How can we improve WHMCS?

Share, discuss and vote for what you would like to see added to WHMCS

Big overhaul of the affiliate system.

  • Anthony Smith shared this idea 3 years ago
  • Payments/Billing
  • 2 Comments


I would like to request that the affiliate system is overhauled, if you look at https://requests.whmcs.com/search/affiliate there are 9 pages of requests for improvements to the affiliate system not a single one has got past the 'under consideration' status.

The affiliate system is incredibly basic in WHMCS and it would not take much to improve it to make it modern like other affiliate systems made in the last 5 - 10 years

Suggestions to revamp include:

1. set custom affiliate codes with built-in discounts, this has been a basic affiliate marketing feature across the board for a very long time, think "go to www.meundies.com/whmcs" for 10% off, this is a common method of using affiliate links whereby discount is applied for marketers and they also get a commission as well.

In the above example the customer gets 10% discount, affiliate marketer gets 10% commission

2. The ability to tick a box to make the commission 0% when creating promotion codes, so if a product is purchased using that coupon code then the commission is 0

This helps combat the affiliate discount rings destroying profit margins with tons of fake accounts (usually coming from hostloc forums).

3. The ability for admins to require confirmation to activate affiliates and ideally a set of terms that need to be agreed too specific to the affiliate system.

4. The option to require at least 1 active service for the affiliate to remain active.

5. Tiered affiliate system so that you also earn when your affiliate sign ups get sign-ups.

6. none financial reward system - the option to add time on to services rather than financial payout e.g. each sign up gets you an extra xx days extension on the due date of your hosting or vps product.

I am aware some third party modules can achieve this however in most cases the module writers have terrible reputations and these really are pretty basic features of modern affiliate systems I think it is fair to expect that WHMCS at least have the majority of these of their roadmap.

I am making this suggestion now in the hope that we have these features by 2027, the current system stifles marketing opportunities which limits potential customers which in turn could impact revenue for WHMCS as hosts reach thresholds for paying higher WHMCS license fees slower so if these are implemented everyone winds, better customer experience, better affiliate marketer experience, hosts grow faster, whmcs get higher tier license fees sooner.

2 Comments

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Additionally usage billing should be able to be included in the affiliate calculation!
We cannot use affiliate because our product revenue is 100% based on the usage billing.

This is a joke, it should be looking at the invoice revenue for the customers they have referred.
This would be nice!