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In this newsletter, youâll find:
đ§Ÿ Stop paying creator commission on sales they didnât drive
đ Google Ads is changing how campaigns are measured and optimized
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đ§Ÿ Stop paying creator commission on sales they didnât drive
A shopper sees a creatorâs Partnership Ad, clicks, leaves, gets your email two days later and checks out with the creatorâs code they found on a coupon site.
The ad platform and your email platform both claim the order, and the code pays the creator a commission on top. Cyber Week multiplies it by thousands.
Price the leak
Say 1,000 Cyber Week orders use creator codes, with an average order of $90 and a 15% commission. Thatâs $13,500 in commission.
If 30% of those codes came from coupon sites and browser extensions, you paid $4,050 for sales the creators didnât drive, plus the code discount itself. The 30% is illustrative, so check your own referrer data.
Spotting which creators drive real orders is easier when your creator platform reads your ad data. Insense connects to your Ads Manager and shows which creators perform best, and new customers can get $200 toward their first campaign. Book a free strategy call by DATE and get $200 towards your first campaign
Find the leaked codes
Pull every code order and check the sessionâs landing source. Orders arriving from coupon or extension domains, or with no creator link in the session, are leaks.
Rule 1: Pay on links during the sale
From November 20 to December 1, pay commission on orders placed through each creatorâs tracking link. Deactivate any code found on a coupon site and issue a new one.
Rule 2: Stop codes from stacking
Set creator codes so they canât combine with sitewide sale pricing. A 15% code on top of 30% off cuts margin twice.
Rule 3: Switch to a target bonus
During the sale, replace percentage commission with a flat bonus for hitting a link-order target, such as $300 for 50 orders. Your cost is capped and the creator still has a clear goal. The figures are illustrative.
Rule 4: One claim per order
When two creators touch an order, the most recent creator link within seven days gets the credit. That window is my judgment.
Contract wording you can send
âFrom November 20 to December 1, commission applies to orders placed through your tracking link. Codes found on coupon sites will be replaced, and codes wonât combine with sitewide offers.â
Count commission in creator ROI
On October 5, TikTok said GMV Max will factor in affiliate commissions, coupons and referral fees to optimize for true return. Apply the same logic to every creator:
Creator ROI = (revenue â commission â coupon cost) Ă· ad spend
Search each creator code on the top coupon sites. Every hit is commission youâll pay in November unless you replace it now.
Together with AirOps
Are You Judging AI Search by the Wrong Numbers?
You wouldnât judge a brand campaign only by last-click sales. Yet AI search is being asked to prove itself against paid-channel attribution standards.
You risk cutting the budget that helped win a customer because another channel got credit for the sale.
On October 15, join Matt Hammel, COO of AirOps, and Zak Prauer, Expert Partner at Bain & Company, to rethink how you evaluate AI search:
Use findings from Bainâs Marketing Leaders Reality Index to understand why paid-channel measurement sets the wrong expectations.
Look beyond citations to whether AI recommends your brand when buyers are weighing their options.
Discover what AI search conversations reveal about customer needs that survey responses can miss.
Youâll leave with a clearer view of what your reporting overlooks, so the next investment decision accounts for how buyers actually choose.
Canât attend the session live? Register anyway, and youâll get the recordings in 24 hours.
đ Google Ads is changing how campaigns are measured and optimized
Google is rolling out updates across Demand Gen, Conversion Lift, AI Max and commerce advertising, giving advertisers new reporting tools, more automation and additional ways to reach customers.
The Breakdown:
Display Views Get Easier to Count - Demand Gen Display will count any rendered impression as a view for attribution, even if just one pixel appears briefly. View-through conversions may rise without any actual performance improvement.
Conversion Reporting Gets More Detailed - Google Ads is adding video impressions to eligible web conversion paths and grouping metrics by funnel stage. Conversion Lift is also becoming self-serve, requiring at least 1,000 observed conversions and a $5,000 campaign budget.
AI Max Gets More Transparent - New reporting columns show location-of-interest, optimized targeting and brand inclusion settings. AI Max can also generate and refresh search ad copy using landing pages, keywords and existing assets.
Retailers Can Share Audiences With Brands - Googleâs commerce audience sharing lets eligible retailers provide first-party audience segments to advertising partners. Brands can combine these with their own data, but campaigns must direct traffic to the retailerâs approved domain.
These updates give advertisers more ways to understand campaign performance while Google automates more of the execution. The biggest distinction is between reported conversions and incremental results: easier attribution can increase credited conversions, but Conversion Lift helps determine whether advertising actually generated additional business.
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