Set up affiliate and influencer tracking with Affluencer Hub

Overview

Affluencer Hub is where you manage the influencers and affiliates you work with directly inside Triple Whale. Use this article to add a partner, give them a way to drive traffic (a discount code, a tracking link, or both), log what you're paying them, and read their results. Plan on 10–15 minutes for your first partner; subsequent partners take about 2 minutes each.

Before you begin

You'll need:

The Triple Pixel installed and firing on your store (see What is the Triple Pixel?)
Edit access to your Triple Whale workspace
Access to your sales platform (Shopify, etc.) if you'll create discount codes there

⚠ Pick your tracking method before you onboard partners. Switching methods later won't fix old data, it only applies going forward. Most stores use a mix: discount codes for influencers (the customer enters the code at checkout), tracking links for affiliates with their own audience or website, and both for partners who do a bit of each.

Step 1: Add a partner

In Triple Whale App, go to Marketing Acquisition > Attribution > Select All Channels drop down > Select Affluencer.
Click Add Affluencer.
Fill in the partner's name and any contact details you want on file.
Click Save.

Naming matters more than you'd think: when you set a per‑order commission later, Triple Whale matches orders to partners by name, so spelling and capitalization need to be consistent. Pick a convention up front (e.g., always Jane Doe, never jane doe or JaneD) and stick with it.

⚠ Add the partner before their code or link goes live.

If a partner posts on Friday and you add them on Monday, you'll lose the weekend's orders.

Need to recover historical orders? Reach out to Support or your CSM to request a backfill, it has to be triggered on our end.

Step 2: Give them a way to drive traffic

You have two options. Most stores use both.

Option A: Add a discount code

Open the partner's profile.
In the discount codes area, click + to add a new code in Discount Codes field.
Enter:
- Code: what your customer types at checkout (e.g., JANE15)
- Start date (optional): when the code should start being attributed to this partner
- End date (optional): when it should stop
Create the matching discount in your Shopify (or other sales platform) admin so the discount actually applies at checkout.

One code = one partner. Don't share the same code across multiple partners, Triple Whale needs each code tied to a single person to attribute revenue correctly.

Option B: Generate a tracking link

Open the partner's profile.
In the Triple Whale Generated Links area, click + to add a new generated tracking link.
Share the link with your partner. When shoppers click it, the Pixel tags the visit and any resulting order back to that partner.

The link Triple Whale generates already includes its own tracking parameters, you don't need to add UTMs to it.

Need more than one link for the same partner? Open the partner's profile and add additional links from the same place you created the first one. Each link can have its own:

Destination URL: where the link sends shoppers (homepage, a product page, a landing page)
Campaign (optional): what the link is for (e.g., Summer Launch)
Source: where the partner is sharing it (e.g., Instagram, TikTok, YouTube)

Every link is unique, so label them clearly when you send them, the Instagram link and the YouTube link will look almost identical at a glance. Pick a source naming convention and stick with it ("Instagram" everywhere is cleaner than a mix of instagram, ig, and IG).

💡 Tip: Tracking links work whether or not the customer uses a discount code, so they're a solid catch‑all. Many stores give influencers both, the link for tracking, the code as the offer.

Step 3: Log what you're paying them

Affluencer Hub supports three expense types:

Expense type	When to use it	Example
Per‑order	The partner earns a cut of every order they drive	10% commission on each sale through their code
Fixed (one‑time)	Flat fee for a campaign or post	$500 sponsored Instagram post
Fixed (recurring)	Ongoing retainer	$1,000/month brand ambassador retainer

To add one:

Open the partner's profile.
In the expenses area, add a new expense.
Choose the type, enter the amount (flat dollar amount or % of order), set a date range if needed, and click Save.

Per‑order commissions are matched to your partner by name, so a typo in the partner's name field means those orders won't get matched and your spend numbers will be off. Double‑check the spelling before you turn this on.

When you edit a recurring expense, your reporting updates immediately, including for past dates inside the expense's range. Changing a $1,000/month retainer to $1,200/month will reflect the new amount on previous months in that range. To preserve the old amount for past periods, end the original expense on a specific date and create a new one starting the next day.

Step 4: Verify and read your results

Once partners start driving orders, open your Affluencer Hub report to see:

Revenue and orders per partner
Spend (from the expenses you logged)
ROI per partner
Trends over time

After you add or edit a partner, give the dashboard 10–15 minutes to fully refresh before reading results, new and updated records take a few minutes to propagate.

You're done when: the partner's profile shows incoming orders, the Pixel page shows traffic under the expected channel, and any logged expenses appear in the Affluencer Hub report.

Other ways partners get into Affluencer Hub

You'll mostly add partners by hand (Step 1), but partners can also show up through:

CSV upload: bulk‑add partners if you've got a spreadsheet
Auto‑created: Triple Whale can spin up a partner profile automatically when an order or tracked visit comes in with a discount code or tracking parameter that doesn't already match a partner you've added
Backfill: historical orders can be matched to partners after you set up tracking

⚠ Backfills aren't self-serve. Contact Support or your CSM to request one, backfills have to be triggered on Triple Whale's end and can't be run from your account. Available once your tracking (codes and/or links) is set up.

If you're managing more than a few dozen partners, see Bulk-upload affluencers via CSV or ask Support.

Automatic Affluencer channel tracking with UTMs

Triple Whale can automatically categorize affiliate and influencer traffic into the Affluencer channel when the Triple Pixel detects one of these utm_medium values:

utm_medium=influencer
utm_medium=affiliate
utm_medium=affluencer

When one of these values is present, the traffic will appear under the Affluencer channel in the Pixel table.

For best results, use the rest of your UTMs consistently:

utm_campaign should identify the partner, influencer, or affiliate.
utm_source should identify where the traffic came from, such as Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, or a partner site.
utm_term can identify the campaign or promotion, such as summer-launch or product-drop.

Example:

yourstore.com/products/example?utm_medium=affluencer&utm_campaign=jane-doe&utm_source=instagram&utm_term=summer-launch

If utm_term is missing, the traffic can still be categorized under the Affluencer channel, but the campaign value may appear as (not set) in reporting.

Troubleshooting

My partner's orders aren't showing up under their profile. If the partner was added after the code or link went live, see Step 1. Attribution doesn't backfill automatically, but Support or your CSM can trigger a backfill for you on request.

My partner shows orders but zero sessions. Expected when shoppers used the discount code without clicking a tracking link. Sessions are tracked by the link; orders can be tracked by either the link or the code.

Two partners are showing the same orders. You probably have one discount code shared across both. Each code should be tied to a single partner.

My spend numbers changed for past months after I edited an expense. Expected, edits to an expense apply across the expense's date range, including past dates. To preserve the old amount for past periods, end the original expense on a specific date and create a new one starting the next day.