Electric Cigarette Affiliate Programs
I first ran into electric cigarettes at the CES (Consumer Electronics Show) in Las Vegas, back in January of 2007. I knew immediately that I wanted to be early in the affiliate space, and since then, I’ve checked out practically all the affiliate options.
All of the ecig suppliers hat we deal with here are our affiliates, and each of our relationships seems to have it’s own advantages and disadvantages.
I’ll be adding info about a few more shortly, and these are the most active ones right now.
Greensmoke -
By far, Greensmoke seems to have the best affiliate program, and it doesn’t take too much volume to get up to their top payout percentage, which is 20%.
The reason I say they are “the best” is primarily because of their products, which are completely state-of-the-art, and hold their price for a well too. You won’t see them being discounted all over the web.
They also offer the most marketing support, with not only a wide variety of banners and text links, but they also provide printed materials as well, along with the PSD files. They’ll even custom order you business cards.
They provide you with two discount codes, a 5 and a 10%, and you can even get an e-mail address at their domain, if you choose to do so.
Affiliate software – IdevAffiliate
Payouts – 10 to 20%
Pay frequency – monthly
Pay on time – Yes, always
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Esmoke.net (United States Only)
These guys also offer an excellent product which is easy to sell, but I’ve found that their website doesn’t convert quite as well as Greensmoke, but still pretty darn well.
Furthermore, while their products appear to be a bit cheaper, as you browse, you’ll find that the card is a little bit confusing, and by the time you add cartridges and refills, the customer isn’t saving all that much money over Greensmoke.
Their warranty is also not nearly as good, at only 30 days instead of a year, but the management is very easy to get on the phone, and they’ve claimed to me verbally, but they’ve never let a truly defective unit go on replaced for a customer. In other words, if justified, they will extend their warranty as long as necessary to make the customer happy.
It does take longer to reach their highest payout level with 60 sales required before you reach 20%, but it does make a nice companion product to the Greensmoke line.
They also have a good selection of banners and text links, and offer the ability to create your own deep links, and they approve sales quickly and pay on time as well. I’m very happy so far.
Affiliate software – IdevAffiliate
Payouts – 10 to 20%
Pay frequency – monthly
Pay on time – Yes, always
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ZeroTar – (Canada and US only)
These guys begin their affiliate program at 15%, and you can quickly get up to 20. They have a wide variety of units from the very inexpensive three-piece models, two top-of-the-line two-piece models, and their website converts pretty well.
My biggest problem with Zerotar has been there incredibly terrible customer service. They offer absolutely no telephone service, and despite my repeated emnail requests no one will talk to me on the phone.
They’ve been late on all of their affiliate payments, most recently over 30 days late, and to be honest we’ve phased them out completely primarily for that reason.
Another downside of their program is that they have their own affiliate software that frequently contains broken banners and code, and getting e-mail response to fix them is extremely slow.
You also do not have the ability to create custom deep links, so you are at the mercy of promoting only what they happen to provide you with a working banner / link for.
That said, if you’re trying to flesh out a store that offers all prices and models, they seem quick to ship, and their wide selection gives them a high conversion rate. They certainly DO have a good selection, and are our only vendor right now that routinely stocks the nicotine refill liquid, so for the time being we are keeping them, although not pushing their products as much with the slowpay issue.
Affiliate software – custom Shopping cart
Payouts – 15 to 20%
Pay frequency – monthly – sort of
Pay on time – Nope, but they DO eventually pay 
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