Hiding the Affiliate Link

In my previous article, Affiliate Hide and Seek, I explained why it was important to hide your affiliate links, the main reason being loosing money, as apparently there are people who would change the user-id of the link to theirs or remove it altogether.

So, as promised, I’ve compiled a small how-to on hiding your affiliate links, along with an overview of the available options.

 

Edit (04/02/09): I’ve written a Double Meta Refresh white paper that is available for download here. Double Meta Refresh is a technique used to hide your Landing Page from the merchant.

 

Use an Online Service

Two services that I know being used by some affiliate marketeers:

  1. TinyURL.com

  2. URLFreeze.com

They work by replacing the long affiliate link with a short tinyurl.com/12345, or urlfreeze.com/12345 accordingly.

Whilst efficient at first glance, you have to keep in mind the following:

  • By going to their website it is possible to trace the url and expose the affiliate link, hence defying the purpose of hiding. People who are aware of this are usually those who have been involved in Internet Marketing at some point.
  • To the beginner, those links can be a potential deterrent, since it has nothing to do with the provided product. And of course, it doesn’t serve your branding goals.

So, when using this we are scaring off the beginner, and aren’t doing anything to protect against the savvy. Therefore I wouldn’t recommend using those.

 

Use a JavaScript to Change the Status Bar Text

It is possible to insert a piece of code into your page’s html, that will simply substitute the affiliate link that is presented in your status bar when the mouse is hovered on the link, with a text of your liking. It is useful when you want to display the affiliate’s direct url: (the green text is what’s presented in the status bar):

<a onMouseOver=’window.status=”http://www.affiliate.com/“;
return true’ onMouseOut=’window.status=”Done”;
return true’ href=”http://www.affiliate.com/?user_id=12345″ mce_href=”http://www.affiliate.com/?user_id=12345″>
http://www.affiliate.com/</a>

However, keep in mind the following:

  • Many people disable JavaScript in their browsers. This is because many times before, JavaScript was used to exploit the security holes in web browsers and perform all sorts of shenanigans, such as disabling the back button, hiding affiliate links (ahem…), etc.
  • The experienced user will be able to browse the source code and notice the JavaScript.

 

PHP Redirect

By using this simple technique you can effectively redirect from your site to another.

First, create a file, for example yourfile.php, and insert the following code:

<?php
header( ‘Location: http://www.affiliate.com/?user-id=12345 ) ;
?>

Upload this file to your server’s public_html directory, or to a directory within public_html you’ll create, such as yourdirectory.

Now, when the url is www.yoursite.com/yourdirectory/yourfile.php, the user is redirected to your affiliate url.

USEFUL TIP: If you name your file index.php and place it inside yourdirectory then the url will only have to be www.yoursite.com/yourdirectory to be redirected.

 

For WordPress Users: Use a Plugin

This is why I love WordPress so much. It has a great community and a plugin for every occasion.

Redirect Plugin

This redirection plugin will redirect your urls, and do much more than that. Watch the video and read the description on their site to get a glimpse of what it can do.

This is what I currently use for my redirections, and enjoy every minute of it. It offers me an easy way to make redirection links, it has a log where I can keep track of all the activity, and a handy 404 errors’ log which already exposed some broken links on my blog.

This is only a fraction of its capabilities, it offers so much more. Oooooh, how exciting!…

 

So, now you know the what’s and how’s of affiliate link hiding.

The most important part of it is enjoy what you’re doing.

 

- Alex

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