This week, we had the opportunity to speak with Anna Gidirim, the head of the Admitad Affiliate. We discussed the evolution of the company from its early days, learning more about the services it offers, and how Anna envisions the future of the industry.

Please describe the story behind Admitad: What sparked the idea, and how has it evolved so far?

Founded back in 2010, the Admitad affiliate network has expanded beyond its headquarters in Heilbronn (Germany) by setting up 8 offices around the world, with plans to further global expansion. The idea behind this business was simple: bring advertisers and publishers together to inspire cooperation, and profits will flow.

“I decided not to reinvent the wheel; I just wanted to improve the existing platforms and excel at customer service,” says Admitad’s CEO Alexander Bachmann.

Prior to Admitad, Bachmann contributed as a publisher at Zanox & Affilinet (rebranded to Awin). These platforms are considered to be the European affiliate marketing giants. Instead of going head-to-head with Zanox, Bachmann discovered an opportunity in the CIS market, namely, in Cost-per-Acquisition (CPA) affiliate marketing. Fortified by his experience as a top affiliate, Alexander decided not just to create his own affiliate network, but to build a company with all the features and qualities the current platforms were lacking. It hit the spot — within a couple of years, Admitad managed to get its first e-commerce contracts, and soon enough the affiliate network had no equals in Russia and Ukraine.

As Admitad went on, we kept adding new businesses and investing into affiliate-related projects. In 2016, Admitad Invest was established to keep an eye out for promising ideas, and in 2017 — Admitad Projects startup studio to help them grow. Dozens of projects went through our hands and received funding — LetyShops cashback provider and RevGlue platform included — or were acquired — as Adgoal and Tapfiliate. Aside from the Affiliate Network, Admitad infrastructure hosts the Advertiser Marketplace and the GetUniQ ad management system. We develop new means to drive sales and earn online, such as Admitad Cashback, ConvertSearch, ConvertLink, ConvertSocial, and Vendor Network.

Now Admitad Affiliate is the fastest growing affiliate network in the European market and is quickly expanding to both Asia, Middle East, Latin, and North America with offices now opening all over the world. Today, Admitad Affiliate serves over 2,000 advertisers and cooperates with over 800,000 publishers who brought more than 162 million target actions to Admitad customers’ websites in 2020 alone. In total, Admitad employs over 900 people worldwide.

Starting April 2021, Admitad Affiliate has been headed by Anna Gidirim, the former Head of Admitad Affiliate Russia. Anna is responsible for all the regions of Admitad presence – Europe, North America, LATAM, MENA, APAC, Russia, and CIS.

“We pursue an ambitious goal — becoming the leader in the global affiliate market — and we have done pretty well in the last couple of years. Affiliate marketing is not as unfamiliar as it used to be. Advertisers find it useful to increase their sales by paying for each confirmed action, and publishers can enjoy monetizing their traffic sustainably. We are making our tools available to everyone, and keep nurturing partnerships that are profitable for online businesses. We have a long road ahead, but also an amazing team, and I am happy to be a part of it.“ Anna says.

What services do you offer?

Admitad Affiliate develops tools to increase online sales and help traffic owners make money by publishing ads. The network brings together publishers and advertisers, keeping the focus on nurturing partnerships, affiliate training, and consulting.

At Admitad Affiliate, advertisers can take advantage of the affiliate channel and get extra sales within a predictable budget, boost media coverage and brand recognition. The platform is an entry point to audiences from any country, region, or continent.

On their side, publishers who deal in traffic are able to monetize various ad spaces by rerouting their viewers to other companies’ goods and services. They can work with any of the affiliate programs listed in the Admitad catalog to receive the due reward for each targeted action wanted by the advertiser.

Apart from that, Admitad Academy, the educational branch of Admitad Affiliate, holds webinars and courses, not to mention all the free articles it creates for publishers.

What is the mission of Admitad?

Admitad Affiliate makes it possible to sell and earn money online by bringing together advertisers and publishers on one platform. Our mission is to nurture fruitful partnerships and thus help all marketers increase their earnings.

In fulfilling our Mission, we rely on the company’s high-end tracking solutions, meticulous traffic quality control, and utmost brand safety. With over a dozen years of experience in affiliate marketing, we provide top-notch service to all who need it and are flexible enough to timely react to new market challenges. As a result, Admitad Affiliate is apt to harvest synergy effects for rapid growth, develop new tools at lower costs and keep improving the quality of its products every day.

What makes you different from other similar platforms?

Admitad Affiliate streamlines the process by providing individual account management, in-house end-to-end tracking, and many more unique features.

Quick payment. Whereas most of the affiliate networks follow a monthly payment schedule, whereas Admitad Affiliate has a weekly pattern. Moreover, we have Express payments, which allows you to get your money ready for withdrawal within 24 hours. At the moment  Admitad Affiliate supports 6 payment methods: bank account, bank card, PayPal, WebMoney, ePayments, and Payoneer.

Transparent data. After joining Admitad Affiliate, you’ll get a comprehensive dashboard that allows you to easily track your sales activity, monitor which publishers and campaigns are performing well, and generate reports at any given time. This allows you to optimize your affiliate marketing easily, saving you time and budget.

Personal approach. Admitad Affiliate assigns each client an expert and dedicated account manager to deal with all the queries (in your native language). They solve every problem which clients face, assist them with campaign optimization, and recruit publishers in accordance with the client’s criteria. There are also expert support teams in place to aid with any technical issues. And for our top e-commerce sellers, there are exclusive coupons & codes which are perfect when working with opinion-makers on social media.

Academy. Finally, as far as we’re aware, we’re the only affiliate network to educate its clients and partners on a regular basis. Admitad Academy does just that: provides free training courses, launches on-demand webinars, etc. The Academy is designed to educate advertisers and publishers, share in-depth guides, advanced tips, and marketing insights.

Which trends and technologies do you find to be particularly intriguing these days?  

We currently foresee three trends in the years to come. Firstly, we expect further pressure from browsers and legal bodies that aim to curb affiliate networks’ opportunities to track and attribute online orders. Secondly, the share of desktop traffic will keep falling as mobile Gen Z grows its purchasing power. Thirdly, launching affiliate programs and monetizing traffic is anticipated to become much more accessible. We have watched the market change, and our recent acquisition, Tapfiliate, will help us spearhead the paradigm shift.

How do you envision the future of your industry?

Eventually, we see a very bright light at the end of this privacy policies tunnel. Once we manage to pull through the market expansion, we expect everyone down to the smallest enterprises to realize the true potential of affiliate marketing and discover the unlimited growth it has to offer. However, they will need guidance — someone has to teach them how to use the channel, share their expertise and show the ropes of CPA.

The user acquisition costs will keep rising due to the limited demand of high-end publishers, partly softened by the appearance of freshly cut partners. As the costs of CPA grows, more and more influencers and creators will see the performance channel is worthy of their time and effort.