Beyond Discounts: Zilch Reveals What Actually Influences UK Purchases Today

If you're running an affiliate program based purely on last-click attribution, you’re missing the full picture of how customers really shop. Drawing on insights from Zilch’s platform of more than five million UK customers, Phil Thompson, Partnerships Manager at Zilch, challenges long-term held assumptions around consumer loyalty, price sensitivity and partner value. Lee-Ann and Phil discuss why traditional cookie tracking leaves critical blind spots, how first-party payment data offers a clearer view of intent without complex integrations, and what Zilch’s data reveals about modern purchasing behaviour. From grocery shoppers who appear loyal to one brand while spending significantly more elsewhere, to the limits of price-led promotions, the discussion highlights how consumer decision-making is far more nuanced than discounts alone suggest.

Talking Points Include:

• The affiliate channel's unique negotiation problem that happens after the sale rather than before, and why payment-level data fills gaps that cookie consent leaves behind
• How Zilch's  fee-free credit model helps merchants win customers from competitors by funding interest-free instalments through commissions, not consumer fees or interest
• Why price-led marketing is increasingly ineffective and what seasonal campaigns such as Valentine’s Day dinner-for-two offers reveal about emotional storytelling that genuinely shifts behaviour

The Fintech Publisher That Sees Where Your Customers Really Spend

Zilch operates as a UK-based fintech publisher and Visa issuer serving over 5 million customers who grow by 70,000 every month. What sets them apart in the affiliate space isn't just their reach but their business model. Unlike traditional buy-now-pay-later providers that charge consumers interest, transaction fees, or late penalties, Zilch uses what they call an Ad Subsidized Payment Network. Merchants pay commissions that fund the cost of credit, allowing customers to split purchases into installments with zero fees, zero interest, and zero late charges.

This creates a powerful conversion mechanism for affiliate programs. When customers discover they can buy the same trainers for £100 but split the payment interest-free by shopping through a fee-free merchant partnered with Zilch, they abandon brands they've loyally shopped with for years. During peak 2024, Phil watched cautious UK consumers actively hunt for value by shifting spend away from traditional retailers toward merchants offering Zilch's fee-free credit option. The message became clear: when economic uncertainty hits, even nominal fees drive customers to competitors.

Your Attribution Model Only Shows Half the Story

Most affiliate programs celebrate when customers shop regularly and spend consistently. You've got a million loyal customers generating three million pounds weekly. Success, right? But what if those same customers are spending nine million pounds with your competitors during the same period? Phil's access to Zilch's card-linked data reveals the uncomfortable truth: attribution models built on cookie tracking only show you the transactions they capture, not the complete customer spending picture.

Because Zilch operates on Visa rails and sees every customer transaction across online and in-store purchases, they can map the full spending journey. That grocery customer doing their £120 weekly shop with you? They're simultaneously spending with three other similar retailers. Traditional tracking celebrates the visible while ignoring the invisible. Cookie consent, cross-device journeys, and app-based shopping create blind spots that make your most valuable customers look less valuable than they actually are. The solution isn't abandoning affiliate tracking but augmenting it with payment processing intelligence that shows where your customers spend when they're not with you.

The Data You Have Access To Right Now (If You Look)

Affiliate managers consistently tell Phil they've been burned by publisher types that didn't work, so they've closed that chapter. But this thinking assumes the market stands still while your program fossilises around past failures. The uncomfortable reality: you have more data access now than any marketer in history, yet many programs still rely on Google Analytics while spending millions on advertising.

The winners this year won't be programs with the biggest budgets but those using data most effectively. This means partnering with publishers who bring first-party shopping intelligence, not just traffic. Zilch can tell brands exactly which customers live in Manchester, Leeds, or Glasgow, what their purchase history looks like, and critically, where else they're spending. No expensive integration required because it runs on standard Visa rails. The barrier to entry for testing fintech data partners has never been lower, yet programs still hesitate based on assumptions from three years ago.

Why Seasonal Campaigns Need Longer Runway Than You Think

When Phil analyses campaigns that moved the needle versus ones that flatlined, the differentiator isn't creative quality or discount depth. It's time. One-week promotional pushes feel urgent and create internal momentum, but consumer behaviour doesn't shift on your campaign calendar. That customer who's shopped at the same grocery store every week for years won't permanently switch because you ran a seven-day offer.

But give that campaign three months? Now you're changing habits. The initial promo gets them through the door. The second purchase proves your offer wasn't a fluke. The third visit establishes a new pattern. By month three, they're comparing your Valentine's dinner-for-two against what they would have bought at their old haunt, and you've earned consideration rather than impulse. Programs that treat partners as long-term customer acquisition engines rather than quick-hit traffic sources see lifetime value increases that dwarf new customer volume. The fee-free credit Zilch offers becomes the hook, but the emotional storytelling in your campaigns creates the lasting behaviour change.

Listen to Find Out More About:

• The exact moment UK consumers became willing to abandon brand loyalty for fee-free payment flexibility, and what this reveals about post-peak shopping psychology
• Why Phil refuses to position Zilch campaigns as integration-heavy when they run on standard Visa rails, and how this changes the barrier to entry for testing new publisher types
• How Intelligent Commerce tracking uses merchant ID data to close attribution gaps that cookie-based models leave wide open
• The demographic shift that took Zilch from Gen Z fintech app to cross-generational payment tool, and why cost-of-living pressures create opportunities for value-focused affiliate partnerships

Why diversification matters more than ever when clicks still exist but shopping behavior fragments across devices, apps, and privacy-conscious browsing

Key Segments of This Podcast and Where You Can Tune In to Go Direct:

[09:05] How Intelligent Commerce works: using merchant ID and payment processing data to fill attribution gaps that traditional cookie tracking misses

[13:16] The consistent age-group patterns Zilch sees in 2025 spending data, and why everyone hunts for value right now, not just younger demographics

[22:22] Why one-month campaigns don't typically move consumer behaviour needles, and the longer timeline required to shift shopping habits permanently

[25:07] Phil's call for affiliate managers to stay open to testing and learning, even after being burned by publisher types in the past

The affiliate programs that thrive this year won't be the ones clinging to 2019 playbooks. They'll be the managers who embrace data partnerships, extend attribution visibility beyond cookie tracking, and recognize that publishers deliver value across the entire funnel, not just at conversion. Ready to build a program that leverages first-party shopping intelligence? Work with the KonverJ team to audit your current partner mix and identify the data gaps costing you revenue. We'll help you move beyond last-click thinking and build partnerships that capture the complete customer journey.

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