The Affiliate Marketing Podcast

The E-Commerce Brand's Guide to Unified Performance Marketing in 2026
If your affiliate and influencer teams are still working in separate silos with separate budgets and separate tools, this episode will challenge everything about how you've structured your program. Lauryn Day, Director of Agency Partnerships at Levanta, joins Lee-Ann to explain why the lines between affiliate and creator marketing have blurred beyond the point of separate strategies, what a unified approach actually looks like in practice, and why the brands thriving right now are the ones that have stopped treating these two channels as competitors for budget.
This is a practical, no-nonsense conversation about how modern e-commerce brands are scaling creator and affiliate programs across Amazon, Shopify, and Walmart, and what the data tells us about where discovery and conversion are actually happening in 2026.

About Lauryn Day
Lauryn Day is Director of Agency Partnerships at Levanta, the leading affiliate marketing software for marketplace sellers. Having started her career on the brand side before moving into tech, she brings a practical, dual-perspective view to creator and affiliate strategy that is rare in this space.

Talking Points Include:
Why most affiliate infrastructure was built more than 20 years ago and no longer reflects how brands actually operate, and what a modern platform built for today's e-commerce reality looks like
How Levanta's one-click integration with Amazon, Shopify, and Walmart collapses what used to be a multi-tool, multi-spreadsheet operation into a single five-minute setup
What AI is actually doing to the shopper journey, and why the data shows less than 10% of consumers who use AI for product research convert through it
The product sampling tool that replaced a spreadsheet-and-email nightmare and why brands are calling it one of the most immediately impactful features they've adopted
How creator content is now serving two parts of the buying funnel at once: driving direct discovery and feeding the LLM recommendations that consumers use to shortlist products
The real cost of over-indexing on bottom-funnel partners like coupon and loyalty sites, and how to build a program that serves the full funnel
Key Segments of This Podcast and Where You Can Tune In to Go Direct:
[01:46] What Levanta is, how it was built, and why most affiliate infrastructure was already out of date before the creator economy arrived
[10:24] How consolidating creator and affiliate data into one platform changes the quality of decisions brands can make, with real client context
[22:12] Why treating creator and affiliate as separate strategies is the most common and most costly mistake Lauryn sees, and how to fix it
[26:30] Lauryn's three actionable tips for brands getting their programs ready for 2026:
Consolidate your tech stack. Unify your creator, affiliate, and marketplace channels under one program so your team can focus on strategy rather than administration.
Invest in top-of-funnel creator content. UGC builds brand trust, drives direct discovery, and increasingly feeds the AI recommendations consumers use to shortlist products.
Stay nimble and test often. Whether it's trialling higher commissions for specific creators, experimenting with a hybrid compensation model, or testing a new content format, run short tests, look at the data, and be willing to pivot quickly.
A huge thank you to Lauryn Day for joining us and sharing her insights on where creator and affiliate marketing is heading. If you want to explore what Levanta can do for your program, you can connect with Lauryn directly on Linke
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Why Every Affiliate Manager Needs to Understand What's Happening to Search Right Now
Search is changing faster than most programs can adapt. AI-powered platforms like ChatGPT and Gemini are absorbing customer journeys that used to generate trackable clicks, and the content that influences purchasing decisions is increasingly going unrecognised and unpaid.
In this episode, Lee-Ann sits down with Alex Springer, Director at openattribution.org, and Leanna Klyne, Head of Agency at KonverJ, to unpack what open attribution actually means, why last-click attribution was already broken before AI arrived, and what the industry is doing about it together, many of them for the very first time.
If you work with publishers, run an affiliate program, or depend on content-driven traffic to generate sales, this conversation will reshape how you think about measurement, value, and what comes next.
Talking Points Include:
Why content creators are producing value they will never be paid for and what needs to change before the affiliate industry loses its commercial foundation entirely
The difference between how people shop and how AI thinks people buy and why that gap is exactly where affiliate marketing's future opportunity lives
Why last click was always a fiction and why the shift to AI-assisted search is finally forcing the industry to confront it
What Open Attribution actually is and why it starts with something as simple as a list of URLs that changed everything

