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Hiding your pixel URL w/ traffic source from the advertiser? (12)

04-03-2018 08:28 AM #1 Money (Member)
Hiding your pixel URL w/ traffic source from the advertiser?

Hi there,

I'm running a new, high volume traffic source that I don't want to reveal to the advertiser. The pixel I'm using has the traffic source URL in it, so the traffic source can be identified.

How can I hide my pixel but still track conversions in Cake so that the advertiser doesn't see or steal my traffic source? The thing with this new traffic source is that it only has java and image pixels, not postbacks unfortunately.

I'm aware that I can create a php file and upload the pixel to a domain which ads another layer of steps someone would have to go through to find the pixel (click the URL, then view source code). I'm also aware that you can just put multiple pixels in the tracking platform so the advertiser doesn't know which one you're running.

I also had an idea to create a bitly link for the URLs in the pixel, to make them a bit less obvious. Is that feasible or will that cause problems?

Are there any other methods that would work well? I'd love to hear your recommendations! (:

04-03-2018 08:38 AM #2 twinaxe (Senior Moderator)

It sounds like you are using the pixel from the trafficsource itself.
Just give your AM on the CPA network a global postback URL from your tracker for S2S postback.
Then the network only sees the postback URL from your tracker.

04-03-2018 08:52 AM #3 Money (Member)

Hey Twinaxe, thanks for the quick reply. I added this to the original post to avoid confusion, the thing with this new traffic source is that it only has java and image pixels, not postbacks unfortunately. Any other ideas?

Currently I'm thinking the best thing to do is:

1) Host the java pixel, among other pixels, on a domain, then iframe the domain and place that in Cake
2) Place multiple pixels in Cake as well, so that the source of the traffic can't be attributed.

This way the advertiser would have to take multiple steps to see the pixel (paste URL into browser, view source code) and they wouldn't know which pixel I was using for my traffic.

Any better ideas?

04-03-2018 02:14 PM #4 matuloo (Legendary Moderator)

Are you using any tracker at all?

It's not necessary to pass ANY info to the source, it can all stop at the tracker. That's one of the reason why trackers are so popular ... it will collect all info that you pass to it from the traffic source, then it will append a clickID to the click and send just that to the advertisers ... this clickID will help you identify what click made the conversion.

Not sure how much you are experienced with the popular trackers, so don't want to go into basic details before hearing back from you.

I see you mentioned cake, are you using that for tracking, or is it the backend solution that the advertisers uses? Or is it an affiliate network?

I'm afraid we need more details about your setup.

04-03-2018 03:33 PM #5 twinaxe (Senior Moderator)

From what I read above he is using a tracker but the trafficsource itself only has Java and image pixels.
When he uses a tracker where you can only set postback URLs for the traffic sources and not imagie pixels then the situation above would occur.

04-03-2018 09:37 PM #6 matuloo (Legendary Moderator)

Quote Originally Posted by twinaxe View Post
From what I read above he is using a tracker but the trafficsource itself only has Java and image pixels.
When he uses a tracker where you can only set postback URLs for the traffic sources and not imagie pixels then the situation above would occur.
He can still define custom tokens, or maybe the network supports some ... I doubt there isn't a way around this, that's why it would be cool to know more about this particular setup.

04-04-2018 03:28 AM #7 Money (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by matuloo View Post
He can still define custom tokens, or maybe the network supports some ... I doubt there isn't a way around this, that's why it would be cool to know more about this particular setup.
Hey Matuloo,

Thanks for chiming in here! I'm currently utilizing Voluum as my tracker (mainly just using it for double meta refresh to hide my referrers.. still learning how to use it), and tracking sales and spend in the traffic source ad server. I like using the traffic source ad server to see stats in real time because I can see my spend and sales in real time, as opposed to not being able to see my spend in real time per campaign, ad set and ad in Voluum. What's your solution for this? Do you just update your spend in Voluum per ad per day? I have an account rep at the traffic source ad server, perhaps I could request to have them dynamically pass the spend to my Voluum somehow (this seems unlikely)? I've also had friends in the industry say they just put their avg. CPC as the fixed cost in Voluum to see a general view of the performance, how's your experience been with this?

