Sub Affiliates in CAKE

Jeff Olliver

Modified on: Sat, 20 Jun, 2026 at 6:50 PM

This article will cover the following:

What Is a Sub Affiliate?
How Sub Affiliate Tracking Works
Viewing Sub Affiliate Performance
Payout Structures
Managing Sub Affiliates
API: Sub Affiliate Endpoints

What Is a Sub Affiliate?

A sub affiliate is a publisher you recruit and manage under your own affiliate account. Instead of joining an advertiser's program directly, sub affiliates run traffic through you — the primary affiliate — and you take responsibility for their performance, compliance, and payouts.

Media buying agencies managing multiple in-house traffic sources.
Affiliate networks that white-label campaigns for their own publishers.
Experienced affiliates who mentor and manage newer publishers.

Note:
Sub affiliates are sometimes called "sub publishers" or "tier-2 affiliates" depending on your network. In CAKE, the platform refers to them as sub affiliates throughout the interface.

How Sub Affiliate Tracking Works

CAKE uses sub IDs — small pieces of extra information appended to your tracking link — to identify which sub affiliate sent a conversion. When you pass a sub affiliate's unique identifier in your link, CAKE stamps every click and conversion with that value.

You receive a tracking link from the advertiser or network for the offer you're running.
You append a sub ID to that link identifying the sub affiliate — for example, ?s1=publisher42. Each sub affiliate gets a different value.
The sub affiliate runs traffic to their version of the link. When a user clicks, CAKE records the sub ID alongside the click.
A conversion fires. CAKE ties it to your account as the primary affiliate and records the sub ID for reporting.
Reports populate in your dashboard, broken out by sub ID so you can analyze each sub affiliate individually.

Caution:
Sub ID values are passed as plain text in the URL. Never place sensitive personal data (full names, emails, payment details) in a sub ID field. Use internal codes or numeric identifiers instead.

Viewing Sub Affiliate Performance

All sub affiliate reports are available in your affiliate portal under Reports. Filter by offer, date range, or specific sub ID values. Group by sub ID to see clicks, conversions, conversion rate, revenue, and payout for each publisher.

Tip:
Set your reporting date range to match your payout period before exporting. This makes reconciliation much easier and helps you catch discrepancies before you process payments to your sub affiliates.

Payout Structures

Payout Model	How It Works	Common Use Case
Fixed split	You pay the sub affiliate a fixed percentage of every conversion payout (e.g., 70% to them, 30% to you).	Long-term relationships where performance is predictable.
Flat rate	You pay a set dollar amount per conversion regardless of your own payout rate.	Standardizing payouts across many sub affiliates and offers.
Tiered rate	The sub affiliate earns more per conversion once they hit a volume threshold.	Incentivizing high-volume publishers to scale up.
Negotiated rate	Payout is agreed individually with each sub affiliate.	Premium publishers who command higher rates based on traffic quality.

Caution:
CAKE does not process payments to your sub affiliates automatically. You use sub ID reporting to determine what each sub affiliate earned, then pay them according to your own agreement.

Managing Sub Affiliates

Log in to your affiliate portal and navigate to Sub Affiliates (sometimes under Account or Network).
Click Add Sub Affiliate or Invite and enter basic information — name, email, contact details.
Assign a unique sub ID or let CAKE generate one automatically.
If your network requires approval, the sub affiliate remains in a pending state until you or a network admin approves their account.
Build their tracking link by appending their sub ID to your base tracking link and share it with them.

API: Sub Affiliate Endpoints

List Sub Affiliates

GET /api/2/sub_affiliates.json

Parameter	Type	Required	Description
sub_affiliate_id	integer	No	Filter to a single sub affiliate by ID.
affiliate_id	integer	No	Filter to sub affiliates belonging to a specific parent affiliate.
sub_affiliate_status	string	No	Filter by status: active, inactive, or all. Default: all.

Sample request

GET https://your-instance.cakemarketing.com/api/2/sub_affiliates.json
  ?api_key=YOUR_API_KEY
  &affiliate_id=67890
  &sub_affiliate_status=active

Sample response

{
  "request_status": "Success",
  "sub_affiliates": [
    {"sub_affiliate_id": 301, "sub_affiliate_name": "MediaPartner_A", "payout": 5.00, "payout_type": "cpa"},
    {"sub_affiliate_id": 302, "sub_affiliate_name": "MediaPartner_B", "payout": 20.00, "payout_type": "percent"}
  ]
}

Create Sub Affiliate

POST /api/2/sub_affiliate.json

Parameter	Type	Required	Description
affiliate_id	integer	Yes	The parent affiliate under whom this sub affiliate will be created.
sub_affiliate_name	string	Yes	Display name for the new sub affiliate. Must be unique within the parent affiliate.
payout	decimal	Yes	Commission amount. Flat currency value (cpa) or percentage (percent).
payout_type	string	Yes	How payout is calculated: cpa (flat amount) or percent (% of parent payout).