Does Lowes Have An Affiliate Program? Is It Any Good?

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Hello everybody and welcome back. It’s time to look at one of the big boys in affiliate programs.   this isn’t one of these small independent affiliate programs that you often find me reviewing this is one of the biggest Home and Garden stores out there.  Lowe’s is the company in question and if you live in the United States you are probably already familiar with this company and have probably been to one of their stores if you needed something to repair or remodel anything in your house.

Does Lowe’s have an affiliate program? The good news is that Lowe’s does have an affiliate program that you can use for a wide variety of Home and Garden niches. A lot of times these larger stores will simply do away with their affiliate program or never have one in the first place. But that is not the case with Lowe’s.

So now the question becomes is it any good. A lot of these larger affiliate programs do not have the best terms for affiliate marketers.  There are some exceptions and that’s what we’re going to take a look at.

Are the cookie and the commission generous enough to make it worth your time to use Lowe’s as one of your affiliate programs? What Niches Benefit most from Lowe’s?  These are the questions, these are the questions that need answering and that is what we are about to do strap in and let’s get to it.

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screenshot of the lowes affiliate prgoram

A Closer Look At The Affiliate Program

The 2% Affiliate Commission

I am using the information provided on the CJ.com profile for the Lowes Canada affiliate program.  These numbers may change from region to region but this is the best set of numbers that I have for this affiliate program so it is the one that I’m going to use throughout this article.

The commission offered by the Lowe’s affiliate program is somewhat disappointing. They only offer 2% on sales made to their affiliate programs. This is pretty common for large affiliate programs. Amazon Associates for example only offers between a 1% and a 3% Commission on most of their products at this time.  Home  Depot offers a similar affiliate commission.

That still doesn’t make it a very good one. There are plenty of smaller affiliate programs that will offer you a much better return on your time invested. The problem is none of them cover as many different niches as Lowes.

So in order to get those higher commissions you were going to have to be very specific in the type of Niche product that you want to promote.  For example, you could use Lowe’s as an affiliate program for a vertical gardening site.  They have plenty of building materials and plants and seeds for you to use them successfully for that very specific Niche.

Or you could go with something like the Garden Tower project affiliate program. Which offers you a much higher percentage and is much more focused on exactly the type of Niche site that you want to run. 

The bottom line here is that using Lowe’s as your primary affiliate program is probably not the best idea because of the 2% Commission unless you have an incredible conversion rate. But it can make a great option as a safety net for any other affiliate programs that might not have the exact products that your audience needs.

The 1-day Tracking Cookie Duration

As low as the commission is I think that the cookie is even worse for this affiliate program. Again I’m using the numbers from the Lowe’s Canada profile because that’s the only one that was readily available.  This affiliate program offers a one-day tracking cookie for their affiliate Partners.

This is incredibly low and will lead to a good amount of missiles and ultimately will drive your conversion rate down. It also changes the places where you can successfully place Lowe’s affiliate links.  Putting them in informational content without a lot of buyer intent is probably not a great idea because people aren’t looking to buy within the next 24 hours when they come looking for that type of content on a regular basis.

So your affiliate links for the Lowe’s program are going to need to be in your single product reviews as well as your top 10 lists and any other type of content with a very high level of buyer intent. Basically you want to have your audience go directly from your content to Lowe’s ready to buy something otherwise you’re going to miss out because of the short cookie duration.

A Bunch Of Products To Promote

I usually take a look at a few of the products and services that you can expect to promote with these affiliate programs, However, With a huge warehouse store like Lowes there are far to many products to touch on. Suffice to say that if you need something in the home and garden or building material space they are probably going to have it.

From power tools and grills to seedlings and even small trees, Lowes can deliver just about anything you need for your home or garden. With that said let us move on to the best niches for the Lowes affiliate program.

A Look At Niches

There are probably hundreds of different niches that you could use Lowes for. They have so many products and such a wide range of product categories that you could fit them in just about anywhere. So what I am going to do is just pick some of the larger main niches so we don’t get too bogged down.

