Anyone still having trouble with ClickBank?

15 years ago

If your list member is using Firefox 3, you're screwed - Firefox now blocks affiliate cookies from clickbank.net by default and your commissions won't be tracked unless they've gone into cookie management and explicitly allowed clickbank.

I don't know how one would approach the Mozilla foundation about getting clickbank removed from the autoblock list but since they're now blocking cookies from most affiliate networks - CJ included - chances are there's nothing we can do.

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SaSeoPete

15 years ago

Wow thats pretty bad news for clickbank and me!

Originally Posted by Melkor

If your list member is using Firefox 3, you're screwed - Firefox now blocks affiliate cookies from clickbank.net by default and your commissions won't be tracked unless they've gone into cookie management and explicitly allowed clickbank.

I don't know how one would approach the Mozilla foundation about getting clickbank removed from the autoblock list but since they're now blocking cookies from most affiliate networks - CJ included - chances are there's nothing we can do.

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Louis Raven

15 years ago

Originally Posted by Melkor

If your list member is using Firefox 3, you're screwed - Firefox now blocks affiliate cookies from clickbank.net by default and your commissions won't be tracked unless they've gone into cookie management and explicitly allowed clickbank.

I don't know how one would approach the Mozilla foundation about getting clickbank removed from the autoblock list but since they're now blocking cookies from most affiliate networks - CJ included - chances are there's nothing we can do.

That right there has just ruined my day!

Mix that with checking your your stats to see how many are using FF3 and you'll have a breakdown lol.

Why would they specifically drop Clickbank cookies?

What xxxxholes.

Louis

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Fabian Tan

15 years ago

Originally Posted by Louis Raven

That right there has just ruined my day!

Mix that with checking your your stats to see how many are using FF3 and you'll have a breakdown lol.

Why would they specifically drop Clickbank cookies?

What xxxxholes.

Louis

Keep quiet before everyone panics and runs.

Fabian

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Louis Raven 15 years ago

Originally Posted by Fabian Tan

Keep quiet before everyone panics and runs.

Fabian

HAHA are you saying I was over the top? :p

Seriously though can't CB just change their cookie names or something? I dunno..
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samstephens

15 years ago

Clickbank don't use 3rd party cookies, so they shouldn't be blocked by Firefox.

Ryan, as well as asking Clickbank about this, it'd also be worth contacting the vendor and ask them who got the commission for the sale.

I think as more and more people start to think that "personal discounts" are okay when buying Clickbank products, affiliates will feel the pinch as they lose commissions to the actual buyer.

cheers
Sam

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Melkor

15 years ago

Firefox defines clickbank cookies as third-party. If you've got it on your computer, open your "options" menu, click on the "privacy" tab, and check which sites are listed in the "exceptions" menu.

Cookies from these domains are prohibited by default. Both clickbank.net - where your hoplink goes through and where your visitor is supposed to get an affiliate cookie from you - and cj.com among others are blocked by default in Firefox 3.

(What's even worse is spybot Search&Destroy's "immunize" feature which blocks both clickbank and CJ in your hosts file, so it's not even possible to click through a CJ or clickbank.net link to get to the merchant.)

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SirHandsome

15 years ago

Originally Posted by Melkor

Firefox defines clickbank cookies as third-party. If you've got it on your computer, open your "options" menu, click on the "privacy" tab, and check which sites are listed in the "exceptions" menu.

Cookies from these domains are prohibited by default. Both clickbank.net - where your hoplink goes through and where your visitor is supposed to get an affiliate cookie from you - and cj.com among others are blocked by default in Firefox 3.

(What's even worse is spybot Search&Destroy's "immunize" feature which blocks both clickbank and CJ in your hosts file, so it's not even possible to click through a CJ or clickbank.net link to get to the merchant.)

I'm not sure about this. I have FireFox 3+, and i never changed any settings. Looks like I accept cookies and 3rd party cookies by default.

Also, I know for a fact that someone was just credited for a commission from me because I bought through their link for an incentive they were offering.