Listen to Find Out More About:
What the agentic commerce protocols from OpenAI and Google actually do, and why the contributions Open Attribution is making to them matter for every publisher and brand in performance marketing
Why some of the highest-quality publisher content has been deliberately removed from AI training sets, and what that means for the accuracy of AI recommendations right now
The early warning signs that brands and affiliate managers should be watching for as AI-generated content starts to game LLM visibility the same way SEO was gamed in the early days of Google
How the SPUR initiative and the APMA AI task force connect to what Open Attribution is building, and where compliance and governance conversations are actually happening
Why Alex believes websites are not going away in five years, and what types of purchases will continue to require the kind of considered, content-led journeys that affiliate publishers are built to support

Key Segments of This Podcast and Where You Can Tune In to Go Direct:
[02:47] Alex introduces Open Attribution, his decade in performance marketing, and why he shifted focus from AI as a technology to AI as an industry actor
[05:45] Why last click was already broken before AI, and what transparency and usage auditability actually mean for content owners and brands
[27:05] The CPA debate: whether cost-per-acquisition still makes sense, what influence really means now, and why the shopping journey has always been more complex than the model we used to measure it

Ready to Build a Smarter Affiliate Program?
If this episode raised questions about how your program is measuring influence, attributing value, or preparing for an AI-first customer journey, the KonverJ team can help. We work with brands and publishers to build affiliate strategies that are built for where performance marketing is heading, not just where it has been.
Get in touch with the KonverJ team to find out how we can help you build a program that performs in the new landscape.
Send me a text with your questions

How treating compliance as a marketing function rather than a legal checkbox can protect your program, your brand, and your bottom line.
If compliance makes your eyes glaze over, this episode is worth pushing through. Sarafina Wolde Gabriel, CEO of Rightlander and a 20-year veteran of affiliate marketing, joins Lee-Ann to make the case that compliance is not a legal formality but a direct driver of revenue. They get into why the biggest programs are still leaving massive blind spots unchecked, what AI-generated content is doing to risk exposure, why a large affiliate is not automatically a compliant one, and the practical steps any affiliate manager can take today to audit their program before a regulator does it for them.

Listen to Find Out More About:
Why even a compliant, long-standing affiliate in your program can still be exposing your brand through content they published years ago and have forgotten about
How the Honey browser extension scandal is a preview of the tracking integrity challenges that are coming for affiliate programs this year
What Sarafina would prioritise in the first week of managing a new affiliate program to put the right compliance foundations in place from day one
Why proving to a regulator that you had systems and monitoring in place before a problem occurred can be the difference between a warning and a fine
How to split compliance responsibilities across your team so it does not all sit on one person and quietly fall off the priority list during busy periods
The one piece of advice Sarafina would give any affiliate manager building a program from scratch, and why knowing your affiliates is still the most important thing in this industry after 20 years
Key Segments of This Podcast and Where You Can Tune In to Go Direct:
[03:05] Why the foundations of affiliate marketing have not fundamentally changed in 20 years, and what that means for how you should still be operating today
[05:09] What actually happens to revenue when compliance fails, and the moment a customer walks away because your affiliate's promotional content did not match reality
[06:38] Rightlander's core function explained: scanning, risk scoring, and giving affiliate managers an action step rather than just a data dump
[21:58] The two compliance trends coming in the next two to three years that most programs are not yet preparing for
[23:26] The five-point compliance checklist Sarafina recommends for any affiliate manager who has never formally audited their program before

Call to Action
A big thank you to Sarafina Wolde Gabriel for joining us this week and for making compliance feel like something worth paying attention to rather than something to hand off to legal. You can connect with Sarafina on LinkedIn and find out more about what Rightlander does at rightlander.com.
If you want more practical insight like this delivered directly to you, sign up for the Affiverse newsletter at affiversemedia.com. We cover the latest in affiliate marketing strategy, industry news, and program growth every week, and it is one of the simplest ways to stay ahead without having to go looking for it yourself.

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Why personalised affiliate recruitment still outperforms automation (and what the best affiliate managers do differently)
If your affiliate recruitment is generating lists but not conversations, this episode is your reset. Frederic Jean-Bart, founder of Performance Partners, has spent 17 years building relationships across every side of this industry: affiliate networks, brand-side program management, and as an affiliate himself. Lee-Ann and Fred get into why the era of AI-generated outreach is actually making human connection more valuable, not less, how deal making with high-quality affiliates is where real program growth happens, and what separates elite affiliate managers from everyone else hitting send on the same mass email.

