Pippin Williamson and Andrew Munro have just launched Version 1.0 of AffiliateWP, an affiliate marketing plugin for WordPress with simplicity and ease of use in mind.
Pippin is well known in the WordPress community for his work as a plugin reviewer on WordPress.org, his blog and plugins on PippinsPlugins, and his popular eCommerce product Easy Digital Downloads. Andrew Munro has been a big contributor to Easy Digital Downloads since 2012, primarily using the name Sumobi. He also boasts themes and plugins for Easy Digital Downloads.
How AffiliateWP came to be
Late last year, Pippin got fed up with the various affiliate marketing options, and set out to do it the right way, straight from WordPress. From the announcement post, they cite their motivation:
We wanted a platform that was reliable, worked effectively, and one that we loved to use.
Today is the result of those months of work, and amazingly the plugin already has 14 contributors.
In an impressive move, Pippin and Andrew have decided to host and maintain the plugin on a public Github repo, despite selling the plugin as a commercial product. Post Status contributing editor Travis Northcutt will have an interview up with Pippin soon to talk about that decision.
AffiliateWP pricing and how to use it
AffiliateWP has gone through two beta cycles and is in use on a select number of production websites, including Pippin’s own. Now, anyone can use AffiliateWP for a starting price of $49 per year. Additional licenses are available for $99 and $199.
If you’re interested in a complete breakdown of how to use the plugin, Beka Rice has already done an excellent job showcasing how to use AffiliateWP on the SellwithWP blog.
Integrations with eCommerce plugins
One of the most interesting features of AffiliateWP is the integration potential. With Version 1.0, AffiliateWP already has integrations available for every major WordPress eCommerce player, including EDD, WooCommerce, Exchange, Shopp, and WP E-Commerce. More integrations are on the way as well.
Creating integrations for AffiliateWP is also quite simple. The existing integrations are all about 100 lines of code or less. There is even a roadmap for AffiliateWP to enable integrations for hosted eCommerce solutions.
Affiliate marketing, in general
In full disclosure, I’m not a big fan of affiliate marketing for this blog. I don’t use it. However, I do fully appreciate the power of affiliate marketing for getting the word out about products for product makers, as well as a revenue generator for bloggers. I have no qualms with folks that use affiliate plugins, even though I don’t see my site as a fit place for it in the normal capacity.
AffiliateWP promises to be an exceptional plugin. I’ve been tracking the development progress through the Github activity, as well as Pippin’s updates on the ApplyFilters podcast. I know that he has gone the extra mile to ensure that this is a solid solution for folks that want to do affiliate marketing the right way, seamlessly, from their WordPress install.
You can learn more about AffiliateWP on the launch post.
It’s awesome that they decided to host the whole project publicly on GitHub and ask users to buy a license in good faith and/or if they need support.
This is _exactly_ what’s needed for the WordPress community in my opinion as I’m really starting to get fed up with all the great plugins in the official plugin repo asking for money to get the “pro version” :-/
I do understand that they have to make money too, I’m a developer myself, however there are other ways, just like the one Pippin showed today! Go AffiliateWP!
So far we are really, really pleased with the result. We’ll go into more detail in the post coming up that Brian mentioned above, but one of the huge advantages is the extra sets of eyes that we get from other developers to help us fix bugs, add features, etc.
At the time of launch, 14 developers had contributed code.
I’m rooting for you guys, I believe that a more stable and featureful product in exchange for a couple of extra bucks by keeping it private for those that don’t purchase is a no-brainer!
I agree that hosting this on a public repo is a great move, and ultimately, I think it will make for a more profitable plugin.
I am a little confused by your mention of plugins on the dot org repository, which also have a pro version. Is your preference that paid plugins simply not publish any version to the dot org repository? Just want to make sure I understand where you’re coming from 🙂
Nope, I think the “here is an awesome looking plugin, but this just a teaser, please buy the full one if you’d like to actually do something with it” mentality is hurting the WP community as a whole. Releasing a completely free and open source version and then charging for support is much much better. Most people will need support anyways and if you have a great plugin, it will get you business. A lot! But if you don’t have a great one, you won’t sell too many copies anyways so now you’re not making money and the users are missing out on a plugin too. That’s what I’m against. Oh and plugin authors using the repo only as a free marketing/traffic source… Not sure if that makes sense? 🙂
I’ve been using AffiliateWP since the first public beta, and I can honestly tell you it’s a refreshing solution to many of the affiliate headaches that other platforms create. I’m expecting great things for its future, even if it never improves from its current state.
wow! .. I have been looking for an Affiliate Plugins for WordPress. And not just any plugin but a good plugin to help me get affiliates for my membership sites.
I just tried the Demo and I’m liking this so far. I might end up purchasing this plugin soon! 🙂 ..
As soon as I finish my products and they are looking good to go big!
This is a nice blog site by the way!
Thanks for sharing this info!
I wish you the best!
Cheers!