I'd like to hear more input about it though

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Melkor

15 years ago

Very odd, because on my default installation if you go Options->Privacy->cookies->exeptions and look at the list of sites that are blocked from setting cookies by default you'll find Clickbank.net in there, among a whole bunch of more threathening scumware, parasite infectionware and other computer nasties.

Now, Clickbank also uses IP tracking so if you bought straight away when you click through the link IP tracking might catch you and credit your transaction correctly even if the cookie tracking failed. but it's dreadfully unreliable compared to cookie tracking - when it works..

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terryd

15 years ago

Originally Posted by Melkor

Very odd, because on my default installation if you go Options->Privacy->cookies->exeptions and look at the list of sites that are blocked from setting cookies by default you'll find Clickbank.net in there, among a whole bunch of more threathening scumware, parasite infectionware and other computer nasties.

Now, Clickbank also uses IP tracking so if you bought straight away when you click through the link IP tracking might catch you and credit your transaction correctly even if the cookie tracking failed. but it's dreadfully unreliable compared to cookie tracking - when it works..

My default installation has no sites under exceptions so I don't think thats the case at all

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Centimetro 15 years ago

Originally Posted by terryd

My default installation has no sites under exceptions so I don't think thats the case at all

yeah, my default is blank with no sites listed under exceptions, and with all cookies enabled. Strange.
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Melkor

15 years ago

Something's odd then, because I learned of it from Dave's computer tips : Dave's Computer Tips - Cookies, are they helpful or harmful - checked it according to his instructions, and yep, sure enough, there it was in the list of blocked sites.

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Fabian Tan 15 years ago

Yep, I had Clickbank.net under the list of Blocked Sites in Firefox and had to set it back to 'Allow'.

Let's put this into perspective: if even 20% of Firefox users have Clickbank.net as a blocked site, you are potentially losing 20% of your sales from Firefox users.

Fabian
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Melkor

15 years ago

There's something quirky going on at any rate - I mean, there's two of us in this thread who had a populated block list in FF3, and two who didn't. So it's not necessarily the case that all FF3 users have populated block lists by default, even if Dave says they do. And the IP tracking still works I presume, so if your prospects click through and buy straight away you'll probably still get credit.

It's just another possible leak that isn't due to anything Clickbank is or isn't doing in their system and that they probably can't do anything about unless they've got some way of convincing the Open source crowd that clickbank tracking isn't evil in the lop.com or Gator/Claria way.

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SuzanneH

15 years ago

Put me in the group that uses Firefox3, without any changes, and my aff. id shows up just fine... edited to add: And there's nothing in my exceptions...

Suzanne

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ExRat 15 years ago

Hi,

Two PCs both running firefox 3.0.4 - nothing in exceptions.

What exact version of firefox are you guys running that has clickbank listed?

Also, are you sure about spybot? That problem reared it's head about 18 months ago, and after pressure, they removed clickbank and CJ from it. Are they back in it?
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Fabian Tan

15 years ago

I'm running version 3.0.5, with Zone Alarm and Avast running on the side.

Fabian

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Nicolaas Theron

15 years ago

Just for the record, I've been using FF3 since it was made available and there's nothing in my cookie exception list either.

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ExRat

15 years ago

Hi Fabian,

I'm running version 3.0.5, with Zone Alarm and Avast running on the side.

Freebie seeker like me then, huh?

I've got the same, except my firefox isn't 3.0.5. Must be the time difference

Did you get an update to Avast yesterday that then announced that you had a virus?

I had it happen on both machines as soon as it updated - both identifying the same file as the culprit. I think it was getting a little carried away...

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Fabian Tan

15 years ago

Originally Posted by ExRat

Hi Fabian,

Freebie seeker like me then, huh?

I've got the same, except my firefox isn't 3.0.5. Must be the time difference

Did you get an update to Avast yesterday that then announced that you had a virus?

I had it happen on both machines as soon as it updated - both identifying the same file as the culprit. I think it was getting a little carried away...

Yeah I got it too...it was a dll file which it recommended me to ignore at first, but I ended up deleting it

Fabian

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ExRat 15 years ago

Hi Fabian,

LOL. Same here. We're living the same life in parallel universes...only our version of firefox is slightly different...spooky
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Melkor

15 years ago

I've got Firefox 3.0.4 too - I'm going to go dig around in my system and see if any of the addons I've installed are responsible rather than the default install.

I clicked "immunize" in spybot S&D back in august, couldn't access anything, and found CJ in my hosts file. It's possible that I've got an old block list installed by mistake or it's some other program that also messes with my host file rather than Spybot what did it - Javacools' spywareblaster comes to mind since I've used that in the past. Neither are installed on this computer though so they're not responsible for the block list I'm seeing.

Given that you're not seeing the behaviour Dave clued me into, the only extension I can think of that would be a likely culprit would be NoScript. either that, or it's AVG antivirus being funny with their "antispyware" module.

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samstephens

15 years ago

My exceptions list is empty too, and the default in my FF3 is to allow 1st party AND 3rd party cookies.

Melkor, did you install FF3 from scratch? Or was yours an update from v2?

I wonder if that's the difference?

Or you may be on to something with Spybot S&D - that's the software that blocks pretty much everything.

It probably added all the site blocks to Firefox for you.

For the others that have CLickbank in the exceptions list, do you also run (or have you run at some point) Spybot S&D?

cheers
Sam

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rejoov

15 years ago

Originally Posted by Ryan_Taylor

I received an email from a member of my list thanking me for the product recommendation. It was a direct link to the sales page in an email and I didn't receive any credit for the sale.

Did you use a redirect to send to the sales page? If you had your hop in the email that's probably why you didn't get credit. You have to send to an actual webpage or use a redirect. If you link straight from an email to a sales page you won't get the referral.

Clickbank stopped allowing direct linking through email a while back.

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Ryan_Taylor

15 years ago

Originally Posted by rejoov

Did you use a redirect to send to the sales page? If you had your hop in the email that's probably why you didn't get credit. You have to send to an actual webpage or use a redirect. If you link straight from an email to a sales page you won't get the referral.

Clickbank stopped allowing direct linking through email a while back.

Hey Rejoov - actually it was a php redirect from my domain. I should have mentioned that.

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Ryan_Taylor

15 years ago

That's scary about FF 3, but in my case the customer told me she read my email, clicked the link that went to the sales page, and purchased. I know cookie tracking isn't perfect, but a direct buy??

Anyway, she sent me the receipt. I'll contact the publisher and CB and see what happens. Like I said though, I'm not really concerned about getting paid for this one sale - I'm more concerned about how many other sales I potentially lost.

Maybe there's an explanation though. I'll post back when I get a response.

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allbusiness888

15 years ago

If you masked your clickbank affiliate code - it should work.

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Andy Hart 15 years ago

I have the latest version of firefox and I have a huge list of exceptions including Clickbank and CJ.com.

This is not good news for affiliates

thanks
andy

**EDIT** wow this topic is all over the net!! apparently the list of exceptions is being populated by virus programs and not the browsers, more in particular "spybot s+d" which is what I have installed, so that answers why some have a list and others dont, still hugely worrying
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samstephens

15 years ago

Spybot S&D have always had a tonne of problems like this.

I'd recommend uninstalling it, and simply use something like Lavasoft's Adaware.

It's free, and it doesn't block legitimate sites, and doesn't try and take over your browser.

I've seen a lot of reports of Spybot S&D coming up with false positives.

cheers
Sam

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Melkor

15 years ago

Hmm, I built a new computer in October, had a fresh install of Firefox, and haven't installed spybot or Javacool on this new one - I used foxmarks to transfer my bookmarks over as well. I did install AVG antivirus though - which comes with a built-in spyware blocker and it keeps flagging Clickbank and CJ cookies as spyware.

I spent a few hours on the Mozilla.org site yesterday and couldn't find anything about any default cookie blocking there. So the conclusion is that Dave's wrong and it isn't a Firefox default behaviour?

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Vijay M

15 years ago

Hmmm...

Last weekend, I had 740 hops and not 1 sale to the top converting forex product. I was using php redirect.

