Which commission rules can I choose for my product?

When more than one affiliate participates in a buyer’s purchase journey, Hotmart uses an attribution rule to determine who will receive the commission for the sale.

In this article, you'll learn how the commission rules available in the Affiliate Program work, the differences between them, and how to configure the option that best fits your sales strategy.
 

What is an attribution rule?

An attribution rule is the criterion used by Hotmart to determine which affiliate will receive the commission when a buyer interacts with promotional links from more than one affiliate before completing a purchase.

For example, a customer may discover your product through one affiliate's link and, days later, complete the purchase using another affiliate's link. In this scenario, the attribution rule determines who receives the commission from the sale.

This identification is made through cookies, which record the source of the buyer's visit. The validity period of these cookies is defined by the creator and may be 60, 90, or 180 days, or permanent, depending on the selected rule.
 

Which attribution rules are available?

Hotmart offers three commission attribution models:
 

❯ Last Click

Also known as Last Cookie Counts, this is Hotmart’s default model and the most widely used in affiliate programs.

Under this model, the commission is assigned to the last affiliate whose link was accessed by the buyer before the purchase.

This option generally works well for evergreen products because it allows affiliates to use different strategies to influence the customer throughout the purchase journey.

❯ First Click

Also known as First Cookie Counts, this model assigns the commission to the first affiliate who introduced the product to the buyer.

Even if the customer later returns through another affiliate’s link, the commission will still be assigned to the affiliate responsible for the original referral.

This rule is commonly used for launches because it rewards affiliates responsible for generating the initial traffic and leads.

❯ Multi-Click

Under the Multi-Click model, the commission from a sale can be shared among more than one affiliate.

This happens when a buyer accesses promotional links from different affiliates before completing the purchase. In these cases, the commission is split between the first and the last affiliate involved in the purchase journey.

This format expands commission distribution among partners, although the amount received by each affiliate will be lower.

Important: To enable the Multi-Click model, the product cannot have any linked affiliates or active discount coupons. In addition, once this model is activated, it will not be possible to switch back to the First Click or Last Click models.

How do I configure my product’s commission rule?

To define the attribution rule for your product, follow these steps:

1. Access your Hotmart account through: https://app.hotmart.com.
2. From the side menu, click Products > My Products.
3. Select the I'm a Creator tab.
4. Choose the product you want to configure.
5. From the product side menu, click Affiliate Program.
6. Click Settings.
7. In the Commissioning section, select the desired rule.
8. Click Save to finish.

Done! From that moment on, sales commissions will be assigned according to the rule configured for your product.
 

To learn more about configuring your Affiliate Program, visit this article.