How Payout Rules Work

Payout rules allow you to proactively set a range of payout outcomes depending on the circumstances around an action. For example, you may want to hinge the amount you pay out for a sale on the customer's location, the category of product they purchase, and the promo code linked to the purchase. To do this, you would set a default payout in your contracts as usual, then create additional rules that determine under which conditions that default is modified.

Payout rules apply automatically to a partner's payout, and they make it possible to build Payout Restrictions, Payout Groups, and Payout Adjustments for your more customized payout needs. Learn more.

Understand the anatomy of a rule

Each rule (e.g., Customer Status is New) is a single condition made of three parts:

• A parameter (Customer Status): Which circumstance you want the payout condition to hinge on.
• An operator (is): How the specified parameter and value must relate to each other for the rule to apply.
• A value (New): What needs to be met in order for the rule to apply.

Build & combine rules

You can use multiple rules to either narrow the conditions for payout or widen them.

• When the action must satisfy every rule: Add multiple rules to a single payout restriction, group, or adjustment. To override the default payout, all rules must be met simultaneously. In this case, Customer Status is New and Order Total > $200 will apply to new customers who also spend over $200.
• When the action must meet at least one rule: Put each rule in a separate payout restriction or adjustment. To override the default payout, only 1 rule needs to be met. In this case, Customer Status is New and Order Total > $200 will apply to both new customers (who spend any amount), as well as returning customers who spend over $200.

Note: With payout groups, only one group can apply to an action at a time. When an action matches more than one group, the group's rank decides which one applies. Learn more.

Payout rules reference

The parameters available to you depend on your impact.com edition. Some parameters (like exception-list lookups and product-catalog fields) are only accessible on specific editions or add-ons.

General payout parameters

Payout rule	Description
Currency	The currency in which the purchase was made. This is used to calculate exchange rates into funding and payment currencies if needed. If this is not sent, your account's default currency will be used.
Customer City	City the customer specified in the conversion.
Customer Country/Region	The location the customer specified in the conversion.
Customer Postcode	Postal (or ZIP) code the customer specified in the conversion.
Customer Region	Region code of the customer in the conversion.
Customer Status	Status of the customer (e.g., New, Returning, etc.). These values must be configured in the Customer Status Mapping section when editing an event type.
Date1-10	General date field that accepts a date or datetime you want to send. These values appear in your reports. When you create payout group rules using a date field (such as Date1–10), any date range you specify is start-inclusive and end-exclusive: The start date is included in the range, but the end date is excluded from the range. For example, if you set a payout group rule for: Date1 is between 2024-08-01 and 2024-09-30, conversions where Date1 is 2024-08-01 up to and including 2024-09-29 will match the payout group and 2024-09-30 will not match the payout group.
Derived Browser	Browser determined by the user's IP address at the time of the conversion.
Derived Country/Region	Country or region determined by the user's IP address at the time of the conversion.
Derived Device Type	The electronic device determined by the user's IP address at the time of the conversion.
Derived OS	The device operating system determined by the user's IP address at the time of the conversion.
Derived State/Region	The geographical state or region determined by the user's IP address at the time of the conversion.
Gift Purchase	If you're tracking gift purchases, you can mark the order in the conversion as a gift purchase.
Hear About Us	Used to capture how the customer heard about your business.
Item Brand	The brand's name associated with the product.
Item Category	Category for the product referenced at the item level.
Item Delivery Type	The delivery method specified for a product.
Item Discount	Discount applied to each item purchased.
Item Name	The purchased product's name.
Item Price	Individual unit price for each product.
Item Quantity	Quantity of the item that was purchased in the order, expressed as a whole number.
Item SKU	Unique stock-keeping unit (SKU) value of the product referenced at the item level.
Item Subcategory	If applicable, the subcategory for the product referenced at the item level.
Item Subtotal	Total price for this line item (all products purchased of this type). The final value will be determined by subtracting the corresponding discounts from this value.
Money1-3	General numeral field that accepts strings of any money or financial data you want to send. These values appear in your reports.
Note	General field used to pass information for event-level reporting purposes.
Numeric1-10	General numeral field that accepts strings of any numeric data you want to send. These values appear in your reports.
Order Discount	For sales, this is the discount applied to the order overall. The amount is automatically subtracted from the order total on processing. If item amounts are used, this discount will be subtracted proportionally from each item amount sent in. Generally, shipping discounts are excluded.
Order Location Id	Used primarily for travel, this specifies the unique identifier for the location for this purchase.
Order Location Name	Used primarily for travel, this specifies the location for the purchase.
Order Location Type	Used primarily for travel, this specifies the type of location for the purchase.
Order Payment Type	How the customer paid for their order.
Order Promo Code	The action includes a promo code used by the customer.
Order Shipping	Primarily used for retail sales with shipping costs for a conversion. The total sale amount used for payout purposes will not include shipping costs.
Order Tax	Primarily used for retail sales with tax costs for a conversion. The total sale amount used for payout purposes will not include tax costs.
Order Total	The amount before tax is deducted and after any discount is deducted.
Referral Ad	The ad name and ID that triggered the click.
Referral Ad Campaign	The ad campaign name of the ad triggering the click (third party/ad server notion of ad and campaign).
Referral Ad Campaign Id	The third-party ad campaign ID captured from the referring click's tracking parameters, e.g., Google Ads. This is pulled automatically from the associated click data rather than the conversion data submitted by the brand.
Referral Ad Group	The third-party ad group that this step in the conversion path is contained in (e.g., Paid Search).
Referral Ad Group Id	Google's ID for the third-party ad group.
Referral Ad Keyword	Keywords used in Paid Search efforts.
Referral Ad Placement	The location of the ad on the partner's page. Typical values are "Home", and "Forum".
Referral Ad Type	Which third-party ad distributor served the ad (e.g., Google Ads).
Referral Deal	Type of the deal associated with the ad.
Referral Derived Browser	The browser determined by the user's IP address at the time of the click.
Referral Derived Country/Region	The country or region determined by the user's IP address at the time of the click.
Referral Derived Device Type	The device type determined by the user's IP address at the time of the click.
Referral Derived OS	The operating system determined by the user's IP address at the time of the click.
Referral Derived State/Region	The state determined by the user's IP address at the time of the click.
Referral Landing Page	The landing page's URL for the event.
Referral Param1-10	Values that partners can include in the click query string and can be anything they want them to be.
Referral SharedId	General SharedId field that accepts strings of any SharedIds you want to send. Appears in your reports.
Referral SKU	Unique identifier for the item—usually the stock-keeping unit (SKU) identifier of the product being promoted.
Referral Subaccount ID	Id of the partner or media source that drove the action.
Referral Subaccount Name	Name of the partner or media source that drove the step.
Referral Traffic Type	Where users come from when a partner directs them to your site.
Referral Traffic Source	Where on the referral site the ad is hosted.
Referral URL	The Uniform Resource Locator or link of the website that referred the customer.
Site Category	The category associated with your site.
Site Version	Specifies the version of the site this customer visited.
Text1-50	General text field that accepts strings of any text data you want to send. These values appear in your reports.

