Perhaps you aren’t paying attention, but one of the top issues in the industry right now seems to be networks not paying their bills. With the failure of quite a few networks and a lot of new networks popping up with the business model of screwing affiliates, more and more companies are selling their network by pointing out their history of payments. No longer are just highest payments the best, but companies need to prove that they actually pay their bills.
Jason Akatiff, the founder of A4D Performance (FKA Ads4Dough) a told us that payments to publishers are becoming more important, because publishers don’t have time to be running after non-paying networks. “As a publisher the most important thing to me was getting paid on time every time,” said Akatiff “It allowed me to free my mind from worrying about the finances and I could focus 100% on building campaigns.”
Networks are often acting like banks for many affiliates, and because of that affiliates want to make sure that the network they are working with actually has funds to pay them. In the day and age where it seems that anyone can start a HasOffers network, more and more affiliates are growing up and realizing that a business needs more than just a website. If affiliates and publishers wanted to take the risk, they’d probably work with the network directly. If a network cant pay on time, what use is it working with them and giving them part of the cut?
CPALead, the content locking agency and network, has been on company that has been very vocal about their campaigns. In order to prove that they pay everyone on time, they offered a reward to anyone who could show otherwise.  Peter Tarr, the CEO of CPALead told us that affiliates need to do a lot more due diligence on the companies that they do business with. “My advice is to ignore all of the hype and look at each company as a real business, try to understand why they should be stable or why not,” said Tarr. “Treat it as though you’re performing due diligence on a publicly traded security. Is there risk? What kind? Are they a target for a big lawsuit? Are they currently being sued?”
Similarly, Adknowledge, one of the oldest companies in the industry has been making it clear that they feel the industry is full of less than solid companies, and their stability is one of their best assets. They recently started a new campaign on Performance Marketing Insider, comparing networks that pay their bills to Ghosts, Bigfoot and even Aliens. The advertisements ends that Adknowledge pays on time, and they are “proud to be a rare sight in the industry.” They have told us that they will be advertising their network in coming months with equally creative banners that differentiate Adknowledge from the rest of the pack.
Tarr told us that the payment issues aren’t necessarily bad and that this is part of an industry consolidation period. “In the end, the better and more established companies are able to stand out and be recognized for the good job they’ve done in building reliable, long lasting companies.”
Jason Akatiff said it perhaps best:  “At the core, the only thing a network has is its payment history and trustworthiness. Without that it is nothing and will wither and die.”
