It’s that time of year when blogs are stuffed full of the top affiliate marketing trends for the upcoming new year.
We’re doing something different, asking the Affiliate and Partner Marketing Association’s (APMA) members a few leftfield questions instead.
We hope to spark a few fresh ideas rather than just asking the classic question of ‘what’s going to be hot in 2025?’.
Here’s part one of our alternative affiliate marketing trends. We hope you enjoy the answers as much as we did and they trigger some alternative perspectives you haven’t considered.
In part one, we ask Elliot Myers from The Affiliate Marketing Advisor (TAMA), Lee-Ann Johnstone from Affiverse, Connected Path’s Anthony Clements and affiliate network Optimise for their views.
What will affiliate marketing’s biggest headline in December 2025 be?
Lee-Ann Johnstone (L-AJ): Where’s the value at? With attribution hijacking and incrementally being the top topics on everyone’s hit list, I think we need to start focusing on what the performance marketing program objectives are for each company in the year ahead. Get back to the WHY we are doing this, WHO we need to do it with and create measurable outcomes with the partner that can bring us the value.
No more over-inflated bloated ROI numbers, rather show and tell where the value is that the partnership programme is really delivering to the business. Get back to basics. Do these right, the rest will follow.
Anthony Clements (AC): Hopefully it won’t be about tracking! I reckon ‘Will shoppable AI help or hinder affiliate marketing?’ AI-powered search companies like Perplexity are already integrating shoppable links into products. It will be interesting to see whether this presents an opportunity for the affiliate channel, or threatens some of its traditional publisher methods like commerce content and Google Shopping.
What affiliate marketing trends or tech will change the way you do your job the most next year?
L-AJ: AI tools are already changing the way we get more efficient in the jobs that we have to do.
I think affiliate managers that can harness new AI tools and learn to prompt to get efficient outcomes from this tech. In doing so they can tell better stories, see different insights and adapt their strategies faster to effect positive change
Giles Hunt (GH, Optimise): AI & Large Language Models (LLM) continue to evolve and gain a greater understanding and relevance alongside the automation of manual processes. e.g. automated browsing/purchasing for users like https://www.perplexity.ai/shopping/
Elliot Myers (EM): Reinventing the channel as performance PR and a compliment to organic SEO
AC: I asked AI…and it said AI… that feels so 2024. I think 2025 will be the year of the office renaissance. I expect more in-person client meetings and face-to-face professional interactions that will have me partying like it’s…2019. But back to the office won’t mean a return to the 9-to-5. Next year the idea of creating office spaces that cater for personalised schedules and individual experiences will reach critical mass.
What’s a challenge in affiliate marketing no one’s talking about—but should be?
AC: The Government’s consultation on potential Buy Now, Pay Later regulation. Regulation on how customers use BNPL may impact its continuous availability for customers that need to offset purchases of higher value purchases. But it may also affect the way these companies use affiliate marketing as a monetisation method.
EM: Why aren’t we championing the brand awareness work we do, our work is just as important as the John Lewis Christmas advert; where is our equivalent? Who is collating exciting work to share with the masses?
L-AJ: Fraud – bigger numbers doesn’t mean better ROI or growth. Are we doing anything as an industry to stamp this out by closing the variable loopholes we’ve made and demanding better industry practices between all stakeholders, or is it going to remain every man for themselves?
GH: If LLMs become more sophisticated and provide a greater volume of searches, how do affiliates fit into this mix? At some point advertising will need to be integrated into LLM results to continue the freemium model – how will affiliates (and other advertising platforms that don’t belong to the big players), be able to operate in this space?
Will the Competition and Markets Authority need to get involved to ensure that competition in the ad space continues. If a publisher’s content is used how are they remunerated for it? One way is licensing but could this also include paid links which can reward that content provider?
Bryony Smith (Optimise): AI driven results on Google will become so intelligent; when people come to search, they’ll get more than an AI answer. They will get an entire AI-organised page custom-built for them, personalised with audience, interests, demographic attributes. Some publishers already have dynamic pages that change based on the user’s search, so this will become more commonplace & may well be replaced with Google’s pages within the search results.
In 10 words or fewer, predict the most surprising development in 2025?
EM: AI doesn’t do anything significant
AC: Original Content Score: originality will be Google’s 2025 SEO talking-point.
L-AJ: Micro-influencers drive niche growth through better AI-matched partnerships.
What’s your wildest prediction for affiliate marketing next year (go rogue!)?
L-AJ: Virtual influencers sign exclusive affiliate deals, outperforming human creators globally.
AC: By December 2025, 50% of all the channel’s sales will be tracked by a new tracking technology that is: cookieless, ad-blocker proof, cross-platform and accurate and reliable for both advertisers and affiliates.
EM: Everyone and their dog launches an ‘AI-powered product’ that doesn’t do anything significant.
Hungry for more? Read Part Two of our alternative affiliate marketing trends for 2025.
Read more about affiliate marketing trends in 2024 and how publishers and brands feel about the channel in 2025. Download our FREE 75-page report:
