At last month’s iFX EXPO International conference in Limassol, our Vice President of Strategy Sarafina Wolde Gabriel hosted an affiliate workshop for financial trading brokers. Prior to the event, she developed an article discussing the topic for leading forex B2B news site Finance Magnates. The article was published online, and can be viewed here. You can also read the full piece below.
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One measure of the forex industry’s sustained growth and evolution is that iFX Expo International, the world’s largest financial B2B expo, has organised more than 10 events since May 2012. An industry that shares a similar trajectory, necessitating its own commitment to progress, is affiliate marketing.
Although commonly associated with high-end global retailers, hospitality, and iGaming, affiliate marketing has been gaining traction in the forex market for years. And while forex tends to be more exclusive than other sectors, the primary objective of increasing customer acquisitions to achieve sustainable growth serves as a unifying theme.
The forex market already provides an appealing opportunity for new market entrants and incumbents, generating more than $5 trillion in turnover every month. However, as is the case with any brand-building initiative, successful affiliate marketing relies on leveraging unique selling points (USPs) more likely to attract new traders. Whether it is offering competitive spreads, different platforms to meet different trading styles, strict security guidelines or highlighting industry accolades, affiliates can use these details to widely promote a brand and bolster trader acquisitions.
When considering the benefits of affiliate marketing, it’s important that forex brokers also evaluate their existing marketing mix to have a clear understanding of how they envision it fitting into their current strategy. Affiliates are themselves expert marketers across a range of channels, including mobile, paid and organic search, social media, and email. This makes them not just advertisers but also astute business partners that can help advance marketing strategies through actionable insights.
Building Affiliate Relationships
Making the most of these affiliate relationships requires that brokers effectively address the selling points that will entice them to enter a partnership in the first place. These include making it easy for affiliates to understand brand USPs, offering reliable programme support, providing clear terms and conditions and, perhaps most importantly, offering a fair commission model through which affiliates can generate revenue. While all brands should conduct research when determining appropriate models, it’s not uncommon to see cost-per-acquisition (CPA) deals ranging from $500 to $800, depending on performance.
Affiliates can account for upwards of 30% of new customer acquisitions and are a cost-effective channel for businesses to leverage. We have partnered with forex brokers that have seen the direct benefits of launching a branded affiliate programme, particularly when comparing commission payouts with net revenue totals. Customers acquired by the top third of programme affiliates can account for over 90% of net revenue generated, which itself can be more than six times as high as the commissions paid out per customer.
A key factor for attracting and running a successful affiliate programme is timely and flexible payments of referral commissions. Focusing on reliability and choice, many affiliates expect programmes to offer wire transfer, online bank transfer and credit cards as available options. The inclusion of digital wallets, such as Paysafe’s Skrill and NETELLER, will also highlight payment flexibility.
Typically used as a long-term strategy, brands have seen consistent growth through the affiliate channel, sometimes as much as a 200% increase from the previous year, across key metrics. These include: trade volume, depositing accounts, new account acquisitions, overall deposits, etc. With this kind of opportunity and proven ROI, it seems only a matter of time before more forex brokers expand their marketing initiatives to include affiliate marketing.
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The Income Access affiliate software powers the affiliate programmes of leading forex brokers, including GAIN Capital and ETX Capital. To schedule a demo of our affiliate marketing software and discover more about our other management services for financial trading brands, please reach out.
