UK Affiliate Performance Manager

UK Affiliate Performance Manager

Location: London, UK – Hybrid (2 days in the office)
Contract type: Permanent, Full-time
Department: Marketing
Reports to: Head of Discovery Commerce

About The INKEY List

At The INKEY List, we believe skincare should be simple. We make science easier to understand, so everyone can make informed choices about their skin.

Since launching in 2018, we've challenged the industry by putting education, honesty and efficacy first. We listen to our community, create products backed by science and never overcomplicate what should be simple.

We Give A Care. About our customers, our community and the people who make The INKEY List what it is. We know our best work happens when people feel supported, trusted and able to be themselves.

About the role

We're looking for a commercially driven Affiliate Performance Manager to lead and scale our UK affiliate programme, with a clear focus on revenue growth, creator productivity and return on investment.

This is a performance-first role. We're looking for someone who understands how to build a commercially successful affiliate programme: identifying the right creators, driving consistent content output, improving conversion and turning affiliate activity into sustainable revenue growth.

TikTok Shop will be the immediate commercial priority, but our ambition extends beyond a single platform. We're building a wider affiliate and creator commerce ecosystem, including opportunities across YouTube Shopping and other affiliate channels.

You'll take ownership of the commercial performance of our UK affiliate programme, using data to understand what's working, identify opportunities and make decisions about where we invest our time, products and budget.

You'll work within the Discovery Commerce team, collaborating closely with our Trading, Influencer and wider commercial teams to bring a performance-led approach to how we acquire, activate and scale creators, driving sustainable revenue growth across channels and markets.

What you'll be doing

Affiliate Performance and Revenue Growth

• Own UK affiliate revenue performance, with clear accountability for growth, efficiency and delivery against commercial targets.
• Build and execute plans to grow affiliate revenue through creator acquisition, activation, content productivity and conversion.
• Understand the commercial drivers behind affiliate performance, including creator activity, video output, GMV per video, product performance and commission efficiency.
• Monitor performance daily and weekly, identifying opportunities to accelerate growth and quickly addressing underperformance.
• Identify our highest-performing creators, content and products, and develop clear plans to scale what works.
• Set targets and forecasts for creator acquisition, content output and revenue, ensuring activity is aligned with wider trading objectives.
• Bring clear commercial recommendations to weekly trading meetings, moving beyond reporting results to identifying the actions required to improve them.

Creator Acquisition, Activation and Productivity

• Build and manage a performance-led creator acquisition strategy, focused on recruiting creators with the greatest potential to drive revenue.
• Develop a consistent pipeline of new affiliates aligned to our priority products, categories and commercial opportunities.
• Own the creator performance funnel, from recruitment and sampling through to first content, first sale and consistent revenue generation.
• Increase the proportion of recruited creators who become active, productive and commercially valuable affiliates.
• Segment creators by performance and potential, developing targeted strategies to accelerate emerging talent, scale proven performers and reactivate inactive creators.
• Identify the characteristics, content formats and behaviours of our most successful affiliates and use those insights to improve recruitment and activation.
• Build scalable processes that allow us to grow creator numbers and content output without proportionally increasing investment or resource.

Sampling Performance and ROI

• Own the commercial performance of our affiliate sampling programme.
• Develop sampling strategies based on creator performance, content potential, product priorities and expected return.
• Set targets for sampling volume, acceptance, content creation, sales conversion and revenue generated per sample.
• Continuously optimise sampling allocation to improve the proportion of samples resulting in productive content and revenue.
• Identify opportunities to increase sampling efficiency and reduce wasted investment.
• Work with Trading and Operations to align sampling activity with stock availability, launches and key commercial priorities.

Commission, Incentives and Commercial Investment

• Recommend and optimise affiliate commission structures to balance creator motivation, revenue growth and commercial returns.
• Develop performance-led incentives, competitions and creator missions designed to increase content output, product focus and sales.
• Analyse the incremental impact of commission changes, incentives and creator investment.
• Identify opportunities to increase revenue and content productivity without unnecessary increases in programme costs.
• Support commercial planning around product launches, promotional campaigns and key trading periods.
• Ensure affiliate investment decisions are grounded in measurable performance and return.

Performance Analysis, Forecasting and Optimisation

• Own UK affiliate performance analysis, reporting and commercial recommendations.
• Develop clear reporting across the full affiliate funnel, identifying where performance is strong and where growth is being lost.
• Track and optimise key commercial metrics including:
• Affiliate revenue and revenue growth
• Active and revenue-generating creators
• Revenue per active creator
• Content volume and productivity
• GMV per video and GMV per 1,000 views
• Creator acquisition and activation rates
• Sample-to-content and sample-to-sale conversion
• Revenue per sample and sampling ROI
• Creator retention and repeat performance
• Commission and incentive efficiency
• Product and campaign performance
• Programme profitability and investment efficiency
• Build forecasts and performance models to support decisions around investment, creator growth and revenue opportunities.
• Analyse creator cohorts to understand which recruitment and activation approaches generate the strongest long-term returns.
• Turn performance data into clear actions, tests and commercial decisions rather than simply producing reports.

