Heartbeat gives you built-in tools to run your own affiliate program — so your members can promote your community and earn commissions when they drive paid signups.

This article explains how payouts work inside your Heartbeat community’s affiliate program. (If you're looking for info on the official Heartbeat company affiliate program, check out this article →)

Setting Up Your Affiliate Program

You'll need to set up your affiliate program within Heartbeat. To do so, navigate to Settings Manage Affiliates.

The Manage Affiliates section will only be available if you've set up Heartbeat payments. If you don't have Heartbeat payments configured, you won't be able to access the affiliate management features.

How the Payout System Works

When members join your affiliate program, they’ll receive a unique link to share. Heartbeat automatically tracks:

• Visits – when someone clicks their link

• Leads – when someone signs up (free or paid)

• Conversions – when someone pays

Once a conversion happens, the system:

1. Moves the commission into “Pending” — this lasts for 30 days while we check for any refunds via Stripe.

2. After 30 days, moves it to “Due” — once there’s no refund, the payout is now ready.

3. You’ll get a monthly email reminding you which payouts are due

4. Send the payment manually via PayPal, then mark it as paid in your Heartbeat dashboard.

Paying Affiliates via PayPal

Once your affiliate program is up and running and an affiliate is due for payment, you'll need to follow these steps to complete the payment via PayPal:

• Check Payment Due
  When a lead converts and the payment is finalized (i.e., no longer pending), the affiliate's email address will appear under the "Due" tab in the Manage Affiliates section.

• Send Payment via PayPal

  • Go to your PayPal account

  • Select the Send Money option.

  • Copy the affiliate's email address from the "Due" tab in Heartbeat

  • Enter the amount due and complete the payment.

• Mark as Paid
  Once the payment has been sent through PayPal, return to the Heartbeat platform. Go to the Manage Affiliates section and click Mark as Paid next to the relevant affiliate.

Payout Timing & Best Practices

• Heartbeat uses a net-30 system to monitor for refunds before releasing payouts.

• Because emails go out monthly, we recommend you tell members to expect commissions within 60 days of a successful purchase.

• Payouts are manual, so you stay in full control and can manage everything directly through PayPal.

Process all affiliate payouts once per month (e.g. the 1st of each month) to keep things simple and consistent.

Reminder: This Is Your Program

This affiliate system is built for your own community — so your members can promote your content, courses, or memberships. If you're looking to refer other people to Heartbeat as a product, that’s our separate company-run affiliate program (and a different setup entirely).