Networks and Cookie Occurrences - Transparency Needed

[Matthew Wood]

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An old topic however I'm doing some research on cookie occurences and following up from Qui Gon Jinns excellent post in January. I feel there is still some clarity needed in this area and it affects YOU perhaps more than you realise.

How many affiliates have actually done research into this and finding huge amounts of merchants on various networks that will ONLY pay for the first sale unless the cookie has been deleted? Fair enough if the commission is fair versus the Lifetime value of the customer (LTV) but often its not. I think this really has crept in through the backdoor over the last few months and has gone un-noticed by affiliates.

So back to networks - with Commission Junction merchants can set the number of occurences for which the cookie and thus commissions payable will be valid for within the program setup - but what about the other networks? is it fair to presume that they are set to unlimited unless stated by the merchant?

I have my own feelings onthis but thought it best to see if we can get clarification now.

Updated: (networks can we presume these are correct statements?)

• CJ - unlimited unless stated within program terms (big thumbs up for transparency here)
• DGM - Unlimited within cookie period??
• AF - All cookies are 30 days - unlimited within cookies period unless stated in program terms.
• Buy.at - Cookie duration varies - recurring events clearly stated within program terms (again big thumbs up for transparency)

More networks to follow...

We can then look at the merchants with single occurence cookies as this small and often dis-regarded piece of data can affect your returns from one program over another.

Matthew

[Rich]

Here's a related thread with some info from Buy.at and AF http://www.a4uforum.co.uk/showthread...ght=occurences

[KevinEdwards]

Hi,

dgm's referrals are unlimited within the cookie period.


Thanks,

[Matthew Wood]

Thanks Rich and Kevin.

Kevin is that statement correct for programs that are on dual networks with yourselves??

I just felt this was an ambigous area where clarification is needed in black and white here. I'll update the top post as and when we get clarification in from networks.

Matthew.

[Qui Gon Jinn]

The problem is that saying there is unlimited sales during cookie period, doesn't mean there actually is .. it should also say in programs details for ALL networks. . so at least we can call upon that if need be.

I am looking at a few programs at moment & already see conflicting information for a program on dual networks. I do feel that the concept & important aspect of cookie duration has been mis-sold to affiliates .. but i have been repeating myself like a parrot on that one for a while.

Here is a list of UK Merchants on CJ, it's an improvement on when we first rallied on this maybe 18 months ago do so perhaps they may want to have a task of bringing these around so as to shorten the list. However on Merchants from the US on CJ it seems a lost worse. But credit to CJ at least we know (tranparency), but on the whole better to have pan-network understanding that all sales in cookie period are unlimited (maybe a few exceptions). From the list below it is about 20% of their programs are on a once only ARO

ADVFN
Betfair
Betfred.com Sportsbook
British Airways
Capital One
DatingDirect.com
Easy Loans
eBay.co.uk
essentialtravel.co.uk
eurobet.com
Freelance Work Exchange (On lead)
Goodhealth Worldwide
Gumtree On Lead
Hobsons
Homechoice
HotMat - Free Mouse Pads
KING.COM
Lastminute.com
Laura Ashley
Littlewoods Home Shopping
Loans.co.uk
Luckysurf.co.uk
LX Direct
marbles.com
Marks and Spencer (and only a 4 day cookie)
Meetic UK
Napster UK
Orient-Express
PaydayUK
RaceBook.com
Search123
STA Travel (On lead)
Surpriseyourwoman
T-Mobile UK
The Origins Network
Totalbet.com
Totesport
vBulletin
Virility Health
YouCanGetMe (On lead)

After this exercise it maybe worthwhile lookg at Merchants with a cookie less than 30 days
Aiming for standard Minimum 30 day cookie
& Unlimited sales during any cookie period
& Complusary remuneration for lost tracking
& Compulsary payment for program closure with out 30 day warning

[Darren]

I'm with Paul on this one. We need absolutely transparency on this issue from every single network. We need to understand, also, why a merchant would chose not to pay for unlimited action occurances within the cookie duration too! Have they budgeted their affiliate program and commission structure appropriately, for example.

