Title: An empirical investigation of factors that influence commitment and active participation in in-house affiliate marketing network

Authors: Ladislav Beranek

Addresses: Department of Applied Mathematics and Informatics, Faculty of Economics, University of South Bohemia, Ceske Budejovice, Czech Republic

Abstract: At present, affiliate marketing has become a standard tool for organisations and companies that have business activities on the internet. It can take the form of a third-party service or can be directly managed by a merchant (in-house). In this study, we deal with in-house affiliate marketing. It is taken as a fact that affiliates are driven by economic bonuses. Our study confirms that a long-term relationship with affiliates is advantageous for the merchant, especially with those affiliates who are active and lead more customers to the merchant. In these relationships, economic bonuses are the primary motivation, but as our study shows, there are other factors that affect affiliates' commitment and their active participation within affiliate marketing. We explain how economic benefits, communication and its quality, merchant's brands and reputation, interdependence and quality of services impact affiliates' commitment and active participation. Results of this study support hypotheses that economic benefits and communication (including its quality) critically impact affiliate marketing performance. The interpretations and implications of the findings as well as future research directions are discussed.

Keywords: affiliate marketing; commitment; active participation; e-commerce; relationship management.

DOI: 10.1504/IJEB.2018.095957

International Journal of Electronic Business, 2018 Vol.14 No.3, pp.189 - 211

Received: 14 Sep 2017
Accepted: 16 May 2018
Published online: 05 Nov 2018 *

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