The Best Affiliate Networks of 2018: The Year’s Top Programs

Choosing a solid affiliate network is a crucial part of being a successful affiliate marketer.

There are literally thousands of affiliate programs offered by merchants to market their services or products and I’ve gone through most of them.

Some affiliate programs are large and reputable enough to be listed here as their own entity, but for the most part, the right affiliate network can help you to find the perfect offers to maximize earning potential by doing one or more of the following:

• Creating a central database for affiliate offers that can be easily organized and filtered to your specifications.
• Allows you to participate in multiple programs through a simple registration to a single network.
• Provides analytics, various reporting tools and reliable payment processing tools and services.

No matter what types of products or services you are looking to promote, you can find a large and reliable affiliate network to suit your needs.

Below is a list of my personal favorite affiliate networks in 2018 catering to various products, services, and industries.

2018’s Best Affiliate Networks

CJ Affiliate

Formerly Commission Junction, this affiliate marketing network specializes in pay-for-performance programs and is considered to be the biggest platform online.

They operate globally and have the affiliate programs of some of the world’s most recognized and specialized retailers. Examples of recognized companies that are partners of CJ would be Home Depot, Apple, TurboTax and Zappos.

I personally like them for their high end, powerful reporting tools as well as reliable and timely payments.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Check; Direct Deposit
• Minimum payment amount: $100 Check; $50 Direct Deposit
• Programs offered: CPA, CPL, CPS, CPC

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ShareASale

ShareASale is among one of the largest U.S. affiliate networks with currently over 3900 merchant programs on its platform and over 700,000 affiliates participating. They are based out of Chicago, IL and have been operating for over 17 years with an outstanding reputation for fair and honest business. This is a great affiliate network for people getting into affiliate marketing to promote physical products.

Personally, I’ve done made a lot income with ShareASale.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Check; Direct Deposit
• Minimum payment amount: $50
• Programs offered: CPA, CPL, CPS, CPC

Visit Site

Rakuten Affiliate Network

Formerly Buy.com, this is another great affiliate network for e-commerce focusing mostly on physical goods. While their network is smaller than some of their competitors with around 1,000 partners, they are one of the oldest affiliate programs and dedicated to premium technology.

These guys offer a ton of creatives.  Optimizing sales is thus made easier by using technology such as rotating ads and flexible linking options. This means CRO junkies like me will likely appreciate the slick features that this affiliate network provides.

Fun fact: Rakuten helped me get my biggest affiliate month ever in December 2016.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Check; Direct Deposit; PayPal
• Minimum payment amount: $50
• Programs offered: CPA, CPL, CPS, CPC

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Clickbank

This very large and longstanding affiliate network stands out from the pack by focusing on digital information, product launches and other internet marketing products. They market over 6 million unique lifestyle products created by passionate entrepreneurs. They take pride in delivering products that improve the lives of roughly 200 million customers around the world.

Personally, I’ve never ran any info products but this is where I’d go if I did.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Check, Direct Deposit, Wire Transfer
• Minimum payment amount: $10
• Referral program: Yes

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ReviMedia

If lead generation is your game, then this affiliate network is not one to be overlooked.

ReviMedia specializes in the industries of insurance, home services and financial verticals in global markets. They offer a full-service platform that focuses on using superior technology to fully automate the lead generation process. With lead scoring and verification technology, they enable you to maximize your revenue with higher lead conversions.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Check, Wire Transfer, PayPal
• Minimum payment amount: $50

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Avangate

This affiliate network specializes in global eCommerce of software, digital goods and SaaS solutions. They are partnered with over 4,000 digital businesses in over 180 countries. Strong support from their publisher community has given this network a big boost in rankings.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Check, Wire Transfer, PayPal
• Minimum payment amount: $100

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MaxBounty

This is a CPA network, which means the advertiser pays for a specific action.

That action could be a sale, form submission, download, or any other action performed by the visitor that can be tracked then paid for by the advertiser. There are certain web services, such as software downloads or file sharing, that generate much more affiliate income when using a CPA network as opposed to premium affiliate networks such as CJ or ShareASale.

If you’re an ace at conversion rate optimization, this is where you want to be.

MaxBounty has been around for over a decade and is consistently considered one of the best CPA networks.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Check, Direct Deposit, Wire Transfer, PayPal, Payoneer, Bitcoin
• Minimum payment amount: $100

Visit Site

Top Affiliate Programs

Amazon Affiliates

Amazon is the biggest and most well known online retailer in the US, so it’s no surprise that they have the largest single affiliate program in which you can advertise over a million products to customers.

One of the biggest attractions to this affiliate program is it’s ease of use and the wide range of physical goods that you can market.

From experience, 80%+ of the affiliate marketers I know are in Amazon.  And many of them reach 5-figure monthly levels, depsite the low payout percentage.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Check, Direct Deposit, Amazon.com Gift Certificates
• Minimum payment amount: $10
• 60-day hold on payment

Visit Site

eBay Partner Program

This large marketplace represents 5 million sellers with a combined 800 million listings selling to a total of 162 million active buyers. eBay parnter network sells to a global market operating in 13 countries around the world. Through the website and mobile app, you can use simple tools to create links, share via social media, track sales and get easy-to-understand reports and analytics.

Quick Look:

• Payment methods: Direct Deposit; PayPal
• Minimum payment amount: $25

Visit Site