Affiliate platforms continue to find more and more use for AI, taking advantage of a technology that at first brought a lot of challenges to the sector.
The latest to do so is ReferOn, an affiliate management platform. The firm has launched a new open standard, the MCP (Model Context Protocol), which allows AI assistants to connect to ReferOn’s platform.
This includes connections to ReferOn’s APIs, databases and platform actions. The company’s goals will be familiar to many companies and individuals looking at using AI in a business sense – freeing up time.
ReferOn has cited relationship-building and growth as additional benefits, believing that the main benefit of using products like MCP is the freeing up of affiliate managers to focus on strategy and other tasks.
Alex Bukin, ReferOn’s General Manager, said: “Strategy and real impact come before hype. MCP isn’t about chasing a wave, it’s about creating a foundation that keeps affiliate managers and operators ahead of the curve.
“By focusing on building the groundwork to support structured data and open standards, we’re making sure AI has real use cases, not just cosmetic add-ons. Our goal is to set the benchmark for innovation and lead the affiliate management ecosystem by shaping its future.”
At first, Generative AI had a pretty negative impact on affiliate platforms. The rise of AI generated content posed challenge and competition, while Google’s AI summary feature has impacted search traffic – something felt by many other media stakeholders.
The response of the industry seems to be to fight fire with fire, and more and more firms are now looking into how AI can enhance their existing platforms. In its case, ReferOn has sought to make itself ‘AI ready’.
This process has seen the creation of its Refie platform, an AI-backed ‘living ecosystem’. It has also launched a Global Search (Beta) feature, functioning as an entry point for data, actions and insights.
Affiliate platforms continue to find more and more use for AI, taking advantage of a technology that at first brought a lot of challenges to the sector. The latest to do so is ReferOn, an affiliate management platform. The firm has launched a new open standard, the MCP (Model Context Protocol), which allows AI assistants …