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23 Ways To Use An Ad Tracker

The ad tracker was originally developed to provide a recordof all hits to a site resulting from ad placements. Thisarticle shows a host of different ways to utilise an adtracker.

FOR AFFILIATES

#1. The Long Url Problem

Have you ever seen an ad where you are asked to click on anaffiliate URL so long that it stretches over 2 lines, likethis

http://www/anysite.com/cgi-bin/dir1/dir2/.cgi?code=123RT&type=10235&subid=89715

Do you think your reader will bother to do the necessary cutand paste to put it in a browser?

Probably not.

And that's probably one lost sale.

And even a one line affiliate link may exceed thepermissible length for some ad posting requirements.

The solution: use a short tracking URL.

#2. Losing Your Affiliate Code

As an affiliate you may have your affiliate code embedded ina link something like this:

http://www.abc.com/123

Some customers will bypass the affiliate code and just typein the home URL http://www.abc.com (possibly because theythink that they will be paying extra for an agent'scommission)

The solution: use a tracking URL - so that your affiliatecode number is never seen.

#3. Make Your Ad Stand Out

You may have seen search engine results showing nearidentical listings for the same product, differing only inan affiliate code appended to the URL.

Your listing here will be just one of many unless you makeit stand out. So bypass the standard affiliate URL and use atracking URL.

#4. How Effective Are The Links

You can measure and compare the effectiveness of thedifferent banners or text links the affiliate programsprovide you by using a tracking URL.

#5. Changing Links

If an affiliate company change their links then yourexisting ads, wherever they are posted, become worthless.But if you use a tracking URL you simply revise theaffiliate URL at the tracking control centre.

#6. Affiliate Program Discontinued

Similarly if an affiliate program is discontinued you justchange your tracking URL to a new page where you explain thecircumstances and point your visitor to your otherpromotions.

#7. Better Affiliate Stats

Not all affiliate programs provide you with stats about visitors.And if they do are they adequate ?

Compare a basic monthly figure say

- Jan: 39 hits

with a detailed analysis such as

- Jan 12: 10 hits

- Jan 13: 2 hits

- Jan 20: 21 hits

- Jan 21: 6 hits

where you can relate those dates to particular ad campaigns.

Tracking URLs will give you these improved figures.

#8. Checking Affiliate Stats

Even if you do receive good stats from your affiliateprogram it still makes sense to use tracking URLs so thatyou can compare your figures with theirs.

A large discrepancy could mean errors in their software or(hopefully not) fraudulent activity on their part.

An alternative reason is that their measurement takes placewhen their page is fully loaded rather than at the start,indicating that visitors are clicking away because it istaking too long to load.

FOR EZINE PUBLISHERS

#9. Win Advertisers With Tracking Reports

If you sell advertising space in your ezine you can offer toyour advertisers to replace their URLs with your trackingURLs and Email them the results.

Tell your advertisers about these benefits in youradvertising guidelines

- They will know the number of clickthroughs their ad hasgenerated. They can then decide how to improve the ads forbetter performance

- If they use a tracker program with your own domain name inthe tracking URL your ezine subscribers will be moreinclined to click

- They can use your ezine as a test centre, modifying theirads until they are happy, before launching with otherpublishers

#10. Use Tracking Report Results

The tracking reports above will provide you with informationon your subscribers' interests, influencing your editorialcontent and helping you select which potential advertisersto approach

Also, once your advertisers have seen for themselves thebenefits of an ad tracking program they will be inclined topurchase one. So set yourself up as an affiliate for aprogram and promote it to them.

#11. Measure Your Readership

You may know how many subscribers you have but how manyactually open and read your ezine and which parts of itattract most attention ?

Here's how to find out if you distribute your ezine in HTMLFormat: include an image on your page, e.g a banner or logoor a single pixel GIF. Then reference this image with atracking URL.

For an ezine distributed as plain text it is not possible tosee if it is actually opened or read. But what you can do isinsert tracking URLs at the appropriate points, such asproduct offers or special articles, and get comparativefigures for which items are being read.

AT YOUR WEB SITE

#12. The Problem Of Permanent URLs

Web sites are continually evolving and changing.

You may want to rename a page to make it more consistent andlogical but there's a huge problem. You have given out theURL in an ebook, or a directory submission, or an article orwherever. There's no way you can undo this.

The solution ?

Never provide the actual URL, just a tracking URL. You canthen just edit the link at the tracking centre whenever apage is moved or renamed.

The external links, in your ebook for example, stay the samebut they will redirect to your new page.

#13. What Are Your Visitors Doing ?

You have text links all over your site, links to your otherpages and links to recommended sites.

Where are your visitors clicking ?

Where are they leaving your site, why, how can you stop them ?

Which graphic do they click on the most ?

Do they click on the text link more than the graphic link?

Your log files may tell you at best which are the mostpopular pages at your site but it is vital to know how yourvisitors move through your site and what is tempting them.

Use tracking URLs to replace actual links wherever you needto monitor click activity.

#14. Sell Website Advertising Space

You can offer tracking reports to your advertisers in thesame way as for ezine publishers (above).

#15. Stop Piracy

If you have invested man-months of time setting up a vitalresource site involving a directory of links it's very easyfor a pirate to simply copy your page and provide usefulcontent for his own site.

If you use tracking URLs for those directory links you candetect this copy - because the ad tracking program willrecord the referring URL.

At the same time of course you can measure the popularity ofthe directory links.

USING PAY PER CLICK SEARCH ENGINES

#16. Better Click Activity Reporting

Pay per click search engines will report to you clickactivity on your URL. Engines vary in the frequency andformat of the reporting so you can use tracking URLs insteadto obtain better information.

#17. Prevent Fraudulent Activity

You can compare your figures with the engine's and shouldquery any large discrepancy.

If click activity is unusually high you may have acompetitor clicking on just to incur costs against you. Youmay be able to detect this by comparing the figures forunique hits and actual hits (several hits per visitor).

OFFLINE MARKETING

#18. Check How Successful

If you have ever wondered whether it was worth advertisingoff line because of the supposed impossibility of measuringthe response then ad tracking URLs will answer that problem.Just include them in your ads in

- newspapers

- magazines

- flyers

- billboards

- press releases

- shop notice boards

- and so on

#19. Use The Time Reports

The date and time when clicks are made will allow you tocheck the progress of your ads, for example

- has your newspaper ad been submitted yet ?

- has your billboard notice been removed ?

- how long does a magazine ad stay around ?

For a long running ad you can study the response and switchthe link midstream if necessary to an improved web page.

EBOOKS

#20. Do Free Books Work ?

The main purpose of a free ebook is to get the reader backto your site. But how successful is it proving ?

Put tracking URLs in the book and you will find out.

#21. Maintain Control After Download

Once your ebook is downloaded it would appear that you nolonger have any control over it. Not so. You can redirectthe reader to other pages of your site by changing thetracking Url links.

OTHER WAYS

#22. Become An Ad Tracking Affiliate

Since ad tracking programs are high demand marketing toolsyou can profit by joining their affiliate program (if theyhave one).

Owning the product that you promote always gives that extraadvantage e.g you can give an example of how you use it or apersonal testimonial as to how it has benefited you.

#23. Privacy

You may want to post an URL somewhere and - for reasons ofyour own - not let it reveal your website. You can do thiswith an ad tracking program where the supplier domain nameis used in the tracking URL.

For more details about the above tips and yet more ways to use an ad tracker see Harvey's free ebook Ad Tracking SuperTips

http://www.ad-tracking.com/adbook.html

Publishers can reproduce this article and change the URL to point to their own rebranded version.