Default Affiliate Cookie

[davidd]

Hi there,

I've been using the affiliate cookie hack of website address 30 to limit cookie to 30 days. i posted about 5 years ago here for those instructions.

Is 6 months still the default? I want to limit my affiliates to only a few products and not a general site wide cookie.

so how do i do the cookie have and limit a product to 30 days?

thanks, david

[E-junkie_Guru]

We still set affiliate referral cookies with a 6-month expiration by default. You should still be able to override that by specifying your desired duration in days after each affiliate landing page URL you enter in Seller Admin, separated by a space, like so:
http://www.example.com/your/page.html 30

Note that you'd need to do this for each landing page URL you enter in your affiliate settings, as the override would only apply to that particular link.

Also bear in mind we only set affiliate referral cookies identifying your and the affiliate's respective account IDs in our system, rather than product-specific referrals that are only good on purchases of that particular product. The only difference between hop links is what landing page they redirect the buyer to. Regardless of which hop link a buyer follows, anything they purchase from you during the lifespan of their cookie would track the affilaite's referral.

You can grant affiliate sharing for some products but not others by one of these methods:

• Leave your Common Share at 0% even if you enable your Common Hop Link, and then just enable the Product Hop Link and specify a Product Share % only for items that should grant a commission;
  ...OR...
• Enable the Product Hop Link for exempt items, paste your homepage as their landing page URL, but set a Product Share of 0%.

[davidd]

okay i think i got. option 1 is the one i'm looking into.

Let's say i have 20 products but i only want to pay affiliate on 2. So i'd do the following:

1. I'd set the Common Affiliate to 0%

2. I'd set the Product-specific Affiliate Settings for the 2 products at say 30%. I'd also make the hop link as http://www.example.com/your/page.html 30 if i want the 30 day limit.

i believe that's it?

No matter what, the other 18 products, the affiliate would not get a commission on, correct?

But would the affiliate get a notice about one of those 18 products that affiliates aren't paid on with an email indicating 0%? In other words, would the affiliate be getting several notifications of products showing 0% that they aren't earning a commission on?

thanks, david

[E-junkie_Guru]

Yes, that's all correct. You might consider granting at least a token 5-10% Common Share just to avoid any guff from affiliates about sales of those other products, which you may not have sold without their referral anyway, so they'd still deserve something for referring those buyers.

A different approach you might consider is using Direct Links, rather than Hop Links. These work as an instant purchase link the affiliate can place on their site, share on social media or email newsletters, etc. These don't set a referral cookie for residual commission earnings after the initial referral; they only grant a share on each purchase made through the affiliate's Direct Link. This way you could keep a 0% Common Share and only enable the Direct Link for those 2 eligible products.

[davidd]

okay, i think the Direct Link is what I am looking for.

I'm on the Affiliate Dashboard and i see the Enable Product Direct Link box and I check it. But I don't see a link that I send them. I don't think they want a buy it now button, just the code they can hyperlink to text or email. Where is the link for the affiliate?

[E-junkie_Guru]

Direct Links are immediate purchase links/buttons that affiliates can share in text, email, social media, etc. They will not direct buyers to your sales page, but they would still be buying directly from you.

Affiliates would obtain their own link from Affiliate Admin once they click your sign-up link to register for their own E-junkie account (if they don't have one already) and join your program. You can find your sign-up link at the top of your Affiliate Program Settings.

This help page for affiliate explains our system from their perspective:

Help for Affiliates

[davidd]

oh perfect, i got it. the affiliate will need to log in to their admin and get the link.

thanks for all the help!

david

[davidd]

okaty, direct link is going to work for affiliates.

there are 6 products i would like to give affiliate commission on. the other products will not be affiliate commission related.

so here is what i setup:

under common affiliate program settings i have set the common affiliate share at 0% and hop link blank

under product-specific affiliate settings, for EACH of the 6 products i set a hop link to that specific product page, i.e. hop link for product 1, on the product 2 product i have hop link for product page 2, etc.

i also set the product affiliate share for each of those 6 products at 6%.

so i have 6 different hop links because i have one for each product. the affiliate would like to only manage one hop link.

if i'm understanding the program correctly, it doesn't matter which hoplink the affiliate uses, any of those 6 that drives someone to the site, will result with the affiliate earning commission on any of the 6. i.e. if they give out hop link 1 and user goes to our site and purchases product 3, affiliate will still earn commission. is that correct?

[E-junkie_Guru]

Yes, you've got that all correct, but what you described would actually be using Hop Links, rather than Direct Links.

Hop Links redirect the buyer to your landing page for that link while we set a referral cookie in their browser that expires in 6 months. Anything the buyer purchases from you during the lifespan of that cookie would track the affilaite's referral and calculate a commission earned, using the Product Share % for any purchased items that have one, or your Common Share % for any other purchased items.

Direct Links work like an immediate purchase button affiliates can use to sell your item directly, rather than referring buyers to your sales page, though the buyer is still purchasing directly from you. Direct Links don't set a referral cookie for residual commissions on future sales like Hop Links do; they only grant a commission share on each order placed through the affiliate's Direct Link. If you don't want to offer this type of link, just leave "Enable Product Direct Link" un-ticked in the product's affiliate settings.

[davidd]

thank you!