Clickbank ripping you off too??

[Floyd Fisher]

Originally Posted by alexa_s

However you look at it, Clickbank's problem is a problem that Clickbank have that their competitors apparently don't have. Clickbank, as far as I know, are the only ones lying, concealing, censoring and evading. That's why they're the ones losing so many of their affiliates.

As observed above: "Head. Sand. Problem goes away. Awesome".

What's difficult to understand about this?

So instead of using your brain power to do something constructive like create a next generation affiliate system, you would rather just accuse anyone who doesn't bleat along to your conspiracy mantra as corporate toadies.

As a wise man once said, "If you're not part of the solution, then you are the problem."

Either fix the problem, or be the problem. Your call.

[R Hagel]

Originally Posted by Harvey.Segal

It's hard typing out this reply while flying my private jet.

I know what you mean. That's why I use Dragon Naturally Speaking. Problem solved.

Cheers,
Becky

[Stallion]

Either fix the problem, or be the problem.

Why is it my problem to fix?

Let me explain something to you... I'm in a business. I'm here to make money. I'm not here to play games or screw around with incompetent businesses like Clickbank. If Clickbank cared about profits, they would of fixed this problem a long time ago. Any business that doesn't seem to put their profit first are dangerous. It's the same reason they have shady products, and warez products (before a few days ago).

Clickbank is shady, it's scummy and it lacks integrity.

What needs to happen is that we need to see Atlas shrug. We need people to tell CB to frig off, call them out (publically) and send their traffic to the competitors. CB's competitors convert so much better than CB and everyone would be much better off if they'd stop subsidizing this pathetic behavior from CB.

[Chris Kent]

Originally Posted by alexa_s

However you look at it, Clickbank's problem is a problem that Clickbank have that their competitors apparently don't have. Clickbank, as far as I know, are the only ones lying, concealing, censoring and evading. That's why they're the ones losing so many of their affiliates.

As observed above: "Head. Sand. Problem goes away. Awesome".

What's difficult to understand about this?

Oh come on. Please bury your hate for Clickbank. There are plenty of affiliates and vendors who have no major gripe with CB. Sure, they have some issues, but lately all your posts here are gripes about CB.

Did they wrong you in another life or something?

[Trader54]

Originally Posted by Stallion

Why is it my problem to fix?

Let me explain something to you... I'm in a business. I'm here to make money. I'm not here to play games or screw around with incompetent businesses like Clickbank. If Clickbank cared about profits, they would of fixed this problem a long time ago. Any business that doesn't seem to put their profit first are dangerous. It's the same reason they have shady products, and warez products (before a few days ago).

Clickbank is shady, it's scummy and it lacks integrity.

What needs to happen is that we need to see Atlas shrug. We need people to tell CB to frig off, call them out (publically) and send their traffic to the competitors. CB's competitors convert so much better than CB and everyone would be much better off if they'd stop subsidizing this pathetic behavior from CB.

This thread is full of rants like this. Full of accusations with no proof.

One that tried to start a thread with proof was called out for doctoring
his clickbank stats.

If your statement was true why are they the biggest in the business they are in.

Their by no means perfect, but what online system is.

"send their traffic to the competitors" that's the thing, they really don't have
any competitors.

[Janus]

For anyone able to get past the who, what, when, where and why issues of what was either done or not done, the sad thing is that ClickBank has not adequately corresponded with its affiliates about this issue.

Good Luck,
Pat

[Floyd Fisher]

Originally Posted by Stallion

Why is it my problem to fix?

Let me explain something to you... I'm in a business. I'm here to make money. I'm not here to play games or screw around with incompetent businesses like Clickbank. If Clickbank cared about profits, they would of fixed this problem a long time ago. Any business that doesn't seem to put their profit first are dangerous. It's the same reason they have shady products, and warez products (before a few days ago).

Clickbank is shady, it's scummy and it lacks integrity.

What needs to happen is that we need to see Atlas shrug. We need people to tell CB to frig off, call them out (publically) and send their traffic to the competitors. CB's competitors convert so much better than CB and everyone would be much better off if they'd stop subsidizing this pathetic behavior from CB.

You want a reason to fix it?

I've got a billion of them, all with pictures of George Washington on them.

Just come up with a better system than affiliate tracking cookies, and it's all yours. All you have to do is achieve what the best and brightest on the internet have failed to do better part of a decade, and affiliate programs will beat down your door to get a license to use it.

How's that for a reason?

[Trader54]

Originally Posted by Floyd Fisher

You want a reason to fix it?

I've got a billion of them, all with pictures of George Washington on them.

Just come up with a better system than affiliate tracking cookies, and it's all yours. All you have to do is achieve what the best and brightest on the internet have failed to do better part of a decade, and affiliate programs will beat down your door to get a license to use it.

