Home > >

---

GEN13: Using a Tracker (10)

---

Do You Even Need a Tracker for FB Campaigns?

Personally I'm finding that FB's pixel and reporting already gives me all the stats I need.

And I'm not testing so many landing pages and offers that using a tracker would make the testing more convenient.

As for conversion postback: I've mostly been promoting offers that are either exclusive or are restricted to only a few affiliates, so having my FB pixel embedded on the offer page wouldn't be a big risk (for getting account bans by association - when other affiliates running the same offer get the hammer).

However, that's just me. There are reasons why you may want to use a tracker for your FB campaigns, and below are some of them.

You can go through them and decide whether you need to subscribe to a tracker or not.



Reasons to Use a Tracker


1)To Post Conversions to FB

Some trackers can post conversions to FB, including Prosper202 and Voluum:

http://prosper.tracking202.com/blog/...-s2s-postbacks

https://Voluum.com/blog/how-to-setup...-ads-tracking/

However, there are other ways to post conversions back to FB, without using a tracker. For details please see the section "How to Track Affiliate Offer Conversions" in this post:

https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...Your-FB-Pixels

Still, for people that are not very technical and don't want to mess around with code and scripts, using a tracker to post conversions to FB may be the easiest method.


2)To Split-test Landing Pages and/or Offers

Trackers can allow you to generate a single campaign link to use with an ad, that will automatically rotate landing pages and/or offers to split-test them.

However, here's my concern with such an arrangement: A single url leading to different landing pages may tip off FB's radar.

The disclaimer here of course is that I haven't actually used a tracker to split-test landing pages, so don't know whether that can get an account banned faster.

So - feel free to experiment by using a tracker to split-test lander and offers! But if you share my concern above, here's how you can split-test without a tracker:

To split-test 2 landing pages LanderA and LanderB: Set up two ABO adsets AdsetA and AdsetB, each containing the same ad (3 copies). Have the ads in AdsetA go to LanderA and the ads in AdsetB go to LanderB.

To split-test 2 offers OfferA and OfferB: Set up two ABO adsets AdsetA and AdsetB, each containing the same ad (3 copies). Create two copies of the same landing page and put them on 2 separate URLs, URLA and URLB. Have the ads in AdsetA go to URLA and the ads in AdsetB go to URLB.

And of course if you're wanting to test more landers or offers, just set up more adsets than just two.

Then, use the following methods to decide on a winning lander/offer:

https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...Banners-Part-1

https://stmforum.com/forum/showthrea...ferent-Payouts

The obvious disadvantage to this split-testing method is that each adset would be targeting a different audience pool within your defined target audience, so that you're not entirely comparing apples to apples.

Here are my thoughts regarding this: Even if you use a tracker to do the split-testing, where you're targeting only one audience pool with one ad, the winning lander/offer would only apply to that particular audience pool. So if you start a new adset to test a different ad, or start a new campaign (to scale for example), you'd be targeting different audience pools anyway - which may render your split-test results inaccurate anyways.

If you want to do more testing to get better results, instead of setting up one adset per landing page, or one adset per offer, set up multiple adsets per landing page/offer to hit different audience pools, and just keep running the adset(s) that is/are the most profitable.

Always be reminded that ultimately, we're after maximizing profits, NOT maximizing split-test accuracy.

Lastly - members have suggested using Google Optimize to split-test landers. I haven't had a chance to check out how it works, but here's a link to more information:

https://marketingplatform.google.com/about/optimize/


3)To Avoid Triggering Affiliate Networks' Geo-Redirection

If you have experience running affiliate offers, you'll know that many affiliate networks have what is called "geo-redirection" in place.

What it does is, if you send traffic to an offer that is not accepted by the offer (e.g. sending US traffic to a CA offer), the affiliate network would automatically redirect that traffic to another suitable offer (e.g. redirecting the US traffic to an offer that accepts US traffic).

And the "suitable offer" often has nothing to do with the original offer you're promoting. Worse, it could even be a crypto offer, or *gasp* an adult offer (which are against FB's advertising policies).

