Jacob, here is a simple method that's quick to implement:
1) Pass the affiliate's key in the URL and catch it on the target page by
looking for it in Application.cfm.
2) If the user is an existing customer (as noted by cookie or login), add
this key to his profile, wherever it is stored. For extra value, also
store the base template on which the user first entered your site, if this
is a first visit (i.e., no cookie).
3) Set a flag so you don't keep re-storing the key in Application.cfm on
subsequent pages.
4) When a significant ecommerce event occurs (sale, subscription, refund,
cart abandonment, etc.), tag it in your log table with both the customer
key (which can be as simple as the CFID and CFTOKEN if they are not
established customers) and the affiliate key.
5) Meaningful statistical analyses can now be easily run across both
customer and affiliate dimensions, though you'll probably still want to
extract this to a data warehouse during off-hours and analyze it there,
rather than in your OLTP DB.
6) Analyze the frequencies of "new user site entry templates" you store in
your customer profiles against your most significant ecommerce events
(sales and abandonments) to see if there are any discernable patterns and
if there are, look at those templates and ask yourself why.
There's a lot more you can do, of course, but this is the easy stuff you
can crank out quickly.
Come to the Ecommerce Development with ColdFusion seminar in Memphis next
week to learn a whole lot more. Go to www.ColdFusionSeminar.com for
details. If you want a half-price seminar pass, just send your request to
[EMAIL PROTECTED] and I'll send you a PassCode right away.
Hope this helps, Jacob. Take care, my friend.
At 05:42 PM 8/25/00 -0500, you wrote:
>I am working on setting up an affiliate program for an ecommerce web site
>and was wondering if anyone had seen any CF apps or custom tags to do this.
>If not, do you have any experience or insight into how to get started, what
>to do and not do, etc.?
>
>Thanks in advance!
>jake
>
>============================================
> J a c o b M c K e e
> Senior Development Manager - Mobile Solutions Group
>Vectrix
>Tel: 214.890.1801
>8800 N. Central Expressway
>Suite 800
>Dallas, Texas 75231 USA
>
>E: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>W: http://www.vectrix.com/
>============================================
>
>
>------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
>To Unsubscribe visit
>http://www.houseoffusion.com/index.cfm?sidebar=lists&body=lists/cf_talk or
>send a message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with 'unsubscribe' in
>the body.
Respectfully,
Adam Phillip Churvis
President
Productivity Enhancement, Inc.
****************************************************************************
* PRODUCTIVITY ENHANCEMENT, INC. *
* *
* Publishers of the CommerceBlocks line of modular development tools *
* for ColdFusion *
* *
* Website: http://www.commerceblocks.com E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *
* Phone: 770-446-8866 Fax: 770-242-0410 *
* *
****************************************************************************
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Archives: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
To Unsubscribe visit
http://www.houseoffusion.com/index.cfm?sidebar=lists&body=lists/cf_talk or send a
message to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with 'unsubscribe' in the body.