How's that for a reason?

I agree.

Everyone seems to be able to point out whats wrong but no answers to fix it.

[sbucciarel]

I wrote an article based on a Shoemoney article awhile ago about this

http://dotcommogul.net/affiliate-mar...tion-programs/

A lot of spyware programs eat cookies including affiliate cookies. It's possible that these programs are the culprit rather than Clickbank.

[Harvey Segal]

Originally Posted by Trader54

I agree.
Everyone seems to be able to point out whats wrong but no answers to fix it.

Actually ClickBank have.

They introduced supplemental hoplink tracking back in May 2007.

Details here

-----------------------------------------------------------
Tracking hoplinks and affiliate credit with cookies is 100%
accurate in the vast majority of cases. For some percentage
of customers, however, cookies do not work for tracking. In
these rare instances, customers either have cookies turned
off in their browser, have utilized new browser security
and/or privacy parameters, or have other software installed
on their computer that prevents ClickBank from setting a
cookie at all. We have developed a new technology that will
accurately track hoplinks and award correct affiliate credit
for most instances where cookies are not set. This new
technology works hand-in-hand with our current cookie-
tracking system to ensure proper credit is awarded to
referring affiliates.
-----------------------------------------------------------

Harvey

[ExRat]

Hi,

Just following this discussion with interest and noticed a few notable comments -

Hi Trader54,

they really don't have any competitors.

Traditionally, in most fields, this is a problem. But I imagine most affiliate marketers (myself included) accept the risks (of losing commissions) in exchange for the benefits of 'riding the crest of the wave' of a relatively new industry, where fast movers can clean up. There's always a price to pay - it's the uncertainty and also the certainty (of losses), in this one.

Hi Brett2000,

That is why I believe the only solution to this is to have an independent auditing committee that can see that the sales/stats are close to correct, if they are not, the committee can make adjustments to the affiliate system to make amends. It's the only thing that is going to solve this

Hmmm. Call me cynical, but...in other areas of life/business, whenever this is introduced, it simply creates an illusion of security (often by design) and acts as a further buffer between the two sides, IE not helping.

An (ahem) 'independent' auditing committee between two sides - one with tons of money held by the few, another with tons of money distributed between many, who are also independent of each other (difficult for them to communicate and group together).

How difficult is it for the former side to bribe the committee? Easily enough that it happens almost every time without exception. The committee simply ends up working on behalf of their paymasters. Works a treat, in councils, governments and businesses worldwide. Besides, committees are never a good solution to a problem - they waste time arguing endlessly with each other, jockeying for position,ego and fancy titles. A bit like forums

Hi sbucciarel,

I wrote an article based on a Shoemoney article awhile ago about this

You need to work on a better pre-sell to get my click (sorry, couldn't resist)

[askloz]

Hold on to your hats then. I've been working on a project to take out clickbank, for 2 years. Hope to have it released by end of 2009, early 2010.

Originally Posted by Floyd Fisher

Just come up with a better system than affiliate tracking cookies, and it's all yours.

[The Copy Nazi]

Originally Posted by Harvey.Segal

I managed to get a transcript of a conversation between two ClickBank employees.

A: I've got Fred Smith on the phone complaining yet again:
one week zero sales, the next week lots of sales.

B: Well just do the usual trick. Go to his account and click
on the "Activate" button. It always works - it is
programmed to cause an onrush of sales and keep him quiet

A: OK but I've been thinking. If that solves the problem then
surely . . . that means you know what the problem is.

B: Shhh. Lower your voice - of course I do.

A: Then why don't you code it in

B: Too much work. As you know I'm the only programmer here
and I wrote the system twenty years ago in Cobol.

A: But people are complaining.

B: Well use the server 7 solution

A: What's that ?

B: I've put the code fix on server number 7.
That's where we put the top sellers. So stick Fred in there.

Any more problems ?

A: Affiliate Jim Kelly can't get sales. He read at the
Warrior forum that if you open a new account then
miraculously the sales start again.

B: It's not a miracle. New accounts get put on server 8
where I've also put the code fix.

A: So how long before you do all the servers.

B: Oh it's only an hour's work but no hurry, we've got no
competitors so we're not worried about annoying vendors and
affiliates. Maybe next year some time.

That's brilliant! Like a episode of...gosh...dunno..."The Office"..."Yes Minister"..."Seinfeld"?

[The Copy Nazi]

Originally Posted by Jeremy Kelsall

Set up new accounts with new hoplinks....

I must have 30 accts on clickbank now. Whenever they start with the shaving ****, I just open a new acct, change out my hoplinks, and my conversions go back to normal.

