Tripology unveiled a new affiliate program with a twist -- a 30% to 50% revenue share.
Based on volume and lead quality, the travel agent lead-generation service is offering this range of compensation to affiliates for leads provided to Tripology and sold to travel agents.
"Every transactional site out there has some sort of affiliate program," says John Peters, general manager of digital strategy and travel for Rand McNally, which owns Tripology. "Instead of some hum-drum program, we thought we'd do something dramatic -- share up to 50% of revenue we earn with a few select partners in the travel industry."
Peters says Tripology will limit the program to 50 affiliates.
Tripology doesn't charge agents big dollars for leads so the affiliate program may not generate large dollars for affiliates -- unless the volume is large.
However, each lead can be sold up to three times.
Tripology says the leads sell for $1 to $25 each, with the price determined by an algorithm.
"The more the agent can earn from a booking, the more it costs," Peters says. "So a lead for two people going to Williamsburg for the weekend costs less than four people looking to take a Greek Island cruise. So, an air-only request might cost $1 but a destination wedding to Saint Lucia for 20 people would cost $25."
Website and blog owners with substantial traffic can sign up for the affiliate program on the Tripology website. If approved, Tripology generates an affiliate link to track the leads that the affiliate sends to Tripology.
The affiliate program comes with a dashboard so affiliates can monitor how much money they are making as they make it, Tripology says.
Peters says Tripology will be more selective about which sites can participate in its new affiliate program than it did under a prior program, and the compensation is greater, as well.
"Why? Because in travel lead-generation, the quality of the leads is more important than quantity," Peters says. "Anyone can generate a lot of bad leads. At Tripology, we focus on securing quality leads for our Tripologists."