Can networks really tell?

6 replies
Hey Warriors,

I've been hearing a lot of contradictory views on something.

Lets say an offer only allows for search and email promotion. You want to promote using video or offline techniques instead. You send all the traffic you generate with these methods to your own domain you've purchased and then onto the CPA landing page.

Will the network be able to tell where the traffic was initially generated from? Will they know it came from a video site like youtube and not from PPC or search?

How does this work? The above scenario is just an imaginary example. I'm not saying I want to break the offers TOS. I'm just curious as to how accurately they can determine the source of traffic if you send it through your own domain first.

Thanks for your help on this!

Andrew
#networks
  • Profile picture of the author Affiliace.com
    Anyone can do a search to see which sites are linking in to yours. But if the source of the traffic does not come directly from a URL, I suppose they would only find it if they know about the source.
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    Mike Bertrand - Affiliate Network Manager for www.Affiliace.com
    New Campaign: Passion Search Online Dating paying $40

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  • Profile picture of the author Jcsarokin
    They can definately tell how your promoting via the referrer. They are smarter then you think lol.
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    • Profile picture of the author p2y
      It's best to speak with your affiliate manager and ask, some offers say "search and email only" but would more than welcome offline advertising or print ads. The problem is they can't list EVERY promotion method allowed, otherwise it would be a very big list of allowed vs not allowed so they stick to the main 4: search, email, banners, and contextual (ppv)
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  • Profile picture of the author Fraggler
    They can't tell from the referrer if you are sending them to your own landing page. The landing page will become the referrer. The only way they can tell is if they stumble across your video or they survey a customer and they tell them where they found the offer.
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  • Profile picture of the author bozz723
    You can cloak your link and block the referrer any way. However the network will see that your site is the referrer if you are using a landing page. They can look up links to your site and find the video that way.


    Promoting like this will not get you banned and if you do get caught I doubt your commissions would even get reversed, but they may.
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  • Profile picture of the author Kenster
    Yes there are tricky ways to hide referrers and fake them, but networks will normally deny commissions if they find out. Its a balancing act with hiding referrer because the networks want to know as much about your traffic as possible and you want to protect your traffic in many instances but still get your commissions.

    That is why it is so important to build a relationship with your ams

    If you arent blocking, blanking, or hiding, they will normally be able to see exactly where your traffic is from
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