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NewMom0208
Joined: 15 May 2008
Posts: 51
Location: Miramar, FL
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 Posted: Wed Jun 11, 2008 5:01 pm Post subject: What is click cloaking and is it necesary? |
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Sorry, newbie here asking away
What is click cloaking and is it necessary? |
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NewMom0208
Joined: 15 May 2008
Posts: 51
Location: Miramar, FL
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| Posted: Fri Jun 13, 2008 6:02 pm Post subject: |
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Found a definition
serving different content to search engine spiders than to human visitors. Cloaking is basically a "bait and switch" tactic, where the web server feeds visiting spiders content that is keyword-rich, thus fooling the search engine into placing that page higher in the search results. Yet when the visitor clicks on the link they are given different content, which may be totally unrelated. Search engines frown upon this practice and some will penalize or ban sites that they catch doing it
Source: http://www.seoglossary.com/ |
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Rosalind Gardner
Site Admin
Joined: 02 Nov 2005
Posts: 803
Location: Beautiful BC, Canada
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| Posted: Sun Jun 15, 2008 3:46 pm Post subject: What is link cloaking? |
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Hi NewMom0208,
That's one definition.
The meaning that is most attributable to affiliate marketing purposes however is the use of coding to hide the fact that the link is an affiliate link from site visitors.
Doing so is not so important in most mainstream niche markets, i.e. dating, where people don't really care or notice if a link is an affiliate or merchant link.
I generally use onmouseover code to show a root domain name in the status bar if I think my visitors will check the link or be put off by an affiliate link.
Here is the code that I add to the link...
| Code: | | onMouseOut="window.status=''; return true" onMouseOver="window.status='http://rooturl.com'; return true" target="new" rel="nofollow" |
The other option is to use software to generate cloaked links, such as Affiliate Link Cloaker by Jim Edwards.
Hope that helps.
Cheers,
Ros
Last edited by Rosalind Gardner on Wed Jun 18, 2008 12:47 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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NewMom0208
Joined: 15 May 2008
Posts: 51
Location: Miramar, FL
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| Posted: Mon Jun 16, 2008 2:06 pm Post subject: |
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I see, in my case, I think I need to do this. The status bar can just show the website description instead of the link itself
Now, where does that code go?
I am using wordpress and, while I know some HTML, the code seems to be php which I don't know at all.
Thank you! |
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Jim Hutchinson
Moderator
Joined: 17 Jan 2006
Posts: 562
Location: Iowa, USA
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| Posted: Mon Jun 16, 2008 2:47 pm Post subject: |
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| NewMom0208 wrote: | Now, where does that code go?
I am using wordpress and, while I know some HTML, the code seems to be php which I don't know at all. |
When editing a page or post in WordPress, the editor has 2 tabs: HTML and Code. You can use the HTML (graphical) as you normally would to position the link. Highlight the text you want to link and click the chain link icon on the button bar. That will pop up a box for the link details.
Once done with that, you can switch to the Code view to put the other code in it that Ros gave you to hide the URL. That code will go inside the link, such as:
<a href="affiliate-link" JavaScript "here">
Hope that helps.
Jim Hutchinson |
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seemediet
Joined: 19 Jun 2008
Posts: 7
Location: HOT HOT HOT Arizona
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| Posted: Fri Jun 20, 2008 12:57 am Post subject: |
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Wow Jim, you even helped clear it up for me (and that's saying a lot) LOL  Thanks!!
Smiles,
~Nikki |
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jpatriar
Joined: 29 Jan 2006
Posts: 32
Location: Watertown, MA
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| Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2008 8:29 am Post subject: Re: What is link cloaking? |
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| Rosalind Gardner wrote: | Hi NewMom0208,
That's one definition.
The meaning that is most attributable to affiliate marketing purposes however is the use of coding to hide the fact that the link is an affiliate link from site visitors.
Doing so is not so important in most mainstream niche markets, i.e. dating, where people don't really care or notice if a link is an affiliate or merchant link.
I generally use onmouseover code to show a root domain name in the status bar if I think my visitors will check the link or be put off by an affiliate link.
Here is the code that I add to the link...
| Code: | | onMouseOut="window.status=''; return true" onMouseOver="window.status='http://rooturl.com'; return true" target="new" rel="nofollow" |
The other option is to use software to generate cloaked links, such as Affiliate Link Cloaker by Jim Edwards.
Hope that helps.
Cheers,
Ros |
Hi Ros,
I cloaked my afffiliate links almost the same way. However, if I'm not mistaken window.status no longer works in IE 7.x by default. There is a way of enabling it in the options.
