Linking Guidelines?

Hi everyone,

Here's something that I've been wondering for quite a while now...

As affiliates, can we link directly to our affiliate links?

For example, with the following code that we are provided:


<a href="http://www.kqzyfj.com/click-xxxxxxx-xxxxxxxx" target="_top" >Some text goes here</a><img src="http://www.tqlkg.com/image-xxxxxxx-xxxxxxxx" width="1" height="1" border="0">


Does CJ allow its affiliates to link directly to "http://www.kqzyfj.com/click-xxxxxxx-xxxxxxxx" when using CPC programs such as AdWords?

Also, would it be acceptable to use meta-refresh on a page to automatically redirect users to an affiliate link? Or perhaps use Tiny url or some other URL shortening service with these links?

I've seen some people using these methods, but was never sure if it's violating the TOS.

Thanks!

 

yes you can do it

you will get no impression or CTR statistic on CJ.

This have been discussed last month in this forum but with non conclusion,

I *think* that this is against TOS due this is the called "forced click" - but I'm not sure.

also I think that this would produce invalid clicks as tiny-url would not be recognized by CJ servers as your site reference.

invalid clicks = no sales

after a lot of invalid clicks you could be banned from CJ

I would not mess with this redirect stuff unless you get approved by CJ staff to do it or you find here someone that do it without problems.

 

HI, thanks. this is new information for me. i wanna be try this.

 

Thanks Micromag!

 

"Does CJ allow its affiliates to link directly to "http://www.kqzyfj.com/click-xxxxxxx-xxxxxxxx" when using CPC programs such as AdWords?"

Yes, but does the merchant? You should ask them first just to make sure, it's up to them.

"Also, would it be acceptable to use meta-refresh on a page to automatically redirect users to an affiliate link?"

No, that's forced clicks, it's against the Publisher TOS.

 

I have been promoting a lot of Merchants using direct link using PPC stuff.

I am not telling that you're wrong, now thinking well maybe with this we're hurting Merchant's banner CTR statistics.

But from my experience I never had problems with this kind of use.

What you need to take very care is the restrictions regarding the PPC use for each Policy for each Merchant.

 

Yep, most don't have a problem, some do. Sometimes they have it in the merchant details or the keyword link. I wish more merchants would use it and put their policies out there so it's very easy to find. They've become a little more strict on that with the Google rules of 1 domain showing up per search. So they might be doing inhouse PPC and want their ad to show and would want their affiliates to bring the traffic to the affiliate site first then off to the merchant. Depends on the merchant

 

Ok, thanks guys!