YITH WooCommerce Affiliates vs Affiliate for WooCommerce

If you own an WooCommerce online store, you understand the integral part that affiliates play in growing sales and expanding your business’s footprint.

An affiliate plugin helps you manage your affiliate business, run marketing campaigns, track commissions and much more.

So, if you can’t decide which plugin is the best for you to create an affiliate program, you’ve come to the perfect place. In this article, we’ll look closely at two major players: Affiliate for WooCommerce and YITH WooCommerce Affiliates.

This in-depth comparison article will go over major features, costs and user experience so you can have a superior plugin at your disposal to master the affiliate game. Let’s get started.

Plugin Overview

Now that the comparison table has provided an overview of each plugin’s capabilities, it’s time to conduct a detailed analysis to uncover the differences in the major features both the plugins have to offer.

YITH WooCommerce Affiliates

YITH WooCommerce Affiliates provides an opportunity to create affiliates and collaborative relationships that will bring more traffic, engagement and sales to your business.

This plugin makes it easy to sign up customers, bloggers, freelancers and social media influencers as affiliate partners.

You can then request them to promote your products on their platforms via articles, postings and other compelling content to drive traffic and purchases.

With the free version, you can manually approve affiliates and set a default commission for referrals. Affiliates also receive a dedicated dashboard for tracking clicks and commissions paid.

Free features include:

• Use the default form for your affiliate registration process. You can enable or disable fields like Name, Surname, Email and Password, as well as specify which of these items should be necessary.
• Use the affiliate registration form shortcode to create a custom registration page for your affiliates.
• Option to reject/ban affiliates and set a custom message to show to specific rejected/banned affiliates. Restrict affiliates from earning commissions on their own purchases.
• Add an affiliate manually from an existing user or by creating a new user.
• Allow affiliates to share their referral links on social media.
• Get a personalized affiliate dashboard for affiliates to track visits, monitor conversions and review their commissions and payment status.
• Set a default commission rate for all affiliates. Manually pay commissions via direct bank or wire transfer.

Premium features include:

• Create a customized form for your affiliate registration process. Add an unlimited number of fields to the form, such as the URL of their website or blog, links to affiliates’ social media channels, biography/portfolio and so on.
• Automatically approve all affiliates following their registration to avoid manual activation.
• Exclude certain products, categories, or tags from the affiliate commissions. Exclude specific users or user roles from the affiliate program.
• Set commissions based on specific products, product categories, affiliate tags and user roles. Detailed commission reports for each product – advanced reports (visits, commissions, earnings, popular affiliates, popular products, etc.
• Assign coupons to affiliates for promotion. Associate an order with a specific affiliate.
• Allow affiliates to apply for payment of their commissions (and upload or generate invoices for withdrawal requests).
• Email notifications for the commission paid/generated.
• Export commissions and affiliates into a CSV file.
• Pay commissions through PayPal.

When it comes to features, the free edition of YITH WooCommerce Affiliates is somewhat limited. To get the most out of your affiliate program, you have to upgrade to the premium edition of the plugin.

Try YITH WooCommerce Affiliates demo

Affiliate for WooCommerce

Affiliate for WooCommerce, developed by StoreApps, is a top-tier, enterprise-grade plugin for attracting affiliates and increasing revenue for WooCommerce sellers.

It minimizes tech expenses and setup time. It has high-quality code and is compatible with shared hosting websites, making it popular among consumers.

You can manage everything from a single place.

This feature-rich plugin includes personalized registration forms, referral link tagging, instant payouts, multi-tier commission plans and a suite of marketing tools/brand creatives.

It also boasts robust tracking and seamless integration with extensions like Smart Coupons.

With 40+ five-star reviews and exceptional support, Affiliate for WooCommerce stands out as a reliable and comprehensive affiliate marketing solution for digital entrepreneurs and forward-thinking WooCommerce sellers.

