Most Clicks not tracked.

[mikee17]

Hi,

It doesn’t seem that clicks are being tracked for the affiliate program

I made a text link in the admin panel, and made my first affiliate. Link is below

http://buyyournichesite.com/?ap_id=mikee17

I tried and 2 of my remote employees tried. When I go to the admin panel and go to the Click Throughs page, it doesn’t see my click or my other employees click. It only lists one click from the other person. When I have him click again, it still only shows his first click.

When I have him try another page like

http://buyyournichesite.com/sites-for-sale/?ap_id=mikee17

It only shows the original click, which by the way was done from IE8.

My other employee and I clicked using FireFox.

My php.ini settings are at http://www.buyyournichesite.com/test555.php

Any ideas?

..Mike

[amin007]

where can I go and sign up for a test affiliate account to test this?

[mikee17]

Hi Amin,

Affiliate Join link is

http://buyyournichesite.com/wp-content/plugins/wp-affiliate-platform/affiliates/login.php

Thanks,

…Mike

[amin007]

Hi mikee17, Just had a quick look.. clicks are getting tracked fine. you however made a slight mistake when configuring the link. This is what I got from the “Banners” that you configured:

<a href="http://www.BuyYourNicheSite.com?ap_id=amin21"></a>

you can see that the link doesn’t specify an “Anchor Text” you need to fill that field in when you configure a Banner or Text Link.

I modified the above to the following and put it on one of my test sites:

Test Link

Then I clicked on it a few times and I can see that the “Referrals” are being tracked nicely. You should be able to see this in your WordPress dashboard too.

[mikee17]

Hi Amin,

Hmmm…… Couple of points

*************

**Point #1 **

*************

I have worked with dozens of affiliate systems and EVERY one allows you to use a plain URL link.

That doesn’t really make sense that a anchor tag must be used since there are many times that a person will just want to use the link NOT wrapped in an anchor tag. For example, many people use TinyURL.com or some other form of link cloaking.

This is a serious design flaw and limitation for any affiliate. Can it be fixed?

*************

**Point #2 **

*************

Okay I uploaded a test banner for a test. Whether I click your “Test Link” above, or my banner 2 clicks are being recorded, normally 1 second apart. Take a look at your stats and you’ll probably see the same thing.

What is causing this ?

Thanks,

..Mike

[gfmedia]

Mike, I agree with you on your first point. Requiring more than just a link is not the way to go.

Just so you know, I’ve had over 10 years of affiliate marketing experience. I’ve even worked as an affiliate manager for one of the “top” gurus so I think I know a little about affiliate marketing.

Amin, I too am having issues getting the affiliate plugin to work correctly, but I’ll start another thread for my issue so I don’t hijack this thread.

[amin007]

LOL… (I am now confused as to what you are fighting about) ofcourse plain links work.

For example the following is a plain link and it will work just fine:

http://buyyournichesite.com/sites-for-sale/?ap_id=mikee17

You can create a tinyURL of the above which looks like the following and it will work fine too:

http://tinyurl.com/yg6pzo8

Now what I meant by giving “Anchor Text” is how do you create a HTML link without an anchor text??

For example you had the following HTML code:

<a href="http://www.BuyYourNicheSite.com?ap_id=amin21"></a>

when you put that on a HTML page it’s going to have a blank link (remember you need to put the link text between the ">" and "</a>" block?

all I did was point out an HTML coding error and I had to get a lecture on how affiliate software works

[mikee17]

Amin,

It’s real weird. If I click on your links above

http://buyyournichesite.com/sites-for-sale/?ap_id=mikee17 or

http://tinyurl.com/yg6pzo8

The click is registered fine, but if I cut and paste it into my browser although it redirects, it doesn’t record the click.

Does it record the click if you paste in your browser?

..Mike

[mikee17]

Amin,

I think I see the problem with double clicks being recorded. In My WP setup my site was setup as http://buyyournichesite.com not http://www.buyyournichesite.com so my theory is that having the link point to “http://www.buyyournichesite.com…” was recorded, then forwarded to “http://buyyournichesite.com…” and the click was recorded twice.

One mystery solved.

Still, I’ve tried pasting http://www.buyyournichesite.com/sites-for-sale/?ap_id=mikee17 in several different browsers and it doesn’t record the click, it’s only when I click on a link. Does it work for you when you paste it in the URL bar?

..Mike

But

[amin007]

Hi Mike, copying and pasting the URL in the browser won’t record the click because that is not considered as a click. For a click to be valid I make sure that the visitor followed the link from a web page or email or something so this reference can be recorded in the database too. If you paste the address directly in the browser then this does not satisfy the definition of referral. This can be easily changed if you want on your installation though.

The double click record issue is related to how different browser handles redirection (on IE you won’t see this behavior). At the moment the Affiliate Platform plugin doesn’t do Unique referrals (this is something I will add in a future release) so it doesn’t really hurt to have multiple clicks.

I tried to keep it as simple as possible, so all I have tried to make sure is that the very core functionality of an affiliate software works (an affiliate sends traffic your way and he/she gets proper commission for that referral).

[mikee17]

Amin,

Hmmmm…. I understand that technically it’s not a click but… since it redirects to the destination site, it really should be counted as a click.

I know that I always check out an affiliate link by pasting in the browser to make sure it works. If I were to use TinyURL of some other method of cloaking I always test that too my pasting in the URL bar.

If my potiential affiliates do the same and see how it sends the person to my site but doesn’t show up a click for them, they won’t like that, and may think that I’m being dishonest so they won’t promote my products. That’s very bad. Or I will be constantly having to explain this problem to them. That’s also a hassle.

I know you’ve been getting lectured on affiliate marketing in this thread

But having nearly 10 years experience on both sides of the game, it would be great if you could do the following:

1) Pasting a URL should be counted as a click since it sends the visitor to the destination.

Double clicks make it look like an affiliate’s traffic is only converting half as well. This could cause him to stop promoting my products

2) To avoid double clicks, only record a click from the same IP/Referral URL if there has been a 15 second time or greater difference. This would get rid of most of them

Does that make sense?

Thanks,

..Mike

[amin007]

yeah it sounds good… I will get this implemented… bug me in a few days if I haven’t finished doing it. I have a super long to do list so it is very easy for me to forget

[amin007]

I have updated the plugin so now it will record it as a click even when you directly enter the affiliate link in the browser’s address bar. Also the double click issue has been sorted out.

[lingstar]

Hi Amin,

I am having the same issues – a direct link/click does NOT get recorded. Is there an update to the plugin that I’m missing?

Thanks!

Barbara

[Ivy]

Hi Barbara, I have sent you and update for the Affiliate. Please let me know if you do not receive this email.

Cheers,

Ivy

[Author]

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