Merchant Knowledge Base

Run your affiliate program with confidence

Everything a merchant owner or staff member needs: programs and terms, approving affiliates, tracking and integrations, creatives, commissions, paying partners, tax access, and team roles.

Getting started

Set up your business, understand the workspace, and take the first steps as a merchant.

What is Diversified Affiliates

An overview of the platform and how merchants and affiliates work together on it.

Merchant quick start

The first steps to take as a new merchant on Diversified Affiliates.

Business profile and verification

How to complete your business profile and submit it for Diversified Affiliates verification.

Your merchant dashboard and account

What the Overview page shows and how to reach account and security controls.

Programs

Create, publish, and manage the affiliate programs merchants run on the platform.

What is a program

How a program packages your commission offer, terms, and visibility for affiliates.

Creating and editing a program

Step-by-step instructions for building a new affiliate program.

Program statuses and lifecycle

What each program status means, from Draft through Active, Paused, and Closed.

Program terms

Build and update the terms affiliates agree to when they join a program.

Understanding program terms

What program terms cover and the platform rules they can never override.

Program Terms Builder

How to use the guided form that produces your program's terms document.

Changing program terms

How updates to program terms are versioned and why existing affiliates keep visibility into changes.

Affiliates

Review applications, manage your affiliate roster, and invite new partners.

Reviewing applications

How to approve or reject affiliate applications to your programs.

Affiliate profiles and geography

What affiliate profile details you can see and how country compatibility is checked.

Affiliate roster and segments

How your approved affiliate roster is organized and filtered by segment.

Inviting affiliates and the directory

How to search the affiliate directory and send program invitations.

Managing affiliate relationships

How to update an affiliate's status once they are part of your program.

Tracking

Understand how clicks, referrals, and leads are attributed to affiliates.

How tracking works

How the platform attributes a click, order, or lead to the affiliate who referred it.

Tracking IDs and referral links

How affiliates get a tracking link for your program and what it records.

Attribution windows, coupons, and direct links

How long a referral stays credited and how coupon and direct attribution fit in.

Testing tracking

How to run a safe test transaction to confirm tracking, conversions, and commissions work.

Leads and affiliate of record

How submitted leads move through review and who they credit.

Creatives

Build and publish the banners, links, and copy affiliates use to promote you.

Understanding creatives

The types of creative assets available and how the review and publish flow works.

Creating creatives

Step-by-step instructions for building and publishing a new creative asset.

Campaigns

How to group creatives into a campaign to report on them together.

AI Creative Studio

What the AI Creative Studio generates and the guardrails it follows.

Dynamic creatives

How the Always fresh setting keeps a published creative link current without new links.

How affiliates use creatives

What an affiliate sees and can do once you publish a creative.

Commissions

Understand how commissions are calculated, statused, and reversed.

How commissions work

How an approved order or lead becomes a commission owed to an affiliate.

Commission rule priority

What determines which commission rule applies when more than one could match.

Commission statuses

What pending, approved, paid, reversed, and rejected mean for a commission.

Refunds, chargebacks, and reversals

How a refund or chargeback reverses a commission, and the limit on how far it can go.

Payments

Pay affiliates directly and keep records of what you owe and what you paid.

How affiliate payments work

Why the platform never holds affiliate funds and how you pay directly.

Payment methods and thresholds

Which payment methods you can offer and how the minimum payout threshold works.

Recording and confirming payments

How to log a payment you sent to an affiliate outside the platform.

Payment problems

What to do when an affiliate reports a problem with a payment you sent.

Tax

Understand your tax responsibilities and how to access affiliate tax documents.

Merchant tax responsibilities

What tax responsibilities fall to you as the merchant paying affiliates directly.

Accessing affiliate W-9s

How to view a certified tax document for an affiliate connected to your programs.

Integrations

Connect your store or server so orders and events reach the platform.

Integrations overview

How the Integration Center connects your store or server to tracking and commissions.

WooCommerce

How to connect a WooCommerce store to Diversified Affiliates.

Wix

How to connect a Wix site using a webhook or automation.

CubeCart

How to connect a CubeCart store to Diversified Affiliates.

API and postbacks

How to send events directly from your own server using the REST API, and how outbound webhooks work.

Testing and troubleshooting integrations

How to check, diagnose, and safely disconnect an integration.

Messaging

Communicate with affiliates and stay on top of platform updates.

Messaging affiliates

How to send and manage private messages with your affiliates.

Notifications and What's New

How to review platform notifications and updates relevant to your account.

Reporting

Track performance across programs, affiliates, and creatives.

Merchant analytics and reports

What performance data is available on the Analytics and Reports pages.

Team and security

Manage staff access and keep your account secure.

Merchant staff and roles

The staff roles available for your merchant organization and what each is for.

Account security

Where to review account access and security controls for your merchant account.

Automation

Automate routine merchant workflows with rules and segments.

Automation rules

How to automate routine merchant workflows based on triggering events.

Affiliate segments

How to build a saved, filtered audience of affiliates for reporting or automation.

Support and compliance

Get help and understand your standing on the platform.

Getting support and filing complaints

How to contact Diversified Affiliates support and how private complaints differ from support requests.

Merchant status, verification, and reliable payments

How your merchant organization's status and verification affect your standing with affiliates.

Importing

Bring an existing affiliate program onto the platform.

Importing existing affiliates

How to bring an existing affiliate list onto the platform and prepare for cutover.

Plans

Understand your plan, entitlements, and billing.

Plans and billing

How to review your merchant plan, entitlements, and request a plan change.

Reference

Quick-reference tables for statuses and troubleshooting.

Merchant troubleshooting

Quick answers to common problems merchants run into with tracking, payments, and applications.

Merchant status reference

A quick-reference table of every status used across programs, applications, commissions, and more.