Summary
Silverside, an online lender in consumer finance, built its acquisition on affiliate links that sent traffic to its loan application on a simple CPA per approved loan. This worked for a while, but as the market matured they needed to adapt. They built a custom in house solution, which proved hard to maintain and improve and started to limit their growth. It also pulled internal resources away from their core lending business and was neither transparent for affiliates nor easy to integrate through a standard API. After detailed research they chose PalDock and replaced the custom tool with a platform that already reflects thousands of hours of experience from other lenders and industries, so they could grow on top of a proven setup instead of learning everything the hard way.
In mature lending markets, 90% of new loans come via affiliate APIs
Silverside is a European lender that works with individual affiliates as well as multiple affiliate networks. The company built its acquisition strategy on affiliate links that sent traffic to its loan application on a simple CPA per approved loan. This model worked well in some markets, especially in the early stages. As key markets matured, however, most of the volume from serious affiliate partners started to shift from simple click traffic to full lead generation through forms and APIs. In some mature lending markets, up to ninety percent of new loans from affiliates now come via APIs rather than traditional affiliate links. On top of that, up to 40% of traffic cannot be tracked at all due to missing cookie consent (YouGov global consumer study).
Silverside realised that without its own lead generation flows it was leaving money on the table. They also knew they had a window of opportunity. Only a few lenders in their markets were ready for proper affiliate APIs, so moving early meant they could become a preferred partner before the channel turned into a commission war.
“Although we are a small lender, a strong API and affiliate friendly features made us competitive and easy to work with. Affiliates could start quickly and we could buy leads on the same level as much bigger players. Thanks to background third party checks and lead validations, we could choose which leads to accept or reject. That way we stayed profitable while still paying an attractive CPL.” Silverside’s CEO, Pavel Strnádek
When a custom solution feels like a good idea… but isn’t
Like many other lenders, Silverside first built its own custom solution. On paper it looked perfect: full control and features tailored exactly to their needs. In practice it meant that affiliates had to integrate and debug yet another unique API on top of dozens they already worked with. Every lender behaved differently and when something broke there was no shared, transparent environment where both sides could easily see what was going on. There was no real time reporting of approved loans or rejection reasons, only exports and manual summaries, so partners had very limited data to optimise their campaigns.
Internally the tool was also heavy on resources. It consumed limited IT capacity, cost a lot to maintain and every change or new feature requested by affiliates had to wait for development. That slowed down new integrations, delayed campaigns and blocked further growth, creating missed opportunities long before the custom solution was anywhere near “good enough” to support what the channel could really deliver.
How they found the best value for the money
They did not take shortcuts. They put in the work, looked across the market and analysed every tool they could find. After two months of research, testing free trials and comparing features, they narrowed the list down to a single option. In the end PalDock was the clear winner thanks to features such as:
- Links and lead generation in one place: Affiliates who like links can keep running link campaigns, while the same platform handles embedded forms, API based leads and routing, so everyone works in one system with one set of numbers.
- Standardised affiliate API with ready made templates: PalDock standardises API integrations for affiliates, cutting integration time from weeks to a few minutes. Also, instead of building a new custom integration for each lender, affiliates can reuse previously prepared API templates to send traffic in 3 clicks.
- Embeddable and fully customisable forms: Less technical partners who cannot or do not want to integrate via API can simply embed a form on their site, adjust the look and start sending leads without touching any back end logic.
- Accurate tracking without relying only on cookies: PalDock has cookieless tracking not only for clicks, but naturally also for leads, where affiliates track 100% of their conversions without any losses.
- Real time stats on approved loans and rejection reasons: Both Silverside and affiliates see up to date data on issued loans and clear rejection reasons, which lets partners optimise campaigns based on what really gets approved instead of guessing from end of month reports.
- Flexible lead validation and pre check rules: The lender can define detailed validation and pre screening before accepting a lead, so they only receive leads they can realistically convert, while affiliates get fast feedback and more stable earnings per approved lead.
- Shared dashboards for easier debugging and less support: Partners have direct access to their own dashboards, so they can see traffic, leads and rejects in real time.
Feedback from affiliates
Affiliates were genuinely happy with the change. Instead of pushing random clicks, they could finally send real leads, which are more tangible and valuable. That brought higher and more stable earnings per click, plus more total revenue from the same traffic. Thanks to embedded forms and API flows they gained real control over funnels and could watch approval rates per source, optimise on the fly and have less downtime when something went wrong.
Their setup also became much simpler. Instead of fighting with another custom lender API, they could use a standardised integration or just embed a form, which meant faster and easier onboarding and integrations. With multiple ways to deliver customers to Silverside (links, forms, API leads), both sides could choose what worked best for each project and grow revenue on both sides of the partnership.
Key Results & Benefits
Since moving to PalDock, Silverside:
- Increased approved loan volume and revenue thanks to strong API connectivity and affiliate-friendly features.
- Made integrations fast and predictable by replacing the custom tool with one platform for links, forms and APIs, cutting onboarding time from weeks to minutes and reducing downtime.
- Gained accurate tracking, real time stats and rejection reasons, which helps affiliates improve traffic quality without adding extra IT workload.
Ready to grow?
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