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Problems With Setting Up Affiliate Registration
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I am experiencing some problems when trying to set up the registration process in Affiliates Pro.
I am using the plugin on a dropshipping Woocommerce site I am building at www.thespectrummarketplace.com.au.
Before I raise my questions, I thought it might be helpful to set out what I am trying to achieve.
I have generated an “Affiliate Area” page using the button on the Pages tab under the plugin settings. I have also set up two other pages – one called Affiliate Registration” which contains the [affiliates_dashboard_registration] shortcode, and the other called “Affiliate Login”, which contains the [affiliates_dashboard_login] shortcode. The latter page is accessed via a menu link in the top bar of the site.
There is a a link on the home page which invites people to find out about the Affiliate program. This takes them to a page which will explain how the program works and the benefits etc.
At the end of the page there is an “invitation to register” CTA which is linked to the Affiliate Registration page, and a separate CTA linked to the Affiliate Login page which allows to login if they are already registered.
My idea is that after the affiliate receives the email approving the application, they will go to the Affiliate Login menu link on the site and login to their Affiliate Dashboard using the user ID and password advised in the email.
I understand that a new applicant could be taken directly to the Affiliate Area page, where they will be presented with both a registration option and a login option.
However I feel they might find this a little distracting or confusing, which is why I have tried to separate the registration process from the login process using the shortcodes provided. To me it seems logical that you would only worry about logging in after you have been approved.
I have registered a dummy affiliate successfully and received the email confirming acceptance, which leads me to my problems.
Problem 1
The URL link included in the confirming email – i.e https://www.thespectrummarketplace.com.au/wp-login.php – is actually a link to the site login page.
I pasted this in a browser and logged in using the login details provided in the email.
This opened up a “My Account” page for the affiliate representative whose name had been entered under the “First Name” and “Last Name” fields on the registration form.
In other words the system seemed to treat the affiliate as a customer who had or would make a purchase from the site, whereas I expected him to be taken to the Affiliate Dashboard.
Why is this so, and how do I fix it so that an affiliate can login to the Affiliate Dashboard?
Problem 2
When I attempt to login to the Affiliate Dashboard using the Affiliate Login link in the top bar of the site, the login box appears and lets me enter the affiliate’s details.
However, it also does not take me to the Affiliate Dashboard, but instead returns me to the Affiliate Login page. The login box has also now disappeared leaving only a blank page.
Why is this happening, and how do I fix it?
If it helps, the dummy affiliate’s login details are User ID: marra, and Password: pdawa01
I would appreciate your assistance.
Regards
Michael Roper
Posted in Affiliates Pro
Comments
12 responses to “Problems With Setting Up Affiliate Registration”
Hi Michael,
Happy weekend! I trust you are safe and well.
Please with respect to “How are you going with the missing password in the welcome email?”
Please note that the [password] token cannot be used in the notification email for affiliates changing status from Pending to Accepted. This happens because a user password is stored in the database as an encrypted string and it is impossible to retrieve it as plain text due to security reasons.
Please share the password in the first notification on registration. It wouldn’t affect your current workflow as they would not be able to access the Affiliate Dashboard until their account is approved.
STAY SAFE, and have an awesome weekend.
Kindest regards,
Eugen.
Hi Eugen
We seem to be at cross purposes.
You have answered two questions that I did not ask, and neither of the questions I did ask.
My first question was:
On Screen Registration Approval Confirmation Message
The message which shows up on screen after a successful registration application has been submitted shows a “Log In Here” link. A screenshot can be seen here – https://www.dropbox.com/sh/024kg5noawkg524/AADDQJ1XSKUClfKPLS0cU9A0a?dl=0
If the applicant clicks on the “Log In Here” link, it takes them to a “My Account” page.
If they log in there, they are taken to an account page which would only be relevant if they were purchasing their own products. This will confuse them, as they will assume they are logging in to their affiliate dashboard.
I don’t want affiliates to have any access to any account until they have been approved and received their “welcome aboard” email.
So how can we get rid of the “Log In Here” link? Can it be hidden with CSS or by some other way?
My second question was one that I have asked twice now:
Payment Information For Affiliates
I plan to manually pay affiliate commissions each month by bank transfer, which in Australia requires two pieces of information – i.e. an account number and a BSB number.
I appreciate that I could add a couple of required fields to the initial registration form to achieve this, but I am reluctant to do so as it may scare some potential applicants off at that early stage.
I find people are often nervous about giving that sort of information out until they are more committed.
Is it possible to construct another form to which I can direct the affiliate in the welcome email, and if so how?
Failing that, can you suggest another automated method which will allow me to collect this information after an affiliate has signed up?
I have also just signed up another dummy affiliate, and the password still does not appear in the welcome email.
Have you been able to solve this problem yet?
Regards
Michael
Hi Micheal,
Thanks for the clarification on the matter. I trust you are well and safe!
Q1: Yes you can use CSS to hide the link
Q2: Yes you can definitely create a form and attach to a page and share the link of this form in the welcome email.
