Have you ever seen a banner ad that 'follows' you when surfing the internet? If so, you’ve seen first-hand the power (or poor execution, depending on the frequency and quality of the ad) of a tracking pixel.

Such powerhouses of pint-size are frequently underestimated by digital design companies, too. We will transform the next campaign, refine the website, and boost sales when used the appropriate way.

Let's look at a few commonly asked questions about pixel tracking.

What is Tracking Pixel?

A tracking pixel is a snippet of HTML code that is loaded when a user visits a web site or opens an email. It is useful for tracking conversions and user behavior. Advertisers may acquire data for online marketing, site research, or e-mail marketing using a tracking pixel.

Tracking pixel

Tracking pixels within the source code might look like this:

<img style="“position: absolute;" src="“Tracking">

<img style="“display: none”;" src="“Tracking">

<img src="“Tracking" width="“0”" height="“0”">

The tracking pixel URL is the memory location on the server. When the user visits a website, the image with the tag is loaded from this server. Optical properties such as visibility, or very small size are defined using the style attribute.

How does Tracking Pixel work?

An online website operator or sender adds the tracking pixel using a tag in the HTML file or email received by the website. This code provides an external link to the server pixel. When a user visits the destination page, the application processes the Html normally the browser of the user.

In addition, various information about the user is also transmitted using this method. To some extent, combination with JavaScript is necessary in order to collect information about the operating system or browser type.

The following data can be acquired and analyzed with a tracking pixel.

  • Operating system used (gives information on the use of mobile devices)
  • Type of website or email used, for example on mobile or desktop
  • Type of client used, for example, a browser or mail program.
  • Client’s screen resolution
  • Time the email was read or website was visited
  • Activities on the website during a session (when using multiple tracking pixels)
  • IP address (gives information on the Internet Service Provider and location)

Pixel Tracking for Affiliates

Why bother tracking affiliate links? After all, many affiliate programs have their own dashboards and reports that show the number of clicks and conversions.

If you’re still new in affiliate marketing and you’ve only been promoting a handful of products or services, you may feel like everything’s under control. These dashboards are enough… for now.

But as you take affiliate marketing seriously and begin to promote more products, it will be dizzying for you to open multiple dashboards. You’d want to have one place where you can see and compare which posts and affiliate links are doing well.

Below are some top reasons why seasoned affiliate marketers track their affiliate links.

Easily compare affiliate link performance

Having a link tracking system in place makes it easy to see which posts, affiliate links, and marketing channels are generating the highest value for y

Make better decisions

When you know which links and posts are producing more results, you can decide to promote these more. You can also create related posts, or upgrade your past post to get even better traffic and conversions.

Link tracking also shows you which platforms are generating most of your traffic. Knowing this, you can focus your efforts on promoting your materials in the most effective marketing channels.

Increase CTR

Some affiliate marketing platforms let you create short links, but others do not have this feature. This leaves you no choice but to use long links containing a jumble of letters and numbers that readers don’t recognize.

This affects your click-through rate (CTR). Viewers are more likely to click and share shorter links they can read and understand, rather than long ones that look suspicious.

To solve this, affiliate marketers and link managers use URL shortening. Many link managing tools also allow you to brand your links (i.e., to use a custom domain name), helping you build brand awareness and trust.

Protect your earnings

Some people try to steal other affiliate’s earnings by replacing affiliate IDs, taking away legitimate affiliates’ commissions.

When you use branded tracking links or URL shorteners, you are able to cloak your affiliate ID and prevent commission theft.

How to Track Your Affiliate Links?

There are several tools that let affiliate marketers easily create and track branded or custom links. One of which is AWIN Affiliate Marketing Network.

AWIN Affiliate Marketing

AWIN is an affiliate marketing network. Formerly known as Affiliate Window, AWIN is a platform that contains thousands of affiliate programs that simply can connect and earn money from.

AWIN is simple to connect and simple to utilize, and it has thousands of high-paying affiliate programs for bloggers. You'll get to a ton of programs in one place, apply to those programs, find out how much they pay, get your affiliate links, and get paid…all right there in your affiliate dashboard.

