ActionAlert recently selected Versa Marketing to manage their affiliate program in the LinkShare and LinkConnector affiliate networks.  Action Alert has created a product that allows parents to create a safe computer environment for their children.  This product is the only internet safety solution endorsed by the Child Safety Network.  The best part is that consumers can download the product and use it for free. Action Alert Affiliate Program The ActionAlert affiliate program is ideal for affiliates that specialize in software downloads or mommy bloggers who naturally target a perfect audience for this type of product.  The program offers a payout of $0.50 per free download and 25% of the sale amount if the customer chooses to upgrade.  There is a 30 day cookie window from the first click to download and 1 year tracking window for download to the upgrade.  To achieve a 1 year tracking window it wasn’t feasible to do this through browser cookies.  A server-side tracking solution was implemented which ensures that the affiliate will receive commission regardless of when the cookie is inevitably deleted.  Here’s a brief overview of how the cookie and server-side tracking works. When a consumer clicks on an affiliate banner a cookie is set on their browser by the affiliate network and by ActionAlert.  This cookie contains information about the click record which identifies the affiliate that generated the click.  The consumer then proceeds to download the free product.  When they reach the free download confirmation page a pixel (bit of tracking code) will fire.  The pixel, when fired, will refer back to the click record and determine which affiliate should be credited for the sale (in this case $0.50). Now for the trickier server-side tracking portion.  When consumer first clicked on the affiliate link ActionAlert set a cookie that identified the referring affiliate.  The consumer, just in the process above, continues to download the product.  When they reach the free download confirmation page ActionAlert stores the affiliate ID, identified in the cookie they set, in their database for that specific customer.  The customer then continues to use the program for free.  Let’s say three months down the road they decide to upgrade.  The consumer would go through the process to upgrade and pay ActionAlert for the full functionality of the product.  When they complete this purchase ActionAlert will know if this was a customer referred by an affiliate three months earlier by looking for an affiliate ID in their customer database records.  If the customer was referred by an affiliate then ActionAlert’s system will fire a server-side pixel which will contain the affiliate ID and the purchase amount.  LinkShare will see this pixel fire and credit the affiliate with 25% of the purchase price.  This tracking mechanism and the affiliate ID will remain in ActionAlert’s database for an entire year.  This gives the affiliate credit for a download resulting in a sale for up to a year later. The $0.50 per free download and 25% of upgrade payout makes this a very attractive program for affiliates to promote.  Versa Marketing also commits to providing publishers with extremely responsive affiliate program management.  Publishers can reach out to our team at any time for help with their marketing efforts.  We are here to our affiliate partners successful.