It’s beneficial to be aware of the top recurring affiliate programs.
Indeed, it pays off repeatedly!
To be honest, as an affiliate marketer, recurring revenue affiliate programs are your best buddy.
Why should you be compensated once for introducing a customer when you may be compensated several times?
Recurring affiliate programs frequently offer a substantial monthly compensation and the opportunity to earn residual revenue.
Additionally, if you select the appropriate affiliate network, you can earn lifetime commissions.
What Are Recurring Affiliate Programs?
That sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it?
It is not, believe me. There are numerous incredible recurring commission affiliate programs available – for more than what we have listed on this list.
Affiliate programs that generate recurring revenue are exactly what they sound like. Rather than paying you a one-time “bounty” commission for each customer you recommend, they pay you a percentage of monthly recurring revenue.
When you refer a consumer who purchases a $100 product, you receive a percentage of the sale – say, 15%.
However, with a recurring affiliate program, that product may cost $100 every month, which means you’ll be paid your 15% income monthly, either for a defined length of time (often one year) or for life.
What Are The Best Programs To Earn Recurring Affiliate Commissions?
Nobody is going to pay ongoing monthly commissions on a one-time transaction.
As a result, recurring affiliate programs entail marketing products that pay monthly.
You may find recurring income affiliate programs in a variety of areas and product categories, including the following:
- Software as a Service: Many CRM applications, SEO tools, and social media managers pay recurring commissions.
- Online courses & subscription sites: As long as the customer remains a member, you earn affiliate commissions.
- Web hosting & cloud storage: Affiliates promote these “online infrastructure” products through some of the best programs available.
Why Promote Affiliate Programs with Recurring Commissions?
Obviously, it’s a “harder sell” to convince people to subscribe to paid-monthly items than getting them to make one-time purchases.
However, the benefits make recurrent affiliate programs well worth the effort.
When each referral entitles you to lifetime commissions, you’re well on your way to realizing the affiliate marketing ideal of generating a passive work replacement income.
Are you enjoying what you’re hearing? Are you prepared to begin earning recurring commissions on products you promote?
Let’s begin by examining the 15 most lucrative affiliate programs for recurring income:
1. AWeber – 30% lifetime recurring commissions
🤑 Commission rate: 30% lifetime recurring commissions
⏰ Cookie duration: 365 days
AWeber is nominally an email marketing platform, but it also allows customers to create landing sites and send web push notifications. It even includes eCommerce capabilities.
While AWeber offers a free product tier, you’ll be pushing the Pro plan — which starts at $16.15 per month — through this recurring affiliate program.
When you refer someone to AWeber, you’ll receive a 30% recurring commission on the initial transaction, plus 30% on all subsequent payments (paid monthly).
To ensure that you get the most out of your referrals, AWeber provides an extraordinarily large 365-day cookie window, the longest of any recurring affiliate program we’ve encountered.
2. ConvertKit – 30% lifetime recurring commissions
🤑 Commission rate: 30% lifetime recurring commissions
⏰ Cookie duration: 90 days
ConvertKit is an all-in-one email marketing platform for online entrepreneurs that includes e-commerce tools and landing page creation capabilities.
If you’re looking for confirmation that ConvertKit has one of the greatest recurring affiliate programs available, look no further than the fact that it partners with well-known affiliate marketers such as Pat Flynn of Smart Passive Income.
With lifetime commissions of 30% on each referred customer, it’s easy to see why he signed up.
Affiliate marketers that join the ConvertKit recurring affiliate program receive extensive assistance in optimizing performance, including a lesson with Pat Flynn, as well as images, video assets, and evergreen webinars.
3. ClickFunnels – Up to 40% recurring commissions
🤑 Commission rate: Up to 40% lifetime recurring commissions
⏰ Cookie duration: Lifetime
ClickFunnels is a sales funnel and website builder that is geared toward entrepreneurs who do not know how to code.
Its solution has aided over 110,000 clients in generating about $12 billion in combined revenue.
Joining the ClickFunnels recurring affiliate network entitles you to an upfront 20% lifetime commission rate, which is already rather lucrative. Even better, it scales upward from there:
- Earn $1,000 in monthly commissions to qualify for recurring commissions of 30%.
- Once you reach 40 active live accounts for a minimum of 30 days, you can increase your commission rates to 40%.
Additionally, you can earn a $100 reward commission on the sale of ClickFunnels’ “One Funnel Away” and “30 Days” items.
4. MailerLite – 30% lifetime recurring commissions
🤑 Commission rate: 30% lifetime recurring commissions
⏰ Cookie duration: 30 days
MailerLite is an email marketing solution that was designed with simplicity in mind.
