know what? We learned from that and what didn't work and why didn't it work. I think being able to reflect on the things that don't work is even more valuable than than

reflecting on the things that do work. It's, you know, replicating. But you can gain some really insightful learnings, not just, oh, we should never do that again. Absolutely. And But asking, how can we do that differently next time to make it work? Absolutely. And and documenting that, institutional knowledge and importing that into the next test and experiment is is such a a great great way of thinking. I

love that. It's funny you mentioned, like, the flat fee. It seems like I don't know what you've seen, but I I imagine is it have you seen it where that CPC or that flat fee will actually depending upon the partner and the client, does that sometimes outperform that everyone's favorite cost per purchase or cost per lead model? Does that happen? Yeah. It absolutely can. Again, I think there's not a tried and true saying, like, this will work for you, but I've seen

with well known brands, especially in those comparison. I mean, when it when you change positions within those articles, it can start to really perform and take off. So it's sort of finding that that sweet spot both for the client and for the publisher. Yeah. I like it. I think you talked about this a little bit, but circling back to assessing if a b to b brand is ready. I am I'm kind of curious to maybe double click on that a little bit. You talked about kind of

brand recognition and competitors. Are there other factors that you look at when you kind of assess a b to b brand and affiliate marketing to say, hey. Does this channel really make sense for them? I'm curious to know know your perspective more on that. One thing I I've actually run into is sort of the I mean, this could happen again for b to c, but the reviews of the service and the product can play an impact on how successful.

Again, the decision making is a is more in-depth. I think I could say that confidently than maybe a b to c. Now if you're buying something like refrigerator, I'm sure that consumer is doing just as much research. But when you're you know, for these businesses, they're gonna look. And if you have bad reviews on your site about your service or your product, that is going to play a big role in in how you convert with you know, they're looking at the affiliate content,

but then they're also gonna do a little bit more due diligence. So I have seen brands where it's not just going to plug a hole. Right? That needs to be good. So sort of saying,

look internally, let's make sure our product and our site and everything is is buttoned up, and then we can take it to affiliate. So in that case, it wouldn't matter if you are the only one in your space. If you don't have good reviews,

it's probably not going to going to work out. Yeah. I love that. I recall, I think it was Sean Frank on the Nine Figure Operators podcast talks a lot about that and prioritizing that over most things, really having a killer product before you're really, you know, over a certain NPS, certain number of reviews, certain number of, types of reviews before you can really, fully distribute or or stand certainly stand up a brand new performance marketing channel. Yeah. It's a really

good call. Yeah. And I think across the board, the clients who are see success, especially earlier on, are the clients that are willing to test. If they have a little bit of budget, they're willing to pay for a flat fee or test this article or move the, you know, commission up to a cost per clicker. And I'm not saying you have to do that across the board, but they're they're at least willing to entertain those

ideas and test because with more testing, you get more learning. Yeah. Right? And so the clients that are willing to do that a little bit more from the start are probably gonna see quicker success because they'll know what works, what doesn't work, and how to optimize against it.

I love it. Yeah. Are there any ways you've seen, maybe tests structured a way that you really like or maybe some, like, other kind of don't do don't do this kind of thing, like, myths or things like that that you've maybe found out? Because I think the experiment thing from my view is is so central to what we hear a lot of, and I I love this concept. And I think kind of, like, are there ways that you maybe seen them set up right or maybe set up not so effectively?

I mean, I think to set them up right when you don't set them up right, you haven't used at least some kind of data. It could be a new partner. Right? But having a a conversation with the partner to understand what to expect. You know, have you done this with another brand, and how did it perform, and what can we expect in terms of clicks? You know, great way to also kind of work is that the putting some of the onus on the

publisher to say, okay. Let's guarantee some click. We have to guarantee certain number of views or certain number of clicks in order to fulfill the campaign so that we know, okay, it's not just gonna be an article. And it may have a really strong click through rate or conversion rate, but it barely gets seen. Right? So they need to do some promotion on their end to get it in front of maybe more on social or out in an email, but I was like, something that gives it some additional push.

But I think that's where you're gonna find your best success is that you've done the due diligence upfront. In terms of the the structure performance, you're sort I think the upfront work is where it's at. I love it. Yeah. And then, so awesome. I love the soccer experience and the athlete experience. I'd love to hear any any highlights that you recall from your your playing days?

