Need US Residents for a Link Test

[DomainRecap]

Thanks

 

[poweredbyme]

what is link test? Are you looking for someone who will click on a link from the US ?

 

[DomainRecap]

what is link test? Are you looking for someone who will click on a link from the US ?

Yeah, since early August, I've been having serious trouble with the site registering US affiliate clicks, as it used to be the main source, but it's gone down to virtually zero now.

Still the same or higher from GB, India, Canada, Australia, but US has dropped, so I tested it the site was GEO-blocked (apparently not), hacked (again, tested with every internal/external tool available and nothing), so I am thinking it's an issue on Commission Junction or GoDaddy.

Site traffic is (was) growing and page views were up for August, but it seems that either everyone in the US stopped clicking, or the clicks are being skimmed or diverted elsewhere. Who knows what happened, but on August 8th, I went from averaging high 3-figures clicks from the US to absolute zero. Like absolutely no US clicks for weeks.

It's got so bad that I'm having a hard time getting the energy to update the site, as it's not even paying for server costs this month, and I won't pay $$$ as well as put in the time and effort in the morning/lunch/after work. Even I'm not that crazy.

 

[poweredbyme]

I am an experienced webmaster for about 15 years. I can help you more than just a click. I know well about CPA networks including CJ and many other website related things.
Have you tried to click from a VPN or proxy website?
Have you recently checked if the CPA links you advertise are still accepting traffic from the US? As you know most CPA offers target a particular country and CPA offers change quite frequently, almost monthly. You may contact CJ if you are sure the website can be browsed with no probelm from the US. But if other CPA networks have the same issue, then you should look for the problem in your website codes and servers (http and dns servers).
It's quite possible some page elements or javascripts that are hosted by third party servers block the page loading if accessed from particular IP range. I should look at the html codes. There are many other possibilities.

 

[DomainRecap]

Thanks, and I have talked to both GD and CJ about this (as well as doing a lot of the above, like using VPNs, link testing, and others), as well as having GD techs test the links (they went through fine and were cataloged at both GD and CJ) and it looks like it comes down to a new algorithm they are using to determine "duplicate clicks" like one person comes to the site and clicks on 30 links - now a lot of those won't be counted, when in the past they would.

That would definitely impact a site like mine, where people are clicking on multiple auctions per visit.

I also did some link monitoring myself, and there are quite a few alt-browsers hitting the site that don't seem to be counted anymore, not to mention the issues with the latest version of Firefox.

Thanks again for the reply.

 

[poweredbyme]

Duplicate clicks are no longer counted? It's a good news. Most duplicate clicks are made by bots. Humans, normally, are not expected to click the same link for more than once or twice.

Only the US clicks affected, because most servers are located in the US including the servers that run bots for crawling. Bots may follow all the links when they crawl websites. Bots except a few good bots need to be blocked carefully as most bots, except a few, don't do something good for your website. But it's not an easy task as there are thousands of bots and blocking capacity is limited by server resources. I think most likely CJ/GD have decided to count only the first click from the same IP.

In short, those were bot clicks. I haven't taken this probability into consideration. Because I thought your revenue has also dropped.

Even if only the first click is counted, it can still be a bot click. Most clicks will usually be fake bot clicks (even if you don't count 99% of them) unless human visits are way bigger than bot visits. Because there are too many different bots and their CTR is much higher than humans. I wouldn't care about number of clicks in CPA as it's not predictable. I would look at only the number of conversions and number of real human visitors. But bots can inflate website traffic stats as well.

I am happy to know that the issue in your stats is resolved.

 

[DomainRecap]

I think most likely CJ/GD have decided to count only the first click from the same IP.

Yep, but the question they couldn't answer was how this could affect a site like mine, where the same person may click on multiple links on the same page, from the same IP, and how the new duplicate click algorithm would handle those.

And as for the revenue question, yes revenue is noticeably down (drop is limited to CJ and GD, everything else is consistent + visitor metrics keep trending up), which is why I'm concerned that something is wrong or has changed.

 

[poweredbyme]

The easiest algorithm would be to count based on IP for only once per x hours, usually per 24 hours. In fact I can't think of an alternative way. This is the algorithm used by almost all ad networks. Because it's one of the most common criteria offered to online advertisers.

Number of clicks should be irrelevant to conversions. But I think I got your point. You probably mean if the second or third click converts from the same IP, will it be counted? In my opinion it should. Because they charge advertisers based on conversion. When they charge an advertiser they should automatically credit publisher account as payable commissions unless they also promote the same CPA offer and keep the commissions that are the result of clicks on their own web properties.

They are registered companies. They must record all revenues and expenses. Charging an advertiser is revenue for them. Without recording their expense (publisher commission) for that revenue their financial records would be questionable for inconsistent profit margins. Profit margin is expected to be flat or stable. If they don't count some of your commissions they would make exceptional profits in some activities, in some advertisers, in some time intervals or in some publishers. Educated eyes of a finance expert can spot it. They have to credit your publisher account if a click from your site converts. But the actual situation may be different especially if the outcome is subtle in the size of their business and if they intentionally don't count publisher commissions partially in a way which is very difficult to spot. I don't think this can be the case as nothing would be worth risking commercial goodwill. It's very less likely. Of course all of these are hypothetical without proofs.


If the revenue drop is limited to CJ and GD and if the same pages have other CPA links from other CPA networks which are working normal, then you can do nothing as your website has no problem. But it's a bit weird there is revenue drop in 2 different CPA network. But if you promote GD offers via CJ links, it's actually CJ, only 1 CPA network, not 2. Then you should suspect your website as well. I know CJ has GD offers. But as far as I know GD has its own affiliate program as well. I mean it's possible for you to promote CJ and GD as 2 different CPA networks.

It's also possible the issue is related to GD only if you promote GD offers via CJ. CJ may not be able detect everything on an advertiser part. Because conversion detection of CJ and other CPA networks relies on the technology used on the advertiser website starting from their landing page until their checkout page (conversion or thank you page)

 

[DomainRecap]

But as far as I know GD has its own affiliate program as well. I mean it's possible for you to promote CJ and GD as 2 different CPA networks.

I think GD got rid of that and is now entirely CJ, other than specific ad deals with big sites of course.

Also, GD has been having consistent problems for a while now (site issues, features unavailable, 404 screens, transfer issues, etc.) so the blip might be on their end.

 

[poweredbyme]

So the problem is with only GD offers at CJ. Then yes the dropping revenue issue must be related to somewhere in GD website. You may ask CJ if they have noticed a general revenue drop with other publishers who promote GD. Then CJ may want to take a closer look at how GD website handles conversion reporting to CJ website. Because if there is an issue with GD conversion reporting, it will drop the revenue of CJ as well, not only yours.