cookies - do you test for them?

[mojoman]

do you do a pre check of surfers to your site. do they have js? do they have flash? do they have cookies enabled?

or, do you rely on them having it all enabled?

if cookies are disabled, how can a cookie be planted on them to track your sales?

[Rofl]

Originally Posted by mojoman

if cookies are disabled, how can a cookie be planted on them to track your sales?

Do sponsors offer an alternative? Direct click throughs are fine I guess (unless sponsors ONLY check cookies and not URL's) but I guess otherwise you gotta take the wheat with the chaff.

[mojoman]

Originally Posted by Rofl

Do sponsors offer an alternative? Direct click throughs are fine I guess (unless sponsors ONLY check cookies and not URL's) but I guess otherwise you gotta take the wheat with the chaff.

i'm being devil's advocate. some sponsors set the id to follow through in the current session. but, if they come back at a later date, then, your cookie doesn't exist!

[Head Boy]

Wouldn't it be great if somebody produced a site that listed sponsors with their cookie policies?

[Rofl]

Originally Posted by Head Boy

Wouldn't it be great if somebody produced a site that listed sponsors with their cookie policies?

Get to it then headboy, I'm sure you can pull a suitable domain out of the hat!

[Head Boy]

I think SaveYourCookies.com is one of my spare names.

I've had my fill of these webmaster info sites though. They are a lot of work, and you don't get any thanks or encouragement for maintaining them.

[Rofl]

Originally Posted by Head Boy

They are a lot of work, and you don't get any thanks or encouragement for maintaining them.

Now I KNOW you are not that naive. You get eyes on your ref links of course! And hopefully clicks too!

[Head Boy]

Well I've got PornCookies.com, so I guess I could report sponsor statements I guess.

[Rofl]

Nah, what's that site where you put in the URL and it reports the cookie duration and all that? I forget, it's buried too deep in my bookmarks lol.

Simple case of copy/paste URL and then copy/paste the results of that into your site.

Et voila!

Could break it down by Main Tour | FHG's | Blogs etc, maybe there is a difference depending on where the surfer came from too?

EDIT: could also expose where there is a difference between sponsor statements and what the cookies ACTUALLy do... maybe it would be a bit of an eye opener!

[Donkey]

I am assuming they have 1) cookies enabled 2) Javascript support. At least my stats tell me
IF a sponsor uses cookie-only tracking but has better conversions, then its better to promote it, even if i may lose some sales from the cookie. I take the cookie tracking game as a part of traffic leak game many programs have.
Well what matter for me in the end is not the conversion that the sponsor shows me in the stats. It is the actual traffic I send them and the final amount on my check. But of course many the sponsors know very well that not every1 is tracking their traffic.

As for Javascript - same issue... those stats dont provide cookie stats, since the tracker uses cookie to track
Browser capabilities (last 30 days)

Java Enabled
Yes 1,004,342 98.61%
No 14,142 1.39%

Flash Versions
9.0 695,984 68.34%
9.0 r115 133,712 13.13%
9.0 r47 37,800 3.71%
6.0 24,038 2.36%
8.0 23,845 2.34%

[Head Boy]

OK, then I'll give it a go for a week or two and see what happens.