Understand the lag chain from click to paid, and when the first customer lands
After this lesson you can
Trace click to signup to trial to paid for your own trial length and recruiting style, and place the first paid customer on a realistic month, typically five to six, instead of a hopeful one.
Understand the lag chain from click to paid, and when the first customer lands
Between an affiliate's click and a commission in your account there are six steps, each with its own delay. Write them down for your own program and you will know which month to expect the first paid customer, instead of hoping for it.
The chain
- Click. The affiliate publishes, the page ranks or the email goes out, someone clicks. Months two and three.
- Signup. Within a day of the click, usually; nearly always within a week.
- Trial. However long your trial is. Seven days and thirty days are a month apart at the end of the chain.
- Paid. The customer converts, the payment lands in Stripe or through the API, and the commission is generated in real time.
- Payout. Commissions generated in a month enter a payout on the first of the next month; you have thirty days to pay. The affiliate sees the money 30 to 60 days after the customer paid.
- The next one. The affiliate has been paid, tells other affiliates, publishes again. The chain restarts, shorter.
Add it up for a typical program and referrals arrive in months three and four, the first paid customer around month five or six, and the affiliate's first payout a month after that.
What moves it
Two things you control. Trial length: a seven-day trial converts weeks earlier than a thirty-day one. Recruiting mode: a program that recruits its own network and allows paid-ads partners sees revenue months before a program relying on affiliates who first have to write and rank an article. The timeline calculator models both for your numbers, and the month it gives you is the one to write down, not the typical one above.
The hold you get for free
Because a commission generated this month is paid out next month, you have 30 to 60 days to check that a referred account is real and using the product before the affiliate is paid. A refund or chargeback in that window rejects the commission. This is why the classic affiliate fraud worries mostly do not apply here: nothing is paid before the money has landed and been checked.
Do not judge before the chain completes
A program judged on revenue in month three is being judged before step four has happened for most of its referrals. Judge month three on trial quality. Judge month six on revenue.
What to expect
Ballpark figures for this stage. Not promises: your trial length and how you recruit move them in both directions.
Want the band for your own program? Run the timeline calculator. Two minutes, no signup.
Key takeaways
- Six steps from click to commission, each with a delay: click, signup, trial, paid, payout, the next one.
- Typical: referrals in months three and four, the first paid customer around month five or six.
- Trial length and recruiting mode move it by months. Write down the month the timeline calculator gives you.
- Commissions are paid 30 to 60 days after the customer pays, which is your verification window.
- Judge month three on trial quality and month six on revenue.
The detail lives in the help centre
This lesson tells you the order and the judgement. The clicks are in the articles below. Open one, do the step, and you will find a way back to this lesson at the top of the article.
Reference: read if you need the detail
Background you can skip on a first pass.
- End-to-End Payment Tracking: How Reditus Tracks Revenue and CommissionsHow each stage is recorded.Help centre · Tracking, Attribution & Integrations
- How do automated payouts work at Reditus?What happens once a commission exists: payouts enter on the first of the following month.Help centre · Using Reditus as a SaaS
Do this before the next lesson
Each step says how much counts as done. Doing a third of it and moving on is how programs stall.
Logged in? These open the right screen in your Reditus account. Not a customer yet? They take you to signup first.
Questions we hear at this point
When do affiliates get paid?
Commissions generated during a month enter a payout on the first of the following month, and you have thirty days to pay it. Payouts run through PayPal by default, with Wise and bank transfer on request, and automated payouts cost 5% by card or 2% by invoice. An affiliate typically sees the money 30 to 60 days after the customer paid.
Can we speed the chain up?
Shorten what you control: a shorter trial, a lower payout threshold so the first payout comes after two or three commissions, paid-ads partners if your funnel converts paid traffic, and affiliates recruited into pages that already rank. Everything else is the customer's buying cycle, which no program setting changes.
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