Dating Affiliate Programs & Networks

Dating is a vertical of affiliate marketing where offers are dating sites or their apps. This vertical is considered evergreen. And it’s no surprise, since people always want to meet and seek relationships. To help you run dating campaigns profitably, we have collected our top-list of dating affiliate programs:

---

What types of dating affiliate programs & networks are there?

In the dating vertical, like any other major vertical, there are specific niches. Two main ones:

• Mainstream – dating for serious, long-term relationships. The offers here are white-label dating sites.
• Adult – dating for sex.

Occasionally, there’s also casual dating – the “one-night stands” – as well as narrower niches such as gay dating, lesbian dating, milf dating, webcam dating, etc. But usually, affiliate networks will indicate whether an offer belongs to mainstream or adult dating.

Dating offers are also divided by payment models. Dating affiliate programs pay for CPA for target actions (payment for private chats or purchasing other paid services) or for CPL – for registration. CPL payment can come in two forms:

• SOI – one-step registration. Here, you don’t need to confirm your phone number, email, or other information. You just need to fill out the form on the website or in an app.
• DOI – registration with confirmation. Such leads are valued higher because their validation happens right away, weeding out random users.

Finally, dating affiliate networks and programs are also divided by GEO – for the West (Tier 1) and for the CIS countries (Tier 2 and Tier 3). GEO in Western affiliate networks are not equal either. The highest rates are for top-tier countries. These are the USA, Canada, Australia, some countries in Western Europe. But the competition here is much higher, for example, than for Latin America (Tier 2). Africa, Southeast Asia, some countries in Latin America are classified as Tier-3. Traffic is cheap here, but the audience is inexperienced. Many offers, that are not relevant anymore for other regions, work well here.

By the way: Not everyone knows, but there is also Tier-4. These are countries that are almost pointless to target. The situation there is unstable, and the purchasing power of the population is close to zero. These are some countries in Africa, Afghanistan, North Korea.

How to choose the best affiliate network/program

A few tips to help you find the best dating affiliate network or program:

• Pay attention not only to rates, but also to payment conditions – clarify the hold period and its availability, as well as the withdrawal methods;
• Evaluate the choice of geos and offers – best dating affiliate programs have many offers, so you can choose something optimal for you;
• See what promo materials, tools, and bonuses are available for affiliates – good affiliate networks and programs often provide their affiliates with promo codes for trackers, anti-detect browsers, some other useful services, as well as ready-made promo materials and landing pages;
• Read reviews on affiliate marketing forums. The easiest way is to look for it in the affiliate network rankings.

How did we compile our top-list?

Our top-list includes affiliate networks and programs that we have personally verified, considering:

• Selection of offers for different geos;
• Rates for offers;
• Quality of ready-made promos;
• Tools and bonuses for an affiliate;
• Convenience of payments;
• Quality of support.

We talked to representatives of the dating affiliate networks that made it into our ranking. They helped us evaluate their programs/networks from the inside – for example, finding out about private offers and their future plans.

Of course, we also carefully read user reviews on other platforms. All opinions were taken into account. We verified the affiliate networks and even made some test runs as well.

How to start making money in the dating niche

We recommend that novice affiliates in dating affiliate programs use a smartlink. It is an intelligent affiliate link that shows the user ads for the offer that will be most interesting to them. The smartlink works based on an algorithm that evaluates the user’s geo, browser, sites they are coming from, and more.

Advantages of using smartlinks in the dating vertical:

• No need to create a separate campaign for each targeting option;
• No time wasted on testing combinations;
• Minimal chance of getting zero results.

Smartlinks are available in the best dating affiliate networks such as iMonetizeIt, Trafee, Yellana, and some others from our top-list.

Another great advantage for beginners in dating affiliate marketing is responsive support. An affiliate manager from your network/program can and should recommend offers, provide access to new promos, and help in solving any difficulties.

Traffic sources for dating

Dating is a vertical where a wide range of traffic sources is available. You can promote dating offers via:

• Social networks – targeting, influencer advertising, promotion through your own accounts, direct messaging;
• Contextual advertising – mainstream offers are easier to promote through contextual ads, but adult dating can be promoted using whitelisting and cloaking;
• Push notifications – one of the top traffic sources for dating, also being quite cheap. Push notifications can also be used to mimic messages from dating sites, messengers or social networks, and are less likely to be ignored than aggressive pop-up formats;
• Teasers – another cheap traffic source that can be used for adult dating without worrying about strict moderation;
• WebView applications – a relatively new trend in promoting dating offers.;
• Classified ads – through a dating ad that redirects to a messenger or directly to a dating landing page;
• Blogs – if you run a blog, this can be a free traffic source. Dating offers can be promoted native recommendations, on YouTube via direct or native advertising, comments, and more. Another way of promotion on YouTube is to create a short, intriguing video, and include a link to the full version in the comments.

Therefore, both paid and free traffic sources are suitable for earning on dating affiliate networks. Which one to choose depends on your creativity and experience.

Promo materials (creatives) for this niche can be created with the help of AI. There are, for instance, AI tools that generate nude images.

Case studies of successful dating campaigns

We’ve gathered some cases, including examples with different traffic sources, classic offers, and smart links.

$1300 on Tier-1 countries with push traffic

• Affiliate network: AffMy
• Offers: JoinTheDating, DateMinx, LookAWoman, MilfNearMe
• GEO: USA
• Period: March 11-22, 2021
• Traffic source: RichAds
• Spent: $1721
• Revenue: $3022
• Profit: $1301
• ROI: 75.62%

Targeting the USA is considered a difficult task. Many approaches have failed there, and it’s not easy to engage with the audience. This didn’t stop the case author. Several offers were selected in the AffMy affiliate network. Non-converting offers were turned off during the campaign. Ideas for creatives were found in a free spy service.

With the help of Keitaro, the traffic was evenly distributed between each offer at 25% to more accurately track conversions. They chose to show only 1 impression and 1 click per user, and limited the devices to mobile only. They left all regions for targeting.

As a result of the tests, two offers – DateMinx and LookAWoman – showed good performance. They promoted them only for another week. As a result, they earned $3022 with campaign expenses of $1301.

$10,750 with Google UAC on Dating Smartlink

• Affiliate network: iMonetizeIt
• Offer: Dating Smartlink
• GEO: France, Greece, Croatia
• Period: March 2021
• Traffic source: Google UAC
• Cost: $7,361
• Revenue: $10,751
• Profit: $3,389;
• ROI: 46%

For this case, the author chose France as one of the top geos, and also Greece and Croatia based on the advice of the affiliate manager (by the way, iMonetizeIt is on our top-list). It was decided to run with Google UAC as this source is low-competition for dating. The accounts used were warmed up, as it is easy to get banned with fresh accounts. Traffic was obtained from a Telegram channel for renting Android apps.

The creatives didn’t mention dating. The format with beautiful girls but without nudity worked best.

The case author purchased fake comments to increase the app’s rankings. To increase conversions, push notifications were sent out with messages like “Hi, let’s get to know each other!” As a result, there were about 7,000 confirmed conversions and over $10,000 in earnings in a month.

FAQ