Google Closing Google Affiliate Network

Posted on April 17, 2013

Google has announced plans to end the Google Affiliate Network. The closure will be sad news for affiliate and merchants that have been using the network, but a plus for rivals like Commission Junction and Linkshare.

Our goal with Google Affiliate Network has been to help advertisers and publishers improve their performance across the affiliate ecosystem. Cost-per-action (CPA) marketing has rapidly evolved in the last few years, and we've invested significantly in CPA tools like Product Listing Ads, remarketing and Conversion Optimizer. We're constantly evaluating our products to ensure that we're focused on the services that will have the biggest impact for our advertisers and publishers.
To that end, we've made the difficult decision to retire Google Affiliate Network and focus on other products that are driving great results for clients.

Google will continue to support the network as it winds it down over the next few months. Relationships between publishers and advertisers will be disabled on July 31, 2013, a little over three months from now. Search Engine Roundtable says this is technically the second time Google has closed its affiliate network.

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