Tracking Affiliate Sales and Tracking Them Right
Quick warning to any new affiliates out there, something I as an ageing affiliate wish I had drummed into me while I was young. USE SUB TRACKING IDS.
This includes any sub accounts, extra keyword tracking, campaigns, tracking IDs or whatever the affiliatenetwork or affiliate program you are getting commissions from call it. Don’t think ill do it later, if you are linking to a website using an affiliate tracking url/code set up the site/page specific tracking perameter there and then.
I built a number of niche focused affiliate sites using a piece of software using PHP, that mashes together amazon aws affiliate web service feeds with ebay results, presenting a broad range of specific products to the user at great prices. (yes it is a bit like this script but no nice interface, and alot less of the customisation power)
Now I have dozens of these niche sites, generated in place of any standard domain parking, as they give content to the website and generate a bit more revenue than a standard ppc domain name parking.
But in my haste I duplicated the standard tracking ID and didn’t give each site its own. Now I am finding that one or more are making some money, and I cannot tell which. Part of the joy of using the system was to test which domains and designs converted, but now I cannot. I have money in the bank but still feel some time has been wasted.
Now I have to go back and change the link urls (just one config file for each site, but it is still work) and then wait another 6 months to regain the data I should have been sitting on.
Oh well, such is life.