If 30% of the clicks had the cookie blocked, of the reamining 500 hops, a lowly 0.20% conversion would mean atleast 1 sale. :-(

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Kay King 15 years ago

I've had 3 of 4 sales recently that I knew were purchases through my affiliate link - and that I was not credited for. Testing it, I clicked on my hoplink 5 times (refreshing in between) - and only three of those clicks took me to my affiliate id. These were direct links - yet I had similar results with redirects.

We've seen posts about this now for almost two months and they seem to end with some saying there is no CB problem. The problem may not affect everyone - but there does seem to be something not working correctly.

We've heard that Spybot blocks CB, that IE7 blocks CB, and now that Firefox3 may block CB. All - or some of that - may be true. Bottom line is
CB should be upgrading to a tracking method that works reliably...just as other affiliate sales sites do.

kay
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Wayne

15 years ago

It is Spybot that is adding these sites to your blocked sites. When you use their immunize feature, this adds the sites to your blocked sites. It is NOT Firefox that is adding these by default. Spybot has been doing this for a long time.

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imaddict

15 years ago

I am writing a little script to address this issue over the next 2 weeks. There's only one problem, the merchant needs to add code to their page. If anyone wants a copy when it's ready send me a PM and I'll send you a copy (for free).

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Frank Bruno 15 years ago

I have the Answer to this problem of not getting ripped off!

Develop your own products! lol

Frank Bruno
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- Alibubble 15 years ago
  
  Originally Posted by Frank Bruno
  
  I have the Answer to this problem of not getting ripped off!
  
  Develop your own products! lol
  
  Frank Bruno
  
  Or use PLR as a starting point!
  
  I guess I am going to have to do this now, because I cannot trust CB to make sure I get my commission. I know it really isn't their fault, but that doesn't make the problem any better.
  
  Good thing I just bought PLR rights to an ebook in my niche...
  
  Thanks
  
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essmeier

15 years ago

"Spybot S&D have always had a tonne of problems like this.

I'd recommend uninstalling it, and simply use something like Lavasoft's Adaware"

The problem with that is that Spybot and Adaware don't entirely overlap. A lot of people use them in tandem because each program finds problems the other one doesn't.

I'm using Spybot and I've got CJ and CB in my exceptions list for FF 3.0.5.

Charlie

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Mark Brian

15 years ago

I think it's really Spybot. I'm on FF 2 and I have clicked that "immunize" button from Spybot sometime ago, now CB is in my exception list. I think we should send a group letter to Spybot to stop this in their next software/definitions update. It's not like we're scamming people by putting CB cookies in their computers.

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samstephens

15 years ago

The problem with that is that Spybot and Adaware don't entirely overlap. A lot of people use them in tandem because each program finds problems the other one doesn't.

I agree, but sometimes finding more "problems" is NOT a good thing.

The thing I like about Adaware is that it doesn't come up with false positives.

Spybot labels Clickbank links as problems, when they're not. It makes you wonder what else they're blocking?

Just my personal opinion, of course

cheers
Sam

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Harold Hsu

15 years ago

I don't know if this is an issue, but my sales over the weekend have dropped significantly (to unusually low levels).

I thought it was just a freak occurrence, until a subscriber wrote in to tell me that he tried to make a purchase but got an "unable to process at this time" error.

Could this be what's happening instead?

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ripsnorta2

15 years ago

Originally Posted by Harold Hsu

I don't know if this is an issue, but my sales over the weekend have dropped significantly (to unusually low levels).

I thought it was just a freak occurrence, until a subscriber wrote in to tell me that he tried to make a purchase but got an "unable to process at this time" error.

Could this be what's happening instead?

Ask your subscriber if he has changed any CC details, or has been issued a replacement card.

I received that error when I tried to use the CVV number on my reissued credit card. When I used the old CVV number, the sale went through.

This doesn't seem to be restricted to Clickbank. I've been using the old CVV on all my recent purchases and it still works. I'm not sure if this should be the case. I thought the banks disabled the old numbers when a new card was issued.