ℹ️ Our refreshed co-marketing experience is currently in open-BETA. For support on legacy co-marketing, please reach out to our support team.

Benefits for Brands

Increased Reach Without Extra Ad Spend
Tap directly into retailers' customer lists to promote products — without paying for ads or building new audiences from scratch.

Scalable Brand Consistency
Maintain control over brand messaging and visuals while scaling across multiple retail partners.

Boosted Sell-Through at Retail
Drive product awareness and movement at the shelf level by aligning marketing

efforts with retail partners.

Shared Marketing Costs
Co-marketing means retailers can distribute your message at little to no extra cost to you — maximizing ROI.

Stronger Retailer Relationships
Provide value to retail partners through ready-made campaigns, making it easier for them to promote your products.

Trackable Engagement & Performance
Monitor how campaigns are being used, who’s adopting them, and how customers are responding — giving you actionable insights.

What is a Sponsored Campaign?

A Sponsored Campaign is a pre-built campaign proposal created by a brand and shared with retailers. While it comes ready with suggested content and settings, retailers have the flexibility to customize it before launching.

A Sponsored Campaign only becomes an active campaign once a retailer reviews, edits (if desired), and officially launches it.

How to Set Up a Sponsored Campaign

Navigate to Co-Marketing Campaign Builder

Navigate to Campaigns > Co-Marketing Campaigns and click the purple add (+) button to open the campaign builder.
Select campaign type, channels. Make sure to select 'Co-Marketing' under the 'Sharing' section. Click 'Next'.
Alternately, select 'See templates' for premade campaigns tailored to your brand.
If you are a vertically integrated account and are seeing the email channel greyed out, make sure to click on 'Co-Marketing' under the 'Sharing' section first.

Configure Campaign Details

Fill in campaign info like name and assign any appropriate tags. Select appropriate audiences, and click 'Next'.
Option to exclude audiences or cap the number of audience members who are sent campaign under 'Optional Recipients Filters'.
Add content for each selected channel type. Click 'Next'.

Add Retailers and Collaboration Settings

Add retailers that will be able to access your sponsored campaign by clicking 'Add retailers to collaborate with'.
Search or filter list of retailers to find retailers more quickly.
Use 'Selected Locations' dropdown to choose a single location from a retail group.
Optionally, add a support email. This is the person retailers should contact via email when they have any questions.
Add one or more notification recipients. Notification Recipients will handle proposed edits from the retailer, and approvals.

Configure Availability and Budget

Select Date Available. This will be the date retailers can access your sponsored campaign. Retailers will not be able to access your sponsored campaign before this date and time.
Optionally, set an expiration date. Retailers will not be able to access your sponsored campaign after this date and time.
Set a budget by percentage or dollar amount.
Use 'Set a budget for retailers' to define a maximum dollar value by retailer.
To edit the budgets, scroll up to Retailers table and edit budgets in the right hand column.
Recommended: If your sponsored campaign includes a budget, enable the setting to require approval for any edits made by retailers.
Review campaign settings and set the schedule.
Click send to retailers.

Campaign Statuses

Status	Description	Actions
In Review	Edits have been sent to the brand for review.	No action required.
New Edits	The retailer has suggested new edits in the back-and-forth approval flow.	Approve or reject the edits.
Denied	The retailer denied the requested edits.	Send with new edits or leave as denied.

How Sponsored Budgets Are Assigned

Budgets are assigned at the campaign level, so for any locations within the retailer group wanting to use the sponsored campaign, budget will be first-come, first-served.

Any requested edits to a budget will prompt approval from the brand regardless of the 'Require Edit Approval' setting.

Example:

Retail City has 3 locations. The brand has assigned a $3000 budget to the campaign.

Location A sets up their campaign first, and end up using $1500 from the total budget. That means Locations B and C will have the opportunity to use the remaining $1500 between their campaigns.

Reviewing Retailer Edits

Retailers can request edits to the following aspects of a campaign:

Channels
Audiences
Content
Conversion window
Scheduling
Budget

This flexibility ensures campaigns align with each retailer’s unique branding and tone of voice.

Not all edits require brand approval. During campaign setup, you can choose whether to enable the 'Edits Require Approval' setting.

If enabled:
All edits will require brand approval before going live.

If not enabled:
Only budget changes will trigger an approval request; all other edits will be applied automatically.

This setting gives you control over how collaborative or streamlined your campaign management experience is.

How to Review and Approve Edits

Open edits by clicking on campaign tile under 'Needs Attention', or click on the sponsored campaign from the list of campaigns.
A pop-up will appear to ask if you would like to view edits, click 'View Edits'.
On the campaign review screen, any campaign element that has been adjusted will show up with an orange bar to ensure the proposed changes are easily visible.
Review any changes, make any necessary adjustments, and 'Approve edits'.
Optionally, 'Deny edits' will decline all requested changes to the campaign.
Once approved, your retail partner can launch the campaign.

Viewing Campaign Performance

To see how co-marketing campaigns are performing:

Navigate to Campaign Reports tab.
Once on that screen find the appropriate campaign in the table and click to open the Campaign Performance drawer.
Inside this drawer, you will find detailed reporting.

For more information, see Reporting.

FAQ

How can I pause a sponsored co-marketing campaign?

To disable an active co-marketing campaign, you can simply toggle the campaign to a 'disabled' status.

How can I connect with a retailer on co-marketing?

In AIQ platform: If you don't see a preferred partner when selecting retail partners to share your sponsored campaign with, simply add their email into the 'Invite a Retailer' section and invite them to use AIQ.

Outside of AIQ platform: Alternatively, we hear of many brands and retailers who connect directly using email, phone, or video calls to collaborate and set up co-marketing campaigns.

How can I view legacy co-marketing campaigns?

In July 2025, we updated our co-marketing functionality to fold it into the normal campaign builder and reporting. To see any co-marketing campaigns prior to this date, you can view them in:

Marketing > Campaigns > More (...) menu > View Legacy Co-Marketing Campaigns.