If you’re a blogger who does any type of affiliate marketing, it’s not enough to track just clicks. You also need to track conversions.
Most affiliate marketers (and most businesses, for that matter) don’t track conversion rates. But without question, that is the No. 1 thing you must do in order to be successful with affiliate marketing.
Unfortunately, Pretty Links, one of the most commonly used tracking plugins, doesn’t have this functionality. So if your site makes any serious revenue, you’ll outgrow Pretty Links pretty quickly.
Before I started using ClickMeter, I compared many competing services. They either lacked conversion tracking or had conversion tracking that was difficult to use.
In my pursuit of a link management system that supports conversion tracking, I found ClickMeter.
What Is ClickMeter?
ClickMeter is a hosted service that allows you to manage your marketing (affiliate) links and social media links in one place. If you’re looking for a link-shortening service, you should use ClickMeter’s sister service Rebrandly.
Unfortunately for bloggers, ClickMeter doesn’t currently have a WordPress plugin that easily adds affiliate links to your site. But that’s not the primary reason to get ClickMeter. You get ClickMeter because you want to track affiliate link conversions.
ClickMeter allows you to measure both clicks and — more importantly — conversions. You have the option to either embed a pixel on the merchant’s site, or use the more common postback option.
The service gives you many options to integrate and extend ClickMeter to suit your specific needs.
But unfortunately, I wish some other functionalities were part of ClickMeter’s service.
Summary
Larry's Take
| Platform | Cloud |
|---|---|
| Price | $19 - $3,990 per month |
| Annual Discount | Yes - 2 months free |
Pros
- Easy to Use — It's overall one of the easiest affiliate tracking services to use.
- Powerful Reporting — There are many ways to display the data captured by ClickMeter. You can also export data via its API and CSV files into Google Sheets or Microsoft Excel.
- Powerful API — If you're a super affiliate, this is perhaps the best feature of ClickMeter. You can extend the functionality and integrate with third-party services via its webhook functionality (ClickMeters calls this a "piggyback").
- Many Redirection Options — You can redirect by country and device and perform A/B testing. If you are looking for a redirection option, ClickMeter more than likely has it.
Cons
- Doesn't Track UTM Codes — Out of the box, ClickMeter cannot track UTM parameters. However, with its custom variables you can create this functionality.
- Conversion Tracking Setup Can Be Confusing — While ClickMeter is powerful, setting up server-to-server conversion tracking can be confusing. ClickMeter needs to support more affiliate networks to automate this process.
- Out-of-Date Documentation — There are minor annoyances in the documentation and setup (i.e., there's no mention of support of SSL for the postback link).
- No WordPress Plugin — ClickMeter doesn't offer a plugin to integrate with its service.
- No Method to Block Google — Because there's no method to block links from Google, it's not recommended to directly place ClickMeter links in the wild. I recommend creating a reflection page on your site that masks and blocks Google from indexing your affiliate links.
- No Landing Pages — Unlike competing products such as Voluum, ClickMeter lacks landing page functionality. However, IMHO I would rather use another dedicated service that better implements that functionality.
Screenshots
ClickMeter Conversion Tracking
Super affiliates realize that tracking products is critical for success. My strategy is to track conversions as if they were my own products.
That makes ClickMeter’s conversion tracking its most important feature. You can use ClickMeter to track and manage affiliate links all in one place.
There’s no way to track conversions with Google Analytics. You can’t really use that service for click tracking, either. That’s because, although Google Analytics will let you track per click, its tracking algorithm uses JavaScript, so it’s not 100% accurate.
What you need is a tool like ClickMeter to get a report on each conversion.
ClickMeter’s tracking can be a little confusing, but it’s powerful once you get it set up. Watch my video below for a demonstration of how to set up a server-to-server postback link.
As you can see, it takes only three steps to start tracking conversions:
- Adding a sub-ID with a server-to-server unique ID
- Creating a conversion tag in ClickMeter
- Adding the postback conversion code from ClickMeter to the merchant’s affiliate system
If you’re interested, I’ve created a functionality you can add to ClickMeter to make conversion tracking easy and automated. Contact me for details.
ClickMeter Pricing
Like most Software as a Service (SaaS), ClickMeter charges a monthly fee. However, there are annual discounts available. If you sign up for a 12-month subscription, you get two months free. If you prepay for 24 months, you get six months free.
The cheapest subscription starts at $19 per month.
| Price | Events | Datapoints | Storage | Domains |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| $19/mo | 5,000 | 500 | 1 year | 1 |
| $29/mo | 25,000 | 2,500 | 1 year | 1 |
| $49/mo | 50,000 | 5,000 | 1 year | 1 |
| $99/mo | 200,000 | 20,000 | 2 years | 10 |
| $119/mo | 300,000 | 30,000 | 2 years | 10 |
| $149/mo | 500,000 | 50,000 | 2 years | 10 |
| $199/mo | 1,000,000 | 100,000 | 2 years | 10 |
| $349/mo | 2,000,000 | 200,000 | 3 years | 100 |
| $449/mo | 3,000,000 | 300,000 | 3 years | 100 |
| $649/mo | 5,000,000 | 500,000 | 3 years | 100 |
As you can see, ClickMeter has options to suit beginners, enterprise customers, and everything in between. For most folks, I recommend starting with the cheapest plan and migrating up as you grow.
ClickMeter Alternatives
There are many ClickMeter alternatives to choose from if the service isn’t what you’re looking for.
| Name | WP Plugin | Conversion Tracking | Starting Price |
|---|---|---|---|
| AAWP | Yes | No | $39 |
| ClickMagick | No | Yes | $27/mo |
| Improvely | No | Yes | $29/mo |
| Lasso | Yes | No | $19/mo |
| LinkTrackr | No | Yes | $17/mo |
| Pretty Links Pro | Yes | No | $59/yr |
| ThirstyAffiliates Pro | Yes | No | $49/yr |
| Voluum | No | Yes | $69/mo |
In my opinion, the only viable ClickMeter alternative is ClickMagick. However, I find that it lacks some of the must-have features that ClickMeter offers. In a ClickMeter vs. ClickMagick comparison, I would pick ClickMeter as the winner.
ClickMagick doesn’t have a public API (application programming interface), nor does it have a webhook (ClickMeter calls this a “piggyback”) to integrate with other services such as Woopra.
In addition, ClickMeter has custom variables with which you can track data that’s important to you. As a super affiliate, those are features I must have in my link management system.
Summary
I have yet to find a better affiliate tracking service than ClickMeter. I not only recommend it but have used this service for years on this blog and among my customers.
But that’s not to say ClickMeter is perfect. I think the best analogy is that ClickMeter is the best horse in the glue factory. There are features and functionality that could be easier. But ClickMeter is currently the easiest link tracking service to use.
Out of the box, ClickMeter can’t track conversions down to the traffic source. You must extend its service — ideally, with some custom programming.
That’s why I used the service’s API to extend ClickMeter’s functionality and offer some add-ons to use in conjunction.
