Optimize Your Commissions With These Affiliate Tools

ClickBank provides affiliates with many useful tools to help you refer customers, track your commission stats and calculate earnings. Use the tools below to help you earn the most with your ClickBank account!

  1. Create a HopLink
  2. Cloak a HopLink
  3. Passing Parameters
  4. Calculating Commissions
  5. Track My Campaign
  6. Instant Notification service

1. Create a HopLink

Your HopLinks should be targeted to the top level of the current window and should be in the following format:

http://AFFILIATE.VENDOR.hop.clickbank.net

This is what it looks like in html:

<a href="http://AFFILIATE.VENDOR.hop.clickbank.net"
     target="_top">CLICK HERE</a>

Here's how to make it work...

  • Replace AFFILIATE with your affiliate Nickname
  • Replace VENDOR with the vendor Nickname
  • Replace CLICK HERE with any promotional text or image you prefer

For example, to make a HopLink to the Marketplace, use "Marketplace" as the VENDOR name in your HopLink:

http://AFFILIATE.marketplace.hop.clickbank.net

Be sure to replace "AFFILIATE" with your own ClickBank affiliate Nickname.

To open a HopLink in a new window set the target attribute of the HopLink to "_blank". Here's an example:

<a href="http://AFFILIATE.VENDOR.hop.clickbank.net"
     target="_blank">Click Here!</a>

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2. Cloak a HopLink

There are a few different options available to cloak a HopLink. The simplest approach is to use the HopLink Shield, which encodes the affiliate and vendor nicknames.

If you prefer to also cloak the ClickBank portion of the HopLink we recommend sending the customer to a URL of your own that redirects them through the correct HopLink. To do this uses the HTML below. Don't forget to replace each occurrence of AFFILIATE and VENDOR with the correct value!

HopLink Cloaker HTML:

<html>
<head>
<title>Loading page...</title>
<meta http-equiv="refresh" content="2;URL=http://AFFILIATE.VENDOR.hop.clickbank.net">
<script>
url='http://AFFILIATE.VENDOR.hop.clickbank.net';
if(document.images) { top.location.replace(url); }
else { top.location.href=url; }
</script>
</head>
<body>Loading
<a href=http://AFFILIATE.VENDOR.hop.clickbank.net>page</a>...
</body>
</html>

If your web server runs php you can use this simple script instead:

HopLink Cloaker PHP Script:

<?php
header("Location: http://AFFILIATE.VENDOR.hop.clickbank.net");
?>

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3. Passing Parameters

If you want to pass other parameters through the HopLink to arrive at the target URL we will pass up to 64 bytes of QUERY_STRING data through to the target URL.

For example:

http://bonnie.clyde.hop.clickbank.net/?ZZ=1&YY=123abC

Would redirect to...

http://clydes-website.com/script.php?hop=bonnie&ZZ=1&YY=123abC

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4. Calculating Commissions

Here is an example of the commission calculation if you are promoting a product that offers a 55% commission:

Retail Price: $29.95
Subtract 7.5% + $1 -$3.25
Net Sale Amount: $26.70
55% of the Remainder: $14.69

Therefore, as the referring affiliate for this sale, you would earn $14.69.

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5. Track My Campaign

As an affiliate, the tracking code enhancement provides the power to track and manage your campaigns by tying a specific sale back to the promotion that initiated it. The tracking code is implemented throughout the ClickBank system as "tid". The format of the HopLink URL with a tracking code is located below.

http://AFFILIATE.VENDOR.hop.clickbank.net?tid=zzzzz

In order for the feature to work properly, you must adhere to these standards during its implementation. The tracking code value, which is "zzzzz" in the example above, can be 24 characters long, containing alpha and numeric characters only. Any value longer than 24 characters will be truncated. Any value containing characters other than alpha or numeric will have the entire tracking code value removed from the HopLink, order process and, will not show in the transaction report. Tracking code values received with lower case characters will be set to all uppercase. The tracking code parameter, which is "tid" in the example above, must be lower case.

For more information about implementing tracking codes please refer to the 2006-11-14 Release Summary.

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6. Instant Notification service

The Instant Notification service notifies clients via HTTP of different types of transactions that occur within the ClickBank system for their account. Each post contains a group of URL Parameters relevant to the transaction. The feature is designed to allow you to easily integrate your back-end operations with the ClickBank transaction management system.

Important: This service is not required. Standard notifications and sales statistics are not affected by this service.

For more information about the Instant Notification service, click here.

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