Despite its name, MailerLite packs a punch in terms of features, including a drag-and-drop editor that enables users to create stunning emails without having any prior knowledge of HTML.
Additionally to its simplicity, it offers one of the greatest recurring affiliate programs we’ve seen. Refer a customer and earn 30% of each sale for as long as they continue to use MailerLite – what could be simpler?
To assist you, you’ll receive access to the same high-quality branding and content marketing materials that MailerLite’s in-house team uses.
5. ActiveCampaign – Up to 30% lifetime recurring commissions
🔗 URL: ActiveCampaign affiliate program
🤑 Commission rate: Up to 30% lifetime recurring commissions
⏰ Cookie duration: 90 days
ActiveCampaign is not your typical email marketing platform. Additionally, it includes all of the CRM and marketing automation capabilities that organizations use to deliver superior customer experiences.
With monthly subscription fees ranging from $9 to $229, it appeals to a broad demographic, making it easy to promote via your affiliate website.
You’ll earn at least 20% recurring commissions on each customer you refer as long as they continue to use ActiveCampaign. Your base commission could reach as high as 30%, depending on the volume of sales you generate and their retention rate.
And it’s definitely worth marketing, as the average ActiveCampaign affiliate gets $1,350 for each sale through the recurring affiliate program.
6. GetResponse – 33% recurring lifetime commissions
🤑 Commission rate: 33% recurring lifetime commissions
⏰ Cookie duration: 120 days
Each week, GetResponse customers send about 765 million emails using their email marketing platform.
In other words, it’s a fairly significant event. In addition to email marketing, it automates standard digital marketing chores and creates landing pages.
Along with a “conventional” $100 per sale reward payment, GetResponse offers one of the greatest recurring affiliate programs on the market.
Once accepted, you’ll receive a lifetime recurring commission of 33% on each customer you suggest, paid on the 20th of each month.
With monthly rents reaching as high as $580, there is substantial money to be made here.
7. Leadpages – Up to 50% lifetime recurring commissions
🤑 Commission rate: Up to 50% lifetime recurring commissions
⏰ Cookie duration: 30 days
The website and landing page software developed by Leadpages has aided over 40,000 small company marketers in optimizing their websites and lead-generating tactics.
As an intuitive landing page builder, it enables clients to construct alert bars and popups.
Each Leadpages affiliate begins with a 10% commission rate on each sale, but you can easily increase your earnings by generating more referrals:
- Earn 40% recurring commissions by referring $50 – $2,999.99 per month
- For sales over $3,000 per month, commissions will rise to 50%
Leadpages is not the cheapest product on the market, with monthly fees ranging from $27 to $239.
This may make it slightly more difficult to sell, but considering that its top-tier commissions are the joint-highest of all the recurring affiliate programs we’ve examined, it’s definitely worth the effort.
8. Thinkific – 30% lifetime recurring commission
🤑 Commission rate: 30% lifetime recurring commission
⏰ Cookie duration: 90 days
Thinkific helps content providers construct and promote online courses and membership sites.
Over the years, over 50,000 creators have used the site to make over $650 million in sales.
Thinkific charges content creators a monthly fee to use its tool, so its recurring affiliate program is built around attracting new creators.
Every time you suggest a creative, you’ll earn a recurring 30 percent commission on their monthly or annual plans for the duration of their stay with Thinkific. That means a single referral could earn you up to $1,700 a year.
9. Teachable – 30% recurring lifetime commission
🤑 Commission rate: 30% recurring lifetime commission
⏰ Cookie duration: 90 days
Teachable is a major rival of Thinkific.
While there are some subtle changes between the two programs, they generally perform the same function, with Teachable costing slightly more and without a free tier.
The business strategy is identical to that of Thinkific, which means you’ll need to recruit content creators to earn money through the platform’s recurring affiliate program.
Again, it gives lifetime commissions, which means that the longer your suggested clients use Teachable, the more money you earn.
While its compensation structure starts at 30%, you can earn up to 50% in recurring commissions by meeting specific monthly milestones.
10. Moosend – 30% lifetime recurring commission
🤑 Commission rate: 30% lifetime recurring commission
⏰ Cookie duration: 90 days
Moosend is another email marketing platform with a slew of additional features, including CRM and segmentation capabilities, as well as tracking and reporting.
Its clientele includes renowned names such as Domino’s Pizza and Vogue, but it remains reasonably priced. Moosend’s entry-level subscription is completely free for life, while the company’s mid-tier Pro plan begins at just $8 per month.
