AI, affiliate fraud and partner vetting, with Tautvydas Vasiliauskas of FirstPromoter

AI is bringing old affiliate fraud tactics back at a new scale, and programs that skip partner checks pay for it. Tautvydas Vasiliauskas, who runs marketing at FirstPromoter and has over a decade in affiliate marketing, tells host Lee Ann Johnston what fraud now looks like and how program managers should respond.

In this episode

• He says AI removes the barrier to entry: no coding or design experience is needed, and anyone can spend an afternoon creating 10 websites (12:26, 12:45).

• Old tricks such as private blog networks are "coming back just wearing a different coat", now joined by fake influencers built from AI avatars and voiceovers (11:27, 11:46, 13:07).

• Fake sites can be picked up by LLMs and search engines for a short time; once they rank, they pitch affiliate programs for placements, then drop, and the program has lost money (18:13, 18:45).

• To spot fakes: real videos show messy, curvy view patterns while bot views give a straight line or odd spikes, and always check the content yourself (20:09, 20:36, 24:16).

• Johnston urges managers to build a partner quality checklist for each partner type and to be selective about who gets free trials (21:50, 22:56).

• Johnston argues for quality over quantity; he says many SaaS teams fail here, letting anyone in under pressure to grow, and expects way more fraud, especially from fake influencers (25:56, 26:13, 26:22, 27:53).

Episode from The Affiliate Marketing Podcast by Affiverse, published on YouTube.