Your partners can customize tracking links with additional parameters that can be tracked by and reported to impact.com. These are called Shared IDs and Param parameters. These are useful when you need your partner(s) to pass more tracking data to you.
Partners have a similar parameter called a Sub ID. This is solely for their tracking purposes, and there is no way for them to pass the data to you unless they send you a report.
Any parameters you want to pass in an ad's tracking link are managed via your Gateway Tracking Settings with the exception of the Shared ID and Param parameters. These two kinds of parameters need to be added to tracking links by your partners.
The Shared ID parameter is the simpler of the two kinds of parameters partners can pass to you. The tracking data for this parameter is shared with both you and your partner(s), and neither party is reliant on the other to view the tracking results. Partners do control what information is passed via Shared ID but are likely to be open to discussing what information passed via Shared ID would be most valuable to the partnership.
Param parameters are harder to implement than Shared IDs. The tracking data for this parameter is only viewable to your by default, but you can send partners the results of Param parameter tracking by sending them custom Advanced Action Listing Reports. Partners do control what is passed via Param parameter, and likely not get much out of the results. Param parameters do function very similarly to Shared IDs, but partners do not get to see tracking reporting through impact.com.
Detail | Shared ID | Param parameter |
Implementation Difficulty | Easy | Moderate |
How to Implement | impact.com Partner UI | Partner manually appends to tracking links |
Who Views Results | Brands and Partners | Brands by default, but partners can be sent reports with tracking results. |
Who Controls What is Passed | Partners | Partners |
Character Limit | 255 Characters | 255 Characters |
Brand Reports to View Tracking Results |
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When a user clicks on an impact.com tracking link with a Shared ID or Param parameter appended, the results are captured by our tracking servers and stored. impact.com then correlates the click to the action.
See the snippet below for the example of how these parameters are appended to a tracking link.
https://trackingdomain.net/c/mpid/adid/campaignid?parameter=value
In the example above, the parameter portion refers to the Shared ID or the Param passing through and reported by Impact.com. See the table below for additional details on the example link.
Component | Description |
trackingdomain.net | The unique tracking domain provided by impact.com. |
mpid | The ID for your partner. |
adid | The ID impact.com assigned to the ad. |
campaignid | The ID impact.com assigned to your program. |
While the Shared ID is added to the tracking link by your partner(s) through impact.com, Param parameters must be manually appended to the end of a tracking link. This means that your partner, when adding the tracking link to where they will host the ad, must add the parameter on themselves. If your partner needs help with this, you can send them this article on Sub ID, Shared ID, and Param parameters.
Once your partner has added a Shared ID or Param parameters into tracking links, you can begin to view reporting on these parameters by using the Advanced Action Listing Report.
When creating an Advanced Action Listing Report for Shared ID and/or Param parameter tracking results, select which parameters you want to include in the report via the filters at the top of the screen. The Param parameter filter is added via the Show drop-down filter first before you can enter which Param parameters you want to add to the report.