I am having some significant problems with very controlled sale transactions through CJ links not being logged as sales. The impression and click traffic is coming through perfectly, but the sales are not being logged or recognized. I contacted CJ, and they verified that my links are being correctly used since the clicks are tracking, but requested I contact the advertisers directly regarding the sales. Is sale recognition on CJ really this spotty? Is there anything I can do to make this more robust or troubleshoot the issues? My confidence in CJ is very low at this point.
What advertiser are you having problems with? I never have any issues with the advertisers that I use. I also help manage a few affiliate programs on CJ, and our backend tracking numbers (for transactions that came through CJ) always match the number on CJ's end, so their tracking pixels are accurate.
There are a lot of security programs installed in today's Spamware/Adware climate that kill your cookies. There are unethical publishers that will simply kill your sale. So it's very possible that circumstances outside your control are killing your sales. You are not alone in losing verifiable sales. And unless you do significant volume for CJ or the Affiliate - no one really cares (It's a sad reality). Microsoft Internet Explorer will automatically kill any cookies that are set in framed redirects. Affiliate Marketing - it's a simple business no?
Advertisers generally have tracking built into their websites. For example, at some merchants (but not all, by far) if you purchase a product through a CJ affiliate link, the marketing source (CJ) and other data (sometimes including the PID) is recorded in the merchant's sale database. Other advertisers use third-party marketing tracking solutions to combine data from all of their campaigns (search, affiliate, etc...) so they have another record of how many CJ transactions come through. And lastly, some smaller merchants have no such backend tracking. It's impossible to know who is using what, or if they have CJ's pixels coded properly into the page. Contact CJ and the merchant so that they can work together to see if the pixel is coded properly to fire when a sale is made.
I appreciate the responses, but it's extremely frustrating when: - Your customers tell you of verifiable sales and the activity doesn't come through, so... - You run some test sales YOURSELF (with optimal browser settings) and they don't come through then either. That's simply fraud. And the fact that they are getting away with it is difficult to swallow.
Talk with CJ. The most likely explanation is not spyware, adware, security programs removing cookies, or anything like that - it could be that the merchant's tech team modified something & now the pixel doesn't fire correctly. CJ will want to get this corrected ASAP if there's an issue with the merchant. On average, CJ gets 30% of the commission that's paid to you as their fee, so they're getting screwed as well if the pixels aren't working. By looking at their EPC, it's clear that Booksfree.com is having at least some sales reported correctly (otherwise they'd have an EPC of $0). Make sure to check your links to make sure that they have the correct PID, and then contact CJ using the Contact Us link within your account. Let us know what happens...