What is the Insound Affiliate Program?

The affiliate program is a way for you to earn money with your website by linking to Insound. You get commission for all sales generated through your links.

Is there any cost to join?

No. Becoming an affiliate is free.

How are commissions calculated?

Your commission is a percentage of the sales generated by your affiliate links – whenever someone clicks from the link on your site to Insound, and makes a purchase, you earn a percentage of the sale.

Starting commission is 7%, but commissions escalate as your monthly sales revenue increases:

Sales in a Month	Percentage
Under $500.00	7%
Over $500.00	8%
Over $1,500.00	9%
Over $3,000.00	10%
Over $5,000.00	11%
Over $8,000.00	12%
Over $11,000.00	13%
Over $14,000.00	14%
Over $17,000.00	15%

For example, if your monthly sales total is $100, you earn $7 (7% of $100 = $7). If it’s $499, you earn $34.93 (7% of $499 = $34.93). If your monthly sales are $800, you earn $64 (8% of $800 = $64); if your monthly sales are $12,000 (wow!), your commission is $1560 (13% of $12,000 = $1560).

You'll be paid every time your commission total is $20 or more. Please email marketing@insound.com if you have any questions about this policy.

How does affiliate linking work?

When you link to Insound from your site, you will use a special affiliate link generated by adding a fromtag to the Insound URL. Fromtags are numerical codes used to track affiliate links. They look like this: &from=444444.

When you become an affiliate, you’re given a unique six-digit fromtag code to use when you generate affiliate links. They’re added to the end of Insound URLs, and they indicate what affiliate site a visitor clicked through from. The fromtag is registered when a visitor first links to Insound from the affiliate site. Any purchases the visitor makes during that session are counted as sales revenue for the affiliate.

For example: let’s say you do a feature on one of the greatest indie albums of all time, Neutral Milk Hotel’s In The Aeroplane Over The Sea, and you want to insert a buy link to it on Insound.
First step - Go to www.insound.com and search for the artist/title.
Second step - Click on the title link for In The Aeroplane Over The Sea
Third step - Copy this URL. Aeroplane’s is http://search.insound.com/search/showrelease.jsp?p=INS16332
Fourth step – Add your fromtag. Let’s say yours is 44444. Your link should now look like this:
http://search.insound.com/search/showrelease.jsp?p=INS16332&from=44444 Fifth step – Create a “buy it at Insound” link to this URL from your site (we’ve made this easy by providing HTML tags, which you can find in the members section). You’ve just created an affiliate link!

Here’s another possibility: you’ve just done a live review of an Elvis Costello show, and rather than link to a specific release, you want to link to a page with all the Elvis Costello releases Insound carries.
Here’s the search link for Elvis Costello:
http://search.insound.com/search/searchmain.jsp?select=artist&query=Elvis+Costello Now add your fromtag, and you’ve got your URL: http://search.insound.com/search/searchmain.jsp?select=artist&query=Elvis+Costello&from=44444 Some affiliates prefer to use artist searches for all their buy links, because they can be less time-consuming to set up. The above link can be changed to search for any artist at Insound. Just be sure to connect all words in the artist’s name with ‘+’, and to attach your unique affiliate code to the end of the URL.

You can also create affiliate links to specific release pages, the Insound home page, any of our main pages (like Sound Savers, new releases, MP3s, etc.), or to search URLs for any given artist (this would display all titles Insound has for this artist). Different types of pages require different fromtag formats; the members section has more information about creating them.

How can I get more people to link through to Insound from my site so I can earn more commission?

If you’re already linking to Insound wherever it’s editorially relevant (reviews, features, etc.), another way you can help draw folks’ attention to Insound.com on your site is by putting up Insound’s banner ads. We have links to download banners for all our current promotions in the affiliate members section.

Another idea is to mention Insound programs/specials in your site’s text, if that’s an option. If you think your site visitors would be excited about Sound Savers, for example (classic indie rock CDs, all under $10), you might make a note of it on your site, and include a link to that page.

The same goes with our monthly promotions: we are always running something new, whether it’s a sale on certain titles, a quiz question where a correct answer earns you a discount, or something free with your Insound purchase. When you join, you’re asked if you want to opt in to the Affiliate newsletter. If you choose to receive the newsletter, you’ll get the scoop on these promotions ahead of time, so whenever we’re running something you want your visitors to know about, you can mention it and include a link to the promotion.

We’re also always open to your suggestions, and we’ll do what we can to work with you and make your affiliate links as successful as possible.