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UPDATED June'26

Affiliate Link Audit — Stop Losing

Commission Daily.

Your affiliate links are where traffic becomes commission. Broken links, untracked links, non-compliant links, and poorly placed links are leaving money on the table every single day. This 37-step checklist walks you through a complete audit of every affiliate link on your WordPress site. Run it quarterly.

Start the Audit Why audits matter
AFFILIATE LINK AUDIT CHECKLIST  |  37 STEPS  |  7 SECTIONS  |  FREE
Link Audit Checklist
Quarterly
Progress 0 / 37
Done

37

Total Checklist Steps

7

Audit Sections

Quarterly

Recommended Frequency

$100s

Monthly Loss from 1 Broken Link

◆ Why It Matters

Why Affiliate Link Audits Are Non-Negotiable

Most affiliate site owners set up their links once and forget about them. But affiliate links are living assets that degrade over time:

💸

Programs change

Commission rates get cut, cookies get shortened, programs close entirely — often with little notice to publishers.

📦

Products change

Pricing pages move, products are discontinued, affiliate landing pages change — making your review misleading.

🔗

Links break

Merchant URL structures change, 301 redirects fail, affiliate networks migrate platforms — silently killing commissions.

🔧

Cloaked links misfire

ThirstyAffiliates or Pretty Links redirects can break after plugin updates without any visible error on the page.

📋

Disclosure requirements evolve

FTC rules and regional regulations get updated — non-compliance risks legal exposure and Google penalties.

A single undetected broken link on a high-traffic review page can cost hundreds of dollars in lost commissions per month. Regular audits prevent this.

◆ All 7 Sections

The Complete Affiliate Link Audit Checklist

Recommended frequency: quarterly — or after any major plugin update or site migration.

Section 1

Link Inventory

  • Export all affiliate links from ThirstyAffiliates or Pretty Links into a spreadsheet
  • List every affiliate program you're part of, with last-checked status
  • Document each link: destination URL, cloaked URL, program, commission rate, and cookie window
  • Note which programs are managed through which networks (Impact, ShareASale, PartnerStack, CJ Affiliate)

Section 2

Link Functionality Testing

  • Click each affiliate link and verify it loads the correct destination page
  • Verify the affiliate tracking parameters are present in the URL after redirect
  • Check that each link produces a valid affiliate tracking cookie (use a clean browser session)
  • Test links on both desktop and mobile devices
  • Check for redirect chains — links going through 3+ redirects should be updated to direct URLs
  • Identify and flag any broken links (404 errors) for immediate replacement

Section 3

Commission & Program Verification

  • Log into each affiliate network and verify your account is active and in good standing
  • Verify current commission rates haven't been reduced since you last checked
  • Verify cookie window duration for each program
  • Check for any program announcements about upcoming changes
  • Confirm minimum payout thresholds and payment methods are still correct
  • Review pending earnings and ensure payouts are processing normally

Section 4

FTC Compliance & Disclosure

  • Verify every post containing affiliate links has a prominent disclosure above the first affiliate link
  • Ensure disclosure uses clear language: "This post contains affiliate links. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you."
  • Confirm the disclosure is visible without scrolling on both desktop and mobile
  • Check that affiliate links in image captions and comparison tables also have nearby disclosure
  • Ensure email newsletters containing affiliate links include disclosure in the email body
  • Review your site's footer for the global affiliate disclosure link

Section 5

Cloaking & Technical Audit

  • Verify ThirstyAffiliates or Pretty Links is up to date
  • Check that "nofollow" or "sponsored" attributes are applied to all affiliate links
  • Test that link cloaking is not breaking UTM parameters attached to affiliate URLs
  • Verify link click tracking is active and recording in your dashboard
  • Check that affiliate links are not indexed by search engines (they should be nofollow)

Section 6

Conversion Optimization Audit

  • Identify your top 10 affiliate pages by traffic from Google Analytics
  • Review CTA placement and copy on each — is the affiliate link prominent and action-oriented?
  • Check whether your review content is outdated (pricing, features, competitor landscape)
  • A/B test different CTA placements on highest-traffic pages
  • Ensure comparison tables with affiliate CTAs are mobile-responsive
  • Verify all product images with affiliate links also have descriptive alt text

Section 7

Analytics & Reporting

  • Review top-performing affiliate links by clicks in ThirstyAffiliates or Pretty Links dashboard
  • Compare affiliate network conversion data to your analytics click data — identify gaps
  • Check EPC (Earnings Per Click) for each active program — which are underperforming?
  • Identify pages with high affiliate link impressions but low click rates — update CTAs
  • Review programs you haven't earned from in 90+ days — consider removing or replacing links

◆ Audit Frequency Guide

When to Run It

Quarterly — full 37-step audit

Monthly — top 10 earning pages only

After major plugin updates

After site migrations

Start the Audit

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◆ Frequently Asked

Questions, Answered Honestly.

Quarterly is the minimum recommended frequency. For high-traffic, high-revenue affiliate sites, a monthly mini-audit (checking active links on your top 10 earning pages) is worth the investment.

Screaming Frog SEO Spider (free up to 500 URLs) or Ahrefs Site Audit can crawl your site and report broken links. WordPress plugins like Broken Link Checker can automate ongoing monitoring.

Yes. Google's guidelines require that affiliate links are either "nofollow" or tagged with the "sponsored" attribute. Failing to do so can result in manual actions (penalties) for violating link schemes guidelines.

Immediately remove or replace all links pointing to that program. Update the content to recommend an alternative product and join that product's affiliate program if available.

Broken links. Lost commissions.

Fix it today.

A single broken link on your top-traffic review page can cost hundreds of dollars every month. Run the 37-step audit quarterly and protect every dollar your site earns.

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◆ Up Next

Complete your affiliate site audit.

Affiliate Link Audit

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