Guide
Strategy
Brands
Affiliate marketing pays only for tracked sales through a network's cookie link, with little to no relationship to the individual affiliate. Influencer marketing is relationship-based: you choose a specific creator, brief the content, and typically pay a mix of an upfront fee and commission. Make Influence's model sits between the two — it uses affiliate-style tracking (unique links and codes) on a curated, relationship-based influencer setup.
Affiliate marketing pays purely for tracked sales: an affiliate places a link from a network, a cookie logs the visit, and the affiliate earns a commission if that visit converts within the network's tracking window. There's usually no relationship with that individual affiliate, and the brand has little control over how or where the link is placed. Influencer marketing is relationship-based: you choose a specific creator based on audience fit and content, brief the work, and typically pay a mix of a guaranteed fee and commission. The real dividing line isn't whether a sale is tracked — both models can do that — it's whether there's a curated relationship and a content brief behind the sale, or just a link in a list.
| Affiliate marketing | Influencer marketing | |
|---|---|---|
| Who places the link | Often a deal site, blog or coupon site signed up to a network | A specific, vetted creator you reached out to directly |
| Relationship to the brand | Usually none — self-serve sign-up through the network | Direct dialogue, a brief, often a contract |
| Payment | Commission on tracked sales only | Often an upfront fee plus commission (see upfront vs commission) |
| Control over content | None — the affiliate chooses format and placement | The brand briefs message, format and timing |
| Tracking | Cookie-based via the network, typically 24 hours to 90 days | A unique link or discount code per creator, often first-party |
| Content reuse | Rarely possible — the affiliate owns their own content | Usage rights can be bought and the content reused as ad creative |
| Speed to scale | Fast — hundreds of affiliates can join at once | Slower — each creator has to be found, vetted and briefed |
| Brand safety | Low — you don't always know where your link ends up | High — you chose the creator and approved the content |
Affiliate marketing typically runs through a network (Awin, Impact and Rakuten Advertising are widely used examples, alongside Nordic-focused networks like Partner-ads and Adtraction) that handles sign-ups, links and payouts on the brand's behalf. An affiliate — a coupon site, a comparison service, a blog, or even an influencer running their own affiliate account — joins the programme, gets a unique link, and places it wherever they choose. When a visitor clicks, the network sets a cookie. If that person buys within the network's tracking window, the affiliate earns commission — whether or not the brand has ever spoken to them.
That makes affiliate marketing cheap to start and easy to scale: you only pay for results, and you can have hundreds of affiliates signed up without vetting each one. The trade-off is control. You rarely know exactly where your link is running, what language is being used about your product, or whether the placement fits your brand at all.
Influencer marketing starts from the opposite end: you choose a creator because their audience resembles your customers and their content fits your brand. You brief what should be said, and often how. Payment is rarely commission alone — see upfront vs commission and hybrid influencer deals — because a pure commission-only arrangement asks the creator to carry the full risk of your conversion rate, pricing and checkout, none of which they control.
The tracking mechanics are closer to affiliate marketing than most people assume: a unique link or a personal discount code per creator is, in practice, the same mechanism as an affiliate link. The difference is that it's usually first-party — your own system or an influencer platform, not a third-party affiliate network — and it sits on top of a curated relationship rather than an open sign-up.
In practice the two models overlap more often than the categories suggest. A creator can easily run their own affiliate account alongside a paid brand partnership. An affiliate network can include creators with hundreds of thousands of followers. And a performance-only creator working purely on commission, with no upfront fee, functionally resembles an affiliate more than a classic influencer deal — except that the brand still chose and approved them. What actually determines the category isn't the tracking mechanism, it's whether there's a curated relationship and a brief behind the sale.
All figures below are hypothetical and for illustration only — not data from a Make Influence customer, and not an industry benchmark.
Assume both channels drive DKK 100,000 in tracked revenue in a month, at 55% gross margin.
No guaranteed cost, but you don't own the content and you didn't choose who represented you.
DKK 3,000 lower contribution on the sale itself — but you gain usage rights you can reuse as ad creative, and control over who spoke for the brand. Affiliate networks also commonly charge the brand a network or platform fee on top of the affiliate's commission, which isn't modelled here because it varies too much across networks to assume a figure.
IF you want zero guaranteed cost and can live with low control over who represents the brand → an affiliate network.
IF you need brand-safe, briefed content from a specific creator → influencer marketing, upfront or hybrid.
IF you want to reuse the content as ad creative afterwards → buy usage rights through an influencer partnership; affiliate content is rarely legal to reuse.
IF you're testing product-market fit broadly and cheaply → a pure commission track, either an affiliate network or commission-only creators.
IF the sale depends on trust and demonstration rather than just a discount → influencer marketing carries that better.
IF you already have many interested coupon sites and blogs → an affiliate network gives you scale without vetting each one yourself.
In Make Influence's experience, it's rarely either/or. Most brands with a mature setup end up running a commission-only track of creators that functionally resemble affiliates — just curated and approved — a layer of hybrid deals with selected creators, and in some cases a separate affiliate network alongside it for the broad, uncurated tail. What separates our model from a pure affiliate network is that every creator is chosen and approved, and tracking (a unique link and code) sits on the individual partnership rather than an open sign-up anyone can use.
Yes. Many creators run both at once — a paid, briefed partnership with one brand and an independent affiliate account with another. It isn't a contradiction; it's two different agreements with the same person.
Only in guaranteed cost. There's no upfront to pay, but you also don't get a curated creator, a brief, or the right to reuse the content. See how to calculate influencer marketing ROI for the full calculation, not just the guaranteed cost.
Some do. A number of creator-affiliate programmes function like an affiliate network with social profiles instead of coupon sites. The mechanics are the same; what's missing is the curation.
It depends on whether the product sells itself on a discount or needs explanation and trust. If price alone sells it, an affiliate network or commission-only creators can produce fast results with no guaranteed cost. If it needs demonstration or explanation, a curated influencer partnership usually pays off better — see how much commission influencers should get to price that part correctly.
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