Edition-specific parameters

The following payout rules are only available to specific impact.com editions or add-ons:

Payout rule	Description
Audience	A structured value a partner passes on a conversion to identify which audience segment the converting user belongs to. You and the partner agree on the Audience segment and its value off-platform, then configure your contract so that conversions carrying that value automatically pay a different rate.
Amplification Ad Group Id	Unique identifier linking a click to a specific amplified ad set.
Amplification Ad Id	Unique identifier linking a click to a specific amplified ad.
Amplification Campaign Id	Unique identifier linking a click to a specific amplified campaign.
Facebook Click Id	Meta's click identifier for conversion reporting and data sharing.
List for Order Promo Code	Promo code exception list used to pay partners at different rates based on promo codes associated with actions they drove.
List for Item Promo Code	Promo code exception list used to pay partners different rates based on promo codes for specific line items within the order found on a pre-defined list.
List for Item SKU	SKU exception list used to pay partners at different rates based on the SKU associated with the action they drove.
List for Item Category	Category exception list used to pay partners at different rates based on the category associated with the action they drove.
List for Item Super Category	Category exception list where values are a series of categories and subcategories (formatted as {category}_{subcategory}). This is designed for brands that need to commission based on specific combinations of ItemCategory and ItemSubCategory.
Item Catalog Manufacturer	The entity that manufactures the item. The SKU from the conversion event is used to look up the corresponding manufacturer value in the product catalog.
Item Catalog Original Format Category	The item's category from the original format of the product/item catalog. The SKU from the conversion event is used to look up the corresponding category value in the product catalog.
Item Catalog Category	The category from the brand's product catalog. This is useful when catalog data provides more accurate product grouping than point-of-sale data.
Item Catalog Subcategory	The second or third level of categorization for a product store. The SKU from the conversion event is used to look up the corresponding subcategory value in the product catalog.
Item Text1-10	General text field that accepts strings of any text data for a SKU.
Item Numeric1-10	General numeral field that accepts strings of any numeric data for a SKU.
Item Date1-10	General date field that accepts a date or datetime for a SKU.
Item Money1-3	General numeral field that accepts strings of any money or financial data for a SKU.
Order Discount Rate	The discount rate applied to any order. E.g., OrderDiscountRate50 represents a 50% discount for an order.
Item Discount Rate	The discount rate applied to each item purchased. E.g., ItemDiscountRate123_50 represents a 50% discount for an ItemSku123.
Path Channel Count	How many channels were involved in the conversion path.
Path Closing Channels	The channel that drove the partner to the last click (winner) referral.
Path Closing Groups	The group that drove the partner to the last click (winner) referral.
Path Closing Media	The media channel that drove the partner to the last click (winner) referral.
Path Impact Partner Count	The number of partners in the click path determined by impact.com.
Path Introducing Channels	The channel that introduced the first partner in the click path.
Path Introducing Groups	The group that introduced the first partner in the click path.
Path Introducing Media	The media that introduced the first partner in the click path.
Path Media Count	How many partners and media sources were involved in the conversion path.
Path Participating Channels	The channel that brought any partner between introducing and the last (winner) referral.
Path Participating Groups	The group that brought any partner between introducing and the last (winner) referral.
Path Participating Media	The media that brought any partner between introducing and the last (winner) referral.
Path Partner Count	The number of partners in the click path.
Path Steps	How many activities (e.g., Impressions) occurred in the conversion path.

Additional resources

• Payout Modifications Explained — See an overview of how all payout modification types fit together and the order impact.com evaluates them in. Start here if you're not sure which modification type you need.
• Add Payout Restrictions to Template Terms — Learn how to block a payout entirely when the action matches an unwanted condition.
• Create Payout Groups — Learn how to set up rules that replace the default payout with a new base rate when a condition matches.
• Create a Payout Adjustment — Learn how to set up payout adjustments that modify an existing payout up or down by an amount or percentage when a condition matches.