Why You Need to Understand Your Customer Journey to Run an Affiliate Program

It’s a common mistake for affiliate managers to “put partners first”.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s crucial that you understand, enable and offer true value to your partners. But they don’t come first. The customer comes first.

Here are a few quotes from top business leaders about the importance of anchoring your work to the customer:

You’ve got to start with the customer experience and work backward to the technology. You can’t start with the technology and try to figure out where you are going to sell it.
— Steve Jobs, Co-founder of Apple

There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else.
— Sam Walton, Founder of Walmart

We’re not competitor-obsessed, we’re customer-obsessed. We start with what the customer needs and we work backwards.
— Jeff Bezos, Founder of Amazon

Let me tweak those to apply directly to an affiliate program:

Questions to develop a customer-centric partner program

So what does it look like for an affiliate program manager to put customers first? I like to think of it in terms of a sequence of questions with a very intentional order of priority:

1. Who is our customer?
2. What does their customer journey look like?
3. What actions could partners take to support customers along this journey?
4. Who are the partners that can effectively take those actions?
5. What do we need to do in order to get these partners to do these things?

Let’s tackle each of those questions.

1. Who is our customer?

Understanding your ideal customer profile (ICP) is the foundation of a successful partner program. Your ICP is a detailed representation of your best-fit customer, outlining their industry, role, challenges and goals. Consider questions like:

• What industries do our customers work in?
• What problems are they trying to solve?
• What roles or titles typically make purchasing decisions?
• What size companies do they work for?

By deeply understanding your ICP, you’ll ensure that every decision — whether about partner recruitment, content creation or program design — resonates with the right audience.

Related: The key ingredients for a win-win affiliate partnership.

2. What does their customer journey look like?

The customer journey is the roadmap of your customers’ experiences as they interact with your brand. For B2B SaaS, the journey often includes these stages:

• Awareness: the customer becomes aware of a problem or opportunity
• Education: they start researching solutions
• Consideration: they evaluate different vendors or products
• Decision: they choose a solution

For affiliate programs, the key focus should be on the first three stages, as affiliates play a crucial role in driving awareness, educating prospects and helping them evaluate options. Mapping this journey helps you identify gaps where affiliate partners can add the most value.

Related: Learnings from my first quarter as a B2B affiliate manager.

3. What actions could partners take to support customers along this journey?

Partners can provide value at each stage of the customer journey. 

Awareness

• Sharing thought-leadership articles or videos on LinkedIn, YouTube or blogs
• Hosting webinars or podcasts discussing industry challenges
  

Education

• Writing detailed how-to guides or tutorials
• Creating explainer videos or case studies
• Reviewing your product on trusted review platforms

Consideration

• Publishing product comparison articles
• Featuring your product in best of listicles
• Driving discussions on forums or communities where your ICP is active

The goal is to align partner activities with the KPIs of each stage of the customer journey. During Awareness and Education the KPIs you’ll want to target are impressions and engagement. During the Consideration phase, you’ll likely focus on clicks, signups and referrals.

4. Who are the partners that can effectively take those actions?

The answer is partners already have credibility with your ICP. To identify them, answer:

• Awareness: Who regularly posts content your target audience consumes? Look for LinkedIn influencers, industry bloggers and YouTube creators.
• Education: Who provides detailed tutorials, how-to guides or expert advice? Consider bloggers, consultants, educators or other thought leaders.
• Consideration: Who creates product reviews, comparison articles or top 10 listicles? Seek out review sites, affiliate networks and tech comparison blogs.

Finding the right partners becomes easier when you align their existing strengths and audiences with the customer journey. For example, a YouTube creator with tutorials on B2B software might be perfect for educating customers, while a SaaS review site may excel at driving consideration.

Notice that “who are the partners?” is the fourth question, not the first. You won’t know where to look or who to look for until you understand your ICP, their customer journey and the relevant partner actions.

5. What do we need to do in order to get these partners to take those actions?

To inspire partners to take meaningful actions, you need to build a foundation of value and trust. 

Start with value

• Understand your partners: Take the time to learn what truly matters to them. What are their goals? What challenges do they face? Tailor your approach to show that you value their unique perspective and needs.
• Give value first: Don’t approach partners with your hand out. Offer something meaningful from the start — whether it’s exclusive resources, high-quality leads or co-marketing opportunities. Even small gestures like featuring them in your content or promoting their expertise can go a long way.

Build trust

• Be vulnerable and transparent: Share relevant data and insights with your partners, even if it feels risky. This openness fosters a sense of partnership and demonstrates your commitment to a shared mission.
• Share risk equitably: Don’t push all the risk onto your partners with one-sided structures like revenue share-only models. Instead, look for ways to share responsibility and commissions more evenly. For example, provide upfront payments, access to resources or guaranteed benefits.
• Be authentic: Avoid manipulation or coercive tactics. Instead, prioritize genuine communication, meaningful connections and long-term collaboration. Authenticity builds relationships that last.

By focusing on value and trust, you create a partner ecosystem where both sides feel invested and empowered. Partners are far more likely to go the extra mile when they know you genuinely care about their success and are willing to take risks alongside them.

What happens when you adopt a customer-centric mindset?

By adopting a customer-centric mindset, two key shifts occur in how you approach your partner program.

Start with the customer journey

Putting the focus on customers doesn’t mean neglecting your partners — it means helping them succeed by grounding every decision in customer needs. When you prioritize the customer journey, you naturally create a structure that benefits both customers and partners. Partners who align their efforts with a well-defined customer journey are more effective and derive greater value from the relationship.

When you put customers first:

• Your program becomes laser-focused on solving real customer pain points. 

• Partners feel empowered because their actions drive meaningful outcomes for customers, building trust and credibility. 

• Your program delivers more consistent results, as customers progress seamlessly from awareness to decision.

Reframing partnerships language around the customer journey

Traditionally, partner program managers have relied on the language of partner types and motions. Affiliates and influencers refer, agencies resell and so on.

While helpful for categorization, this language can limit creativity and misalign efforts.By reframing the conversation around the customer journey and partner actions, you unlock new possibilities. 

• Instead of asking, “Which affiliates can promote our product?” you ask, “Who can help us educate customers about their options?”. Instead of focusing on what partners are, you focus on what partners do to deliver value.

This subtle but powerful shift in perspective opens up a broader range of partner types and initiatives, creating more opportunities to connect with customers in meaningful ways.

You might also like: Expert strategies for leveraging AI in partnerships.

Benefits of a customer-centric mindset

Better alignment of partner incentives

When partners understand how their actions directly benefit customers, they’re more motivated to perform. Clear alignment ensures that incentives drive behaviors that matter, from creating educational content to generating high-quality referrals.

Broader field of opportunity

By focusing on customer needs rather than predefined partner categories, you unlock new possibilities. For instance, instead of limiting yourself to traditional affiliates, you might recruit niche experts, content creators or trusted advisors who already have influence over your target audience; and you are able to offer them an incentive that may be more effective than revenue share.

Sharper focus for your efforts

This approach provides clarity on where to invest your time, resources and budget. Rather than trying to “do it all,” you can zero in on the partners, content and actions that directly impact the customer journey stages you’re targeting.

Adopting a customer-centric approach transforms your role as a partner program manager. It helps you make smarter decisions about partner recruitment, enablement, campaigns and incentives — ensuring that every effort drives value for the customer, partner and your business.