Paddle Affiliate Program Integration

Built for businesses selling through Paddle

Paddle is your merchant of record. It takes the payment, handles the tax and issues the invoice. Referly reads the completed transactions and works out who to pay. including renewals, and including the ones that get refunded.

Create my programRead the setup guide

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Attributed

Paddle
CustomerAffiliateRevenueRewardStatus
Jonas WeberAna Ferreira$588.00$117.60PENDING
Jonas WeberKwame Boateng$49.00$9.80PAID

Read this first

Merchant of record changes what is possible

Most affiliate tools assume they can reach into your checkout. mint a discount code, read your product catalogue, tag the cart. With Paddle as merchant of record, they cannot, and a lot of them handle that by pretending otherwise until you are three days into a setup.

Referly does the parts Paddle allows, properly, and says so about the parts it does not. Attribution runs on links: the partner’s id travels into the checkout as custom data and rides along with the transaction, every renewal included. What you do not get here are per-partner discount codes and per-product rates.

If a per-partner coupon code is the mechanic your program depends on, Stripe, Shopify, WooCommerce and Polar all support it and this page is not going to talk you out of that.

The honest version

What it does, and what it doesn't

Both lists, in full, before the setup guide rather than after it.

  • Yes

    Every completed transaction

    Including renewals, each one arriving as its own sale on its own schedule.

  • Yes

    Refunds

    An approved adjustment reverses the commission it earned, immediately.

  • Yes

    Tax deducted first

    Paddle reports the tax it collected, and it comes off before the rate is applied.

  • Yes

    Multi-currency

    Transactions convert into your program's currency at the day's rate.

  • Yes

    Your own click id

    An rsubID on the inbound link travels through to the sale for an ad platform to match.

In practice

A transaction, then an adjustment

Paddle reports a completed transaction and the commission appears. When an approved refund follows, the commission goes back, the partner's balance drops in the same second, and nothing had to be chased.

This is the reversal Paddle sellers ask about most, because a merchant of record issues refunds you did not personally approve.

See the four setup steps

What connects

What Referly tracks in Paddle

Fourteen rows, split into what arrives and what does not. The right-hand column is longer here than on any other integration, and every line on it says why.

Referrals trackedSales tracked

What it does

  • Yes — A signup, trial or new customer is recorded against the partner who sent them, before any money moves.
  • Yes — Every completed payment arrives as a sale with its amount, products and currency, and a commission is calculated from it.
  • Yes — Renewals arrive as their own payments, so a partner can be paid for a set number of payments, a set number of months, or for the life of the customer.
  • Yes — A refund reverses the commission it earned, so a partner is not paid for revenue you gave back.
  • Yes — Tax is subtracted before the commission is calculated, so you are not paying a percentage of money that belongs to a tax authority. On by default, and switchable.
  • Yes — An `rsubID` on the inbound link travels all the way to the sale, so an ad platform or a network can match the conversion back to its own click.

What it does not, or only sometimes

  • NoAttribution runs on links. Paddle discounts are not matched to a partner.
  • No — Referly creates the discount code inside your platform when a partner joins, so you never mint codes by hand.
  • NoRates apply to the whole transaction. Referly does not read a Paddle product catalogue.
  • No — Target a whole collection instead of listing its products one by one, and new products in that collection inherit the rate.
  • With a conditionPaddle transactions carry no shipping line, so there is nothing to deduct.
  • No — Instead of cash, a partner's balance can be issued as credit inside the platform they already shop in.
  • With a conditionOne snippet passes the partner id into your Paddle checkout.
  • With a conditionYou paste a Paddle API key. Referly then creates the notification destination for you.
  • No — Partners are added to a named list or group in your email platform as they join, so onboarding and announcements go out from the tool you already write in.
  • No — Money actually leaves through this platform. Referly hands it the batch, and it moves the funds to each partner.
  • No — One approval sends every partner what they are owed, rather than one transfer at a time.

Recurring

Renewals keep paying, on a schedule you set

Every renewal arrives as its own transaction, so a partner can be paid for a set number of payments, a set number of months, or for as long as the subscription lasts.

  1. Payment 1$588.0020%$117.60
  2. Payment 2$588.004%$23.52
  3. Payment 3$588.004%$23.52
  4. Payment 4$588.004%$23.52
  5. “20% for one payment, then 4% for twelve months”and so on

Set the number of months to zero and it never ends. Schedules are per commission plan, so a partner group you recruited through an agency can pay differently from the creators who found you.

Customer stories

Subscription businesses paying partners on Referly

Software companies with recurring revenue and partners who keep earning on it.

OptimizePress
SaaSSite builder

“We have been running affiliate programs for over a decade, and ours is one of the biggest parts of how OptimizePress grows. Referly is the first platform where an operation with thousands of partners actually feels manageable, from recruiting new affiliates to tracking every sale they send.”

James Dyson

James Dyson

Founder & CEO, OptimizePress

7 figures
in affiliate-driven sales
4,554
active affiliates
10,536
referrals
Letterly
Mobile appAI writing

“This platform is quite simple and easy to use, and you can start attracting people to your affiliate program very quickly. A big plus is that the founder, Ayo, is super responsive.”

Ilfat Khayrullin

Ilfat Khayrullin

CMO & Co-founder, Letterly

300K+
app users
689
active affiliates
24,114
clicks tracked

Setup

Connect Paddle in four steps

One API key, one snippet, and Referly creates the Paddle notification destination for you.

  1. 1

    Paste a Paddle API key into Referly

    Referly validates it and creates the notification destination in Paddle for you.

  2. 2

    Add the tracking script to your site

    One line in your head tag, or one tag in Google Tag Manager. Referly then verifies it.

  3. 3

    Pass the partner id into your Paddle checkoutNeeds a developer

    One snippet sets customData.pushlap_affiliate_id, or a data attribute on your Paddle button.

  4. 4

    Set your commission and invite partners

    Pick a rate, choose how long renewals pay, then send your first invites.

Step 3 is the only one that touches code, and it is a single snippet. Attribution runs on links only. Paddle discounts are not matched to a partner, and there are no per-product rates because Referly does not read a Paddle catalogue. Renewals arrive as their own transactions, and an approved refund reverses the commission.

Read the Paddle setup docs

Guides

Step by step for Paddle

Written for the checkout you actually have.

Browse the help centre

FAQ

What Paddle sellers ask

The questions founders ask in the first ten minutes.

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  • Yes. Paddle handles the sale, the tax and the invoice, and Referly reads the completed transactions to work out who to pay. Nothing about being merchant of record gets in the way of running a partner program on top.

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