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/ie/aa740486.aspx
Release Notes for Internet Explorer 7
Status Bar Scripting--Scripts will no longer be able to set the status bar text through the window.status and window.defaultStatus methods by default in the Internet and Restricted Zones. This helps prevent attackers from leveraging those methods to spoof the status bar. To revert to previous behavior and allow scripts to set the status bar through window.status and window.defaultStatus, follow these steps:
Open Internet Explorer, click the Tools button, click Internet Options, and then click the Security tab.
Click Internet or Restricted sites, and then click the Custom level button.
Scroll down to Allow status bar updates via script, select Enable.
Click OK until you return to Internet Explorer.
They can be masked this way however. Mouseover a banner or a text link and the first href (URL-To-Display) is displayed in the status bar. Upon a click the href is replaced with the link (my-affiliate-link) in the onMouseDown. It only works on the first click, hover over the banner or text link again and the full affiliate url is displayed in the status bar. However the tracking has already been recorded.
| Code: | <!-- start -->
<a href="http://www.URL-To-Display.com" onMouseDown="this.href='http://www.my-affiliate-link.com?aff_id=myaffiliateID';" target="_blank">Anchor Text</a>
<!-- end --> |
Lastly, many affiliates use php code to mask affiliate id's.
Cheers,
LBSO |
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Jim Hutchinson
Moderator
Joined: 17 Jan 2006
Posts: 562
Location: Iowa, USA
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| Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2008 12:39 pm Post subject: Re: What is link cloaking? |
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| jpatriar wrote: | | They can be masked this way however. Mouseover a banner or a text link and the first href (URL-To-Display) is displayed in the status bar. Upon a click the href is replaced with the link (my-affiliate-link) in the onMouseDown. It only works on the first click, hover over the banner or text link again and the full affiliate url is displayed in the status bar. However the tracking has already been recorded. |
I think OnMouseDown is pretty much worthless for setting the status bar. It has other uses that suit it better.
Do you look at the status bar when clicking a link? Normally people check the status bar, if they even know what a status bar is, when they hover the mouse over a link, not while they are clicking it.
If you are concerned about hiding the link, or have a long one, then the best option is to shorten it before putting that link online. |
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jpatriar
Joined: 29 Jan 2006
Posts: 32
Location: Watertown, MA
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| Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2008 1:26 pm Post subject: Re: What is link cloaking? |
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| Jim Hutchinson wrote: | | jpatriar wrote: | | They can be masked this way however. Mouseover a banner or a text link and the first href (URL-To-Display) is displayed in the status bar. Upon a click the href is replaced with the link (my-affiliate-link) in the onMouseDown. It only works on the first click, hover over the banner or text link again and the full affiliate url is displayed in the status bar. However the tracking has already been recorded. |
I think OnMouseDown is pretty much worthless for setting the status bar. It has other uses that suit it better.
Do you look at the status bar when clicking a link? Normally people check the status bar, if they even know what a status bar is, when they hover the mouse over a link, not while they are clicking it.
If you are concerned about hiding the link, or have a long one, then the best option is to shorten it before putting that link online. |
How can the link be shortened and still track?
I always check the status bar, but the OnMouseDown doesn't really set the status bar, what will be displayed on the status bar is the url in the first href by default, Upon execution of OnMouseDown (OnClick would also work) the href attribute is "replaced" with the affiliate link via (this.href=) so it now becomes the active link, (and appears in the address bar as well).
Hover over the link again and the affiliate url is displayed in the status bar since we passed the affiliate link to the href attribute. |
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Jim Hutchinson
Moderator
Joined: 17 Jan 2006
Posts: 562
Location: Iowa, USA
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| Posted: Mon Jul 28, 2008 2:00 pm Post subject: Re: What is link cloaking? |
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| jpatriar wrote: | | How can the link be shortened and still track? |
There are many URL shortening services, including an option to do it on your own domain. However, those services simply redirect the visitors. Redirected links are not tracked because no web page is accessed from the server.
There is a way to track it though. You can set up a web page and use the META Refresh option in the header. Then any time someone visits that page, the server tracks the visits.
Create a new web page and use the code below to redirect your visitors to the affiliate link.
| Code: | <html><head>
<title>PAGE TITLE</title>
<META HTTP-EQUIV="refresh" content="0;URL=YOUR-AFFILIATE-URL"> </head>
<body>
</body>
</html> |
Change PAGE TITLE to the name of the product.
Change YOUR-AFFILIATE-URL to your affiliate link.
Save the page as a .html file with a short but descriptive name, such as superaffiliate.html
Upload that file to your website and test it.
To remove the .html from the link, create a folder instead of the file name above. Save the file itself as index.html inside that folder and upload them to your site.
Then you will visit your-site.com/superaffiliate to get redirected.
Hope that helps. |
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