Conversion Tracking: 5 Steps to (As) Accurate Tracking as Possible

A solid foundation for affiliate marketing

“We don’t have the numbers; our analytics tool only shows 40–60% of sales.” This is a complaint we’ve heard time and again from online stores in 2020. The reasons for this usually lie in the use of third-party tracking tools, which are blocked by ad blockers or browsers, as well as consent management tools, where users often opt out of tracking altogether.

The problem: It’s not just analytics, data-driven marketing, or commercial decisions that become a matter of chance. Partner and affiliate marketing suffer the most. This is driving discussions about CPC commissions and advertising cost subsidies (i.e., monthly or one-time payments) among top partners, as they are seeing cuts to their CPO commissions.

But effective conversion tracking is possible. As the Customer Solutions and Success Team at Ingenious Technologies, we’re regularly asked for our recommendations and best practices for achieving the most accurate sales tracking possible. After all, the goal is robust partner marketing.

Basically, it currently boils down to the following formula:

• Use of First-Party Tracking
• Avoiding GTM & Co.
• Integration of Cookie-less Tracking (Click IDs)
• Please feel free to embed the on-page code
• Integration as a Legitimate Interest in the Consent Management Tool

1 – First-party tracking

No one wants to do without cookies (yet)—but browsers and ad blockers often block (well-known) third-party cookies in particular.

The idea: to perform tracking on the store’s domain. This means that cookies are sent from a subdomain of the store and are thus (technologically) identified as coming from the store’s domain. First-party tracking.

As a result, tracking cookies are very unlikely to be blocked.

The best approach is to set up a dedicated tracking subdomain. Ingenious Technologies guides its clients through the domain setup process and then configures everything on the server side.

Solutions using JavaScript are certainly possible, but we believe they are the inferior choice. This is because we believe that, in the long run, scripts executed in the browser would be too easy to detect or block.

2 – Avoid GTM and similar tools

I read the best—and unfortunately most accurate—comment about Google Tag Manager (GTM) fromonline marketing expert Karl Kratz: “… that you only need Google Tag Manager anyway if you’ve lost control of your code or your organization…”

With that in mind, we recommend that you implement your first-party tracking codes outside of popular tag management systems! This is because these are typically third-party tools that, like any other (especially well-known) tracking tool, can easily be blocked—along with all the codes and content they contain!

Thus, an implementation in GTM directly undermines first-party tracking and reduces it to a standard third-party tool.

3 – Use Click IDs (Cookie-less Tracking)

First-party tracking isn't foolproof either. That's why combining different tracking methods should always be the preferred approach.

In particular, if the user is first redirected through a server (which then sets a cookie in a flash) before reaching the store’s landing page, this can lead to issues with tracking quality. This is because browsers detect these redirects and, in many cases, simply block the cookies created in the process.

The solution: The tracking server sends a unique ID that identifies the click to the store's landing page in the form of a parameter.

The shop can read this value from the GET parameter and store it, for example, in a first-party cookie. It is best to set the cookie using server-side technologies (PHP), as JavaScript could easily be detected and blocked by the browser.

The click IDs stored in the first-party cookie are retrieved on the order confirmation page and passed on to the sales tracking code. This allows for the tracking and attribution of the sale—even if the tracking server’s cookie has been deleted.

4 – Enable bounceless tracking links using the on-page code

Ingenious Technologies' on-page code allows the use of bounceless tracking links: these are links that lead directly to the store. They become tracking links through an appended tracking parameter (the amc code).

Some browsers delete cookies set during redirects by default. Bounceless tracking links do not have this issue. Since the on-page code is (ideally) loaded via a subdomain of the store (first-party tracking), the tracking cookie is a first-party cookie.

5 – Consent = Legitimate Interest

Make sure that the conversion tracking code is always called or is allowed to be called. On the one hand, online stores want to be transparent with their users and disclose all cookies and tracking methods (e.g., in the consent tool or privacy policy). On the other hand, calling the conversion tracking code is essential for excellent tracking quality.

The solution: Specifically for the purpose of affiliate marketing, the conversion tracking code and all associated cookies can be processed on the basis of legitimate interest. This is because the goal is to facilitate sales partnerships in which both the publisher and the online store have a strong (legitimate) interest.

At this point, we highly recommend the BVDW white paper“Data Protection-Compliant Affiliate Marketing” as further in-depth and detailed reading. For those interested in learning more about data protection and performance tracking, we also recommend our podcast with André Koegler.

Conclusion

Achieving effective performance tracking that delivers reliable and as accurate data as possible is well within reach. Key ingredients: In addition to robust technology and a combination of various measures, the most important factor is the commitment to implementing it.

If you have any questions, please feel free to contact us. At Ingenious Technologies, we put the solutions mentioned above into practice and implement them through our online stores.