Trouble happens when for example you're running a CA offer, and an FB reviewer located in the US decides to do a manual inspection, goes to your lander, clicks on an offer link, and promptly gets redirected to an offer that's completely irrelevant to your lander.

So what you can do to avoid this, if you're using a tracker, is to set a condition to check for the country the visitor is from. If country = CA, go to affiliate link. If country = another country, go directly to the destination offer page.

But you don't need to get a tracker just to deal with geo-redirection: Simply ask your affiliate manager to turn off geo-redirection for your affiliate account.


4)To Cloak

Some people use trackers as cloakers by setting up conditions to redirect FB reviewers to a different lander and/or offer than what they're showing to the actual audience. This is blackhat practice that I won't go into detail on.



Tracker Safe Practices

If you DO decide to use a tracker, go with a tracker that allows you to set up redirectless tracking.

It's common knowledge that FB doesn't like redirect links - the destination link you put in ad settings should be the same as your lander url.

Some trackers provide redirectless tracking, including Voluum, Binom, and Funnelflux. These links will provide details:

https://doc.voluum.com/en/redirectle...20redirectless

https://docs.binom.org/lp-pixel.php

http://docs.funnelflux.com/en/articl...redirect-links



***************

This is all I have on trackers for now! When I get a chance to do some actual testing with trackers (for FB camps) I'll come back to add more details. In the meantime, please feel free to ask any questions!



Amy

FB Beginner Tutorial: Index

---

Amazing thread here @vortex ! Quick question...

I'm using Binom and I'm setting it up to use the LP pixel method instead of the tracker link from ad...so it will be from ad to the lander URL and no redirect.

However, from the lander to the offer...are we cool to use the tracking link which redirects there also for tracking...or will FB pick that up and care about that too as a redirect?

I'm doing whitehat leadgen in home space, all above board stuff with this campaign but FB keeps shutting down the account for Circumventing Systems and I think it's been due to the tracker setup so trying to fix.

Hope that makes sense what I'm asking.

---

For that step you are good to use a standard redirect. Yet, if your tracker allows it, you can go redirectless for that step as well, as it improves speed.

These are the reasons for "Circumventing Systems":
https://www.facebook.com/policies/ad...nting_systems#

---

What you're asking makes complete sense! And here's what I think/believe personally:

Based on personal experience plus what I've gathered from conversations with other affiliates that have run heavily on FB, there's no indication that the FB bot will follow outgoing links from the landing page, or penalize a campaign/account for these redirections.

However - 2 things to consider:

1)It would be VERY difficult to "prove" whether FB will care, either way. Account bans are so common these days, it would be difficult to conclude exactly WHAT they're banning you for.

2)Even if the FB bot doesn't follow the outgoing links to evaluate the destinations, you'd still need to make sure that the destinations are in compliance so that they will survive a manual inspection by a human reviewer.

I have a question for you: When you say FB keeps shutting down the account, was this before you started using LP pixels or after?



Amy

---

This was before I started using LP pixel...I have been using track.mydomain.com redirecting to lander.mydomain.com. I was told that if it's all on the same domain it would be cool...not true apparently

Appealed twice and got it back twice, it's a clean offer and that's what I've stated each time. However clearly the bot is being triggered by something for the Circumventing Systems reason and I believe it's because of that, but of course have to test it. Just got LP pixel set up so we'll see.

First time using a proper tracker.

Also...a mentor that's helping me said he's spent millions this year on FB and had no problem with using redirect tracker link from same root domain and it causing circumventing systems stuff going on. Claims he knows of people spending alot and do it without issue, as long as root domain is the same.

So just may not be this even, being a small fry currently on FB.

Would love to cut everything over to Native...but not just that easy to start it would seem.

---

Ah OK that makes sense.

The bot is programmed to err on the side of safety. They don't care about false positives - as they would then rely on appeals and human reviewers to unban the legit advertisers.

I feel we need to adopt the same strategy by doing everything we can to be on the safe side.

As you've pointed out, not all advertisers are treated equal. The nature of the business, the age of the FB page / BM / ad accounts, the total spend to date etc. etc. will ALL contribute to how lenient FB will be.

So as someone who's not spending millions (yet), it was a smart move on your part to avoid triggering banning by the bot in the first place.

