In the affiliate marketing industry, various link
concealment methods are used
for the purpose of
disguising an affiliate link including: simple redirect, link cloaking (also called
link framing), link branding, covert linking and embedded
cookies (also called covert cookies).
This is done in order to thwart attempts by
someone else to either steal an affiliate's
commission (by replacing that affiliate link
with their own) or to STOP potential customers
bypassing the affiliate page (for any number of
reasons) and going directly to the product's
sales page, resulting in commission lost either
way.
For our purposes, methods such as link cloaking (when used
with
some affiliate programs or affiliate links) can be potentially unsafe
and may result commission loss (up to 50% and even more in
some cases).
Below is a full technical explanation of the
problem.
And should you wish to learn more about the other link
concealment methods, you can do so by clicking here.
Two Types of
Cookies
Nearly all affiliate programs use "cookies"
to track affiliate performance and to determine which affiliate gets paid
when an affiliate sale in generated.
Cookies are small text file identifiers sent to a
potential customer's computer for the purpose of recording the ID of the
referring affiliate so that he/she
can get paid for that the resulting sale.
This much is common knowledge,
but the next part isn't.
That there are two
types of cookies - Standard Cookies and
Validated Cookies.
A Validated Cookie is used when a Compact Privacy Policy is
sent (along with a standard cookie (to reassure users that the
standard cookie will not be used to "invade their privacy."
Currently Internet Explorer is the only Web
browser that differentiates between Validated and
Standard Cookies, but since Internet Explorer is still the
most commonly used Internet browser, this affects a lot of
potential customers.
With Internet
Explorer, all Standard (i.e. non-validated) cookies
are discarded by the browser unless they come from the
same Web site as the one shown in the Internet Explorer Address
Bar.
Hence if the Address Bar shows
www.mysite.com/mypage.html, any cookie from
mysite.com will be accepted, but cookies from any other
web site will be discarded unless they are Validated
Cookies.
Visitors (potential customers) may override this
feature by setting their privacy level to "Accept All Cookies"
in Internet Explorer but very few people actually do this
(there is no real reason for them to do it - and most users do
not even know how to, or that they even exist).
To learn more you may also visit the
Internet Explorer
Web site.
The
Consequences
So what does all this mean for
you as an affiliate marketer?
It means that if you are using
anything other
than simple redirect to conceal your affiliate link, unless it is a Validated Cookie
it won't be created.
As a result, you'll LOSE your
affiliate commission.
Not in all cases since some customers will use browsers other
than Internet Explorer - or will have chosen to "Accept All
Cookies". However it is likely that you will
lose more than half your
commissions.
Note that this problem will arise with ANY tool or
script that hides affiliate links, irrespective of assurances
given by the vendor or software developer as there's simply no way
to avoid the problem if the affiliate
link uses Standard Cookies.
What are the choices?
1.Stick to simple
redirects, but lose some of the advantages of using
the more sophisticated link concealment solutions.
2. Use a system such as
Cloak Minder that analyses your affiliate links to determine
whether or not it is safe to use link cloaking with a
particular link.
Are "Safe"
Links 100% Safe?
An "unsafe" link should never be
used with link cloaking as you'll most certainly lose at least half
of your
commissions.
IMPORTANT: Even cloaking a safe link will cost you a
commissions all be it a small percentage. That's because Firefox and
others allow the user to configure their
browser to reject all third party cookies.
Most people do not use that
option, but many do.
Overall, when using link cloaking your losses will amount
far less than your gains but using link cloaking to conceal
your affiliate links is something that only you can decide.
Note that "Simple Redirects" are always safe in all
contexts.
How to check whether you're using Link Cloaking or
Not?
This is the easy way. First, enter the original uncloaked
link into your browser and press enter to visit the site.
Now take a look at the Web address that shows up in your browser's
address bar.
In most cases that link will change to reflect the site
that you're now viewing. If it has then you're definitely
not using a cloaked link.
Now use the cloaked link to visit the same site. If after
visiting the site the
Web address shown in your browser remains unchanged, then you're
definitely using la cloaked link.
NOTE: Other than "Simple Redirect", any link
concealment method you use characterizes a cloaked link of some
kind. Simple Redirect itself take various forms
- PHP redirects, Meta tag redirects and Javascript
redirects.