Hi All,
Firstly please read the project brief carefully, this may not be as straight forward as it first appears.
I've installed PunBB Forum and plan to run a special offers forum where users can log in and post offer codes / good deals they have found online.
What I want to do is turn the external links on the forum into affiliate links where we can automatically. So the user will post a straight link to a retailers website as they normally would, our forum surrounds it with the correct code from the relevant affiliate network or internal code so we can earn a commission from any sales generated from it.
So for example a user would post: [login to view URL]
If the retailer was with the affiliate network "Affiliate Window" the link would be turned into something like:
[login to view URL];amp;awinmid=1202&awinaffid=66890&clickref=&p=[login to view URL]%2F
When a user is logged in, their user number will need to be inserted into the link id section so we can track back what user purchased from the merchant.
For example if the user number was 101 on the forum, the above link would look like (clickref=101):
[login to view URL];amp;awinmid=1202&awinaffid=66890&CLICKREF=101&p=[login to view URL]%2F
There's lots of affiliate networks so the current admin area will need a section to add networks / merchants and manage them along with the link templates, etc.
Thirdly all external links we'll need to be masked so they don't show the affiliate code.
That's all. This is part of a much bigger project that all links together and it's imperative whoever takes on this project understands how affiliate campaigns work.
We're a non profit organisation and whilst i do fully expect to pay for this project and i'm not looking for a freebie, cost will play an important part in the decision making of who to take on. It's just not feasible for us to be paying silly fee's for this.
Please message me on PMB with details about how you will complete the project and ask any further questions. I'm open to suggestions as to the best way to complete the desired goal.
Thanks All.
Paul