AFAIK, nobody has successfully and completely reverse-engineered what will or will not trigger a ban. All we can do is take all known safety measures (some of which I've described in my FB newbie tutorial), hope for the best, appeal as we get banned, hope we get the account back...we're pretty much at the mercy of the FB gods.

(Unless - you want to run with an agency account. That will cost you though.)

Which is why it's important to plan ahead. Don't put all your eggs in the FB basket. Capture your users/visitors' emails or other contact info so you can still access your audience if your ad account or even personal account gets banned. Run traffic from other sources and not depend on FB only.

I completely understand why you'd want to stick with native for a while. If budget is an issue, or if you're not wanting to spend too much to learn the ropes, try offers from less-competitive geos than US for example. And remember to run on a network that has enough traffic volume for your chosen geo.




Amy

---

I tested the no redirect / LP Pixel lander and got my ad rejected. I appealed...it got approved and started running...then the account got shutdown a few hours later for Circumventing Systems again. Appealed that (3rd time in about a week) and got it reopened just like every time...because well, I'm actually compliant go figure. Problem is it all seems system based, so this could keep happening. Got some other things to test I thought about last night.

Yah I'd rather not go with the agency route that's for sure quite expensive hired a couple back when I had my HT coaching business. Wasn't the right fit for me...well obviously b/c here I am starting from scratch with my affiliate biz.

Starting with straight to lead, but plan is to collect emails as I've got some decent email marketing experience in my past businesses. Trying to start simpler though as conversion should be better straight to the offer page (or so I hear, as long as offer converts).

I have some decent budget for Native actually, but would rather get some cashflow going with FB ads before I start going into that. Want to do both actually. Everyone keeps mentioning James Van Elswyk's Native Ads Masterclass, def impressed by some of his YouTubes. Good point on the geos...although I'm starting of in home improvement mainly, so might be trickier to move out of US for that depending on the offer. Found a solid couple HI offers and just got my first lead today, kinda cool.

BTW hope I'm not threadjacking here...if so let me know and can start a new thread.

---

Damn - that really sucks. I'm in a few FB advertiser groups and everyone's been bitching about the random and frequent account bans. I mean that has been an issue for years, but recently it has escalated to a whole new level.

Again - all we can do is prepare for the worst and then hope for the best, and doing everything we can to be safe. And sometimes praying helps.

We have a veteran STM member who messaged to tell me that he's planning on writing some posts to reveal how he's been running lead gen on FB stably with consistent results. No ETA yet but I'm excited!

No concern about threadjacking. Just wished I could help more with the banning situation...



Amy

---

Hi Amy, thanks for this post. I am struggling with this issue now.

I'm running Facebook ads to a landing page and from there clickthrough to a Clickbank offer. FB>Landing Page>VSL (Clickbank/Vendor)>Checkout

For a period of time, I'm getting the 'circumventing systems policy' violation on FB and I figured it could be the Clickbank hop link due to it being abused by tons of affiliates. I found a guy to clone the Clickbank VSL onto my domain, and from there, clickthrough to the direct checkout page on Clickbank. (Some vendors allow this). FB > Landing Page>VSL (Same domain)>Checkout

Sure enough, after I cloned the VSL, I'm no longer getting the violation.

I'm using a tracker + Postback URL to track my purchases because there are too many pixel misfires and FB isn't tracking properly.

Now the problem is for most trackers they require a ?tid in the offer URL to append the ClickID. The problem with the checkout page URL is there isn't a tid, even if I added it in, it doesn't work. A direct checkout page URL looks like this: http://1.username_carbofix.pay.click...sl1&cbexit=209

Any solutions for this?

PS: I'm able to add in my affiliate link with TID using an <img src> on the Add to Cart redirect page but sometimes the ClickID passes through, sometimes it doesn't, so on my tracking program it doesn't always record the sales.

---

Sorry to hear about your woes! I'm afraid I don't have experience using a tracker with Clickbank products, and your case is not typical.

Can you please elaborate on how you're using an <img src> on the ATC redirect page to pass the tid? And do you have any idea why the clickid is only passed sometimes but not always?



Amy

---

Home > >