Campaigns

[FictionNet]

Renee, Renee, Renee... I'm gonna start this issue up again for the bazillionth time

I feel like I've been asking you guys to implement campaign tracking for like ten years now. Is there some reason you can't/won't do it? You've gotta be the only program I know of that doesn't allow it and it REALLY makes a difference when I decide which program to place in an ad spot. I can guarantee than if I consider this when placing advertisers then loads of other affs too.

I'm not sure you realise how much business this must be losing you.

Puleeeze.... can we get this sorted so I'm not asking the same question in another ten years?

Pretty please? With a big, fat cherry on top?

[universal4]

You know I can't let him post this without throwing in my nickel.....LOL

I helped test and debug the campaign tracking Ryan worked on YEARS and years ago....

During the testing phase it worked FLAWLESSLY and to be honest, at the time, it was the absolute BEST campaign tracking any MGS was preparing to offer ever....

BUT....the development of this system stalled and the queries in the back end reporting sytstem were never written and implimented to take proper advantage of the system as it was built.

Over the years I was told over and over that the system as written would NOT track visitors correctly, but it would track and show campaigns when the visitor would convert.

I have said it before and will say it again.

If the campaign information is captured in such a way as to allow the system to show the campaign when the visitor converts, then the campaign information HAS TO BE captured at the visitor's arrival, which means if that campaign information would be stored in the database at that point, it should be retrievable for visitor tracking as well.

Because you guys do such a good job in the weay in which you handle the url string, and since the campaign tracking design dealt with minor adjustments to the url string, I see no reason why you guys could not have just gone ahead and finished the development process that was started so long ago.

I agree that having better tracking might increase my vistor counts toi the Rewards Affiliates properties, but even more so I know I would spend much more time studying my stats with Rewards and work on weaking the traffic I do send in hopes of better conversions....

As before, if you decide to go forward with any kind of campaign tracking I promise I will try and help beta test/provide feedback on any system tests.

Rick
Universal4

[Renee]

Hey guys

Thanks for the feedback..

Rick - the system that Ryan was testing years ago was unfortunately flawed as you stated. Since the coding of the affiliate site was originally done 10 years ago, a lot of the code needs to be rewritten in order for new stuff to fit in properly.

For this reason we have had our coding team compiling a brand new affiliate site from scratch in .NET so that many things that would have taken a long time to implement will be available much easier and quicker (for example some awesome graphs).. This has been in the works for many months now and should be ready for testing quite soon.. So I would say the site won’t be too far away. And trust me, the new site has some AWESOME reporting tools. All members of the aff team have been involved in the build and have put their input from the feedback we have received from affiliates.

Now regarding the campaign tracking, I'm quite sure I've mentioned it on more than one occasion, but we do currently have campaign tracking in place which I am able to send you reports on as often as you need them. These work in the form of:

affXXXXX:campaignid

No spaces, no characters other than letters and numbers with a colon and campaign id immediately following the affiliate id.

If you want to start using this, please email me and I'll get you started.

Let me know if you have any more questions.
Cheers

[universal4]

Sorry, but the campaign tracking does not track with visits.

And if the campaign is captured at time of conversion, the campaign should track at time of visit.

The system that Ryan worked on did in fact work, track all visits, was never incorrect that I could determine, the only thing it lacked were better reports to be integrated into the affiliate backend.(such as a report that showed visits for specific campaigns and which ones converted to downloads, signups etc...

Any campaign tracking that doesn't show what campaigns the visitors came from is not very full featured...

Rick
Universal4

[Renee]

All this stuff is cause for a new site Rick

It's being worked on.

[Chips]

Time to chime in on this.

I am all for campaign tracking as well but would want to be able to see it myself.

Also, if the bounceback could work for a specific domain/campaign... If I have RA on 4 websites, I need the bounce back to work independently for each given domain.

As it stands now, if I set up a bounceback to my landing page for site "A" then the visitor on site B, C and D all go to the same landing (bounceback) page. I really would like to see a way to have multiple bouncebacks tied to a campaign.

This would also work out if I had a poker BB and a casino BB page. That way a poker visitor sees my poker landing page while the casino player goes to a casino lander.

Since you are "working on it" please add the above to the wish lists.

[universal4]

Now that is a great suggestion Chips....

If any changes are being made I too would love to see this considered....

Rick
Universal4

[FictionNet]

The can of worms is open - Renee lurrrves me

[Renee]

Yeah Rob you really are a pain in my ass

I'm just kidding of course.. All of these comments mean that we will have the best affiliate program out there.. So it doesn't bother me to receive them - I just wish you guys would email them to me so the other programs don't have a step up on us

OK to the serious stuff..

Chips - I will forward that over to the guys, however the function wont be available on site release. That's something they will need to add in once the site is up and running as we want to get the new site out so everyone can start using the new functions.

The campaign tracking is very high on our priority list...

[universal4]

Well to be honest Renee, I really like the Rewards Affiliate program, but when it comes to campaign tracking a number of other programs have offered some form of it for many years....even though what Ryan worked on would have been years ahead of others it was never completed....

You have set many trends such as the bounce-back and a few other items....we would all love to see you improve on this every important item as well.

Obviously I hope you are looking at no matter what system you go tomwards will continue to support and track all old links etc....and what would be ideal is for a very similar format of tracking that is in place now...just more options available.

Rick
Universal4