RE: the lost tracking and program closure with zero notice. The issue here, IMO, is the networks en masse aren't prepared to rock the boat and write these things into standard terms and conditions, in fear of losing their contract with that merchant.

There's been far too many occasions over the years where you get an email from a network saying 'this program has closed, remove links now, no commission will be paid from now on' - this is totally unacceptable and we need to demand a provision for a minimum period of notice. Perhaps we, as affiliates, should consider re-negotiating the terms we have with the networks? Just how many networks would not be prepared to, if there was a risk of losing all their biggest-earning affiliates? They'd have to listen.

It's sad to see that a topic of this magnitude in importance terms has had so few replies, given it's been viewed 194 times!

Come on guys and gals - we're all losing money because of this!

[Swiss]

I wasn't even aware that merchants were doing this with their programs, so in my opinion it isn't really made clear when applying to join them - Unless I haven't been very observant that is. But yes, it is quite an important variable to be considered when deciding whether to promote the merchant in question compared to one of their competitors.

[KevinEdwards]

To reiterate, all transactions within the cookie period (last referring click permitting) will be tracked for all advertisers on the network.

In other words all advertisers offer multiple referrers.


Thanks,

[Qui Gon Jinn]

A Polite Quest for CJ

http://www.a4uforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=41468

[OMG Network]

On OMG tracked programmes multiple sales occurances are counted within the cookie period in all instances.

[Peter Dunham]

Hi

All webgains merchants pay for all sales during the cookie period, there is no facility to limit this within the webgains system except where specific quotas are in place for lead generation programs. Where this is the case (we have only ever had one), it is stated explicitly.

However, as many affiliates are no doubt aware, merchants can employ their own local tracking and decide whether or not to notify a network of a sale.

Although we have only come across this once (and worked with the merchant to stop the practice), it is worth being aware of.

Regards

[Qui Gon Jinn]

Peter,

Should something then be written into contracts to protect affiliate & network revenues on the point you mentioned.

[Rich]

However, as many affiliates are no doubt aware, merchants can employ their own local tracking and decide whether or not to notify a network of a sale.

Surely this is the sort of thing that networks should be proactively monitoring.

From a networks broad stats it should be very easy to monitor programs that never report more than one sale per click, or that only report sales within 24 hrs of a click when it should be a 30 day cookie, or that fail to report any sales for x hrs, or that stop reporting sales from deeplinks, etc and automatically email account managers to look into things.

I don't see much sign that networks are taking these steps to automatically monitor programs and it often seems it is left to affiliates to spot the problems.

[Peter Dunham]

Hi Rich

Thanks for raising this, it gives me a good change to wax lyrical about something we put in place early December last year

We have a performance alert system that allows account managers to add alerting rules for any merchant eg, number of sales in a period, number of requests to our sales tracking system (regardless of whether a commission was paid) , level of sales in a period, significant statistical changes etc. It does a lot more as well, but you get the idea.

These rules then generate alerts to account managers that they act on to fix. We did it this way because no 2 programs are alike, nor are trends easily predictable; seasonality changes the profile of most programs, as do promotions and other events.

It has proven very valuable in spotting the common problem of accidental tracking code removal and performance drops caused by other factors. It was also designed to add new rules easily, so your suggestion of looking at changes in average click2sale time, perhaps compared with cookie level is a good one.

This system was partly prompted by the problem highlighted in this thread, but of course any system of this nature relies heavily on having "correct" historical data to use as a comparison.

[Peter Dunham]

Peter,

Should something then be written into contracts to protect affiliate & network revenues on the point you mentioned.

Good point, we have general duty/warranty clauses but I'll ask Robert to check whether it covers this.