We recently brought together 50+ brands and retailers for the first ever Affilifest Brand Huddle in London. We wanted to have proper conversations about what’s actually happening inside affiliate and partnership programmes right now.

And instead of just turning that into another report, we built it into a working document. The insights are broken down into the key challenges brands are facing, with space to reflect, pressure test your own programme, and actually apply what’s coming out of these conversations.

Download the workbook and pressure test your affiliate programme

1. Incrementality is still unclear (and that’s the problem)

Everyone is talking about incrementality. Very few can clearly define it internally.

Brands told us:

• There’s no shared definition across teams
• It’s still heavily tied to last click thinking
• BI support is often a bottleneck

The issue isn’t just measurement. It’s communication.

If you can’t clearly explain what incrementality means for your business, you can’t prove it. And if you can’t prove it, it’s very hard to defend budget or scale investment.

The brands making progress are doing a few things differently:

• Bringing BI teams in early rather than retrospectively
• Running controlled tests with specific publishers
• Using attribution data to support a broader story

Incrementality isn’t a dashboard problem. It’s a narrative problem.

The teams winning here are the ones who can translate complexity into something leadership actually understands.

2. Scaling isn’t about more partners

Almost every brand said the same thing when it comes to growth:

They don’t need more partners. They need more focus.

Programmes are stretched. Teams are lean. And most of the work is still manual.

Growth is being limited by resource, not opportunity.

• Teams are at capacity
• Manual processes are slowing everything down
• Time is being spent on low impact activity

The shift is towards:

• Better prioritisation frameworks
• Smarter partner segmentation
• Automation and tooling where it actually makes sense

Scaling affiliate isn’t about adding more. It’s about doing less, better.

The highest performing teams are ruthless with focus. They know which partners drive value and they double down there.

3. Influencer doesn’t fit neatly into affiliate

Brands are trying to force influencer into models that weren’t built for it. And it’s creating friction.

• CPA vs fixed fee tension
• Tracking is overly reliant on codes
• No clear internal ownership between teams

As one brand put it:

“We’re trying to force creators into CPA models that weren’t built for them.”

The brands seeing success are taking a more flexible approach:

• Hybrid models (gifted + CPA)
• Using creators where product fit is strong
• Partnering with publishers to reach targeted audiences

Influencer isn’t broken. It just doesn’t fit neatly into traditional affiliate frameworks. The opportunity is in adapting the model, not forcing it.

This one is bigger than most people realise. Affiliate isn’t failing internally because it doesn’t work. It’s failing because people don’t understand it.

• Different teams view affiliate in completely different ways
• There’s no clear internal narrative
• It’s still seen as bottom of funnel by many

Brands are starting to:

• Build internal case studies
• Bring publishers into conversations
• Invest in better storytelling

If you can’t explain affiliate simply, you can’t grow it.

The best teams are treating internal communication as seriously as external performance.

This is one of the biggest macro shifts impacting the channel right now. Affiliate is no longer seen as a cheap channel.

It’s becoming a strategic one.

• Rising costs are squeezing profitability
• Brands are moving away from low CPA partners
• Discounting is increasing

• Using LTV to justify spend
• Running smaller, more controlled tests
• Integrating affiliate into wider planning

Affiliate is moving from cheap to strategic. That requires a different mindset internally. The conversation is shifting from “how low can we get CPA” to “what actually drives value.”

Everyone feels this. More data than ever. Less clarity.

• Attribution models are harder to trust
• Cookie consent and tech limitations are impacting performance
• Visibility across partner types is inconsistent

• Cross referencing multiple data sources
• Using custom tracking domains
• Validating MMM outputs rather than taking them at face value
• Working more closely with internal data teams

There is no longer a single source of truth. Brands are moving towards confidence built on multiple signals. It’s messier, but it’s also more realistic.

Most brands want new partners. Very few are actually working with them.

• Over reliance on traditional partners like voucher and cashback
• Difficulty finding genuinely incremental partners
• Influencer and content partners not fully integrated

• Audience first thinking
• Exploring non traditional affiliate partners
• Cross team collaboration (affiliate, influencer, brand)
• Using tools and data to improve discovery

The challenge isn’t a lack of partners.

It’s how brands discover, test and integrate them.

So what does this all add up to?...This isn’t a channel in decline. It’s a channel in transition. Affiliate is becoming more complex, more strategic, and more integrated with other channels.

Download the full Brand Huddle Insights workbook

The full workbook breaks each of these themes down and gives you a way to apply them to your own programme.

Inside, you’ll find:

• The key challenges brands are facing right now
• What’s actually working in market
• Structured prompts to assess your own programme
• Space to map out what to test next

It’s designed to be used, not just read.

👉 Download the Brand Huddle Insights workbook and start working through it yourself