Clickbank integration for affiliates
This guide shows how an affiliate can use Clickbank offers and track everything with CPV Lab ad tracker.
- Clickbank allows tracking conversions by third party trackers in 2 ways:
- Old method: with an instant notification calling a postback URL. Here is the guide.
- New Method: server to server with a single postback URL (the current guide)
Both methods work just fine, but the new method with the unique postback URL is easier to be implemented.
Clickbank Postback URL
Clickbank (opens new window) recently added the option to integrate with other platforms via a general Postback URL.
What is a Postback URL?
The Postback URL (opens new window) is an URL that is called by Clickbank to send information to a third party tool (CRM, tracker, etc) about the conversions registered for an account.
As there are both vendors and affiliates that are using Clickbank and need a tracker, we have a guide for each of them.
This is the guide for affiliate media buyers running Clickbank offers and tracking the campaigns with CPV Lab (opens new window) or CPV One (opens new window).
What to setup in CPV Lab | CPV One
These are the settings you need to do in your CPV Lab or CPV One tracker in order to run a campaign with Clickbank offers and track everything correctly.
Below we will use CPV Lab as an example, but the settings are the same for the cloud ad tracker, CPV One.
Import Clickbank as an Offer Source
On the Sources -> Offers Sources page you need to import Clickbank (affiliate) offer source from the catalog.
The template will contain all the tokens and the postback URL in the right format.
- click Save.
Add Clickbank Offers
Now you will add your Clickbank offers in CPV Lab in order to use them for your campaigns.
- Go to "LP & Offers" menu and add your Clickbank offers in CPV Lab
- make sure you select "Clickbank (affiliate)" as your Source
- you can add the offers directly in the campaign setup as well
- When entering Clickbank Offer URLs, be sure to include the Tracking ID Parameter supported by Clickbank to the end of the offer URL followed by the "subid" CPV macro as:
&tid={!subid!}
WARNING
It is important to add the parameter `tid={!subid!}" because this is the visitor ID and allows Clickbank to attribute correctly the conversion.
Depending on your affiliate link, you will have to add the tid parameter with &
in front or with ?
.
Example:
If your affiliate link is like this:
https://de215b2ko-hfph6cz6wjgf453.hop.clickbank.net
- Then you need to add an
?
before thetid
parameter, like this:https://de215b2ko-hfph6cz6wjgf453.hop.clickbank.net?tid={!subid!}
- This is because the "tid" parameter is the only parameter for your affiliate link
- Then you need to add an
If your affiliate link is like this:
https://de215b2ko-hfph6cz6wjgf453.hop.clickbank.net?aff=1243
- Then you need to add an
&
before thetid
parameter, like this:https://de215b2ko-hfph6cz6wjgf453.hop.clickbank.net?aff=1243&tid={!subid!}
- This is because you have multiple parameters for your URL
- Then you need to add an
Create the campaign in CPV Lab | CPV One
You want to create a campaign promoting Clickbank offers and to track the campaign performance with CPV Lab ad tracker.
In CPV Lab there are 6 campaign types (opens new window) that you can use:
- Direct link and landing page campaign
- Landign page sequence
- Lead Capture
- Multiple Option
- Multiple Path
- Email followup
If you want to track only purchases /sales, then any campaign will work.
If you want to track purcheses and order form impression as well, then you MUST choose one of the following campaign types:
After you select the campign type you need to fill all the necessary fields from:
- General Settings
- Tracking Settings
- Macros and Tokens (where you select the traffic source)
- Landing pages (if you use a landing page)
- Offers (here you select the offer from Clickbank)
- Save the campaign
What to setup in Clickbank
In order to receive in your tracker information about your conversions (order form impression, purchase, upsell) you need to setup the postback URL provided by CPV Lab in your Clickbank account.
For that, you need to do the following in your Clickbank account:
- Add a new integration
- Select "Custom Postback/Pixel"
- Select "Global" for "Integration Level"
- Select the event types for which you want this integration to work (Purchase, order form impression or upsell)
- Paste the Postback URL provided in your campaign setup page in the "Tracking Pixels" section for Clickbank.
- It will look like in the image below:
Besides purchases (or sales), Clickbank can also provide information about order form impressions, an event that is often ignored, but which can offer useful information: each time a visitor goes to the checkout form in Clickbank, it will trigger an "order form impression".
And this can be tracked in CPV Lab (or CPV One) automatically by using the same Postback URL as for purchases and a "Lead Capture" or "Landing Page Sequence" campaign type.
This Postback URL provided by CPV Lab ad tracker, will be called by Clickbank every time a purchase, order form impression or upsell is happening for your offer.
This feature proves invaluable in analyzing the performance of both your order form template and product conversions.
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