To Michael - CasinoCity.

[Moonlight Cat]

I am the fan of CasinoCity.com, and search some casinos/sportsbook sites on CasinoCity very often. Couple of weeks ago i install AbBlock plagin to my Chrome and detect that many aff.links on CasinoCity don't open. The reason is: target="_blank" (New Window).


I think, is better to change "_blank" to "_self". I done the same on some of my sites. And numbers of click and registration grow. Now i think, "_self" is better than "_blank". I will do the same changes on all my sites shortly.

Sorry for my English.

[pokeraussie]

I highly doubt that is the reason. It isn't just aff links that open in a new window.

[eenzoo]

I highly doubt that is the reason. It isn't just aff links that open in a new window.

In fact all Netrefer links are blocked by "Adblock Plus" if open _blank!

[pokeraussie]

In fact all Netrefer links are blocked by "Adblock Plus" if open _blank!

Wow how stupid is that.

[Sherlock]

In fact all Netrefer links are blocked by "Adblock Plus" if open _blank!

I am afraid at least unibet links are blocked if open all methods. I do not even see the link in my browser with adblock.

[TheGooner]

This has been discussed here two or three times over the last year. Pop-up windows (even the _blank variety) are considered a high spammy indicator by the blockers and unless it's a really trusted location it will be suppressed.

And if you think about it neutrally (not as an affiliate) they are right, it's just advertising and if the site/reader really wanted to go there as a good location then they would open in the same window and send the reader on their way.

I don't see this changing anytime soon - especially with mobile growing and wanting to avoid multiple windows on small screen devices.

[Muppet]

"_self" is pointless for most purposes. Removing "_blank" and not replacing with anything would have the same effect.

An easy solution if you want to retain "_blank" is to open a page on your own domain with the link and use that page to redirect to the affiliate link, as ad blockers usually won't block links to the same domain. You can even use your redirecting page to log information about the click if you want. If you are not centralising your links like this already you are no doubt wasting time and effort on changing links all over the place whenever a program changes them.

I am afraid at least unibet links are blocked if open all methods. I do not even see the link in my browser with adblock.

Ad blockers still may block the affiliate link anyway, depending on the URL structure and domain used by the affiliate program and whether it matches the ad blocker's set of filters. This has nothing to do with whether the link was opened in a new window or not. It is simply a block on any requests made by the browser using regex matching. It could be because the string 'unibet' is on the ad blockers filter list, or maybe they have something like '/ads/' in their URLs. There could be many reasons.

Your time would probably be better spent logging some information about how many people visiting your site actually use ad blockers and determining whether they are even worth worrying about. You can even log this info using Google Analytics these days. Yes I know it sounds counter intuitive because people with ad blockers are going to block GA too. But GA has a server side endpoint called the Measurement Protocol that you can use to log info using your own server.
https://developers.google.com/analyt...n/protocol/v1/

[Moonlight Cat]

depending on the URL structure

Maybe using short url is OK?

[Sherlock]

There are ways to go around. I am just crushing the fu**ers with adblocks (yeah I am one of them) with even more intrusive advertisement. My friend who has ad company says that adblock traffic has higher rates than normal. So it is worth of some effort.

Whole http://adserving.unibet.com is on the index. I spoke with Unibet AM, they say they are looking for solution, I think they will rotate some domains (but I am not sure about that now). Either way anything containing "ad" should be forgetten. Also any codes with numbers e.g. "300x250" or "728x90" should not be served to affiliates anymore.

[Muppet]

Maybe using short url is OK?

No. The short URL just redirects to a real affiliate link and if that matches the filter list it will be blocked. It doesn't matter if it does 1 redirection or 20. Ad blockers look at the location for every request made by your browser, not just the links you click on. That is how they block images, scripts, and other stuff, not just entire pages.

Unibet are naive to be using a subdomain with "adserving" in it. Though if their entire domain is being targeted by a filter list then switching to something else is only ever likely to be temporary as someone is specifically trying to block their ads. The bigger more well known brands are more likely to be affected like that because their ads probably appear on high profile sites that attract more attention.

the fu**ers with adblocks (yeah I am one of them)

Me too. Apart from the general annoyance of flashing banner ads and overlays, the wasted bandwidth on mobiles in particular, and my dislike of being tracked around the web by the likes of Facebook, Twitter and Google, ad networks are a recurrent source of malware infection so I think its crazy to browse without one.

[gratisbingo]

very interesting , so adblock block textlinks to ?

by the way , i hate popup ads .

[Sherlock]

Sure. Funny story. I had once a domain that was used for redirections of traffic to overcome the blocks (my experience is that it works for a while). That domain was blocked after a while. I did not know that and went into domain administration (with adblock on) and I saw that domain missing. I was like "wow, someone stole my domain". I exchanged some emails with the domain registrar, that claimed that everything is ok. Desperate, I tried different browser and saw the domain there and then suddenly realized the whole story.

[TheGooner]

Yes - I've checked bookmaker landing pages while having adblocker on - and experienced similar things.

Landing at a page that's almost completely blank with no images or clicks ... thinking WTF is this bookie (coral) thinking.
Then checking back without ad-blocker and the page looks normal with graphics advertising the special offer.

It's well worth checking out the customer experience with ad-blocker yourself ... as it explains why conversions are down at most sites.

[Aeternus]

I changed all my links a while back to open in the same window and they are working with Adblock. I think you miss out a lot of traffic with opening links in a new window with so many using Adblock.

[universal4]

We have a couple of threads here in the public realm that discuss adblocker as well as link masking with some tips that might help some folks.

Rick
Universal4