A setup guide

Affiliate Marketing for Shopify

Set up your program in an afternoon

Install the app, give each partner a discount code, and pay per order. No theme edits and no developer.

To set up affiliate marketing on Shopify: install an affiliate app, decide your commission rate, generate a personal discount code and tracking link for each partner, recruit your first partners from your own customer list, and pay them per order. Referly does all five, and also tracks sales you make outside Shopify.

14-day free trial · No credit card required · Cancel anytime

What is in this guide

  1. 01Install the Referly app from the Shopify App Store
  2. 02Connect your store and verify the tracking script
  3. 03Set your commission
  4. 04Generate a discount code for each partner
  5. 05Invite your first partners

One code in Shopify, the same code earning in Referly.

Before you start

Shopify has discounts. It does not have a program.

Shopify will happily make you a code. Four things it will not do are what turn codes into a program.

A Shopify discount code

Shopify makes this in thirty seconds, and stops there.

What is missing

Attribution

Which partner earned which order.

Holding period

Waiting out your return window before paying.

Tax forms

W-9, W-8BEN and W-8BEN-E, collected and stored.

Payouts

Forty partners, nine countries, one batch.

A partner program

Those four, plus the code, running on their own.

The outcome

What you will have when you are done

  1. 01A partner portal in your colours

    At partners.yourstore.com, in any of 15 languages.

    From Business

  2. 02A code and a link per partner

    Both, for everyone, attributing to the same person.

  3. 03Orders attributed from both

    Shopify reports the order, Referly matches it.

  4. 04Refunds reversed automatically

    A returned order takes its commission back.

  5. 05One payout batch

    PayPal, Wise, bank, store credit, or Referly Payouts.

    From Business

The setup

Five steps to a live Shopify affiliate program

Short sentences, literal instructions. If you already have a store, this is about an afternoon.

0 of 5 done

Tick them off as you work through the steps below.

Ready to start step one?

Create the program first, then install the app into it. Both take a couple of minutes.

14-day free trial · No credit card required

  1. Step 01

    Install the Referly app from the Shopify App Store

    Install the Referly app from the Shopify App Store and approve the scopes it asks for. No theme code is edited and no developer is needed.

    It asks to read orders and products, and to write discounts, which is what lets it mint a code per partner. Nothing is added to your theme's Liquid.

    No theme editsUninstalling removes the script cleanlyBilled separately from Shopify
  2. Step 02

    Connect your store and verify the tracking script

    Connect the store to your Referly program and check that the tracking script reports as verified before you invite anyone.

    The integration screen runs a live check and flips to VERIFIED when the script reports. Do this before step four: a code minted before the script verifies still tracks orders, but link clicks will not attribute.

    Live check, not a checklistShopify native URL redirects, so tracking survives a theme change60-day default cookie window, configurable
  3. Step 03

    Set your commission

    Choose a percentage or a flat amount per order, and decide whether shipping and tax come off before the commission is calculated.

    Most stores start with one percentage for everyone and add per-product or per-partner rates later. Deducting shipping and tax is a switch, and it is usually the difference between a rate you can afford and one you cannot.

    Percentage or flat, per orderDeduct shipping and tax firstPer-product and per-partner rates from Business
  4. Step 04

    Generate a discount code for each partner

    Create a rule that mints a personal discount code per partner, with your prefix and whatever restrictions you need.

    The code is a real Shopify discount, so your own combination rules apply to it. Restrict it to first-time orders to stop it earning on customers you already had.

    Your prefix, built from name or random charactersFirst time order only, minimum order, expiry, max usesAuto-generation is from business
  5. Step 05

    Invite your first partners

    Import your customer list or share a signup link, then approve the partners you want. Your best affiliates are usually people who already bought from you.

    Import a CSV, or publish a signup page and approve applications as they arrive. Different partner types can have their own signup link and their own commission plan.

    CSV import or a public signup linkApprove manually or automaticallyGroups with their own plans from Business

Then the money part

An order lands, the commission is calculated, and it waits. You set a holding period so a return inside your window reverses the commission before it is paid, a payout term, and a minimum threshold so you are not sending $3 transfers.

Holding period
Yours to set
Payout terms
NET_0 to NET_60
Minimum threshold
Per program
Refunds
Reversed automatically
Default cookie window
60 days
Automated payouts
From Business

Shopify specifics

The Shopify details that actually matter

Four things a merchant asks about that a generic guide never covers.

Auto-apply from a short link

The partner shares one URL and the discount is already in the cart.

Native URL redirects

Tracking rides Shopify's own redirect layer, so a theme change cannot break it.

Store credit as a reward

Pay partners in Shopify store credits. The money stays in the store.

Add-to-cart tracking

Product, variant, quantity and price, with a middle step in the funnel report.

  1. Partner shares one URLrefly.to/maya
  2. Store loads?discount=MAYA20
  3. Discount already in the cart-$29.60

Choosing a tool

Most Shopify affiliate apps only work on Shopify

Four things that decide it, and where each tool lands.

ReferlyReferly
A Shopify-only app
A link-only tool

Discount-code orders

  • Tracked
  • Tracked
  • Usually not

A Stripe checkout or a WooCommerce store on the same brand

  • Same program
  • Not supported
  • Stripe only

Fee on your referral sales

  • 0%, every plan
  • UpPromote charges 1 to 2%
  • Varies

A free tier

  • None
  • UpPromote and BixGrow have one
  • Varies

When a Shopify-native app is the better buy

Selling only on Shopify and never anywhere else? A Shopify-native app installs faster and several have a genuine free tier. Referly does not. What the difference buys is one program across every storefront and checkout you run, and no percentage taken off your referral sales.

Customer stories

Shopify stores running this today

Moov's quote below is its five-star review on the Shopify App Store listing itself.

Moov
EcommerceFitness

Affiliates drive a serious share of our revenue across three countries. Since we moved to Referly everything runs from one place, tracking has been spot on, and our partners get paid without me chasing spreadsheets.

Alexander Koppers

Alexander Koppers

Affiliate Manager, Moov

$6.9M

in total affiliate-driven revenue

1,154
active affiliates
19,017
affiliate sales
1,240,030
clicks tracked
The Acoustic Shoppe
EcommerceRetail

A NAMM Top 100 music retailer that turned its endorsing artists into affiliates. Each artist gets a tracked gear-list page, so a fan buying from that list credits the artist automatically, in store as well as online.

Cost

One flat price. 0% of your sales.

Placed after the instructions on purpose. Startup is $75 a month and covers $10,000 of affiliate revenue, Business is $149 and covers $30,000.

FAQ

Questions during setup

What Shopify merchants ask while they are working through it.

14-day free trial · No credit card required · Cancel anytime

  • No. The Shopify app installs the tracking without any Liquid changes, and the integration screen runs a live check so you can see it reporting before you invite anyone. Uninstalling removes it cleanly.