A channel code is a short description that you can enter into your promotions which will allow you to track exactly where your subscriptions are coming from. By coding your promotions we'll be able to tell you whether the majority of your subs are coming from a newsletter mention, a stand-alone offer, a blog post, a widget, etc.
Here is a simple way to add channel code tracking to your offer promotions:
This allows you to track promotions that you create for yourself like blog posts, direct links, newsletter inclusions, etc. For this tracking, you'll add a little bit of code into your links.
Here's how...Every channel coded link will look like this: https://BRAND.tradepub.com/c/pubRD.mpl?sr=oc&_t=oc:&pc=OFFERCODE&ch=CHANNELCODE. To customize this code to track you need to replace 3 variables.
For Example... If you wanted to promote Website Magazine, found at: https://www.tradepub.com/free/webs/, you'll need to modify the link. Assuming your co-branded tradepub URL is https://sitename.tradepub.com and you've chosen the tracking code to be webslink, your channel coded link would become: https://sitename.tradepub.com/c/pubRD.mpl?sr=oc&_t=oc:&pc=webs&ch=webslink. Of course, you can name these channel codes with any eight character alphanumeric term.
If you place links on your homepage sending users to your Co-branded Site, you can track those links as well. Many partners create a navigation link from their homepage to their co-branded site. This would be a great place to add a channel code.
Here's what a channel-coded link to your co-branded page would look like: https://BRAND.tradepub.com/c/pubRD.mpl?ch=CHANNELCODE. Replace the BRAND and CHANNELCODE variables as described above.
If you send users to specific category landing pages within your co-branded resource library, you can now track those links as well. Here's what a channel-coded category page link looks like: https://BRAND.tradepub.com/category/CATEGORY-NAME/CATEGORYCODE/?ch=CHANNELCODE. Replace the BRAND, CATEGORY NAME, CATEGORY CODE, and CHANNEL CODE variables as described above. To find the appropriate CATEGORYNAME and CATEGORYCODE, visit your TradePub site and click on any industry listed in the left column.
For example, all information technology offers can be found at https://www.tradepub.com/category/information-technology/1207/ The CATEGORYNAME is 'information-technology' and the CATEGORY CODE is '1207'.
Under the Reports section in the left navigation you will see "Report by Channel." Running this report prior to implementing channel codes will show all requests in the "none" row. Once the channel codes are implemented, all future requests will be tracked by the assigned channel code. Using unique channel codes for each promotion is a great way to see exactly which promotions are driving earnings, and which are under performing.
Here is an example of a Channel Code Report with unique codes used for each promotion, along with the RSS-to-Email Newsletter code:
If you have any questions about channel codes, don't hesitate to ask!
