The best of two worlds –
Artefact together with its customer
builts on the hybrid partner marketing model
from Ingenious
Artefact Germany manages one of the largest retail affiliate programs in Germany. This client offers new non-food worlds (themed promotions) every week, which are the actual core of the affiliate program. The partner program itself has been in existence since February 2002 and is growing steadily. In particular, the issue of data privacy, as well as browser regulation and the challenges associated with it, prompted this client to evaluate their affiliate setup and seek an additional service provider for their hybrid affiliate marketing strategy as early as 2020.
Since September 2020, Ingenious Technologies has been actively supporting this project as a technology partner.
At a glance
- Due to the close and trustful cooperation with Artefact, an extended function of our conversion requestswas developed. This tool was originally intended for untracked sales and can now be used for complete conversion processing.
- Tracking differences with the customer’s internal analysis toolwere reduced by 66% compared to the previous solutionfor the public network.
- Through closer interaction with the partners invited to the program, Artefact has already been able to see the impact on the partners’ activities and thus on the revenue generated by these partners. One top partner, for example, increased his performance by 166%year-on-year in the last quarter (Q2 2021) – a development that can be attributed in part to improved tracking quality.
- The decision to adopt a hybrid partner marketing modelwith Ingenious is reflected not only in the improved tracking and reduction of manual workloads, but above all in the customer’s greater independencefrom public networks.
About Artefact
Artefact is a global digital and data company that provides services that transform data into real value for organizations. With 800 employees worldwide, the company operates directly at the interface of data consulting, data marketing and digital marketingin order to offer customers a comprehensive service portfolio. This involves breaking down traditional business and IT silos to help companies gain a competitive edge through digital transformation processes.
Client type: Agency
“The Private Network allows us more transparency through detailed and structured statistics, which supports us accordingly in success control and planning, but also in the dialog with our members.
Ingenious Technologies’ technology now also allows for unique shopping cart mapping so that different tracking categories and commission models can be used. For us, this flexibility has a positive impact on the execution and individualization of promotional activities.”
The challenge
The decision to adopt a hybrid network strategy
At the beginning of 2020, Artefact and one of Germany’s largest retail advertisersdecided to implementa private network solution for a hybrid network strategy. to be operated together with the public networks. The reasons for this decision were manifold:
There was a desire for improved technology especially in terms of tracking qualityThe new version offers a number of advantages, including the possibility of individual tool implementations, but also security with regard to upcoming challenges from browser updatesand updates in the area of data protection. Through the latter, the focus is onregaining data sovereignty through independence from third-party providers, which is achieved through a private network solution. In addition, the top partners should receive the best possible support from all parties involved. Finally, the customer was also interested in a trusting partnership characterized by transparency.
In order to meet these points, a detailed selection process tailored to the customer’s needs took place in several stages, where we, at Ingenious Technologies, had to prove ourselves to be the right partner for the customer’s partner program vision.
“The exchange with Artefact was open, transparent and solution-oriented from the very beginning, exactly the way you communicate in a partnership. This way, we knew exactly where to start and what solutions were needed. The result: we were not only able to find a solution that significantly improves tracking quality through first-party tracking or optimizes the operational handling of the system, but we also entered into a new partnership! “
Dr. Siamak Haschemi – CEO Ingenious Technologies
Increase in performance of a top retail partner compared with the previous year
The process
The decision making
In order to identify the right partner, Artefact, in cooperation with the customer, set up a multi-stage process that enabled an objective decision-making process.
After defining the goals to be achieved by using a private network solution, a questionnaire was created based on this. Various detailed questions were asked about overarching categories such as technology, reporting, billing, supportand advertising mediathat are currently relevant to the customer or will become relevant in view of future plans. These were also given a weighting for a scoring system in order to ultimately be able to make an objective decision.
In a further exchange it went over the illustration of the commission model of the customer, up to deeper technological questions, Consent managementand also the handling in the network interface itself. In parallel, there were also discussions with publishers, which were conducted by Artefact to ensure that there would be no obstacles to a publisher move.
After successful discussions and the decision for Ingenious, the processes to set up the program were started as soon as possible: While the customer took care of the technical set-up and all legal processes together with Ingenious Technologies, Artefact took over the filling of the interface as well as the publisher communication.
“After a multi-stage selection process in search of the right private network technology for our customer, Ingenious Technologies stood out for its powerful technology, flexibility and excellent support. With significantly improved tracking quality and more efficient design of operational processes, the manual effort on our side was significantly reduced. The positive feedback from our partners confirms the decision for Ingenious Technologies and we feel ideally equipped for the further program development.“
Anja Heinicke / Senior Specialist Affiliate at Artefact Germany GmbH
The result
Results and efficiency
Tracking quality
After more than a year of cooperation, the collaboration is proving to be thoroughly positive. The biggest success is the significantly improved tracking quality: currently, the difference between Ingenious Technologies’ technology and the customer’s is only one third of the previous network. This not only leads to positive feedback from the partners, but also to less manual effort in the course of follow-up booking requests, which are frequently made due to the differences.
Conversion Requests
The Conversion Request function was also developed for follow-up booking requests, with regard to which Artefact set the requirements from an operational point of view, which were then translated into a well thought-out tool on the part of Ingenious Technologies. The tool significantly simplifies the processing of requests by automatically assigning the correct commission levels. In addition, the tool is now also used for overarching processes such as sales reconciliation. This standardized processes and made them more efficient.
Partnership on equal terms
Ultimately, however, success is also due to the general cooperation itself. Support from Ingenious Technologies is quickly handled directly via Slack and individual requests are thought through, discussed and, if possible, implemented immediately. The positive feedback has also been felt from partners, who are not only noting the good support and improved tracking quality, but also an increase in performance beyond that.
Reduction of tracking differences to the customer's internal analysis tool
Outlook
Looking ahead
After focusing on the implementation of the originally set goals (improved tracking quality, trusting partnership and satisfied partners) at the beginning, the collaboration is far from the end of the journey. Over the last few months, a common status quo has emerged – now we have reached a point where we can talk more concretely about plans for the future.
Basically, the publisher baseis to be further expanded via the private network, especially with new partnerships, in the acquisition of which Ingenious Technologies will provide additional support by establishing contacts. A potential international use in Eastern Europe is also envisaged and is managed by flexible country settings regarding the currency in the billing.
At the operational level, processes are being made even more efficient and further automated. Among other things, the current manual sales reconciliation will be changed to enable API reconciliation.
Contact
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Arrange a meeting with our expert!
Contact
Christopher Lindner
Senior Business Development Manager
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Anja Heinicke guest on the podcast #partnermarketing
Measurable successes, that was Anja Heinicke’sreason for choosing the path to online marketing after graduation. Today, she is Senior Specialist Affiliate at Artefact and supports various customers there on their way to and in the private network.
Together with Anja, Tobias Rast covers the entire process: from the decision and setup to going live.
In this episode, you’ll learn:
? How does the decision-making process for a private network work? (06:20)
? About the exclusivity clauses in public networks (10:33)
? How to find the right private network provider? (15:24)
? Which functions of a private network are indispensable? (25:00)
? How does a platform setup work? (32:23)
? What makes a setup project successful? (39:50)
? What to expect when starting a private network? (45:20)