Anyways assuming I want to keep tracking sales in the traffic source ad server, what's your suggestion for hiding my pixel (traffic source url) from the advertiser? I've hit a nice vein of traffic that I don't want to give away, but I also don't want to give up my ability to optimize quickly.

04-04-2018 04:02 AM #8 Mr Baffoe (Veteran Member)

I’m not sure how the other tracker pixels work, but in Prosper202 the universal smart pixel can fire 3rd party pixels by dynamically loading them only when a conversion happens.

However it will only load the pixel if the conversion happened from the traffic source’s tracking link.

The only way the network will see the pixel firing is if they clicked your tracking link, and they only way they can click your link is if they know your traffic source.

You can read more about this from when it was launched a few years ago. http://prosper.tracking202.com/blog/...pixel-features

In terms of referrer blocking, Prosper202 uses the meta referer tag/header to control and block referers without dmr which is super slow and costly (lost conversions). There are a few more tweaks being put in place for 1.9.51 to make this more effective.

04-04-2018 07:38 AM #9 thedudeabides (Moderator)

I recall doing that with Prosper202's iframe, when you'd often need to fire multiple 3rd party pixels.

Not sure if Voluum has such options as I see a 'tracking script' option in tracking urls, but no idea if that places other pixels on the page. Also see a 'pixel redirect' but I'm guessing that's for firing conversions on clicks? Would be best served reaching out to them directly.

If they don't support it you could have something coded up. One way would be to set a cookie to be on your lander, via a php image. Then another php file that would be iframed and placed in cake, that checks if that visitors has your cookie set and render the 3rd party pixel. I recall having to do that once.

04-04-2018 10:10 AM #10 matuloo (Legendary Moderator)

What's your solution for this? Do you just update your spend in Voluum per ad per day? I have an account rep at the traffic source ad server, perhaps I could request to have them dynamically pass the spend to my Voluum somehow (this seems unlikely)?
It's hard to pass correct costs, especially with CPM bidding ... plus the clickloss that is always there.

I'm updating costs manually, I know it's not 100% accurate but I simply got used to it. The reason is, I don't like to pass my converzsion data to anyone, neither the source, nor the affiliate network. I like to keep them as private as possible.

By sending conversion data to the traffic source, you are giving them the whole funnel on the plate, so to speak ... in many cases it doesn't matter, but I've heard enough stories and I saw my best converting placements vanish more than enough times... I might be paranoid, but ...

If you really want to keep the current setup : so sending conversion postback to the traffic source and the voluum traffic source postback url isn't an option with your source ... you will need to create some extra layer (domain) as you suggested in the original post and handle it with some php or other code/script.

04-04-2018 11:32 AM #11 sertys (Member)

It has been hinted that what you're trying to achieve is doable with an iframe with double meta redirect inside that fires your pixel(s) and hides the original referrer from both the network and the client. I have integrated that into our campaign management long time ago.

04-04-2018 12:55 PM #12 matuloo (Legendary Moderator)

Quote Originally Posted by sertys View Post
It has been hinted that what you're trying to achieve is doable with an iframe with double meta redirect inside that fires your pixel(s) and hides the original referrer from both the network and the client. I have integrated that into our campaign management long time ago.
Not sure if we are talking about the same thing, he doesn't want to hide the referer info, not with the pixel anyways ... the problem is, that the pixel url itself contains the domain of the traffic source. And since he wants to launch the pixel at the advertisers side, there is a problem. So let's say his traffic source is bestsourcever.com, and the pixel url is bestsourcever.com/pixel.if?id=xyz ...

But yes, it needs an additional "redirect layer" that will record the clickid value and fire another pixel, maybe it can be done with n iframe as you suggested too. Just wanted to point out the url problem, as it confused myself too at the beginning.

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