Affiliate Identity theft; affiliate link theft; affiliate commission theft; - whatever term you use, it means without link cloaking, you, as an affiliate marketer, are being ripped off. You're being robbed of your affiliate commissions.

Is affiliate commission theft a serious problem? I really don't know with absolute certainty. Searching for an answer on the internet has coughed up conflicting information. However, the way I see it, whether you're losing 5% or 40% of your commissions, a loss by any percentage is still a loss.

Can you prevent affiliate commission theft?

Yes, you can. There are several methods available, some with free, some using commercial software. While free methods may reduce the incidence of affiliate link theft or affiliate commission theft, they do not actually cloak your link. To get full link cloaking you will need to spend some money. The bright side is that the affiliate commission theft you prevent will pay for the software many times over.

I'm sure you're aware that simply cloaking or hiding your links isn't going to bring you 'rivers of cash' flowing into your 'bank vault.' Link cloaking may merely lessen the frequency of affiliate commission theft, and could reduce the commissions you would have lost.

Allow me to digress a moment for a few words on affiliate marketing realities.

Hold off on the champagne bottle just because you've got your first affiliate commission check . Without a well planned marketing strategy for backend, up-sell and cross-sell offers, and a means for building your customer base, income will be sporadic, if at all.

One other thing. Whenever we talk about affiliate sales, affiliate commissions or similar terms, the word 'clickbank' is the first utterance. Clickbank is the biggest affiliate network no doubt, but certainly not the only one. And while clickbank has the widest product range in digital products, their terms and conditions certainly don't make it easy for a newbie to see his or her first affiliate commission check.

For example, to comply with legal requirements, you won't get any payment until you have generated sales made with a minimum of five (5) different credit card numbers. Note the word 'different.' So if you generated 10 transactions from the same buyer, you don't get paid.

To make your affiliate commission earning route more uphill, of the five different card numbers, there must be one mastercard and one visa card. If you had 1028 buyers all using only mastercard, tough luck. You don't get paid either. This doesn't mean you lose the commissions. They are held in your account until you meet the required conditions.

Oh, purchases through paypal don't count either. If you generate 1 or 10,000 sales all through paypal only, you don't get a check from Clickbank. Not until you have 5 sales through different account numbers, and there must be a Visa and a MasterCard amongst them.

Before signing up for clickbank know the rules, then decide if it's still right for you. Details are at: https://www.clickbank.com/accounting.html

Back to long, ugly and in-your-face affiliate links, how to go about shortening and cloaking them, and how to prevent commission theft.

1. Some people recommend using free services by websites that shorten your link. I disagree totally with this method. These are actually for links to be included in emails, and are not for online business purposes. But, if you insist, use these services with extreme caution. They are just re-directing services, and store your information on their servers. If they go out of business, or remove your link for whatever reason, your links are kaput, gone, ground to dust. If you've used those links in article marketing, blogs or any other media that has been syndicated, you'll have your links on perhaps thousands of sites all leading nowhere. What a colossal waste of your marketing efforts.

2. Use a re-directing script yourself and upload it to your own domain. This means you need your own website and know how to use ftp, and know how to create a link. Your host server must also allow php. The re-directing script is simplicity itself. However, note that while this shortens your link into something more attractive, and gives you full control over it, it does NOT cloak your link. When your visitor lands on the redirected site, your full affiliate link is visible, allowing your visitor to bypass your affiliate ID to deny you your commission. Why? I really don't know either. But it happens. Some people simply don't want anyone earning a commission from their purchase even though they pay the same price with or without using your link. Go figure.

However be aware that you cannot cloak or re-direct links for every application. Some affiliate networks and Google adwords do not allow re-directing or cloaking. Carefully study the terms and conditions of affiliate publishers before signing up with them or you could be expanding a lot of effort for nothing.

3. You can also choose to buy your own cloaking software which gives you more options and complete control not only over link cloaking but commission theft from parasite software as well. This is the recommended method for serious affiliate marketers - those who actually plan on earning real income from affiliate marketing.

Effective cloaking software not only hides your affiliate links but also protects you from parasite software. Simple redirects and most link cloaking software do not offer this layer of protection. Check out the features thoroughly before you buy.

Parasite Software [which apparently is covertly installed on 80% of PCs,] activates after your visitor has landed on the merchant's web site. Since the parasite software strikes only after the visitor has arrived at the merchant's site, redirects are totally ineffective as a protective measure.

It is well worth the cost and effort to keep your affiliate commissions out of other people's pockets and in your own. After all, you're the one who spent so much time marketing the product.

To protect your affiliate commissions against link hijackers, link bypassers and parasite software with a comprehensive affiliate link cloaking system, I suggest you check the advanced features of Covertlinks at http://www.vmsbonline.com/linkcloaker.php

CovertLinks technology is available in both html and php versions, and is compatible with most affiliate programs and all of the current major web browsers in use today.

Copyright Dan Jeremiah: This article may be freely reproduced only with all contents and links included without editing.