Cloaked Affiliate Links?

If you want to hide affiliate sites from Google you need something that hides the URL from the HTML source code like Elf Links by Warrior Kindsvater.

Something like Pretty Links only makes the link look nice for visitors. It does not hide the link from Google and does not prevent Google from following the link to see if it resolves as an affiliate link.

For Amazon links, make sure they comply with Amazon ToS. You can cloak Amazon affiliate links with something like Elf Links or Pretty Links but you cannot cloak them in such a way that they obscure the source of traffic (your website). You also cannot cloak Amazon links in such a way that they redirect to Amazon without a user clicking the link. Pop-unders and other cookie stuffing methods are not allowed.

There is no real need to cloak Amazon links and as you mentioned, it gives some assurance and trust for your visitors to see that the link goes to Amazon.

I'm just making the point that if you want to hide your affiliate links from Google (as opposed to your visitors) you need something that actually hides the link outside the HTML code.

Masking a link does not hide it from Google because the GoogleBot can just follow the link to see if it resolves as an affiliate link.

If you think Google "penalizes" affiliate sites and you want to hide affiliate links from Google then you need something like Elf Links because Pretty Links won't do it.

Well, in my experience, there's 3 ways to go about this... And all 3 ways are for different purposes.

1. For Amazon products, I just put the link in with "Nofollow", for the exact reason stated above. People see it's amazon, and if you're reviewing or comparing products, they obviously know what that Amazon link will take them to, and they trust Amazon. It pretty much sells itself, simply because Amazon is trusted.

2. I use pretty link and select "Nofollow" for other Affiliate products, such as ClickBank, ShareASale, CJ, etc., simply because their links are sort of ugly IMO. I just use pretty link to make it look better, but more often then not, I put the product directly in my pretty link URL so people see that it still relates to what I'm talking about.

3. If you have a site that's a Blog-style website that you constantly talk about 1-5 of the same products all the time, I create 1-2 specific pages;
1. A "Recommended" Page and/or
2. A "Resources" Page

The "Recommended" page is if I have an entire website dedicated to one product. In all honesty, you should have at least two, for variety, as well as diversity in case a product gets its affiliate program cut.

The "Resources" page is a page that I use to put all the tools, materials, information, guides, etc. on that relates to what my readers are wanting to learn/accomplish.

As I write articles, instead of linking an affiliate link and having Affiliate links all over my website and get a negative outlook, I link internally back to my own pages.

You actually get a bit of a boost since traffic stays on your website longer, you don't look "spammy" with your affiliate links, you have both internal and external links on your website, and it's much easier refer to your own content and add to it as you need then to constantly add new affiliate products to their own pages and hope your readers find what they need in a certain article and buys it.

Hope this helps! Best of luck to you, my friend!