With lifetime recurring commissions of 30% and a cookie duration of 90 days, this is already one of the best recurring affiliate programs available.
However, it is not all. When a consumer clicks on your affiliate link, signs up for the free tier and then upgrades to a paying plan, you get a commission — even if the upgrade occurs more than 90 days after the initial enrollment.
11. Elegant Themes – 50% recurring annual commissions
🤑 Commission rate: 50% recurring annual commissions
⏰ Cookie duration: 180 days
Elegant Themes is a WordPress website builder. With a five-star rating on Trustpilot and a customer base of over 765,000 business owners and web designers, it is clearly good at what it does.
Elegant Themes earns over $3 million per year from over 30,000 affiliates, making it one of the most popular recurring affiliate programs available.
Additionally, it is one of the greatest recurring affiliate programs in terms of earning potential, paying 50% on annual renewals.
In other words, you’ll continue to receive passive revenue if your referrals continue to pay for the various WordPress themes offered by the company.
Additionally, with one of the longest cookie lifetimes on this list, Elegant Themes maximizes your opportunity to monetize the traffic you generate.
12. Serpstat – Up to 30% lifetime recurring commission
🤑 Commission rate: Up to 30% lifetime recurring commission
⏰ Cookie duration: 30 days
Serpstat is about as popular as SEO tools get.
It is Appsumo’s best-selling product in its category and also the most-voted SEO tool on Product Hunt. Additionally, it has a 4.6-star rating on G2 based on over 400 reviews.
These types of trust considerations make it much simpler to convince your audience that Serpstat is worth purchasing (although it is not inexpensive, starting at $55 per month).
Serpstat’s recurring affiliate program has a commission structure based on the volume of new customers you generate, starting at 5% and increasing to:
- 10% from 1st to 5th payment
- 20% from 5th to 20th payment
- 30% from the 22nd first payment
13. Mangools – 30% lifetime commission
🤑 Commission rate: 30% lifetime commission
⏰ Cookie duration: 30 days
Mangools provides a comprehensive set of SEO tools, ranging from the link and keyword analysis to rank tracking and SERP visualization.
It’s priced competitively, with plans starting at just $29.90 per month. Additionally, it offers a free 10-day trial, which makes it even more accessible to your audience.
Mangools reports that its recurring affiliate program rewards each associate an average of $487 monthly. If you follow these steps, you’ll be well on your way to earning a job-replacement income.
The commission rate is a flat 30% and is paid for the life of the account, which means that recurring revenue can quickly accumulate.
The one minor disadvantage is the 30-day cookie window, which is tied for the shortest of all the recurring affiliate programs discussed in this article.
14. Hubstaff – 30% recurring commissions for 12 months
🤑 Commission rate: 30% recurring commissions for 12 months
⏰ Cookie duration: Unknown
Over 40,000 organizations, including household names like Groupon and Instacart, rely on Hubstaff’s time monitoring and productivity management software.
With starting pricing as low as $14 for two users, it’s easy to see why so many firms have signed up.
While Hubstaff’s price makes it a simple sell, you’ll need to send a lot of traffic their way to earn a living from this recurrent affiliate program, which offers 30% recurring commissions.
A few minor annoyances with this affiliate marketing scheme – first, commissions are paid on a 12-month basis rather than on a lifetime basis.
Second, commissions are paid after those 12 months have passed, which means you’ll have to wait an extended period of time to see a return.
15. NordVPN – 30% lifetime recurring commission
🤑 Commission rate: 30% lifetime recurring commission
⏰ Cookie duration: 30 days
NordVPN is one of the largest VPN services in the world. With the worldwide VPN market expected to reach about $36 billion in value by 2022, it’s clearly chosen a wise business.
NordVPN is used and promoted by a slew of well-known YouTubers, like PewDiePie, Casey Neistat, and Philip DeFranco, resulting in tremendous brand recognition. This significantly simplifies the promotion process for affiliate marketers.
And with lifetime renewal commissions of 30%, plus up to 100% on the initial sale, this recurring affiliate program is well worth promoting.
Conclusion
There are numerous recurring affiliate programs available.
However, make no mistake: setting yourself up to generate recurring affiliate commissions takes time and effort.
There is a great deal to do before you see a return on your investment, from developing a website to conducting keyword research and creating blog entries to attract the correct audience.
And that’s before you consider which recurring affiliate programs are the greatest fit for you.
However, do not be deterred. Everyone must begin somewhere, and we’re here to assist you in achieving your affiliate marketing goals.
