Your own affiliate programme or a creator platform: how should an online shop start with creator marketing?

If your programme runs through an affiliate network, the network usually pays the partners. With your own software, payouts and recruiting are entirely up to you. With a platform, you pay on the terms you agree with it. How much of that reaches each creator is settled between the platform and them.

On both routes, creators being able to find and pick your products doesn’t get you posts. The creators you most want usually don’t post without a reason. The real work starts after that: activating many creators at once and seeing who actually sells.

A creator platform can take part in your existing affiliate programme. You approve it once, like any other partner, and sales through its creators are attributed to it. Creators you work with closely can stay on as direct partners.

Agree beforehand what applies when a creator comes through both routes. Which partner gets a sale is decided by your programme’s attribution rule, for example the last click before the purchase. If you pay direct partners different rates from the platform, every creator should know which links count for them. Discount codes you also pay commission on need to be covered by the same rule, or the same sale can end up being paid twice.

1. Do you already have an affiliate programme? Then start by asking creator platforms if they can join it. Tracking and terms are already in place, so you skip building from scratch.
2. How many creators can you look after yourself? Every direct partner needs contact, approval, terms and a check that they label ads properly. If that is more than your team can handle each month, a platform can take over sign-up and payouts for the rest. That alone won’t get them posting; you still need to give them a reason.
3. What do you want to pay for? Clicks can be counted at the link. For sales, your shop has to attribute each purchase to the right partner, and storing an identifier in the browser usually needs consent in Germany (§ 25(1) TDDDG).
4. Who pays the creators? With your own software you issue lots of small documents every month, each one according to the creator’s tax status. Through a network or a platform, that usually sits with them.
5. Do you need per-creator data? For individual terms or targeted support you need to know who drives clicks and who sells. Ask a platform before you start what it can show you.

If you pay creators yourself, you don’t have to wait for their invoices. In Germany, as the recipient of the service you may issue the invoice yourself if this was agreed beforehand: a Gutschrift (self-billing credit note, § 14(2) sentence 5 UStG). If the creator objects to the document, it loses its effect as an invoice (§ 14(2) sentence 6 UStG).

Suppose 40 creators brought in sales this month, 25 of them use the Kleinunternehmer (small business) scheme and 2 are based in Austria. You then issue 40 credit notes: 25 without VAT and with a reference to § 19 UStG, 13 with VAT, and 2 where you usually owe the VAT yourself. Each one needs the usual invoice details, such as the date of issue, the service and the amount (§ 14(4) UStG, for Kleinunternehmer § 34a UStDV). For credit notes to creators, these points also matter:

• an agreement, before the first statement, that you will bill by credit note
• the creator’s full name and address
• for creators in Germany, their tax number or VAT ID (§ 14(4) sentence 1 no. 2 UStG), or for Kleinunternehmer their small business ID number (§ 34a UStDV)
• their tax status: for Kleinunternehmer the turnover is exempt (§ 19(1) UStG), and the document shows the amount as one sum with a note on the exemption (§ 34a UStDV)
• where they are based: for creators abroad, you as a business usually owe the VAT yourself (§ 13b(1), (2) no. 1 and (5) UStG, reverse charge). For creators elsewhere in the EU, the credit note then shows your VAT ID and theirs plus the wording “Steuerschuldnerschaft des Leistungsempfängers” (reverse charge), and is issued by the 15th of the following month (§ 14a(1) sentences 2 to 4 and (5) UStG)
• the word “Gutschrift” on every document (§ 14(4) sentence 1 no. 10 UStG, for Kleinunternehmer § 34a sentence 1 no. 6 UStDV)

With wyrld Boost you take a campaign budget to creators who feature your products in their own videos, and many can take part at once. It gives creators the reason to post that an affiliate programme alone doesn’t. The payout follows the KPIs you set in advance, such as sales, clicks or watch time, and you decide which shops the purchase happens in. Creators label campaign videos as advertising. Each creator decides for themselves if they take part, and wyrld makes no promises about the number of participants, reach or sales.

The brand and shop subscription shows you which creators feature your products, who drives clicks and, where the shop reports sales, who sells. wyrld can set up individual terms for specific creators. Your shop is connected directly or through an existing affiliate programme on one of the major networks. There, wyrld appears as a single partner through which creators can usually already pick your products. wyrld settles with creators every month by self-billing credit note, so you don’t issue the documents from the example above for them yourself.

Prices for the subscription and Boost are available on request, as is a conversation about which starting point suits your shop.