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gamiziuk
Joined: Aug 23, 2000
# Posts: 630
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Posted: 2005-Mar-25 09:28
Has anyone heard of or had experience with a company namd "Precision Reservations" ? precisionreservations.com
They emailed me, soliciting me to sign up for their affiliate program. Never heard of them before, looking for feedback from anyone with a story to tell.
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jonathanm
Joined: May 09, 2005
# Posts: 3
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Posted: 2005-May-10 03:51
An all your cookies belong to us operation!
I also got that email, and did some tests on them last month.
They are in business quite long, their affiliate program previously was called Planetholiday.com but they changed the program towards PrecisionReservations.com. Seems that there affiliate tracking system is helping them in the SERPS of Google. They created one of those lucky affiliate programs where referral links created by affiliates, are counted as a normal backward link towards the landing page of their website. That said, their landing pages have within their main product range (‘City’ Hotels) in Asia sound rankings in Google.
If your targeting those same SERPS you’re dead meat. You’re competing with them as they have a cookie installed within there own SERPS pages. There affiliate agreement seems to mention a 1 year cookie, but with all my tests the cookie was overwritten. If I first visited a affiliate page (cookie was set correct) and thereafter precision reservations via address bar or Google SERP cookie was always overwritten to theirs.
Moreover they created dozens of copy sites to compete further with the affiliate. Not to mention a sort of Rebates Loyalty Program where customers are automatically signed up for after a booking. Wonder what happens to the commission after the first referral.
Especially the fact that you are competing with them for the same SERP, while you give them a free link is sour.!
Just my 2 cents.
Jonathan, Paris
(Note: They are not the same people who run another Bangkok based company called Asiarooms.com / Asiavoyage24.com. Some of you will know what type of scam they where running…. But fortunately for 'unknowing new bees' they stopped their affiliate program as of 15 April this year.)
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Curt
Joined: Eons Ago
# Posts: 3736
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Posted: 2005-May-21 11:16
If their cookie is overwriting your own affiliate cookie, doesn't that mean that the affiliates don't get credit for sending referrals? That would be the same as cheating affiliates. And if they are that agressively working against their own affiliates, perhaps affiliates would not want to work with them. If they don't convert to sales, no point in being an affiliate for them. Seems like a crappy outfit to partner with (given what is being said here so far).
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sittigod
Joined: May 31, 2005
# Posts: 1
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Posted: 2005-Jun-01 09:39
Hi All,
As an affiliate has been for some time partnering with this company, I was really shocked reading the comments about the cookies being overwritten. As soon as I'd gone thru the comments, I immediately examined the cookies on my site. After spending time all day long to see if the cookies on my sites were overwritten, I did not find anything wrong with the tracking codes. All of them worked fine and still remained when being directed to their hotel pages.
The steps below were the process I tested the cookies. If you guys think it is incorrect to examine the issue, please advise.
1. Delete all cookies and offline contents on IE browser in order to avoid any confusion while testing it. Then, go to my website and click on the link that has my tracking code embedded. Once directed to their site, navigate until it reaches a hotel page and make a booking. View source and search for the tracking code.
2. Close the browser and open a new one. Note: Do not delete the cookie to see if it will be overwritten by their cookie. Go straight to their homepage and find a hotel to make a booking. View source and search for my tracking code.
To be honest, I didn’t find any thing about it. If you think the way I tested was wrong, please feel free to post your suggestions on the board. It would be highly appreciated.
Cheers,
Sean
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jonathanm
Joined: May 09, 2005
# Posts: 3
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Posted: 2005-Jun-03 10:30
Hello Sean,
As you did not provide a website for testing i will give one. (Hopefully one of the moderators will allow me....)
Do a Google search on Hongkong Hotels.
4th spot you find an affiliate of them (hong kong hotels network.com) i will not hyperlink the URL for obvious reasons. (No the site is not from ME.
Now go to the site reserve a room, an see what cookie is set at the end URL (BookingForm URL) to me this is CID=8229
Do again a Google seach for 'Hongkong Hotels' on the second page you will find the corp. site of Prec. Reservations.
Reserve again a room and see what cookie is set.
To me this is cookie CID=11438 (Right Mouse Click)
Hope this helps...
Jonathan
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jonathanm
Joined: May 09, 2005
# Posts: 3
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Posted: 2005-Jun-03 11:07
For the People who want to know how this particular Hongkong page of Prec. Res. did hit the 15th spot in the google serp. Do a backlink command on it. Those poor affiliates who link towards it, will probably never see any sale at all.
Allmighty Google probably has first to kill of their free search engine traffic before they start paying any attention towards their affiliates, and change their internal policy to them.
J.
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kiwifarang
Joined: Jun 05, 2005
# Posts: 1
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Posted: 2005-Jun-08 11:09
Hi Jonathan, as Affiliate Manager at Precision Reservations I feel obliged to respond to your comments.
We have run a test of all affiliate cookies and found that they are being placed correctly. We do not overwrite affiliate cookies. Unfortunately the site that you referred to uses outdated links that are not compatible with our system. This issue has been raised on several occasions with the affiliate concerned, but he has yet to update his site.
With regards to the benefit we receive from affiliate links, this was unintentional and we made no effort to optimize these links. When we built Precision Reservations and moved our affiliate program, the links we created were dynamic, long, and included a redirect in the middle. Not exactly SE friendly. SEO information at that time (March 2003) indicated that these links would be easily recognized by the SE’s and discarded.
The Rewards program we implemented may appear to work against the affiliate, but actually encourages multiple transactions within the first year, which ties in with the one year affiliate cookie we use. Repeat customers can be tracked and subsequent bookings are credited to the affiliate.
Since taking over the program I have worked with many affiliates and their ideas and feedback drive the development and enhancement of our systems and tools. I have no interest in cheating our affiliates and feel we are transparent in our dealings with them.
If you would like to discuss this further, please send me an email.
Kind regards
Grant Hoben
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