Cloaking Affiliate IDs

I don't think that you can alter what affiliate link is displayed once someone clicks through your affiliate link and ends up on another website. This site is outside of your control and if it displays the affiliate ID of where they come from then so it shall I think.

It's possible to prevent your affiliate link being seen on hover using javascript. If you do use any affiliate cloaking method then you should think about having a stated policy about affiliate links somewhere on your site - If it's a regular blog with return readers they may be a little annoyed if they think things like this are being hidden from them.

It's also possible to do it very easily just by adding an easy piece of HTML in your link text..

<a href="http://www.theurlyouwanttosee.com" onClick="this.href='http://www.affiliatelinkurl.com'">Your Link Text</a>

but remember that some companies may have different rules about how affiliate links should be displayed so it may be against their terms of service..

Here is a little demo to show how the HTML workaround above works..

Hover demonstration

Not sure this is fully what you needed as it doesn't explain how to get pretty link doing it but it may help you do some of what you are trying to achieve.

I use pretty link and I never experienced that. One question tho, when you are creating the link for the banner, are you actually using the cloaked version or the original affiliate link?

If you use the cloaked version there is no way you can see your affiliate id because after your domain you should have the extension that you specified when you created your pretty link.

For Example:

Mydomain.com/go/AffiliateCashSnipers < --- this is what you should see at the bottom of your browser when you roll over the banner or link.

/go/AffiliateCashSnipers <---- this is the name you create to cloak your affiliate link. In your case it can be whatever you are promoting.

hope this helps.

If you're using affiliate links, I recommend don't cloak or mask them, just redirect the url. Depending on the affiliate tracker, sometimes cloaking or masking them throws off the affiliate id and restores it to the admin link. You could lose some sales and leads this way. This happened to me before and I lost quite a lot of money. Hard lesson to be learned. Just redirect your urls. That's what I'm doing to all my affiliate links now and I'm also using Pretty Link.

Hi
Have you tried POWER LINK GENERATOR?
It a good script that tracks and easy to use.
I also use pretty link too.
Hope this helps
Peace Barry

This is a nice plugin to use and it's a TRUE cloaker rather than semi-cloak:

Cloaking with Intelligence

cheers
TW

People often confuse and use the term "cloaking" when in fact they really mean "redirecting".

Pretty Link Lite (and many other similar plugins) allow you to essentially set up redirects, so that when someone clicks on your "pretty link" it redirects to the affiliate link.

Using redirects ensures that when a user hovers over the link, they see your pretty link at the bottom of the browser rather than the ugly affiliate link.

However, once their browser has redirected to the affiliate link, there is no control over what URL is displayed in the browser. Sometimes it is very obvious that it's an affiliate link as you can see things like

hop=clickbankname

afflink=username

etc

in the URL.

Other times it isn't so obvious as a cookie will be set during an intermediate redirect that isn't very obvious to most people.


Cloaking generally refers to completely masking the affiliate and the site it redirects to by displaying the redirected site in a frame so it appears that to the user that they are still on your website.

You need to be very careful if you use cloaking as it is against the TOS for many affiliate networks.

I use this this little website I created (see sig file) to cloak all my links. Makes it real super easy for you to generate HTML, PHP and Javascript type redirects in like 2 seconds.

Redirecting and Cloaking Link
I use free service in acloaker.com....just click and done! Just type the aff link, the site will generate a web page you can readily download. I usually download the "redirect with hidden URL", change the file name into "blah.HTML"...then copy and paste the HTML file generated in my website folder, i.e. folder "recommends".

Whenever a customer click the link it will show "mysite.com/recommends/blah.html" in their browser tab . Simple and easy.

Yes Pretty Link will do, but I've used acloaker.com and satisfied. It's a no-brainer if you want to redirect and cloaking....


To track amount of link clicks :
1. use a free plugin "WP-Click-Track" if it's on Wordpress.
2. use Google Analytic
3. use a free link shortener and tracker (bit ly alternative that allows aff link) in http;//yoo.ph

I hope this helps

Best method is iframing by far the best method haha wanna learn how then PM me

Anyone use BestDamnRedirect script?

I have it, use it, but really haven't figured out how to use it BEST... in other words, it has tons of features that I'm not making use of. The one thing that I don't like but there may be a way to remove/turn off is the interim redirect page that takes the visitor clicking your link to a quick 3-5 second page showing what the link is for and then on to the linked page. It is very feature filled and powerful but also a bit cryptic in figuring out how to use it best.

I like the way I have different ways of showing that redirected link in my posts/pages but wish that it had better tracking options (more detailed clickthru info).

There is a free tool which will do what you want. I use it all the time.

It's called Profit Protector and you can grab it here: Free HTML Tool - Profit Protector Affiliate Link Cloaker

I use my own script onredirect.com . If you got problem - write me a PM and I will give it to you for free.

I recommend Link Cloaking and Tracking Software That Works - LinkTrackr.

LinkTrackr can help you to:

- Cloak and mask affiliate links easily with our web-based link cloaking software
- Track hundreds of banner ads, PPC campaigns and other advertising clicks
- Accurately track sales conversions and make smarter advertising choices
- Track affiliates sales and performace with pixels and postback URLs
- Split test your landing pages to dramatically improve your conversion rates
- Get free, viral traffic and ready buyers from popular social media sites
- Automate blog monetization with our simple yet powerful WordPress plugin

Hope that helps!

Cheers,
Louie Tugas

Isn't link cloaking forbidden by most major search engines, or am I thinking of a different type of cloaking?