In my Premium Series I’m taking a look at Premium WordPress plugins and WordPress themes that I personally use, either for myself and for others. All opinions are my own and not influenced by affiliate commissions or anyone connected to the product.
Ninja Affiliate is a WordPress plugin from MaxBlogPress that allows you to create easy redirects to affiliate links and automatically link keywords to affiliates. For example, my affiliate link for this plugin is
http://www.maxblogpress.com/go.php?offer=lifegoggle&pid=31
however I have changed to
http://blogtechguy.com/go/maxninja
because it’s easier to remember, easier to type, and looks nicer.
It helps a lot with very long affiliate links, ones like you get from Amazon that are very long.
However the best feature is that often I don’t need to remember the affiliate link at all. For example if I type AWeber now it should change that to my affiliate link automatically. The screenshot below shows you what I have set up for Max Ninja Affiliate, but you can choose whatever keywords you like for each affiliate links.
For the keywords, you can choose a maximum you have per page (I have 4 automatic ones maximum), use nofollow, open in a new window and exclude them from appearing on Pages (so sales pages etc can be excluded, though this can also be set on an individual Post/Page basis).
You can also choose the wording used in the link, and, if you want, have a drop down in the formatting icons on the write/edit Post page.
Often people are worried about people stealing affiliate commissions, especially if you use a service like Clickbank and don’t use EasyClickMate or something similar. So you can also cloak links if you wish,
The settings page tracks raw clicks and unique clicks but (of course) cannot measure conversions. It does give an indication of how well your links are working, but a report by post/page would be more useful, especially if you write about an affiliate product quite often.
Finally if the affiliate changes your affiliate URL, such as when they change affiliate management system, instead of having to dig through every post and page to find the links or run a database query, you can simply change the original affiliate link URL in Max Ninja Affiliate and it will mean all the other links will automatically work again. This saved me a lot of time when Thesis / DIY Themes changed system.
Overall I’ve been using this plugin for a while now. It’s simple to setup, can insert links automatically, works like a URL shortener and is a great time saver and aid for sites that use affiliate links. I also use it to save me adding other frequently used links, not just affiliate links, so it is even more useful. For $37 it is an excellent investment.
Summary
Where I use this: Right here on BTG.
Pros: Easily create short URLs; Simple to use; Can automatically link keywords
Cons: Sometimes links words in headlines within posts, but a minor gripe.
Cost: $37
From: Max Blog Press (affiliate link)
Nice post Joel. I always wonder if my affiliate links are right and working. I have the Ninja plug-in and it works. How often do we need to check our links to see if they are still working for us?
Thank you,
Debbie
I check every so often for the major ones. Usually you will be notified if the affiliate system changes but the good thing about Ninja Affiliate is you have all the links listed do you can simply go down and click on each one to test.
Thanks Joel for answer my question, like you always do. Using the Ninja affiliate is the easy way. I like easy. Thanks again. You are always appreciated.
Debbie