Buy.at Sold to Digital Window

It was revealed early this week that Digital Window, mostly known as Affiliate Window, has bought the Perfiliate, otherwise known as Buy.at, which has sent shockwaves throughout the affiliate industry.

For some, concerns have arisen due to this consolidation; the inevitable monopolisation in the near future, the movement towards a larger dominance within the networks. Kevin Brown mentions that this signifies a commitment to the affiliate channel, which others have agreed that the move will enhance the affiliate ‘experience’ and to grow the affiliate space further through technological benefits and ultimate service levels.

What does this mean for affiliates? Well, if you purely based your affiliate activity on the network that you operate on, then this could put a small spanner in the works – choices will indeed be minimised and if you had certain issues in the past with either of these merged networks then you may well consider letting bygones be bygones. With merchants having reduced choices then there may be a small possibility of these being absorbed into the one, new network.

For agencies, it can make work easier working with one less network especially with all clients’ programmes in one space, but being impartial to all open networks that we do business with, it’ll surely make it harder for us to contrast and compare.

Regardless whether you are for or against the move, you still have to believe that in the long-term this integration will develop the industry as a whole. It may mean that with a majority that the new force will lead where others will follow, but anything that can improve certain tasks, or bring new ideas to the market is something that I’m all in favour of.

Both Buy.at and Affiliate Window have always been a pleasure to work with and I sincerely hope that the positives from each of these respective networks are transposed into the new network offering.

Chris

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