So many. So many highlights. I think I would say the one thing I love about, like, my soccer is I feel like sometimes in affiliate, I feel I played midfield. So you always had to kinda see. I see it when I drive too. Right? You have to see the opportunity and just looking big picture, but also being able to narrow. So I think that experience has helped me sort of continue to go, like, zoom out, zoom in. Zoom out, zoom

in because your head always has to be on a swivel is what I said. But Yep. No. I I was am always forever grateful in my soccer because it took me to a great university, and I wish I had just one one highlight I could share. But I have gotten to play against some of the women's national team players, which is always fun to to see. That's amazing. That's very cool. It's quite an accomplishment. Are you think that your daughters might be interested

in soccer? Are you gonna encourage it? You know what? I'm very mindful of that and not pushing them to do it because I did it. But I think I almost have a backwards perspective of it because growing up, it took so much of my time. And as a parent now, I'm like, man, my parents were very dedicated, and I now have much better appreciation for how much time they put into supporting me than what I did. Not that I wouldn't do that for my own daughters, but I'm like,

I'll let them sort of figure out if this is what they really want to do. I don't need to push them to do it. And, you know, just with my own personal development and understanding who I am in questioning that, I get the opportunity to use that with my daughters. And, you know, I don't know if they'll both of them have very different personalities, and I don't know

if they both will be good will want to do team sports. They may want to do more of an individual, which, I'm really excited to see them kinda grow into who they they are, but I'm not pushing it per se. My oldest is playing soccer right now, and she basically plays for the popsicle at the end. I love it. Yeah. And so young, and they can try so many new things and who knows what they'll be interested in. But I like the open mindedness about that and,

certainly can identify. Probably a good segue, you know, becoming a mom is no small feat, no small change in your life and certainly influenced how you navigate career and family and balance it all, which, is certainly not easy and, not something I can I can understand, although I see it, through the eyes of my my wife and our family? How did you navigate that personally and professionally? I think becoming a parent in general

just gives you a lot of perspective on what's valuable. So a couple of things that come to my mind, time is valuable. After becoming a mom, prioritization at work became a huge interest of mine. So how do I prioritize projects? I can't do it all. I'm not going to work until 08:00 at night, so I need to be better at planning out my day. And if I have too much on my plate, being able to say, okay. What deserves my

attention today? What can be pushed to tomorrow? What needs to be pushed to next week? What needs to be delegated? So all of that became a huge interest of mine, and I still love anything around prioritization today. People are valuable. So I think I was able to find a better balance. I'm it may have been the sports in me, but I was very hyper focused in terms of,

like, get the job done. Get the job done. And as soon as I became a mom, I feel like I got a little bit a lot better, at understanding the personal lives of myself and of the people on my team. So if something came up, it just gave me that perspective that, you know what? You need to take time, take time. That is more important. We are not, I remember one of my bosses saying, like, we're not heart surgeons here. You know, like, we can push something back, if

your if your family needs you or you need to be somewhere else, you know, do that. And, it was a lot more respectful and understanding. And then lastly, I think the personal development at AP, I got introduced to it before I was a mom, and I I liked it. It was interesting. It got me going. But I think as soon as I became a mom, really looking at being the best version of myself and being vulnerable and being able to say, oh, I'm

not strong at this. I'm really good at this, and let's work on my strengths, you know, and not forget my weaknesses and but not harp on them. And so it just gave me a lot of perspective into myself, but also time and people. Yeah. I love that. What a I mean, so much in there. So many learnings professionally, personally. That's phenomenal. I I'm I'm loving every bit of this and appreciate it. Yeah. And I'm sure as a parent, you can understand the value of sleep. Right? Now we we really

appreciate that. That's not as work based, but I whenever I can get sleep, I'm like, oh, this is the best. It's, it's it's amazing how much it helps all areas of life and, couldn't agree more. This has been amazing, Amy. I really appreciate you. And and I think also like, you know, in your consulting now, you know, you, you, you're able to strike that balance. You're, you're solving big

a more about that. Are you feeling like the balance is there? It's giving you that right mix that you've you've kinda wanted? Yeah. So I think the perspective of being home with my girls for the past year and a half and coming back, I I had to think really hard about what works for us and our family, not just what is everyone else doing or what's expected of me. And I think there's a lot of pressure and, you know, to

just go back to what's comfortable. And I was very grateful to have some previous coworkers and people that I've worked with reach out and share their experiences with with me. So, again, just the people in the industry. And it just felt like the right balance. I'm able to make my hours and my schedule, but even more so, I love that I get to work on projects of all different scales and across all my skill sets. So from training and development

to account strategy, to best practices with client services. And so it's not that I'm going back and I'm honing in on one. I've loved every piece of my journey in affiliate. And so I get to do that in different projects, that I'm working on right now. Perfect. I love it, Amy. And for folks wanting to get in touch with you, what what is the best way to find you and reach out? Probably LinkedIn would be the best. Yeah. Beautiful. So nice to have you. So nice to chat and learn and and

dive in as always. I really appreciated it. Thank you for having me. I've loved getting getting to chat b to b and and life in general. Always great. Absolutely. Thanks, Amy. Thanks so much.