The list goes on and one. You can break each one of these categories down into even smaller micro-niches that can do quite well. A gardening site can focus on vertical gardening for example and Lowes would be a decent option for that as well.

What I Like About Affiliate Program

The best thing about the Lowe’s affiliate program is easily their huge Warehouse of products. The benefit for an affiliate marketer do you have one place where they can send their audience to get just about anything they need in their Niche is very good. 

 When it comes to Home and Garden Products there are few places better than Lowe’s to get them online. Their two biggest customers are probably Home Depot and Amazon so it’s really going to come down to which one your audience likes the best. But Lowe’s is a very good warehouse store  if you’re just talking about the products and the prices at which you can buy them.

I also like the name brand aspect of the Lowe’s affiliate program. This is a huge company that has been around for a long time and has very good name recognition among the general public, especially in the United States.  So you won’t have to explain or convince people that Lowe’s is a legitimate business and one that they should spend their money at. That’s going to come with it implicitly.

What’s interesting is that all the pluses for this affiliate program are about the company itself and not the affiliate terms. And that is where this affiliate program really falls down for an affiliate marketer. So let’s take a look at what I don’t like about the Lowe’s affiliate program.

What Could Be Better

I’m going to come right out and say it my biggest complaints about this affiliate program are the tracking cookie duration and the commission.  They are very low and it’s going to be tough to generate enough traffic for a small and midsize light to really make it worth your while to use Lowe’s as your primary affiliate program.

It can work great as a catch-all for some of your smaller affiliate programs that are going to offer you a much higher commission and a much more lenient tracking cookie. But even then you might just want to go with a basket of small affiliate programs that are all going to be more focused on your specific and give you better terms for your affiliate promotions.

It’s kind of sad actually.  Because Lowe’s is such a wonderful name and hope Improvement and one that would sell itself on a variety of Niche websites. You simply send people to Lowes from a product review and it would instantly be familiar and people would instantly be comfortable with using the Lowe’s website for that purchase.

Of course, if you have a huge amount of traffic already then the commission and cookie aren’t going to be that much of an issue. But we’re focusing on small Niche sides and not these huge review sites that are going to be using Lowe’s and Amazon and Home Depot for the majority of their income.  And quite frankly if you’re one of those giant million-dollar review sites you’re not here looking at this, to begin with.

Those are really the only issues I have with this affiliate program.  But they are cord to what make an affiliate program useful by smaller Niche sites.  I think this is a good example of needing an entire affiliate program to be at a certain minimum level before it becomes usable.

You have all these great products and world-renowned name recognition with Lowe’s but for the majority of people, the affiliate program is going to be very tough to use because you only have one day for your tracking cookie and you only get 2% for a sale. 

 If that commission were moved to say 5% and the tracking cookie up to 7 days or 14 days then this would be a fantastic affiliate program to promote on just about any Niche site. It may still not be the primary affiliate program but it would be a great addition to most websites. It can still be that in some cases but I just think the affiliate terms are far too strict to really be beneficial to the broader affiliate marketing business.

The Bottom Line

And that is that. That is the end of our look at the Lowe’s affiliate program.  Great products and a great company let down by a pretty mediocre commission and an outright poor tracking cooking.

 My recommendation for anyone starting an inside or operating a smaller Niche site is to get very specific and find those little out-of-the-way affiliate programs that are going to offer you better terms.

They’re going to have a lower conversion rate, at least at the start, as you are going to need to get your audience comfortable with spending money at these smaller websites. You’re going to lose some conversions just due to the fact that the smaller affiliate programs aren’t Lowe’s and they aren’t Amazon and they aren’t Home Depot.  But that’s a small price to pay for getting a 5 to 10 times commission and a cookie lasting a month or more.

That’s all I have for you today. Thank you for stopping by and reading our article. I hope everyone is well and  I hope you have a wonderful day until your next visit.