As the COVID-19 pandemic takes over the world, businesses are looking for alternate means of generating income.

Affiliate marketers are usually on the lookout for the next big thing to improve their revenue and usually look into different niches to diversify. Despite the recent pandemic that has gripped the entire world and brought entire industries to a halt, the ICT sector continues to soldier on.

SaaS products and various hosting solutions have become incredibly popular, and in this review, I shall talk about Cloudways, one of the leading cloud hosting providers in the industry, and their affiliate program.

What is Cloudways?

Cloudways is a managed cloud hosting provider that helps clients focus on important things such as business growth and client management, instead of worrying about server issues, security, and routine maintenance. The Cloudways Platform allows you to launch servers and deploy web apps within a matter of minutes.

Users get the choice of hosting their projects on any of the five best cloud infrastructure providers: Amazon Web Services, Vultr, Linode, DigitalOcean, and Google Cloud Engine. It’s a fantastic platform that allows users to scale and grow their businesses without worrying about infrastructure-related issues.

Tailored to the Needs of Affiliate Marketers

A big issue that many affiliate marketers face is that many brands running affiliate programs fail to understand their requirements. Thankfully, this isn’t a problem with Cloudways. There are multiple reasons why affiliate marketers prefer working with Cloudways.

There is a custom-built portal for affiliate marketers, which allows them to post tickets and contact the Cloudways team via live chat option. On top of that, they have an extensive FAQ section and blog that can help affiliates resolve some of their issues and come up with new and effective strategies.

These resources will allow you to better explain the benefits of cloud hosting to your potential referrals.

To make the process smooth, Cloudways appoints a dedicated affiliate manager to handle your account, answer your queries, and give you tips to scale your earnings and optimize your promotional campaign to generate the best results.

The web hosting affiliate program operated by Cloudways offers excellent commission rates. Their hosting support staff is also available through multiple channels, including Slack. This is a major plus for many affiliate marketers when they are looking for salient features to market the product. When promoting Cloudways, you can discuss these support levels.

Salient Features that Makes Cloudways One of the Best Affiliate Programs

If you are looking to sign up with a hassle-free affiliate program that is easy to manage and comes with a bunch of perks, Cloudways has just what you need. They give you a choice of three distinct commission structures, including:

• Slab
• Hybrid
• Custom

Let’s break these down for a better understanding.

Slab Model

If you feel that generating multiple referrals wouldn’t be a problem for you, the slab model is an excellent choice for you. It’s great for generating consistent revenue on a monthly basis, and is ideal for entrepreneurs and performance marketers.

In this system, the final payout for each month is calculated on the number of referrals that were recorded by the system. For instance, if you had 5 referrals in the month, but ended up getting one more just before the end of the month, your commission will automatically fall in the second slab. As a result, you earn more.

Hybrid Model

For those who want a commission structure that provides them a sustainable income stream in the long term, the hybrid payout structure is the best choice. This model allows you to spread your earnings out over several months and provides affiliates to earn more commissions as their referred client’s website grows.

This is a model that allows for passive income generation. The affiliate gets a bonus of $30 upfront and a 7 percent commission on the monthly invoice of all referred customers who are active on Cloudways. As long as the referred customer continues to host on Cloudways, you keep on making money. The more services they use, the more you earn.

Custom Structure

If you feel that you can generate a large number of referrals, the custom structure is suitable for you. Cloudways understands that aggressive marketers can bring in quite a few referrals, and to ensure their satisfaction, the company developed the custom structure, which is a wholly unique model in itself, and offers a considerably higher commission for every referral.

The company also provides detailed reports for all of your affiliate activity, making it easy for you to track your referrals, areas where you can improve, your conversion ratio, EPC, and your average commission per sale. To help you understand the reports and figure out what you can do to improve, a dedicated account manager will also be present to help you out at every step of the way.

The company even provides a range of resources for the many seasonal campaigns that they run, allowing you to take full advantage and maximize your referrals. They can tell you what you are doing wrong and guide you on how to improve.

Which Affiliate Marketing Segments Would do Well With These Models?

The Cloudways Affiliate Marketing Program offers something for everyone. However, there are some which make for a much better fit and are ideal for the platform. Here are a few.

