This is one of our top picks in the category so we recommend it over others (you're on the right page), read below to learn why we love and recommend it! ⤵
This is one of the better tools in its category, see below if this tool is right for you! ⤵
PartnerStack was built for B2B SaaS companies out of the gate, so when compared to all of the incumbents (like Impact and CJ), there's no comparison, PartnerStack is better in every single way. Even Rewardful and others, as PartnerStack has a single login and handles payouts (as an affiliate partner, it's fantastic). That said, there are newer entrants in the space like Dub Partners which is our top pick.
We believe there are better options available in this category, read below to learn what they do well, and what they could do better. ⤵
PartnerStack is a partner ecosystem management platform that helps companies build an manage their partnership programs (along with affiliate/referral tracking).
PartnerStack is a SaaS-focused partner management platform designed to help B2B software companies run and scale their affiliate, referral, and reseller programs. Unlike basic affiliate link trackers, PartnerStack goes much deeper offering attribution tracking, partner onboarding, program management, automated payouts, and a polished UI/UX built specifically for software companies.
They are essentially the gold standard when it comes to a SaaS focused partnership platform (they also have the best UI/UX), well, up until Dub Partners launched onto the scene.
PartnerStack is for B2B software companies. If your goal is to run a full partnership program including affiliates, referrals, and resellers, PartnerStack is one of the few platforms designed from day one specifically for that use case. Teams that use PartnerStack tend to take partnerships seriously and need a robust, scalable system to run them.
There's a reason that about 30–40% of our Top Picks use PartnerStack (birds of a feather flock together). That said, we've been seeing more and more of those companies switching over to Dub Partners more recently (also for a reason).
PartnerStack’s first-party cookies work by setting a cookie on your own website’s domain when a visitor clicks on a partner referral link. This cookie stores information about the referral source and remains valid for 90 days, meaning any sign-ups or purchases made within that window will be attributed to the partner.
The cookie gets set either through server-side methods (better for privacy compliance) or a JavaScript snippet on your site (more likely to get blocked). If you do choose to use PartnerStack, make sure to use the server-side method as it will result in better tracking and is less likely to be blocked by modern browsers. This is also PartnerStack's official recommendations.
While using a JavaScript snippet is faster (and some companies choose it to avoid needing engineering resources), avoid this approach because attribution is much more likely to get blocked, leading to inaccurate data.
PartnerStack allows you to set up flexible commissions, and even segment based on partner groups. You can do CPC, one-time, and recurring payments.
With PartnerStack you get full-funnel analytics, from click → signup → revenue. Their dashboards are also user friendly and easy to understand and navigate (especially compared to Impact and CJ).
One feature that PartnerStack does not have is the ability to get deep UTM analytics to see which piece of content is converting most. For example, if you wanted to track how much your website vs your social media content is converting, you’d need to use two separate links. Now if you wanted to see which newsletter converts best…you need another link (for each newsletter). This causes a ton of friction and most creators will never go through the trouble of using multiple links. This means there is a level of data loss as you won’t be able to see exactly which content drove the most conversions. The only platform that allows for this level of detailed tracking with one link is Dub Partners, which is why it's our Top Pick.
One benefit of using PartnerStack is that they handle all partner payouts. Once a month, ParterStack generates a partner commission invoice. As a vendor, you have 7 days to review it, and once the review period ends it is automatically charged to your payment on file and dispersed to your partners.
As a partner, we love that with PartnerStack we get one payout rather than a zillion tiny ones like with other platforms like Cello, for example (total nightmare to deal with as a publisher/content creator).
That said, we do wish that PartnerStack would modify the way they handled payments to creators.
As partners, we have to manually trigger every payout and each one comes with a small fee ($3, $3.50, $3 + $0.50, etc.). We'd much prefer automatic payouts or at least a smoother UX to reduce the constant mental overhead. PartnerStack says they limit automatic payouts for “security reasons” because some partners don’t verify their accounts properly, which can lead to payments going to the wrong PayPal or an old email. But in our eyes, that means the product is being optimized for low performing partners who aren't taking affiliate seriously, instead of the creators and businesses who actually are the top performers.
PartnerStack sells the idea of a marketplace to it's vendors, but many companies we know that use PartnerStack haven't had the best success with it.
The reality is, we get pitches like the one below on a weekly basis, and we haven’t responded to a single one. Most of these outreach messages are not personalized, feel transactional, and are quickly deleted by creators.
If you're joining PartnerStack with the expectation that you’ll automatically get tens of partners promoting your tool, think twice. The companies that actually see success are the ones with a dedicated partnership manager who invests in real relationship-building with creators (not ones that are found on the marketplace).
Not only does PartnerStack have a robust API for vendors (you), conveniently enough via Zapier, but they also have an API for the partners/affiliates side (us). This is fantastic because talk about gamifying the process and encouraging the team!
For example, you want your partners to create content and posts around promoting your product, right? Well it's also exciting for us when we see a new referral goes though (e.g. we're seeing the impact that's coming from the work we put in). So being able to say set up a Slack alert for when we get a new referral is motivating. We can do that with PartnerStack. Not a lot of affiliate tracking tools seem to care about making some part of the API available to the partner/affiliate though, which is just again where PartnerStack actually cares about the partner experience, not just the vendor experience.
Because they are trying to be more than just affiliate tracking, the price-tag is quite a bit higher than most of the competitors (that are anywhere from $50–500/mo for just affiliate link tracking, and even that similar range for Dub Partners).
PartnerStack starts at 5-figures per year, although, if you're a sizable SaaS though doing at-least $1m/ARR, it's definitely a company you should be seriously considering.
They did just recently launch a startup program though which brings it down to a 4-figure investment for the first year, but this is restricted based on company size and funding, and the truth of the matter is that's more similar to the pricing you get with Dub Partners, which is a superior product in most ways.
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We've tracked and verified the above companies are using this software in their team's stack.
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