This is the cold email plan we'd run for an affiliate marketing agency that builds and manages affiliate and partner programs for one industry. The signals are easy to find. Search the best of articles in their category and see who gets linked.
Your market is every company in your industry whose buyers read reviews and comparisons before they buy. Software buyers read comparison articles and brand buyers watch creators. Both are partner channels.
These are the signals worth looking for.
Check the footer for an affiliates or partners page. No page means no program.
An affiliate page with old terms or a signup form that leads nowhere means the program was launched and left alone.
Check their competitors' affiliate pages. Programs on Impact.com and PartnerStack often show the platform on the signup page.
Search phrases like best payroll software for accountants and open the top results. When the articles all link to competitors and none mention this company the partners are working for someone else.
Search their brand on YouTube and in blogs. People already recommending them for free are the first partners to sign.
Crunchbase shows new rounds. A partner program suits a company after a raise because commission only gets paid when a sale happens.
Lead with the competitors who have one.
Lead with their own affiliate page and what is out of date.
Lead with the top article and who it links to.
Lead with the creator or site already recommending them.
Software partner programs and consumer brand programs recruit very different partners. Keep them in separate campaigns.
Thirty sites and creators already writing about their category with who each one links to today. Ahrefs shows who links to their competitors.
It works because it is a recruiting list with the proof already attached. The next step is someone signing those partners up.
Their competitors' public affiliate terms side by side. The commission and how long a referral counts and the payout rules.
It works because it answers the first question any partner asks. Setting competitive terms is part of what you run.
Recruit their first ten partners from the list at no charge. They approve the terms and each partner before anyone joins.
It works because partners only cost money when they sell. The first sales from those partners make the retainer an easy decision.
Aim to have the first partners live within 30 days.
Hi {{first_name}},
Searched "{{search_phrase}}" and opened the top five articles. All five link to {{competitor}}. None mention {{company}}.
Those writers get paid when they send a sale. {{competitor}} pays them and you don't yet.
Want the list of the 30 sites I'd recruit first?
{{sender_first_name}}
Hi {{first_name}},
Found the affiliate page on {{company}}'s site. It looks like nobody has touched it since {{last_update}}.
We run partner programs for {{industry}} companies. Happy to show what a live one would look like for you.
Worth a look?
{{sender_first_name}}
Hi {{first_name}},
We build and run affiliate and partner programs for {{industry}} companies.
{{proof_line}}
Worth a conversation?
{{sender_first_name}}
Swap {{proof_line}} for one real result of your own. A program you built and what its partners sold. If there is no result yet then leave the line out.
At smaller companies the founder or the head of growth decides. At bigger ones it is the head of partnerships.
Results depend on the offer and the list. Three outbound agencies that publish their own numbers land between one booked meeting per 1,000 people contacted and one per 2,000. One of them also tested 650,000 cold emails with a plain offer and got about 3 to 6 interested replies per 10,000 people.
Those are other people's numbers and not a promise about your market. Your market's number only comes from testing it.
We build and run this campaign for one agency per industry.
Thirty minutes on your market and how we'd reach it.