Ideally, this would mean creating a form with any of your favorite form plugin, say for instance Ninja Forms. Then you would proceed to attach this form onto a page you’ll create. You could also add some explanatory text to let the user know why the details are being requested.
STAY SAFE and I wish you an amazing day ahead.
Kindest regards,
Eugen.
Hi Eugen
Thanks for your quick response.
I am afraid I am a complete novice when it comes to CSS.
Can you suggest a line of code that would do the trick?
I will investigate your suggestion re the banking details, which seems very logical.
How are you going with the missing password in the welcome email? This is something that I need to solve ASAP.
Regards
Michael
Hi Michael,
Thanks for the update. Here’s the CSS to hide the login button.
.dashboard-section-registration p:last-child {
display: none;
}
Please create a test affiliate account and notify me if it still doesn’t send out the password.
Kindest regards,
Eugen.
Hi Eugen
When can I expect a reply to the questions I raised in my post of June 19th?
It has been a week now.
Regards
Michael
Hi Michael,
I trust you are well and feeling great today. Please I will be sending you one today unfailingly.
Kindest regards,
Eugen.
Hi Eugen
Many thanks for your prompt reply and your solution, which has solved that problem!
However I would also appreciate your help with the following:
Affiliate Login Page
I notice that the Affiliate Login page does not have a “Forgot Your Password?” link on it. Do you think this would be useful, and if so how do I add it?
On Screen Registration Approval Confirmation Message
The message which shows up on screen after a successful registration application has been submitted shows a “Log In Here” link. A screenshot can be seen at this link – https://www.dropbox.com/sh/024kg5noawkg524/AADDQJ1XSKUClfKPLS0cU9A0a?dl=0
However this takes the applicant to a “My Account” page, which is the same problem I raised in my first support ticket – i.e. the system is assuming that the affiliate representative is a purchasing customer in their own right. I would prefer that this link not show up at all, as my intention is for affiliates not to have any access until their application has been approved.
Can we fix this?
Notification Emails
I have reworded the various emails to my own preferences, including adding some links to various pages on the site.
I have set new affiliate applications to Pending, and have chosen not to include user name and password details in the pending approval email. Instead I have included them in the actual approval email.
However for some reason the password is not appearing in the approval email received by the Affiliate.
You can find screenshots of the registration form settings, the coding of the approval email and the actual email received by the Affiliate at this link – https://www.dropbox.com/sh/024kg5noawkg524/AADDQJ1XSKUClfKPLS0cU9A0a?dl=0
As far as I can tell I have set things up correctly, but I would appreciate your comments.
Additional Email Address For Administration Notifications
In addition to notices of referrals and pending applications being sent to the site administrator, is there any way for a copy of each to be sent to another email address as well?
If so, how do I set this up?
I see that you can change the email address for referral notifications to some other address than the site administrator, but it still only allows for one destination.
Construction Of Pages
The documentation implies that the various shortcodes can be used to construct a page, including all the ones which make up the dashboard – i.e. earnings, profile, traffic etc.
I am interested in this because I would like to have more control over the dashboard layout, including short explanatory sections for each tab and possibly some marketing material.
The current Affiliate Area page only has the [affiliates_dashboard] shortcode, which gives me access to the page, but doesn’t allow me to make any alterations to the dashboard layout itself.
If I were to use shortcodes to build a page to take the place of the existing dashboard, how do I get the login box to open this page?
Payment Information For Affiliates
I plan to manually pay affiliate commissions each month by bank transfer, which in Australia requires two pieces of information – i.e. an account number and a BSB number.
I appreciate that I could add a couple of required fields to the initial registration form to achieve this, but I am reluctant to do so as it may scare some potential applicants off at that early stage.
I find people are often nervous about giving that sort of information out until they are more committed.
Is it possible to construct another form to which I can direct the affiliate in the welcome email, and if so how?
Failing that, can you suggest another automated method which will allow me to collect this information after an affiliate has signed up?
Explanatory Information For New Affiliates
Most of my affiliates will be sports clubs and schools, and the designated representatives (secretaries or treasurers) will often be part time volunteers. Consequently they may be a little overwhelmed by the affiliate procedures, particularly the embedding of banners on websites etc.
I would therefore like to provide them with a “How To” page, which will give them a short and simple description of each part of the affiliate process.
I could construct this myself, but as (a) it will be time consuming, and (b) I am new to the plugin, I wonder if you have such a summary available that I could adapt?
Or failing that, could you point me to something similar that one of your users may already have in place?
Regards
Michael
Hi Michael,
Thank you so much for your patience.
Q1: Forgot password:
You right about forget password option, but once the user enters a wrong password is redirected to the wp-login page where he/she has that option. (However, I think it makes sense to have the option there and I would table this to the dev team)
Q2. Notification Emails:
This is very weird the password is blank. Please could you create a temp Admin access to your staging or live site[if you don’t have a staging/dev site setup] so I can take a closer look at the issue. Please email credentials to this email: eugen [at] itthinx [dot] com
Q3. Additional Email Address For Administration Notifications
For now, the notifications only get sent to one desired email. However, I can table this with the dev team and share the outcome with you.