Bloggers

Bloggers usually try to optimize their blogs to generate as much earnings as possible. By signing up to an affiliate program like Cloudways, you can take part in a range of promotional activities and can scale your earnings much more quickly.

Trainers

Many trainers who own their websites and those who provide courses on Udemy can promote Cloudways directly, allowing them to earn significant revenue. Trainers can benefit considerably from the Custom and the Hybrid models as they get higher payouts per referral, and can generate commissions in the long run.

Freelancers and Developers

Increase your income significantly through the affiliate program from Cloudways without having to do much at all. You can promote the Cloudways platform to your clients and generate a good commission for every referral. Even if you get clients from Fiverr or Upwork, you can simply try to package the Cloudways hosting or tell them the benefits to convert them.

Digital Agencies

And finally, we have digital agencies. With a large number of clients, these companies can leverage their position in order to bundle the Cloudways hosting with their services. For every sale you make, your agency generates revenue on the side. For as long as your clients continue to host on Cloudways, your agency will generate a commission.

Who Benefits the Most from the Slab Model?

The slab model is designed for a specific group of people, including but not limited to:

Performance Marketers

Performance marketers usually make the best use of advertising networks by running ads on multiple networks, like pay per click campaigns on Google and various ads on Facebook’s advertising network. As the cost of advertising on various ad networks is on the rise, the slab model is ideal for performance marketers to maintain a healthy ROI whilst covering the advertising costs.

Influencers

Influencers play a crucial role in the dissemination of information nowadays. Using the slab model is great for influencers as they can generate consistent revenue, and track just how their posts are performing. If you are an influencer and new to affiliate programs, this model is best for you.

Online Entrepreneurs

Online entrepreneurs like coaches and consultants can also benefit greatly from this model. They can bundle it up with their own courses and packages in order to get more referrals. It’s a great way to increase your monthly income from referrals.

The Affiliate Panel Overview

The affiliate panel has a very minimalistic interface that puts all of the important information right in front of you. There’s a sidebar that allows you to access different actions like Reports, check the Campaign for metrics, and a page for support options. Here’s how it looks:

If you are interested in joining the program, simply make an account on Cloudways, and login. Click on the Grid icon at the top, and select the Affiliate Program. Then, just fill out the form and click on “Create Your Affiliate Profile,” and you are good to go.

You can get comprehensive, step by step instructions on how to sign up to their affiliate program here. Also, you should know that each affiliate gets a unique link, which you can add at the end of each page. It’s shown at the top of your affiliate panel, here:

Reports Tab

The Reports Tab is one of the best features of the Cloudways Affiliate Marketing Program. It shows you real-time reports of your performance and makes it easy for you to determine what you need to focus on and how your marketing program is performing. Here’s what it covers.

• Quick Stats: You can check stats for the current day, the previous day, and monthly stats for the sales, number of clicks, and commissions. It gives you a brief summary of your Earnings per click, your Click to Sales ratio, and the average commission you’ve earned per sale.
• Trends: The trends report allows you to evaluate clicks, impressions, commissions, and trends through a stylish, visual format.
• Commissions: The commissions report is basically a live dashboard that shows you information regarding new and current signups and your overall sales status. Users have the option to apply custom filters and can also export data.
• Payouts: Affiliates can also view the payouts so far and check the number of paid and unpaid commissions.

Campaign Tab

There’s also a separate tab for campaigns, giving you access to banners and links and allowing you to customize your site using a range of promotional material available from Cloudways. You can get specific banners related to different campaigns, including new product offerings, and use them on your site.

SubID Tracking Feature

The SubID tracking feature is used by affiliates to monitor the different ad channels and analyze the flow of traffic through different channels. You can also append up to two custom parameters to the linked URL, and these parameters will help you understand which channel is performing the best.

Conclusion

This is one of the most comprehensive and well-managed affiliate marketing programs out there. If you are interested in joining the Cloudways Affiliate Marketing Program, you can do so from their landing page. If you have any issue, the company has also created a comprehensive guide that you can use, or you can just mail them at affiliates@cloudways.com.

With the amount of support and features that the program offers, it will be incredibly easy for you to maximize commissions and generate passive income on the side.