How to Find Competitors' Affiliates: The Ultimate Growth Hack

Last updated on 12 May 2025

Hey there!

Want to know one of the most powerful growth hacks I've seen in years?

Finding your competitors' affiliates.

This strategy has helped my clients generate millions in revenue with minimal effort. Why? Because you're not starting from scratch. You're leveraging work that's already been done.

Today, I'm going to show you exactly how to find these golden opportunities and turn them into revenue-generating machines for your business.

Affiliate Marketing at Scale

Look, I've built multiple 8-figure businesses, and I can tell you right now: getting warm leads is everything. Cold outreach is tough. The conversion rates are low. But what if I told you there's a pool of pre-qualified prospects just waiting for you?

Why It Works

Backlinks are warm leads.

If someone linked to your competitor, they already care about your industry. You're just giving them a reason to care about you more — with commissions.

They Already Trust Your Niche

These sites have already demonstrated interest by linking to solutions like yours. Half the battle is already won!

Income Motivates Changes

Let's be honest: offering commissions gives them a financial incentive to switch links or add yours alongside competitors. Money talks.

Double SEO Benefit

You gain both affiliate revenue AND valuable backlinks for your SEO. It's like getting paid to improve your search rankings!

Lower Cost of Acquisition

You pay only when they deliver traffic that converts—no wasted outreach. It's performance marketing at its finest.

Why Competitors' Affiliates Are Pure Gold

It's super important to find competitors' affiliates. Why? Let me break it down for you.

They're Warm Leads (The Holy Grail)

When someone promotes your competitor, they're showing clear interest in your space. These aren't random bloggers – they're people who already understand your product category and are actively promoting it.

Think about it: which would you rather have?

1,000 cold emails to random websites
50 targeted emails to people already promoting similar products

The math is simple. Conversion rates on warm leads are 5-10X higher than cold outreach.

They Already Care About Your Product

These affiliates have done their homework. They know your industry, understand the pain points, and can articulate benefits. Half your marketing work is already done!

When I helped SaaS companies target competitor affiliates, we saw conversion rates of 15-25% on our outreach emails. That's insane compared to the industry average of 1-3%!

Your Better Program = Their Better Income

Here's where it gets juicy. If your affiliate program offers higher commissions, better conversion rates, or longer cookies, you've got a compelling reason for them to switch.

I recently worked with a client who offered 40% commissions when their competitors were offering 30%. Within 60 days, they'd poached 37 top affiliates and increased their monthly recurring revenue by $18,500.

The 5-Step Process That Actually Works

Ready for the exact process? I've refined this over years of testing. Follow these steps precisely:

1. Find Competitor Backlinks with Ahrefs

First, create an Ahrefs account if you don't have one already. Go to Site Explorer and enter your competitor's URL.

Click on the "Backlinks" report. This shows you every site linking to your competitor.

Pro tip: Focus on "dofollow" links first – these are typically editorial mentions, not just random listings.

2. Export Data to Google Sheets

Ahrefs makes this easy. Just click the export button and save as CSV or Excel. Then import into Google Sheets.

I recommend cleaning the data first:

Remove links with low Domain Rating (under 20)
Filter for pages with commercial intent (reviews, comparisons, etc.)
Sort by traffic value (higher = better prospects)

3. Use AI Sheets to Extract Contact Emails

This is the game-changer. With AI Sheets' email scraper function, finding contact info becomes ridiculously simple.

In your Google Sheet, just use the =email() formula and input the URL column. The tool will automatically find and extract emails from those pages.

For example: =email(A2) where A2 contains the backlink URL.

The best part? It works at scale. Run it across hundreds or thousands of URLs with a single formula.

4. Craft Your Outreach Strategy

Now it's time to reach out. AI Sheets provides amazing outreach templates, but here's my proven 3-step formula:

Acknowledge their existing promotion (shows you've done your homework)
Present your superior offer (higher commissions, better conversions)
Make it easy to say yes (provide swipe copy, tracking links, everything they need)

Keep it short. Keep it focused on THEIR benefit, not yours.

5. Analyze and Scale

Track your results meticulously. Which emails get opened? Which get responses? Use this data to refine your approach.

Once you find what works, double down and scale. This isn't a one-and-done strategy – it's an ongoing growth channel.

Real Results: How editGPT Crushed It

Let me share a real case study.

editGPT needed to grow quickly in the competitive AI writing space. They used exactly this process to target competitors' affiliates.

The results? In just 3 days, they:

Got listed on 20+ affiliate sites
Added $2,387 in monthly recurring revenue
Built a sustainable growth channel they could replicate

How? By making it ridiculously easy for affiliates to switch. They offered slightly higher commissions (35% vs competitors' 30%) and provided better converting landing pages.

The math was simple: affiliates made more money promoting editGPT, so they switched.

Key Takeaways

Finding competitors' affiliates isn't just a tactic – it's a complete growth strategy. You're leveraging existing market demand and redirecting it to your product.

Remember:

These are warm leads – they already understand and care about your product category
A better affiliate program gives them financial incentive to switch
The process is simple: Ahrefs → Google Sheets → AI Sheets email scraper → Outreach
Track, analyze, and continuously improve

Your Action Plan (Do This Today)

Identify your top 3 competitors
Set up Ahrefs (they offer a 7-day trial for $7)
Export their backlinks
Start with 50 high-quality targets
Use AI Sheets to find contact emails
Send your first batch of outreach emails

Even if you only convert 10% of those prospects, that's 5 new affiliates driving traffic and sales to your business.

The best part? Once set up, this system runs almost on autopilot. Your new affiliates become a 24/7 sales force, driving traffic and conversions while you sleep.

That's how smart entrepreneurs scale – by leveraging other people's audiences and turning competitors' assets into your own growth engine.

Are you going to implement this strategy? Let me know in the comments below!