In this episode of Affiliate BI, John Wright sits down with Joe Hatch, Head of Product at StatsDrone, to pull back the curtain on the complexities of affiliate marketing infrastructure, automation, and data reliability. From building in-house stats tools to integrating dynamic variables, Joe gives a deeply informed take on what it really takes to run a successful affiliate operation at scale. They kick off by discussing the illusion that building your own stats platform is easy. Joe details the real challenges — from managing over 1,900 affiliate programs across 90+ software types to maintaining reliable data through inconsistent APIs, scraping, and authentication hurdles. He challenges the belief that AI agents alone can solve these problems, pointing out the edge cases and standardization issues that AI still struggles with. The episode explores practical tools and innovations Joe has been building, including WordPress plugins for Pretty Links and Thirsty Affiliates that simplify dynamic variable tracking. Joe explains how proper click ID management enables deeper analytics and real attribution, turning affiliate sites into powerful CRMs — capable of identifying individual users, tracking their behaviour post-click, and even retaining or reactivating them with targeted offers. The conversation also dives into hot-button issues like shaving and data transparency. Joe explains the importance of change detection and communication between affiliates and operators, while emphasizing that not all data changes are nefarious. For tech-savvy affiliates, Joe lays out integration possibilities using tools like Airtable, Looker Studio, Tableau, and the versatile n8n automation platform. They wrap with a discussion on the future of affiliate marketing as it converges with business intelligence — plus a fun mention of Joe’s satirical project, the iGaming Bullshit Generator.