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Hide Referrer (11)

03-16-2019 08:08 AM #1 therichness (Member)
Hide Referrer

In my tracker docs I see the term "hide referrer".

Who is the referrer and why would want to hide them?

03-16-2019 12:36 PM #2 manu_adefy (Veteran Member)

The referrer means the link where the traffic comes from. In your case, it means hiding your landing page link from the next page the user goes to.

Basically, the purpose is to hide your landing page, aka pre-sell page.

07-01-2020 08:31 AM #3 larsometer (Senior Member)

What is the advantage of hiding the referrer?

As far as I understood the offer page / affiliate network would get it. In how far would that be problem?

Or is the main advantage that spy tools would not get the lander url?

07-01-2020 11:52 AM #4 jeremie (Moderator)

Quote Originally Posted by larsometer View Post
What is the advantage of hiding the referrer?
As far as I understood the offer page / affiliate network would get it. In how far would that be problem?
Avoiding the network to know what is your landing pages, or to know what is the traffic source if you run direct. With that info, they could either run themselves, or give the tip to another affiliate that could run more traffic.

Quote Originally Posted by larsometer View Post
Or is the main advantage that spy tools would not get the lander url?
No, spy tools act like crawlers that click on ads and read landers. They will not get affected by hiding the referer. One can hide landing pages from them but it a completely different and vast subject


Since 2015 when Google forced everyone to move to SSL (which generally hide the referrer by default), it is less of a problem.

The "golden standard" to hide referrer is Meta Refresh and Double Meta Refresh (DMR). Below some useful posts for those who want more details

https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...iding-referrer
https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...ing-a-spy-tool

https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...-lets-find-out

Meta Refresh and Double Meta Refresh are supported in most trackers. See Voluum doc for example
https://doc.Voluum.com/en/redirect_modes.html

They slow down redirects, so it is a trade-off between privacy and speed.

01-03-2021 03:07 PM #5 mcstacks (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by jeremie View Post

Since 2015 when Google forced everyone to move to SSL (which generally hide the referrer by default), it is less of a problem.
Hey @jeremie - does this mean we don't actually need meta refresh this for hiding the ad and/or lander? I'm asking because I'm going no-redirect style for my tracker (Binom, LP Pixel) to avoid any redirects from Facebook ad to lander, to try to minimize more the bot flagging me. But I believe that meta refresh applies from a tracker source link but not for no-redirect setup? I'm not sure TBH.

If I do no redirect will I be OK from aff network not seeing my stuff?

The other reason I'm asking is because I am going to run the same offer from two different affiliate networks to see what pays out better over, and wonder if they will see this and/or get upset.

01-03-2021 03:27 PM #6 jeremie (Moderator)

Quote Originally Posted by mcstacks View Post
does this mean we don't actually need meta refresh this for hiding the ad and/or lander? I'm asking because I'm going no-redirect style for my tracker (Binom, LP Pixel) to avoid any redirects from Facebook ad to lander, to try to minimize more the bot flagging me. But I believe that meta refresh applies from a tracker source link but not for no-redirect setup? I'm not sure TBH.
Meta refresh involving passing through a third party page to hide the initial page. This involves a redirect. It can be done by the tracker, or you could do it on your own. But yeah, it defeats the purpose of going redirectless.


Quote Originally Posted by mcstacks View Post
If I do no redirect will I be OK from aff network not seeing my stuff?
See my post here about page configuration to avoid leaking your url to the affiliate network:
https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...l=1#post409007


Quote Originally Posted by mcstacks View Post
the other reason I'm asking is because I am going to run the same offer from two different affiliate networks to see what pays out better over, and wonder if they will see this and/or get upset.
They won't see it unless talking to each other or doing extensive spying. Anyway, you are perfectly allowed to split test several networks and they won't get upset for that.

01-04-2021 11:35 AM #7 matuloo (Legendary Moderator)

The other reason I'm asking is because I am going to run the same offer from two different affiliate networks to see what pays out better over, and wonder if they will see this and/or get upset.
It's perfectly fine to split test offers from various networks, pretty much all of us are doing this. I wouldnt worry about this at all.

01-04-2021 04:48 PM #8 mcstacks (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by matuloo View Post
It's perfectly fine to split test offers from various networks, pretty much all of us are doing this. I wouldnt worry about this at all.
Cool. And to be clear...I'm not talking about different offers on different networks.

I'm talking about the exact SAME offer from the same vendor on two different affiliate networks because they have different a payout structure. One network is revshare and one is flat payout, for the same offer.

So my concern is if the vendor catches wind and can see bc of my noredirect setup... if they'd get upset at all.

I could see that possibly if someone was trying to get around caps (which I'm not)...but I'm still pretty noob so have no idea.



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01-04-2021 10:51 PM #9 matuloo (Legendary Moderator)

Quote Originally Posted by mcstacks View Post
Cool. And to be clear...I'm not talking about different offers on different networks.

I'm talking about the exact SAME offer from the same vendor on two different affiliate networks because they have different a payout structure. One network is revshare and one is flat payout, for the same offer.

So my concern is if the vendor catches wind and can see bc of my noredirect setup... if they'd get upset at all.

I could see that possibly if someone was trying to get around caps (which I'm not)...but I'm still pretty noob so have no idea.



Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
I've tested tons of offers on various network, I mean exactly the same offer on several networks, even on the same PPL payout structure, but different payout per lead. Nothing wrong about that either. You're here to make money, feel free to test whatever you want, as long as you're not trying to defraud anyone.

The only time this could possibly cause some trouble, would be if you get kicked of the offer on one network, then move to a different one to promote the same offer, get kicked again, move to another one etc... but I've done this too and didn't face any issues In the end, the affiliate network doesn't pass your name on to the network, they just show them an ID, so the the advertisers, you're just a "number".

But again, for the sake of clean split testing, this is not a problem at all.

01-05-2021 12:31 AM #10 mcstacks (Member)

Quote Originally Posted by matuloo View Post
I've tested tons of offers on various network, I mean exactly the same offer on several networks, even on the same PPL payout structure, but different payout per lead. Nothing wrong about that either. You're here to make money, feel free to test whatever you want, as long as you're not trying to defraud anyone.

The only time this could possibly cause some trouble, would be if you get kicked of the offer on one network, then move to a different one to promote the same offer, get kicked again, move to another one etc... but I've done this too and didn't face any issues In the end, the affiliate network doesn't pass your name on to the network, they just show them an ID, so the the advertisers, you're just a "number".

But again, for the sake of clean split testing, this is not a problem at all.
@matuloo = you're a rockstar, many thanks for the explanation.

And this is pure gold >> "if you get kicked of the offer on one network, then move to a different one to promote the same offer, get kicked again, move to another one etc... but I've done this too and didn't face any issues "

Pure affiliate pimpology.

01-05-2021 10:48 AM #11 matuloo (Legendary Moderator)

Quote Originally Posted by mcstacks View Post
And this is pure gold >> [I]"if you get kicked of the offer on one network, then move to a different one to promote the same offer, get kicked again, move to another one etc... but I've done this too and didn't face any issues "
Many things are possible, if you can drive volume I even had an affiliate network create a second account for me, so I could restart on the same offer, once I got kicked of it Surprisingly, on the second try, without doing any major changes, the quality was so good that my lead cap was raised to 1000 leads a day and it turned out to be one of my most successful campaigns ever

Sometimes an advertiser decides to kick affiliates from offer to soon, without giving the leads enough time to mature. That's why it often makes sense to re-test the same offers through a different network.

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