PartnerStack and Rewardful are two of the best SaaS affiliate programs. 

We have personal experience with both programs because we are affiliate partners with several companies who use Rewardful, and several other ones who use PartnerStack.

We want to help you understand the key differences between them, and help you choose which one is right for you to promote your SaaS business.

Background – What unique insights do we have to share?

This article is based in part on an interview I had with Addison Best (Co-founder of AI Growth Guys).  Addison is more of a technical person who deals with actually implementing an affiliate program.  He shares his insights from the technical angle.  I am usually in charge of finding affiliates to promote a particular product or service, so I share my experiences from that perspective.

We have been on both sides of affiliate marketing for 20+ years.  

This means we have used affiliate networks like PartnerStack and Rewardful to find affiliate partners who will then help promote our products and services.  

We have also been the affiliates who promote products and services from other companies. 

What is the key difference between PartnerStack and Rewardful?

If I was to sum up the difference between them, I’d say that Rewardful is for smaller SaaS (Software as a service) companies who are just starting out with affiliate marketing or referral programs to promote their software.  When I say “just starting out”, I mean affiliate sales of $15 000 per month or less.  Rewardful could be the right choice for > $15 000 per month, but this is a decent starting point to consider.

PartnerStack, on the other hand, is for companies who are more focused on B2B partnerships, need more customization, and are willing to spend more right off the bat to jumpstart their growth.  This could be SaaS companies who have VC funding for example.

Rewardful Vs PartnerStack – Comparison Table

Deep Dive into Differences

Pricing Comparison:

Price is, and should be, a major consideration when choosing a SaaS affiliate platform

Rewardful Pricing:

Here is a screenshot of Rewardful pricing:  

All 3 tiers are affordable.  

Starter Plan: $49 per month for SaaS companies with less than $7500 in monthly affiliate sales

Growth Plan: $99 per month for monthly affiliate sales between $7500 and $15 000

Enterprise Plan:  $149 per month for affiliate sales over $15 000

Custom pricing plans are available as well.

Rewardful also has no transaction fees, and no hidden fees.

PartnerStack Pricing:  

PartnerStack does not publish pricing on their website.  They use custom pricing.  Depending on what your requirements are, it could be over $15 000 per year to use PartnerStack.

PartnerStack is clearly more expensive than Rewardful, but that doesn’t mean it is not the right choice.  It has some excellent features that are well worth the cost for some situations.

Marketplace (Finding affiliate partners)

If you are using affiliate marketing to promote your SaaS business, you need to find and recruit affiliates to promote your software.

How are you going to find affiliates?

PartnerStack shines in this category.  It has over 80 000 active partners (affiliates) who actively promote and refer business to SaaS companies listed on the PartnerStack marketplace. 

Over 500 SaaS companies use PartnerStack, largely for the reason of their incredible network of affiliates.

We were unable to find a marketplace of affiliates for Rewardful.  A lot of great companies use Rewardful, and many affiliates promote these companies.  We aren’t sure why Rewardful doesn’t seem to offer such a marketplace.  Perhaps they will in the future.

Ease of Integration and Technical Aspects

Rewardful: Very user-friendly interface and straightforward integration process, especially for businesses using platforms like WordPress for example. 

PartnerStack: Has the capacity for deeper technical integrations. It appeals to companies with more complex B2B ecosystems, and any unique features that cater to these needs.

Customization

Here is an interesting example.  

We are affiliates of Eleven Labs.  Eleven Labs has the best AI generated voices. You will find articles on our website that mention this. 

Eleven Labs uses PartnerStack to run their affiliate program.

Pictory.ai is a software company that uses AI to generate videos.  One of the upper tiers of Pictory allows users of Pictory to generate videos using AI voices created by Eleven Labs.  

So one major selling point of that Pictory tier is the ability to use Eleven Labs AI voices.  This means that Pictory needs to pay Eleven Labs every time someone signs up to this tier of Pictory. (We aren’t sure the exact specifics of how this deal is structured, but this is the essence of it.)

So how do Pictory and Eleven Labs share the revenue? 

They need some kind of software to manage this.  We believe PartnerStack is facilitating this partnership.

This is just one of many examples of the benefits and potential customization capabilities of Partnering with PartnerStack. 

User Experience and Support

Signing up Affiliates:

I have personally signed up as an affiliate to both PartnerStack and Rewardful on several occasions.

Both are quick and easy.

I would give the edge to Rewardful in this domain.  If I’m considering a new SaaS business to promote, I always hope they are using Rewardful.  

It literally takes me a couple of minutes, at the most, to get my custom affiliate link and account setup.  It is also automatic.  

They have my Paypal address and other personal information all ready to go, and they hardly take any personal info from me.  Just name, email, and where to pay me basically.

This is extremely important when you are looking for affiliate marketing software.

You want to make things very easy for potential affiliates and remove all friction.  Affiliates have countless options, and if you make the onboarding process too cumbersome, they can just skip the sign up and go somewhere else.

To be fair, PartnerStack is also great for ease of setup, but I’d still give a slight edge to Rewardful.

Conclusion: Making the Right Choice

Choose Rewardful  if:

• Your SaaS business is new to affiliate marketing and has affiliate sales under $15 000 monthly
• You want an affordable option with a clear and transparent pricing model
• You want affiliate software that makes it super easy to onboard new affiliate partners

Choose PartnerStack if:

• Your SaaS business has a lot of specific needs for customization (Like the Eleven Labs and Pictory partnership)
• You are a fast growing company who wants an outstanding marketplace to find new affiliate partners
• You focus on B2B software and B2B partnerships
• You are willing to pay at least $500 per month to use your affiliate software

Some of the links in this post may be affiliate links. We might earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. It’s one way to support us and keep things running. We also only put affiliate links we believe in fyi.