Affiliate Channel Development and Growth Opportunities

• Support the development of our wider affiliate strategy beyond TikTok Shop, including YouTube Shopping and emerging creator commerce opportunities.
• Bring an understanding of affiliate marketing models, platform economics and performance growth strategies from across the industry.
• Identify opportunities to expand successful affiliate activity across platforms and creator networks.
• Help evaluate the commercial potential of new affiliate channels, including revenue opportunity, investment requirements and scalability.
• Develop performance frameworks and ways of working that can be applied across different affiliate channels and markets.
• Share insights, commercial models and proven growth approaches with affiliate colleagues across the wider business.

Cross-Functional Working

Work closely with:

• Trading and TikTok Shop to align affiliate activity with revenue targets, promotions, hero products and commercial priorities.
• Influencer and Community to identify opportunities to turn creator relationships into commercially productive affiliate partnerships.
• Social and Creative to identify high-performing affiliate content and share insights that can improve content effectiveness across the business.
• Paid Media to identify commercially successful creator content with potential for paid amplification as well as sharing insights that can improve content effectiveness across our Paid Media portfolio
• Product and Marketing to develop performance-led affiliate activity around launches and priority products.
• Operations and Supply Chain to ensure sampling investment is aligned with stock availability and product priorities.
• Finance to monitor programme costs, commission efficiency and profitability.
• Regional Affiliate teams to share performance insights, commercial opportunities and scalable approaches to growth.

What we're looking for

We're looking for someone who is analytical, commercially ambitious and comfortable taking accountability for revenue performance. You'll enjoy getting into the numbers, finding the opportunities others might miss and turning your analysis into measurable growth.

Ideally, you'll have:

• Experience in affiliate marketing, performance marketing, social commerce, ecommerce or marketplace growth.
• A proven ability to grow revenue through data-led optimisation, acquisition strategies and commercial performance management.
• A strong understanding of the affiliate marketing landscape, including different partner models, commission structures and commercial opportunities.
• Experience building or optimising acquisition, activation and retention funnels.
• Confidence analysing large data sets, developing performance reports and translating insights into commercial actions.
• Strong Excel skills, with the ability to build forecasts, performance models and commercially grounded recommendations.
• Experience managing performance budgets, incentives, commission structures or ROI-driven investment.
• A good understanding of e-commerce performance metrics, conversion, attribution and profitability.
• Strong organisational skills and the ability to manage multiple commercial priorities in a fast-moving environment.
• The ability to work collaboratively across teams, combining commercial thinking with an understanding of creator behaviour.

Direct TikTok Shop experience is beneficial, but not essential. We're equally interested in candidates with strong experience in wider affiliate marketing, performance partnerships, e-commerce or marketplace growth.

What matters most is your ability to understand the commercial mechanics of an affiliate programme and know how to scale them.

What Success Looks Like

Success in this role will be measured by the commercial growth and productivity of the affiliate programme, not simply the number of creators recruited or relationships managed.

Our key measures of success will be:

• Revenue growth: Delivering affiliate revenue targets and identifying opportunities to accelerate growth.
• Creator productivity: Increasing the number and proportion of affiliates consistently generating revenue.
• Content productivity: Growing commercially effective content output and improving revenue generated per video.
• Acquisition and activation: Improving the conversion of recruited and sampled creators into revenue-generating affiliates.
• Sampling efficiency: Maximising content and revenue generated from sampling investment.
• Creator retention: Increasing repeat content creation and sustained revenue contribution.
• Commercial efficiency: Optimising commission, incentive and programme investment to deliver sustainable returns.
• Scalable growth: Building processes, reporting and performance strategies that support growth across existing and emerging affiliate channels.

What you'll get from us

We're committed to creating an environment where everyone can do their best work.

Alongside a competitive salary, we offer:

• Hybrid working – giving you the flexibility to balance work and life in a way that works for you.
• Private medical insurance through Vitality
• An Employee Assistance Programme
• Enhanced family policies & support
• Life Assurance - giving you extra peace of mind.
• 25 days' holiday, plus bank holidays
• Your birthday off – celebrate your day, your way.
• Monthly product allowance – so you can enjoy and experience the products you help bring to life.
• Cycle to Work and Electric Car schemes
• Regular team days and a dog-friendly office – because great work happens when people connect (and we're always happy to see four-legged colleagues too!).

Most importantly, you'll join a team that cares deeply, makes things happen and does it together.

Our commitment

At The INKEY List, we know different perspectives make us stronger. We're committed to creating an inclusive workplace where everyone feels welcome, respected and able to do their best work.

If you need any adjustments during the recruitment process, please let us know, we're happy to help.