Listen to Find Out More About:
The exact communication gap between what affiliate managers send and what top publishers actually need to see before they say yes
Why media buyers are among the best affiliates for scale but require a completely different recruitment and relationship strategy than any other partner type
How AEO and brand citation are starting to change where affiliate influence happens in the customer journey, and what that means for program strategy
Why Fred's advice to his 2009 self comes down to one word and what that means practically for anyone building a career in this industry
The rapid fire breakdown on CPA versus revenue share, the one book Fred says every agency owner should read, and why boring operations beat exciting chaos every single time
What trust actually looks like in practice with high-value affiliate partners, and why paying on time is as much a relationship signal as any personal outreach

Key Segments of This Podcast and Where You Can Tune In to Go Direct:
[01:51] Fred introduces his 17-year career spanning network, brand, and affiliate sides of the industry and why building Performance Partners came out of working with nine-figure e-commerce brands
[05:05] Lee-Ann shares the exact outreach emails she receives that get deleted instantly, and what three pieces of information every affiliate needs before they'll respond
[09:35] The case for getting on video calls with key partners and why the human ability to convey excitement and credibility over a call still closes deals that email cannot
[15:30] Why media buyers are the most powerful affiliate type for scale but also the most burnt out by programs that overpromise, and what building genuine trust with them requires
[17:40] Partner diversification as risk management, why brands default to influencers and coupon sites, and how Fred approaches segmentation from day one of a new program

Call to Action
A huge thank you to Frederic Jean-Bart for joining us this week. If this episode has made you rethink how you're recruiting affiliates and managing partner relationships, KonverJ works with brands at exactly this level, building programs that are built on strategy, not spray and pray. Find out how we work with brands here.
And if you want conversations like this one landing in your feed every week, subscribe to the Affiliate Marketing Podcast so you never miss an episode. Share this one with an affiliate manager you know who's still relying on volume over quality. It might be the nudge they need.
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Why tracking everything your affiliates do matters more now than ever before (and what conversion protection tells us about lost revenue)

If your affiliate program isn't tracking properly, you could be losing millions without realising it. Adam Ross, CEO of Awin and 21-year industry veteran, reveals exactly how AI-powered search is fragmenting the customer journey, why deterministic tracking alone won't survive the next five years, and how Awin's Conversion Protection Initiative has already recovered over $250 million in previously untracked revenue. Lee-Ann and Adam discuss his leadership approach, why probabilistic tracking methods are becoming essential, and what the convergence of influencer and affiliate marketing means for program growth.

Talking Points Include:
The seismic shift happening in content attribution – how LLMs are citing publisher content to answer consumer queries, why this value currently goes unrewarded, and the new tracking signals needed to expose it
Why different traffic deserves different tracking methods – different traffic has different value and possibly needs different tracking methods and different reward mechanisms, ending the era of treating all affiliate partnerships equally
The conversion protection wake-up call – how forcing tracking upgrades revealed $16 million in additional commission and what this tells us about invisible program value

Listen to Find Out More About:
Why Awin does quarterly seasonal product releases to bring meaningful improvements to advertiser and publisher experiences, with the winter release focused on simplifying what is still an incredibly complex channel to help everyone get much more value out of the space
How the new platform aims to get smaller advertisers to money-making partnerships as quickly as possible without needing account management support, using 25 years of data to know which partnerships work, what rates to pay, and how to increase active partnerships
Why Adam is extremely bullish about affiliate's future, noting that while this disruption is probably going to be much bigger than past changes, affiliate is a wonderful monetisation infrastructure that can be quite agnostic about how end user experiences evolve
The exciting new influx of AI startups connecting at scale with multiple brands looking for ways to monetise, where the CPA model works very well for AI recommendations based on personalisation
Why the convergence of influencer and affiliate marketing continues accelerating and why people will always want to buy from other people, even when using AI for research
What it means that there's got to be an acceptance that in a lot of cases, the old ways of tracking from a technical perspective are no longer going to work, whilst deterministic tracking remains super important as the base

Key Segments of This Podcast and Where You Can Tune In to Go Direct:
[01:15] The unlikely journey from dentistry student to affiliate marketing through a recruiter who saw potential beyond experience
[18:55] Why different affiliate traffic has different value and needs different tracking methods and reward mechanisms
[27:00] How Awin's seasonal product releases bring quarterly improvements and what the winter release means for platform simplification

Call to Action
Master the tracking evolution that's reshaping affiliate marketing success. Adam's insights into probabilistic measurement, AI disruption, and conversion protection reveal exactly why upgrading your technical infrastructure isn't optional anymore. [Subscribe to the Affilia
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