Posted in Affiliate Marketing by Click Consult on 26th of September, 2008

Before an affiliate marketing campaign goes live you should always, always check your banner and website leakage points. A leakage point on a banner would be the website URL being displayed. This is because people may not go through the banner to make a sale, but rather enter the URL directly into their browser and therefore the sale isnt credited to the affiliate and he or she misses out on the commission. Phone numbers on your website is another example of affiliate marketing leakage points. As affiliates are paid on the basis of online transactions, it is difficult to track and assign credit to a sale that is made over the phone. Now this may cause quite the conundrum because you want the average visitors to see your phone number (with some ecommerce websites, up to 50% of people prefer to order over the phone) but you dont want affiliate referred traffic to see any phone numbers. This can be done and it is a job for your web designer. Always remember, before you start your affiliate marketing campaign, check those leakage points and make sure you are encouraging as many affiliates as possible to promote your website.