FeedFront Magazine Articles
Dealing with Latent Affiliate Links
Latent links refer to affiliate URLs that are for expired offers or are no longer valid, but are still active e.g. listed in a search listing, blog, or other Web page. Because the link is not valid, the landing page for a latent link is likely an error page.
These links are damaging to the merchant due to a poor user experience and damaging to the affiliate’s ROI due to poor conversions. There are several events that can cause a link to become a latent link:
- Affiliate Removal. The affiliate is removed from the merchant’s affiliate program. In this case, the link usually will redirect to an error page hosted by the affiliate network.
- Old Offers. The merchant removes the offer. In this scenario, the link may resolve to an error page on the merchant’s web site or hopefully to an appropriate alternative page.
- Out of Stock. The merchant sells out of an item. Usually these kinds of links point to the actual product / offer page with an ‘out of stock’ message on the page.
Advice for Merchants
- Redirect:
- Ex-Affiliates: Ask your affiliate network provider to redirect links with the affiliate’s ID to a landing page on your Web site – not the affiliate network’s Web site.
- Old Offers / Out of Stock: Redirect traffic to a best alternative landing page to ensure a good user experience. Don’t let consumers land on an ‘out of stock’ or ‘invalid offer’ page.