LinkShare has over 400 merchants listed in their program. Unlike LinkShare s Synergy, BeFree s Bfast is not loaded onto the merchant s servers. Instead, BeFree hosts all of the affiliate transactions and tracking on their own network of servers. With BeFree, affiliates go to merchant branded pages to review affiliate program information. The impression given to affiliates is that the merchant manages the affiliate program and not BeFree.
Affiliates can build virtual storefronts with merchant s products right on their own site.
Links supported include text, animated gifs, Shockwave and JavaScript. Like LinkShare, merchants can run a stand alone private label affiliate network or they can opt to be part of the BeFree s FastApp network, where affiliates can apply to several merchant programs at the same time. BeFree manages over 2.4 million affiliates in total. The fees reflects their emphasis on added services. A Nexchange Host can embed a merchant s products into the host storefront and sell to the consumer without having to pass the customer through to the merchant.