Key features of Affiliate for WooCommerce:

• Dedicated dashboards for store owners and affiliates to monitor performance and statistics, including earnings, top-selling products, campaign assets and more! Monitor traffic, conversions, commissions and rewards in one spot.
• Allow anyone (including your consumers and subscribers) to join your affiliate program using registration forms. Approve their requests manually or automatically and designate their commission rates.
• Allows affiliates to promote your products or services by creating customized referral links or coupons.
• Create a robust conditions-based commission system including commissions based on the first product in the cart, specific products, product categories, specific affiliates, subscription renewals, etc.
• Create a multi-tier affiliate program. Affiliates earn commissions on their own sales as well as those of clients they refer.
• Create, assign and personalize affiliate landing pages.
• Custom page for affiliate dashboard – display the affiliate dashboard on any custom page via a shortcode.
• Create highly individualized marketing campaigns with images, videos, product manuals and other marketing assets. Share these resources with a selected set of affiliates and track the performance of each campaign separately in Google Analytics.
• Bulk generate, import and export coupons for affiliates with Smart Coupons (Demo).
• Prevent affiliates from receiving commissions for their own purchases or transactions.
• Export affiliate data to CSV using search criteria.
• Do instant payouts via PayPal.
• Integrate with Smart Manager, Customer Email Verification, WooCommerce Blocks and PayPal Payments.

Try Affiliate for WooCommerce demo

The head-on comparison: YITH WooCommerce Affiliates vs Affiliate for WooCommerce

Let’s conduct a thorough analysis to determine how the two vary further and which of them has the potential to be your long-term affiliate marketing tool.

Installing both plugins is simple and requires activation on your WordPress admin dashboard.

After installation, you’ll need to adjust some settings for cookies, affiliate approval, registration forms and commissions among other things.

For more details and help with installation, refer to these: YITH WooCommerce Affiliates docs and Affiliate for WooCommerce docs respectively.

Affiliate registration forms

Forms play a crucial role as the connection point between your affiliates and your program. Both plugins offer customizable registration forms for an easy registration process.

YITH WooCommerce Affiliates
Use the [yith_wcaf_registration_form] shortcode to display the affiliate application form on any page of your website, allowing users to easily submit their applications.

Customizing the Registration Form Enable or disable default fields by navigating to YITH > Affiliates > General Options > Affiliate Registration.

Detailed instructions can be found here. If a user has already applied for the affiliate program, a message will inform them about their submitted application.

The shortcode supports several attributes:

• show_login_form: Set to yes or no to display or hide the login form alongside the registration form.
• login_title: Define the title of the login form, if it is shown.
• register_title: Define the title of the registration form.

Affiliate for WooCommerce

Using the registration form shortcode
The shortcode [afwc_registration_form] allows you to include the affiliate registration form on any page or post on your website. This enables users to simply join your affiliate program right from your website.

Customizing the registration form
Display the default fields and add custom fields to collect the essential information from affiliates. This documentation provides full instructions for creating and customizing the registration form.

The real deal-stealer is that Affiliate for WooCommerce integrates with plugins like Contact Form 7 and Elementor Form Builder to improve the visual attractiveness of your affiliate forms.

Affiliate referral links and coupons

Once affiliates fill up the registration form, the store admin can take a call on accepting or rejecting an affiliate.

YITH WooCommerce Affiliates:

• Store owners can automatically approve all affiliates or manually approve each application.
• Add an affiliate manually from an existing user or manually add an affiliate by creating a new user.
• Option to reject and ban affiliates.
• Affiliates can generate custom URLs for different pages.
• Use coupons instead of affiliate referral links.

Affiliate for WooCommerce:

• Store owners can automatically approve all affiliates or manually approve each application.
• Option to reject affiliates.
• Automatically make some users your affiliates based on their user role – Customer, Editor, Subscriber…
• Affiliates can create custom URLs for different pages.
• Use coupons instead of affiliate referral links.
• Affiliates can change the affiliate tracking parameter, and can also customize the affiliate URL (or make it pretty).