How to integrate Awin tracking within Shopify

When setting up the program linking you need to request that your Account Manager (or Technical Services) makes sure all affiliate traffic is sent via the Cake click tracker and that the URL is tagged up in a specific way, namely that !!!awc!!! is populated to the parameter s1, !!!id!!! to s2, !!!Sitename!!! to s3, and finally !!!clickref!!! to s4.

http://domain-name.com/?a=NNN&c=NNNN&s1=!!!awc!!!&s2=!!!id!!!&s3=!!!sitename!!!&s4=!!!clickref!!!

Google Tag Manager

Tag Name: Awin v2 Image Pixel

Tag Type: Custom Image Tag

Image URL:

https://www.awin1.com/sread.img?tt=ns&tv=2&merchant=NNNN&amount={{awinSaleAmount}}&ch=aw&cr={{awinCurrency}}&ref={{awinOrderReference}}&parts={{awinParts}}&vc={{awinVoucherCode}}&testmode=0

<img src="https://www.awin1.com/sread.img?tt=ns&tv=2&merchant=MID&amount={{subtotal_price|divided_by:1.2|money_without_currency}}&ch=aw&cr={{shop.currency}}&ref={{order_number}}&parts=DEFAULT:{{subtotal_price|divided_by:1.2|money_without_currency}}&vc={{discounts.first.code}}&testmode=0" border="0" height="0" width="0" style="display: none;"> <form style="display: none;" name="aw_basket_form"> <textarea wrap="physical" id="aw_basket"> {%for line_item in line_items%}AW:P|MID|{{order_number}}|{{line_item.product.id}}|{{line_item.title}}|{{line_item.price|divided_by:1.2|money_without_currency}}|{{line_item.quantity}}|{{line_item.sku}}|DEFAULT| {%endfor%} </textarea> </form> <script type="text/javascript"> var AWIN = {}; AWIN.Tracking = {}; AWIN.Tracking.Sale = {}; AWIN.Tracking.Sale.amount = "{{subtotal_price|divided_by:1.2|money_without_currency}}"; AWIN.Tracking.Sale.channel = "aw"; AWIN.Tracking.Sale.currency = "{{shop.currency}}"; AWIN.Tracking.Sale.orderRef = "{{order_number}}"; AWIN.Tracking.Sale.parts = "DEFAULT:{{subtotal_price|divided_by:1.2|money_without_currency}}"; AWIN.Tracking.Sale.voucher = "{{discounts.first.code}}"; AWIN.Tracking.Sale.test = 0; </script> <script src="https://www.dwin1.com/MID.js" type="text/javascript" defer="defer"></script>

Awin tracking Disclaimer: Please note that while this template was tested and verified with a number of merchants, we cannot guarantee that it covers all possible Shopify implementations and set-ups. Please replace 'MID' with your Merchant ID. We have used variables provided in Shopify's documentation, and their platform functionality may change without our knowledge.

Please ensure that the Awin dwin1 tag below appears on all pages across the site. This is typically placed in 'theme.liquid' and in 'cart.liquid', directly above the '</body>' tag:

<script src="https://www.dwin1.com/MID.js" type="text/javascript" defer="defer"></script>

This template is for tracking exclusive of 20% UK VAT and furthermore without delivery charge.

If you want to track inclusive of tax / VAT then just remove all instances of | divided_by:1.2, however depending on your Shopify settings, you might instead want to add on taxes. If that is the case then, for example, replace divided_by:1.2 with times:1.1 to add 10% tax to the price entry.

If you want to include delivery charge, replace all instances of subtotal_price with total_price, however then please note that you will end up with an obvious discrepancy between transaction and product-level reporting.

Multiple discount codes, if the webshop set up supports it, can be populated to tracking by looping through the discounts object. In the example below the different discounts, code will be inserted pipe separated.

In image pixel URL:

&vc={% for discount in discounts %}{% if forloop.index > 0 %}|{% endif %}{{ discount.code }}{% endfor %}

In JavaScript declaration:

AWIN.Tracking.Sale.voucher = "{% for discount in discounts %}{% if forloop.index > 0 %}|{% endif %}{{ discount.code }}{% endfor %}";

That’s it!

You’re all set to integrate the AWIN pixel within your Shopify store. However, if you need an extra pair of hands, you can consider hiring our experts for Integrating the AWIN Pixel Tracking in your Shopify store.