After posting about this a few months ago, other people tried the same thing and had the same results.

Anyone that says that Clickbank isn't screwing their affiliates is in denial.

30 accounts! For real? Do you have to create a new email account as well?

[AdamWB]

Originally Posted by Trader54

This thread is full of rants like this. Full of accusations with no proof.

One that tried to start a thread with proof was called out for doctoring
his clickbank stats.

If your statement was true why are they the biggest in the business they are in.

Their by no means perfect, but what online system is.

"send their traffic to the competitors" that's the thing, they really don't have
any competitors.

I've given enough proof. If you choose to just outright not believe me, then that's your call. Although why I would spend my time writing a thread that was a complete lie is beyond me. I have nothing to gain from it. I guess that would mean the other people posting the same experiences are lying to? Yes, we are all part of a big affiliate conspiracy.

First Clickbank - THEN THE WORLD!!

Come on.

And just because they are the biggest business in affiliate marketing does not mean they are immune to mistakes and/or fraud. History has proven that.

If you're not experiencing the CB "slap" then consider yourself lucky. Like I said in earlier posts, I was in the exact same position as you were in - calling people out that were CB bashing. It just didn't make sense. Now look at the position I'm in.

As far as "fixing" the issue - there's really not a whole lot people can do unless they have access to CB servers - I highly doubt anyone on this thread does. Calling / emailing CB doesn't do anything as others in the thread have experienced.So the next best thing raising the awareness. Freedom of speech is a wonderful thing =)

P.S. My newly created CB account is doing wonderful. A BIG thanks to those who gave me the idea!

[Alexa Smith]

Originally Posted by Floyd Fisher

So instead of using your brain power to do something constructive like create a next generation affiliate system, you would rather just accuse anyone who doesn't bleat along to your conspiracy mantra as corporate toadies.

This is really rude and objectionable. Far from alleging any sort of "conspiracy", I have actually stated repeatedly that I don't think Clickbank are deliberately defrauding anyone.

My problem (and that of many others posting here and in other forums apart from the heavily censored Clickbank forum in which you're not even allowed to make any reference at all to declining sales) is with their behaviour and their attitude and their frankly laughable concept of customer "service".

"Head. Sand. Problem gone away", as someone else commented above, sums up the situation very accurately.

[Michelle Adams]

I've also been following this thread with interest. I went from regular sales to zero for almost two weeks, I was dumb founded. I just sent ClickBank an email explaining that I felt something could be going wrong with my account/tracking. Magically the very next day sales appeared and have continued to appear.

Askloz: I'm looking forward to see what you have to offer.

[momkat]

Michelle:
Were you still getting hops, but no sales? I am experiencing something like that right now.

[Harvey Segal]

Originally Posted by alexa_s

My problem (and that of many others posting here and in other forums apart from the heavily censored Clickbank forum

You are referring to my forum - the ClickBank Success Forum at clickbanksuccessforum.com/forum

For the record we have never censored or altered any post -
apart from one exception. Moreover a ClickBank director has
told me he WELCOMES critical constructive comments so that
they can improve their system.

The exception ?

Ah yes.

If you come to our forum and accuse ClickBank of scamming
your post is removed and you with it.


Harvey

[ripsnorta2]

Originally Posted by Kay King

That's interesting. I've never made the claim of "intentional theft" as I don't have the data to back it up (though some others here might).

The comment above sounds like a "reset". Makes me wonder if the problem is a bug in their system that they know about but only fix when it's pointed out to them.

I had the same experience with a new account that quickly had several hundred in sales and then died. In my case I changed to an old account I hadn't been using for a while and the sales picked up again.

Has anyone tried rotating accounts rather than opening new ones? Just curious.

kay

That idea occurred to me earlier in the thread. There's a class of software bug that manifests after a program -- or in this case, an account? -- has been operating for a while. It happens when a variable in the application increments past its maximum limit, and screws up any further calculations.

One of the most famous was with the Patriot Missiles in the first gulf war. They were sitting at operational status for days and weeks rather than the normal case of just being active for hours. This caused an important counter to overrun and end up back at zero, messing up the navigation with the result that they missed what they were aiming at. A simple reset fixed the problem, until a more permanent solution was found.

It seems there is a consensus here that after a certain number of sales have been made, or a certain amount of time has passed, that perhaps a counter or index in the software is incrementing past its limit and is messing with the affiliate tracking.

A new account starts at zero and thus works properly for a time until the right set of circumstances force it into (an uncaptured) error. This might also explain why some affiliates don't have problems. They might not meet all the requirements for the issue to occur.

[easybiztools]

Originally Posted by Harvey.Segal

The exception ?

Ah yes.

