Sometimes cleaning out your inbox can be a wonderful thing.  Long buried in my e-mails to myself, I discovered a note to remind me to check out a system that might be of interest to serious affiliate marketers:

http://ideborah.linktrackr.com/linktrackr (in case you’re wondering, that’s my affiliate link generated with the LinkTrackr software).

LinkTrackr is a link cloaking and tracking software tool.  Using a good link cloaking product is absolutely essential for any internet marketer who wants to ensure that they do not lose out on affiliate commissions.  You can use them to create more presentable affiliate links and track clicks and view tracking so you can better optimize your campaigns.

It used to be that link cloaking was only available if you bought into an expensive monthly hosted blogging system or hosted your own link cloaking software.  The problem with both solutions: cost (for the former) and possible technical challenges (for the latter).

Imagine if you could get the benefits of a link cloaking system for free!  You can with LinkTrackr.

How It Works

When you sign up to LinkTrackr, you’ll be asked to pick a username to create an account with.  Keeping my branding consistent, I picked iDeborah as my username so my LinkTrackr links will be in the format http://ideborah.linktracker.com/abc.  I chose the free plan but will most likely upgrade to a paid plan within the next couple of months.  If you opt for any of the paid LinkTrackr plans, you have the option of using your own domain name for your links.

Even with the basic free account, simple link cloaking is super easy.

Just log into the account you created and fill out the information for your link using the interface below:

Link Name refers to how your link will appear in your own internal reports.

Destination URL is where you would place your affiliate URL.

Tracking Link is the ID that you want to attach to your affiliate link (can be a short name, numbers, characters or whatever you can dream up!).

As the free account is limited to a maximum of 10 tracking links, I didn’t bother setting up a tracking group but I suspect this feature will become handy once I upgrade my account.

Once you’ve made your selections, just click Save Link and voila your link is active.  One of the neat features I noticed when I browsed to my link was that there was an embedded toolbar with social share links already coded with my affiliate link.  Awesome!

Advanced Features

One of the advanced features that’s available to paid users is the ability to use the software to set up A/B split tests.  Several of my own clients have trouble using Google to set up their own split tests.  This looks like it may be an alternative for them.  I haven’t tested it myself yet but will provide an update when I do.

All in all, LinkTrackr is a pretty robust link cloaking solution.  The interface is intuitive and there’s even a WordPress plugin that makes it even easier to use.  Don’t hesitate to give them a try if you are looking for a quality link cloaking service.

Here’s the best part: You can try it risk free for just $1.

http://ideborah.linktrackr.com/linktrackr