Canadian Fintech Affiliate: Can I borrow a feeling🫤?
The lending rate cap takes effect, my interview with Jess Dolnick and what you missed at Lead Gen World last week.
Morning!
Welcome to the Canadian Fintech Affiliate newsletter, a monthly roundup of industry news, offer updates and conferences worth attending for Canadian affiliate marketers.
In today’s email:
What’s trending: new criminal interest rate takes effect, balance transfer season baby
Interview with Jessica Dolnick - Director of Affiliate and Online Marketing @ Applied Mind, Inc.
Best conferences in Vegas and Toronto and what you missed at Lead Gen World in Florida last week.
Jobs: Roles at Milesopedia, Fintel Connect, Betstamp and 15+ others.
Opinions expressed are my own*
Today’s reading time is 5 minutes.
🤑 What’s Trending
Here’s the biggest news impacting financial affiliates in January 👇
35% - The maximum criminal interest rate effective January 1, down from 49%. Lenders like GoEasy, Fairstone and Mogo can no longer charge borrowers up to 49% for a term loan. It will be a period of transition for the industry as lenders (advertisers) update their risk models and review the initial performance of their portfolios post-rate change.
This likely means lower conversion rates as approvals decline and possibly decreased payouts from partners. This could be lower CPAs, CPLs, CPCs or a decrease in the revenue share on a funded loan.
$14 - The maximum amount a payday lender can charge per $100 borrowed, down from $15-$18 depending on the province. The fed redacted the amendment that allowed the rate to be governed by the provinces. Similar to the lenders above, payday advertisers will need update their risk model which mean likely lower conversion rates for publishers working directly with lenders and aggregators managing loan engines.
Cash advance apps like Nyble, KOHO and Bree are positioned to be the beneficiary of these changes as Canadians falling into the 35-49% credit bucket look for alternatives that are not payday loans. Over time we may see consumer interest in credit building products increase.
Focus on paying down credit card debt. January means one thing for credit card advertisers - Balance Transfer season. This time of year is when consumers decide this is the year they finally get their debt under control and a lot start opening a new credit card with a 0.99% intro offer and transferring their balance.
🎙️ Interviews
Jessica Dolnick - Director of Affiliate and Online Marketing @ Applied Mind, Inc.
Tell me about Applied Mind and your role
Applied Mind is a paid search review affiliate. We own various websites including InsuranceRanked.com, TheCreditReview.com, and Favy.com. As a paid search review affiliate, we pay Google to appear at the top of the page in the sponsored results and use part of our affiliate commissions to fund these advertisements.
My role involves partnerships—finding and strengthening relationships with brands, handling contracts, and monitoring performance.You’re live across a lot of verticals including finance, insurance, B2B and shopping. How do the programs differ across verticals when it comes to payout structures & budgets and how do you identify which offers or verticals are scalable?
We value diversification because you can't predict what might happen next in the world—some companies might shut down, while others could suddenly boom. It's smart to spread your interests to stay prepared.
To pick out promising offers or verticals to launch, we start by checking Google keywords to gauge what people are searching for. Then we match this against the offer payouts to evaluate the opportunity.
In the financial realm, we often deal with lead-based payouts because of legal restrictions, whereas in retail, we typically earn commission based on sales.There’s been a lot of chatter about Google punishing smaller sites and making it more difficult to rank organically. On the flip side, targeting is constantly changing across the paid platforms driving up costs. As a publisher that’s active in organic and paid, how are you planning to navigate these new challenges in 2025?
We're mostly active in paid Google search (SEM). Regardless of which landscape you're in, you always have to be prepared for changes and come up with new strategies to accommodate them. I don't think any platform is ever 100% "safe".
We still have so much to cover in terms of verticals we haven't touched and this last month we started with Amazon and it's been doing well. So that's something we're probably going to do a lot of exploring in 2025 because people are always buying on Amazon and seasonality changes and people's needs change.Whether it's Amazon or anything else, it's kind of like one thing is hot and then it changes or one thing is booming and then they're out of business. You must be careful not to put all your eggs in one basket.
It’s important to test new verticals and traffic channels and scale those that show the most promise.There’s no shortage of affiliate networks. As a publisher, what are some greenlights and red flags to look for when signing up to promote and offer with a network? Do you have a reverse vetting process you complete before sending them traffic?
Most publishers are pretty network agnostic -- all of the popular affiliate networks have the core tech that you need for an affiliate program and it will be free to use. There are "nice to haves" and some networks are more user-friendly for beginners, but at the end of the day, we won't decline a partner because of the network they're on.From my former brand-side experience, I have stronger opinions about it. Some platforms can get quite expensive, or have a lot of spam affiliates applying. I've spoken to lots of affiliates who agree with my stance -- networks have nice-to-haves but most haven't been roadblockers, other than networks that require a dedicated login for just one program.
Similar question about working with a new affiliate manager. What do you look for in an AM as early signs that they’re working with you to scale an offer?
Successful existing programs often indicate a helpful affiliate manager, though it’s not always a guarantee. Transparency is vital; more shared data means better optimization on our part. Also, knowing they have significant budgets is crucial, as limited budgets mean limited scalability, making them less attractive for long-term partnerships.
Don't judge someone based on their title - a CMO might have zero knowledge about affiliate programs, and someone with an Associate title can be extremely savvy. Until you talk to the person, you won't know. If they aren't responsive, that's a sign that you might want to explore elsewhere.
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🍸Conferences
I made a mistake in last month’s newsletter and forgot to mention Lead Generation World was taking place in Hollywood, Florida January 5-7, 2025.
Here’s what it looked like from my feeds…
Upcoming conferences worth checking out:
Affiliate Summit West - February 3 - 5, 2025 | Caesars Forum Las Vegas
If you looking at conferences in the US and not sure which to go to, ASW is a safe bet. There will be 5,000+ attendees from all verticals and panels covering all topics.
Automotive Finance Canada - February 11th, 2025 | International AutoShow Metro Toronto Convention Centre, South Building
Hosted by the CLA, if you want to speak with car dealers and auto lenders about leads, this is the show to go to.
💼 Affiliate Marketing Jobs
With the industry reeling and many people looking for work, I launched a job board specifically for affiliate marketing roles in Canada.
See roles from Milesopedia, Fintel Connect, Betstamp and 15+ roles listed.
Check it out 👉 https://affiliate-marketing-jobs.jobboardly.com/