What are average Affiliate Rates?

[Leon]

The title pretty much says it all. I've been trying to research what the average Affiliate rates are. From the little I've been able to find it seems to be around 30% and, depending on how big of a seller the developer is, it can drop down to 20%.

So I come here, directly, to ask the developers - what rates are you offering/seeing? What's low? What's the average? What's high?

Thanks.

[princec]

I offer 50% of net.

Cas :)

[Tertsi]

30% - 50%. Only portals offer less.

[jankoM]

I offer 50% of net.

Too bad your game is not that much appropriate for kids. Maybe I will make website for dadies now ;) . BraveDaddyGames.com

Most games that I affiliate give 30% , some rare ones 20% of >30%.

[kay.altos]

We working on 30% basis. But it depends.

[Leon]

30% - 50%. Only portals offer less.

How low will Portals tend to go? 20%?

[Jamie W]

Forgive me for stating the obvious, and I am probably missing something here, but with those kind of rates, doesn't it make much more sense to just give up game development and setup your own portal, selling other people's games?

Maybe I'm missing something, it just seems way more profitable to run a portal, than it is to develop a game.

*confused*

[papillon]

People generally don't go into indie game development to make money! :)

(And if they had the marketing skills to build and maintain a portal... they could make plenty of money marketing their own games.)

Do you think you can launch a new portal and push enough traffic to it to make it work? It's easy to try, many programs are open to any affiliate who wants to give it a go... :)

[Leon]

but with those kind of rates, doesn't it make much more sense to just give up game development and setup your own portal, selling other people's games?

Okay, now I'm abit confused. When I said I had found the rates to be around 30% I was thinking 30% to the Affiliate and 70% to the developer. Now Jamie's post has me thinking that it's the other way around?

I'm 99% sure I have it right, but someone please confirm and get rid of that 1%. ;)

[Sharpfish]

Leon, Don't confuse portals and affiliates.

Affiliates get the 30% and the developer the larger portion.

With portals they call the shots and you get the lower cut (whatever that may be). Because portals are different. Anyone can be an affiilate, it's not certain exposure to large amounts of traffic. Portals (good/successful ones) on the other hand have put a lot of money into marketing to draw in massive amounts of traffic, therefore they recoup this (and more) by taking the larget cut.

And before you think "that sucks" the point is, with the right game, you could sell potentionally far more games on a portal than you could direct and with affiliates. So instead of $15 a game you may get $5 but you will sell more than you would otherwise so you end up even (or better if your game does very well).

It does seem to developers that we put in the hard work and they take the profits but the fact is it's not easy or cheap to set up and run a large pro portal these days. Their bandwidth costs must be through the roof.

Of course, they still make far more money than the devs but they are an alternative/extra income if you need it. Personally I am more direct sales based but would consider portals if I had the right game for extra sales.

[Leon]

Leon. Do not confuse portals and affiliates.

Yeah, I see now I was getting confused as far as what people were talking about at the time(I understand the difference but for some reason when Jamie said portal I read affiliate). Thanks for unconfusing me. :)

[Jamie W]

Ah, I was under the impression that the lions share went to the portals (and the developer got the 20%, 30% if lucky).

I'm still confusing portals with affiliates; could some kind soul please explain the difference to me.

EDIT:

Portals are the massive popular sites that all seem to be selling the same games?

Affiliates are when developers sell their own games on each other's sites?

Is that right?

p.s. Appologies for the confusion.

[Sharpfish]

Ah, I was under the impression that the lions share went to the portals (and the developer got the 20%, 30% if lucky).


That's the gist of it yes. Portals get the larger cut always.


I'm still confusing portals with affiliates; could some kind soul please explain the difference to me.


I just did in my last post ;) re-read it but with no preconceptions it should be clear then?


Portals are the massive popular sites that all seem to be selling the same games?


Portals are sites like real arcade, reflexive, big fish games, yahoo games etc


Affiliates are when developers sell their own games on each other's sites?


Affiliates merely get a small cut for helping to sell your games. There are a few sites out there that consist of nothing but affiliate links but appear to look like portals. They probably don't make that much cash compared to real portals. Also it's not just developers who sell the games of others as affiliates.. pretty much anyone with a website and the inclination to do so can do it (like displaying google ads or something).

edit - the last paragraph confused me on reading.. so to add:

An affiliate is someone who sells your game on their site using a special link or a special build that can be traced to them. When someone buys that game the system recalls where it was d/l or linked from and gives the agreed credit to the affiliate (the typically 30%). The developer (who is NOT the affiliate nor doesn't need to be involved with the "seller" in any way except to agree to let them sell the game) gets the 70%.


Hope this helps! :)

[James C. Smith]

Affiliates often does not mean “developers sell their own games on each other's sites”

To confuse matters even more, almost all the “portals” have “affiliate” systems where any web site can refer visitors to the games offered by the portal and the affiliate web site gets ~ 20% or 40% of the sale.

With a system like Reflexive Arcade, the affiliate may get 30%, the developer gets 40%, and the “portal” (Reflexive) gets 20%.


When I read Tertsi’s post saying “30% - 50%. Only portals offer less.” I interpreted that to mean that an affiliate who gets a game directly from a developer may get 30% - 50% but an affiliate who gets the game from a portal may get a smaller amount because typical portals pay their affiliates less than a developer would pay his affiliates.