Cloaking Affiliate Links
What is (affiliate) link cloaking?
Link cloaking means that you hide or disguise your (affiliate) links by using a redirect link. This redirect link will then lead the user through the affiliate link. The effect is that the user will not see the affiliate link when he hovers over the button or checks the code. It can only be seen when the cloaked redirect process is reviewed by for example a browser plugin like Redirect Path.
Do i need to cloak affiliate links?
Cloaking affiliate links is a good practice for optimizing visibility of your content, or to meet compliance standards. It essentially masks the original URL and replaces it with a link that looks more natural to both visitors and browsers. Depending on your marketing strategies, cloaking affiliate links may increase click-through rate, reduce the chances of being blocked by search engines, and improve efficiency of your campaigns. It also may help you abide by domestic and international compliance regulations. Ultimately, cloaking is up to your discretion; however, it may be beneficial to understand its full capabilities.
Does wecantrack work when I cloak my affiliate links?
Yes it does. We have created different methods in order to be compatible with almost every cloaking approach.
In case you are using WordPress and cloak via cloaking plugins, our system is most likely to already be compliant with the. In case you use a selfmade solution for the cloaking. We have API endpoints and a function available that will allow you to set up a connection with our system.
In-house cloaking solution – How to cloak affiliate links?
If you cloak your affiliate URLs through a self made solution, you will need to make use of our API endpoints to direct your users through affiliate URLs that contain our unique click IDs.
With each click you will send us an API request with which you send us your affiliate URL. Then we will place the necessary SubID parameter with a unique ID in that URL and send it back to you as a response. You will then need to lead the user through that affiliate URL. The whole process does only take a few milliseconds, so it won’t be noticed by your users.
You can set up a fallback function that will direct the user through your original affiliate URL if you did not receive a response from us within X milliseconds. This will ensure that the users will not experience any delays.
In the following document you can find all the relevant information you need to set up your API requests, it also contains sample codes.
WordPress cloaking (redirect) plugin
If you cloak your affiliate URLs through a WordPress plugin, e.g. Pretty Links or Redirection, you will need to use our wecantrack WordPress plugin. Our plugin will automatically detect your affiliate URLs, even though they are cloaked, and place the necessary SubID parameter with our unique WCT ID.
Find out more about how to receive and install our WordPress plugin.