The programme has one default rate, and rules that override it. A rule matches on product, category, affiliate role, or affiliate group; the most specific match wins.
Rate types
- Percentage of the order total — before or after tax and shipping, your choice. Choose before if you would rather not pay commission on postage.
- Flat amount per order, per product, or per lead.
- Tiered, where the rate rises as an affiliate’s volume or earnings cross thresholds you set.
Which rule wins
Specificity, not order in the list: a product rule beats a category rule, which beats a group rule, which beats a role rule, which beats the programme default. If two rules are equally specific the earlier one wins, and the rules screen tells you when that has happened rather than leaving you to work it out.
Testing before you launch
Place a real order through a real referral link on a real product, then look at the referral row. A commission that is wrong by a factor of a hundred is a percentage stored as a decimal, and it is much cheaper to find that now than in a payout batch.
Changing a rate later
A rate change applies to referrals recorded after it. Existing referrals keep the rate they were calculated at, because retroactively repricing work somebody has already done is not a feature.