Commission plans

Commission plans are the most exciting part of affiliate programs. With the commission plans or rules, you can decide which affiliate will earn how much and on what.

YITH WooCommerce Affiliates
With YITH, you can define specific commission rates that override the general affiliate rates. These rules allow you to create customized percentage rates based on various conditions:

• User-specific: Assign custom rates for individual affiliate users.
• Product-specific: Set custom rates for individual products, including variations.
• Product category: Apply custom rates to specific product categories.
• User role: Define custom rates for different user roles.
• Combination: Create rules that apply custom rates based on a combination of product and user, such as offering a 35% rate only for affiliate “Anderson” when the “RayBan Sunglass” is sold through his link. Product variations are also supported.

Affiliate for WooCommerce
Affiliate for WooCommerce provides a flexible commission plan structure, often regarded as the best in the market. It supports both flat and percentage-based compensation rates, allowing you to define custom earning scenarios for your affiliates.

This customization can be based on a variety of criteria:

• Storewide commission rate: Set up the default or global commission rate across all products in your store.
• Tiered commission: Set up a commission plan with two, three, four…’n’ number of tiers and reward affiliates in each tier. Se
• Affiliate-specific commission: Provide different commission rates to different affiliates.
• Affiliate-tag specific commission: Provide different commission rates to affiliate groups.
• Product and product-category-based commission: Apply specific commission rates to different products and product categories for targeted incentives.
• First order-based commission: Provide commission only if its the user first order on your store.
• User role-based commission: Give commission only if the affiliate’s user role matches with the role set in the commission plan – customer, subscriber, author, shop manager, etc.
• Subscription-based commissions: Set different commission rates for subscription parent order and renewals. For example, give 10% for subscription parent order and 5% for upto 11 renewals.
• Combination – Assign 30% commission to Influencers on the sale of Marketing course but provide 25% commission to other affiliates for the same course.
• Assign commissions only on the main product, not on upsells: Exclude upsell items from commission calculations while rewarding the sale of main products. For instance, if an affiliate refers a customer who purchases both a laptop (primary product) and an additional mouse (upsell item), the affiliate will only be paid a commission on the laptop, with the mouse excluded from commission calculations.
• Assign different commissions for one product and storewide commissions on others in the same purchase order.
• Lifetime commissions: Give lifetime commissions by permanently linking customers to affiliates after the initial purchase, regardless of browser cookies. Let affiliates earn on all future purchases by their referred customers.

Examples of commission plans that you can set with Affiliate for WooCommerce plugin:

• 30% commission on the ‘Health & Wellness’ category and 20% commission on all other categories.
• 50% commission for affiliates tagged as ‘Influencer’ tag on the sale of premium electronics.
• $7 flat commission on the sale of tablets but no commission on accessories included in the same order.
• 30% commission on the sale of the first product and a general storewide commission on additional products in the same order.
• Multi-tier commissions: 25%, 18% and 12% in a three-tier program. John refers Emma and Emma refers David for your affiliate program. David, Emma and John will earn 25%, 18% and 12% commissions respectively on a successful referral by David.
• Recurring commissions – Provide a 25% commission on the initial subscription and 10% for up to 6 renewals.

To set up a commission plan, navigate to WooCommerce > Affiliates > Plans > Add a Plan.

Multi-tier affiliate program

High commissions compromise your profitability, while low commissions might demotivate affiliates.

So, what contributes to striking harmony between the two? Also, how can you get more individuals to register for your affiliate program?

You can use the Affiliate for WooCommerce plugin to create a multi-tier affiliate program with an ‘n’ number of tiers. Affiliates receive commissions on both their own sales and sales made by individuals they refer to your program.

Marketing campaigns

Affiliate for WooCommerce plugin allows you to set up numerous marketing campaigns. Include promotional resources like images, videos, logos, banners, e-books, etc., in the campaign.

