i was wondering, what happens when a customer visits the vendors page through my hoplink, waits for somedays and confirms if he should buy the product. And re-visits the vendors page directly without going through my hoplink (obviously, by now he knows the url of the vendors page of the product he’s interested in) and makes the payment, will i still get my comission? If not, then is there a way to avoid this from happening?
There is a Cookie set on the users browser that is reread on their return, I believe it gives you credit for any sales within 60 days.
One form of fraud “Cookie Stuffing” will overwrite your cookie with another affiliate’s so they get the credit for a later sale. The operators of one popular forum made $Millions in eBay commissions from stuffing cookies, they may have been the first well publicized case of cookie stuffing prosecuted.
Tracking sales through browser cookies is a bit primitive, cookies along with history mat be cleared out by users or by automated scripts.