If you come to our forum and accuse ClickBank of scamming
your post is removed and you with it.

Harvey

<grin> ... Harvey is being too lenient here. He almost wanted to send a terminator but we manage to dissuade him :-)

Back in 2002, I was still working in an IT company - slaving 10-14 hours each day. I got to know Harvey on the forum we've been great friends since. He took me (a green horn and a rookie) under his wings and I've learnt lots from him!

When I learnt about Clickbank back in 2002, I was excited and thought this could be my ticket out of the rat-race. Unfortunately, I found that Malaysians were not allowed to sign-up.

So I wrote in, and sort of pestered them about giving me a chance to join. Much to my surprise and joy, they actually took the trouble to reply, and even forwarded to emails to Steve Rouses (the CEO at that time).

He (Steve) wrote me, and asked me to give him a call.

I did, and I've been with ClickBank ever since. Never had a problem with them. As for Clickbank 'scamming' or 'ripping' people off - that's really, really funny. Why kill the goose that lays the golden eggs?

The *only* grouse I have is their liberal refund policy. No system or affiliate network is perfect, even the mighty Google's adwords/tracking is faulty.

I'll stick with ClickBank anytime!


Cheers,
Adrian

[ripsnorta2]

Originally Posted by Dellco

No one here mentions the fact that CB has your password under their lock and key.

I always wondered why I could not change my password and had to use theirs.

My guess is, so they can access anybody's accounts at any time they want?

Actually, it's more likely they are doing that to ensure that account passwords are using a secure method rather than a someone using a completely insecure method of password generation, like using the word "password" perhaps.

[The Copy Nazi]

Campers, I've been direct-linking (with redirect & mask ;-) a Clickbank product on and off for the last month or so. I've thrown a fair bit of Adwords money at it. It was making a few sales but I wasn't getting the ROI. I've been tweaking it, as you do. I got it to the point where I had Q.S. of 7/8/9 on my keywords and Good CTR - 5.5%.
Last night, after reading this thread, I took your advice and opened a new Clickbank A/C. I threw $150 at the campaign. Same keywords/same ad. 7 hours later I have two sales - netting me $60. CTR of 7.22%. 224 clicks.
Coincidence? Too soon too call. I'll wait until the end of the day. But if there's another couple of sales...
BTW now I'm worried about the funds outstanding in my old account.

[Michelle Adams]

Originally Posted by momkat

Michelle:
Were you still getting hops, but no sales? I am experiencing something like that right now.

Yes still getting hops. I can't be certain of what's happened but no matter what, I have faith that ClickBank are not setting out to scam anyone, that doesn't mean the system isn't fail proof. If they do have tracking issues hopefully they get sorted out quickly.

[Alexa Smith]

Originally Posted by Michelle Adams

If they do have tracking issues hopefully they get sorted out quickly.

That's exactly what we were all saying 8 or 9 months ago. I'm certainly not holding my breath. Far from "welcoming constructive criticism" as they dishonestly claim, they're actually still officially denying that there IS a "problem" at all!!!

[jcaviani]

Jennifer,

I couldn't agree more.

Clickbank gains nothing by entering the conversation. In fact, much like the people who are caught with their hands in the cookie jar by the 60 Minutes crew (and I'm not saying CB is guilty), their probable reaction is to say nothing or even hide.

In general, legal teams or PR firms commenting on behalf of any major company will offer nothing but canned statements. They will also go to great lengths to never admit to any wrong doing. Moreover, any potential settlements reached will seek to quiet their opposition and forbid them from further comment.

So, where does this leave the lowly affiliate? This is perhaps the best example of why being an affiliate is NOT a great long term business model. You have very little leverage even with proof in hand.

It's interesting, I have not seen one thing in the IM realm (idea, software, plan, consulting, etc.) that I couldn't get from someone else in the business world for much cheaper. The internet is a marketing channel not a business, but that's a topic for another post.

[AdamWB]

Originally Posted by easybiztools

He (Steve) wrote me, and asked me to give him a call.

I did, and I've been with ClickBank ever since. Never had a problem with them. As for Clickbank 'scamming' or 'ripping' people off - that's really, really funny. Why kill the goose that lays the golden eggs?

The *only* grouse I have is their liberal refund policy. No system or affiliate network is perfect, even the mighty Google's adwords/tracking is faulty.

I'll stick with ClickBank anytime!

Seriously - this is getting outright ridiculous. People coming on here, cheerleading Clickbank, thinking they are some sort of divine power that are above any mistakes and can do no wrong ---- when there is an OBVIOUS problem. The only way it can get any more obvious is if the CEO of Clickbank himself came on this thread and admitted it, and that's not going to happen.

I mean - are you guys even reading the thread before posting these comments?