Challenge

A wellness company needed a sophisticated affiliate commission system that could handle complex referral calculations beyond the standard capabilities of AffiliateWP.

The business required custom commission logic, automated data synchronization between affiliate records and WooCommerce orders, and efficient export capabilities for their business development team to track new affiliate registrations.

Solution

84EM developed a custom WordPress plugin that extends AffiliateWP with advanced referral calculation overrides and automated data synchronization capabilities.

The solution integrates seamlessly with WooCommerce and WooCommerce Subscriptions, maintaining accurate affiliate tracking across all order types while providing business development teams with on-demand reporting.

Technical Implementation

• Custom referral calculation engine that overrides default AffiliateWP commission logic to accommodate unique business rules.
• Automated data synchronization that copies referral metadata to WooCommerce orders, maintaining affiliate information directly on order records.
• Action Scheduler integration for asynchronous processing of referral updates, preventing performance bottlenecks during high-volume periods.
• One-click affiliate export functionality with built-in caching that generates CSV reports of newly registered affiliates for business development teams.
• WP-CLI command suite enabling bulk operations for syncing referral metadata, exporting affiliate data, and recalculating commissions across custom date ranges.
• An automatic affiliate activation system that streamlines the onboarding process by setting new affiliates to active status upon registration.
• Custom database schema management with version control that automatically updates database structures when the system is upgraded.
• WooCommerce Subscriptions compatibility ensures referral tracking works seamlessly across both one-time purchases and recurring subscription orders.
• Referral status synchronization ensures that commission states remain consistent between the affiliate dashboard and WooCommerce order data.
• Production safeguards are built into WP-CLI commands, requiring explicit confirmation before executing database operations on live environments.

Results

The custom system provides accurate commission tracking while reducing manual data entry and export time for the business development team.

Automated synchronization ensures real-time accuracy between affiliate records and order data, eliminating discrepancies and supporting reliable reporting for commission payouts.