An easy method of manually cloaking an Affiliate link to redirect to any affiliate program you choose to promote is by writing one simple line of php code.  To enhance the security of such links,  be sure to give the file a .php extension [as opposed to .html] – it does not matter if the rest of your web’s pages are .html

This form of masking hides your affiliate link details from the link, but does require your own website or at least access to a limited web space for uploading the simple file that must be created for each new affiliate link.

How To write PHP Code for Cloaked Affiliate Link Redirects:

1. First create a folder [not a file] on your desktop and give it a name relative to the Affiliate product.  So to promote a golfing product called “Beginners Guide” – you might name the folder “GolfBegin”.

2. Copy ‘n’ paste the following into Notepad or any simple text editor, and replace the “xxxxxx” with your clickbank username.  Note that “golfbegin” is the product name Clickbank has assigned to Beginners Golf:

<?php
header( ‘Location: http://xxxxxx.golfbegin.hop.clickbank.net’ ) ;
?>

3. Name the above text file as “index.php” and save it to the “GolfBegin” folder you created on your desktop. It is important the file is called “index.php” and nothing else.

4. Upload the entire “GolfBegin” folder via FTP into your domain’s “public_html” folder.

5. Then advertise your new cloaked link as “http://yourdomain.com/GolfBegin” which looks a lot more professional than a Clickbank, or other long, affiliate link – effectively, stopping affiliate link thieves from substituting their affiliate id and hijacking your commissions

6. Test the link by typing http://yourdomain.com/GolfBegin into a browser.  It should redirect straight to the merchant’s program.  Note, however that the affiliate url IS visible (in another format) in the Browser Address Bar.

7. A similar method of cloaking can also be used to format a Clickbank link… this time to completely bypass a merchant’s “weak” sales page, and go directly to the Clickbank order page.

NOTE: Apart from Clickbank, obviously, this method of affiliate link cloaking works with any other affiliate program.  Simply replace the “Clickbank” url in the example shown with any other affiliate url.  For example affiliate links from: Commission Junction or PayDotCom or those provided directly by the owner of a product.

As your online marketing expands to include a larger amount of blogs and affiliate campaigns it would be timely to further automate your business – eventually resulting in an investment in a professional affiliate link cloaking/masking/redirect program that will also provide some quick statistics on the number of clicks for each link.

Affiliate link masking software can cost between $27 – $97. Most of them will allow you to paste in an affiliate link – which is cloaked on pressing the submit button. But the cheaper products still demand that you manually upload the HTML for the cloaked link to a website.

The better products however do not require this repetitive manual step.  I now use ReDirect-A-Link Affiliate Link Management System that offered these critical features to further protect my affiliate income.

1. The entire cloaking of the link takes place within the software itself, that is installed on just one domain – so no more having to cut ‘n’ paste blocks of HTML or PHP code into separate web pages for each product. NOTE: It’s great in that it needs to be installed ONLY on the one domain but will cloak links on ALL your other blogs and domains as well.  It can also, however be installed on as many sites as YOU personally own.

2. I can opt to completely stop my affiliate link from showing in the address bar and/or choose to have the masked link only, appear on the merchant’s website – which adds credibility with the illusion of the product being hosted on my website.

There are many other tools available to track Affiliate links and ROI and some of them are free – but as the choices can be somewhat daunting particularly for a new entrepreneur, I hope sharing what has worked for me helps somewhat in your dilemma.

Remember – ReDirect-A-Link Affiliate Link Management System

Have you used a similar program with success… please share your experience  – good or bad, via the comments below.

Regards