Affiliate Conversion tag

Due to tracking restrictions and the unstable work of the client-side tracking, your affiliates can lose up to 40% of the commission. It happens because browser tracking is no longer reliable. Apple’s Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP), Firefox's Enhanced Tracking Protection (ETP), and ad blockers restrict the use of third-party cookies. It can be fixed by setting up server-side affiliate conversion tracking.

Stape created an Affiliate Conversion tacog for the server Google Tag Manager to track pageviews and conversions from affiliate partners. By setting up an affiliate pageview event, you take the URL parameter (in most cases, it's either affiliate ID or click ID) and store it in the browser's cookie. You can set the lifetime of this cookie.

When a conversion event triggers, you can fire the affiliate conversion event that sends requests with the configured URL and required parameters.

Benefits of server-side affiliate tracking

For affiliates

More conversions will be tracked, meaning more revenue for affiliates. Awin's research analyzed 150,000 tracking calls and saw that 12,6% more cookies were set with the server-side implementation. Most of the time, client-side cookies were blocked by browsers that restrict the use of third-party cookies (like Safari or Firefox) and the rest by ad blockers. 

For companies

Improved page speed

Imagine you have offers in three affiliate networks, each requiring its tracking code. This means adding three separate JavaScript tags to your site, which can slow down its performance.

Higher data security

When you add affiliate JavaScript to your site, you can't control what data it collects. It may capture more information than you’ve agreed to, such as users’ PII, potentially violating your privacy policy or GDPR. You can control the data sent to the affiliate network with server-side tracking.

A better understanding of results from affiliate marketing

With server-side tracking, you can track all conversions from affiliates. This brings two key benefits:

• A clear understanding of where your conversions are coming from.
• More attractive offers for affiliates. When affiliates see that your offer generates higher earnings, they’ll drive more traffic to your site, leading to more sales.

Useful Links

• Affiliate conversion tag in GTM template gallery
• How to set up an affiliate conversion tag