Glossary
Affiliate link
A URL that carries your affiliate ID, so the program knows who sent the visitor and whom to pay. It usually sits on the network's domain, which means the network, not you, decides how long it keeps working.
Also called: referral link, partner link, affiliate URL, aff link.
You get it from the program's dashboard or the network's link builder: the network's click domain, the merchant's ID, your ID and often a destination page. The click passes through the network, which logs it, sets its tracking and forwards the visitor to the store. If a sale follows inside the cookie window, the commission goes to the ID in that link.
The catch is ownership. Programs change networks, networks retire short links and replace domains, and an old link can stop paying without an error you would notice. That is why publishers put a /go/ link or a tracker in front of it: the address they publish stays theirs, and when the program moves, the affiliate link behind it gets edited in a single place.
Related terms: Affiliate ID, Tracking link, Link cloaking, Link rot, Affiliate network.