The affiliates can access these marketing assets and other resources and utilize them in their channels for promotion – emails, social, blogs, ads, etc.

You can also choose which affiliates or affiliate tags can access individual marketing campaigns

Payouts

YITH WooCommerce Affiliates

With YITH WooCommerce Affiliates, you can make the payouts manually and record the payment. Or, completely automate the commission payouts using PayPal or Stripe by combining with the following tools:

• YITH PayPal Payouts
• YITH Account Funds
• YITH Stripe Connect

Affiliates for WooCommerce
With this plugin, you can pay your affiliates or brand ambassadors manually or via PayPal (free plugin).

In manual payouts, you pay the affiliate out of this plugin (direct bank / wire transfer, cash, cheque payments, credits and reward points) and can record the payouts in the tool. You can also do a mass payout to your affiliates using PayPal’s Payouts API.

Affiliates dashboard

Both plugins provide a dedicated dashboard for affiliates to monitor their performance.

YITH WooCommerce Affiliates
From the General Options > Affiliate Dashboard tab, you can configure all settings related to the Affiliate Dashboard, which is displayed to affiliates on the frontend.

You can select this option to choose the page where the dashboard will appear. Use the shortcode [yith_wcaf_affiliate_dashboard] on the desired page.

Affiliates can easily monitor visits, commissions, payment status and the conversion rate. This plugin lets store admins track metrics like visits, commissions, earnings, popular affiliates, popular products, etc.

Affiliates for WooCommerce
Affiliates can easily manage and monitor all activities from their dedicated ‘My Account’ section. This single dashboard provides an affiliate with all the tools they need to increase sales and, in turn, increase the profitability of your business.

To show this affiliate dashboard on a custom page, simply insert the shortcode [afwc_dashboard] in the page and publish it.

Affiliates can track gross and net commissions, total sales and conversion rates, commissions earned from each customer, payout history and product-specific commissions.

(While the store administrator can track net affiliate sales, unpaid commissions, refunds, traffic, customer count and conversion rate.)

Features include:

• Affiliates can create personalized referral links and request store admin for custom coupons.
• Easily view commissions earned, refunds processed, products sold and other key metrics.
• Affiliates can use brand creatives or marketing materials provided by the store to effectively promote the brand and its products.

Pricing

The premium edition of the YITH plugin is available for $179.99 per year and comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee alongside one year of updates and support.

With a year of free upgrades and enhancements, the Affiliate for WooCommerce costs $179. There’s also a 30-day money-back guarantee.

What do Affiliate for WooCommerce miss out on compared to YITH WooCommerce Affiliates?

• Ban affiliates.
• Allow affiliates to share their page on social media like Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, etc.
• Associate old commissions to new users with the same token.

What do YITH WooCommerce Affiliates miss out on compared to Affiliate for WooCommerce?

• Multi-tier affiliate program.
• Better commission plan rules.
• Landing pages for affiliates.
• Promotional marketing campaign.
• Search for affiliates using predefined filters.
• Make affiliate URLs pretty and also customize URL parameters.

So which WooCommerce affiliate plugin is better?

Though both the plugins have a lot in common – forms, commission rules, payouts, compatibility with WooCommerce Subscriptions, Affiliate for WooCommerce has an edge:

• Simple setup that allows you to launch your affiliate program in a matter of minutes.
• Larger feature set.
• Less expensive.
• High RoI mechanism.
• No complicated interfaces, no jargon and not too many dashboards.

Wrapping Up

For those in need of a basic affiliate solution, YITH WooCommerce Affiliates is the one to settle with. Its core features allow for easy setup, commission management and payouts, with the added benefit of a free trial version available.

On the other hand, if you want an enterprise-grade affiliate program, advanced features and control over your affiliate program, StoreApps’ Affiliate for WooCommerce is the way to go.

The bottom line is that the Affiliate for WooCommerce plugin gets more user recommendations when serious growth through partners, influencers or affiliates is the goal.

Get Affiliate for WooCommerce