Affiliate marketing agreement template

What is an affiliate marketing agreement?

An affiliate marketing agreement is a type of contract where one party (the "affiliate") promotes another company's products or services. In return, the affiliate gets a commission or a fee every time a sale is made, or a specific action is taken, because of their promotional efforts.

For example, a vendor marketplace might share a link to a SaaS vendor on their blog. If someone clicks on that link and buys an annual subscription, the vendor marketplace gets a percentage of that sale. This agreement is mutually beneficial: the company gets more leads and revenue, and the affiliate earns money from their referrals.

What is the purpose of an affiliate marketing agreement?

An affiliate marketing agreement is there to protect the parties involved in the commercial arrangement. They establish the rules of the affiliate relationship, outlining what the affiliate can and can't do when promoting the merchant's products or services.

They also clearly define the plan for compensation or revenue sharing, including commission rates and payment methods. The affiliate marketing agreement creates a transparent structure for a potentially lucrative partnership, ensuring both parties understand their obligations and rights and have a solid foundation to work together.

Who is responsible for managing affiliate marketing agreements?

Management of affiliate marketing agreements usually falls within the responsibility of the merchant's affiliate manager or the marketing team. The company might have a specific partnerships function, depending on how many affiliates it works with.

They must ensure that each affiliate is working within the agreement's terms and conditions, monitor their performance, and guarantee they get compensated correctly. Usually they also work to bring on more affiliate partners to help grow the business too.

Meanwhile, the affiliate should also manage their side of the agreement by maintaining compliance and monitoring their compensation.

What are the elements of an affiliate marketing agreement template?

An effective affiliate marketing agreement template usually contains the following elements:

1. Parties involved: This section identifies the merchant and the affiliate, specifying their legal names and contact information.
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2. Scope of the agreement: This outlines the purpose of the agreement, explaining the nature of the relationship between the merchant and the affiliate, and detailing what the affiliate is allowed to promote.
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3. Roles and responsibilities: The agreement must clearly define the duties and expectations of both parties. For the affiliate, this might include how they should conduct promotional activities, ethical marketing guidelines they must follow, and any reporting requirements. For the merchant, this could encompass support to be provided to the affiliate, like access to promotional materials or tracking software.
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4. Payment terms: This section details how the affiliate will be compensated. It should outline the commission structure, including the specific rates, how earnings will be calculated (for example, per sale, per lead, per click), and the payment schedule.
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5. Intellectual property rights: This part addresses the use of the merchant's brand assets. It should clarify what the affiliate is allowed to use, how they can use it, and any restrictions to ensure brand integrity.
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6. Termination clause: This provides information on how and under what circumstances either party can end the agreement. It may include details on notice periods and potential grounds for termination, such as breach of contract or poor performance.
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7. Confidentiality clause: This segment stipulates that the affiliate must keep all non-public business information confidential, protecting the merchant's proprietary information. (Need a confidentiality agreement template?)
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8. Indemnification clause: This clause protects both parties from legal harm. If a party's actions lead to legal repercussions, an indemnification clause outlines who will bear the responsibility.
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9. Dispute resolution: This section explains how disputes will be handled, such as through mediation or arbitration, and the legal jurisdiction under which disputes will be settled.
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10. Governing law: This clarifies which country or state's laws will be used to interpret the agreement and handle any legal proceedings related to it.

If you cover these elements in your affiliate marketing agreement template, your business can ensure that your relationships with affiliates are clear, fair, and mutually beneficial. You can get started with the free affiliate marketing agreement template PDF available to download above.

How are affiliate marketing agreements usually managed?

Managing your affiliate marketing agreement template, and the contracts you create from it, can be a bottleneck for a company looking to establish and manage lots of affiliate relationships.

Since companies often enter into numerous affiliate marketing agreements at any one time, they're often tasked with managing large volumes of these contracts, meaning lots of routine contract admin to contend with.

The legal and marketing teams usually managing affiliate marketing agreements tend to find themselves buried in low-value drafting and editing work, jumping back and forth between several different tools just to get the contract over the line.

It's repetitive, inefficient and can quickly become unmanageable for lean legal teams. At Juro we find that businesses tend to lose patience when switching between Word, PDFs, email and some kind of eSignature like DocuSign or an alternative becomes too painful.

How can using an affiliate marketing agreement template help?

If you create a standardized affiliate marketing template, you can ensure consistency across all affiliate partnerships, and also significantly streamline the contract creation process.

A template minimizes the time spent drafting individual contracts, as the main structure and terms remain the same; only specific details such as names, dates, and commission rates need to be updated.

Affiliate marketing agreement templates also make the review process quicker - affiliates get familiar with the standardized terms, meaning less contract negotiation and more time spent delivering mutual value from the partnership

Can you automate affiliate marketing agreements?

It's also possible to automate affiliate marketing agreements using automated contract templates. The process is simple:

• Draft or upload your affiliate marketing agreement template in Juro's purpose-built contract editor
• Create new contracts from this template by filling in a Q&A to customize the key fields ('smartfields')
• Approve the agreement by sending it for internal review in seconds - you can even collaborate internally in real time on the document
• Negotiate the agreement online with your counterparty, all in-browser
• eSign securely on any device with Juro's native eSignature, or DocuSign integration if you prefer
• Store and track agreements in Juro's secure digital contract repository
• Renew contracts and receive automated reminders when key milestones approach for your affiliate marketing agreements

By automating significant amounts of routine contract admin, you can save time on paperwork and focus on signing more affiliate partners for your business.

Ready to automate your affiliate marketing template with Juro?

Automate your affiliate agreements with Juro and experience a hassle-free, efficient contract management process that lets you focus more on building successful affiliate relationships, and less on routine admin work.

To find out more, hit the button below.