Q4. Construction Of Pages
If I were to use shortcodes to build a page to take the place of the existing dashboard, how do I get the login box to open this page?
Here’s how you would go about it:
1. You can create a new page to enable your affiliates to login: say you call this page “Affiliate Login”
2. Create a page to hold the shortcodes for the new dashboard of your choice.
For example, assume the name of the new page you create is Special Affiliate Page. And assume I only wanted affiliates to see the Dashboard Overview, then I would add this shortcode to the page:
[affiliates_is_affiliate]
[affiliates_dashboard_overview]
[/affiliates_is_affiliate]
Anything between this shortcode [affiliates_is_affiliate] [/affiliates_is_affiliate] can only be seen by a user that is an affiliate
More on this can be seen here and here
3. You would then need to add the [affiliates_login_redirect] shortcode, alongside the redirect_url attribute, which would be the link the new affiliate dashboard page you would have designed.
Assume the new dashboard you designed has a URL http://www.mywebsite.com/special-affiliate-page. Then the code to add on your Affiliate Login page can the one below:
[affiliates_is_not_affiliate]
Please log in to access the affiliate area.
[affiliates_login_redirect redirect_url="/special-affiliate-page/"]
[/affiliates_is_not_affiliate]
Q5. Explanatory Information For New Affiliates
You can simply achieve this by:
1. Creating a page called “Affiliate FAQ” or “How to” or any other name you would like.
2. Decide on where to add a link to get to the page. Ideally, I would recommend adding it to your customized Affiliate dashboard. Hence the dashboard above:
[affiliates_is_affiliate]
[affiliates_dashboard_overview]
[/affiliates_is_affiliate]
I would add an anchor to the top of the page with a link to the “HOW TO” page. Hence the new content of the custom dashboard would become:
[affiliates_is_affiliate]
Click here to view our How TO guide
[affiliates_dashboard_overview]
[/affiliates_is_affiliate]
Once again I must thank you for using Affiliates, and for being very patient. I look forward to helping you if you need further assistance.
Many apologies for the delayed response and I wish you an amazing weekend.
STAY SAFE!
Kindest regards,
Eugen-Bleck.
Hi Michael,
I trust you are well and awesome today.
First off, thank you so much for using Affiliates Pro. I would love nothing more but provide you with great support.
With respect to question 1: You can use our shortcode as follows:
Since you only intend to show the login form and redirect them to the affiliate dashboard, I would recommend the following:
[affiliates_is_not_affiliate]
Please log in to access the affiliate area.
[affiliates_login_redirect redirect_url="https://www.thespectrummarketplace.com.au/affiliate-area" /]
[/affiliates_is_not_affiliate]
, which would display a login form that will redirect the user to the affiliate-area page after login.
You can read more on this HERE.
Question 2:
Once the above is done this would go away :).
Once again I must thank you for using Affiliates, and I look forward to helping you if you need further assistance.
I wish you a fun and productive day ahead.
STAY SAFE!
Kindest regards,
Eugen-Bleck.
Hi Eugen
Thanks for your reply and the information provided.
I note your comments about “Forgot Password?” and “Additional Email For Admin Notifications” and as you say. maybe they will be addressed in the future.
I have read your suggestions regarding constructing my own Affiliate Area page, and I think I can see how the shortcodes can be used to do this. I will experiment for a while and see how I get on.
Regarding the missing password in the notification email, I have created a new administrator user name of “support” (all lower case) for you, with the password “[password]”.
However, I would still like a comment on two of my other queries, which were:
(1) On Screen Registration Approval Confirmation Message
The message which shows up on screen after a successful registration application has been submitted shows a “Log In Here” link. A screenshot can be seen at this link – https://www.dropbox.com/sh/024kg5noawkg524/AADDQJ1XSKUClfKPLS0cU9A0a?dl=0
However this takes the applicant to a “My Account” page, which is the same problem I raised in my first support ticket – i.e. the system is assuming that the affiliate representative is a purchasing customer in their own right.
I would prefer that no login link of any description show up here, as my intention is for affiliates not to have any access until their application has been approved.
How can we fix this?
(2) Payment Information For Affiliates
I plan to manually pay affiliate commissions each month by bank transfer, which in Australia requires two pieces of information – i.e. an account number and a BSB number.
I appreciate that I could add a couple of required fields to the initial registration form to achieve this, but I am reluctant to do so as it may scare some potential applicants off at that early stage.
I find people are often nervous about giving that sort of information out until they are more committed.
Is it possible to construct another form to which I can direct the affiliate in the welcome email, and if so how?
Failing that, can you suggest another automated method which will allow me to collect this information after an affiliate has signed up?
I look forward to hearing from you soon.
Regards
Michael
Hi Michael,
Thank you for the prompt update and for creating the account. I trust the week is unfolding with a lot of promise for you.
Question #1:The URL link included in the confirming email
To handle this with ease. You could do the following:
1. Navigate to Affiliates -> Notifications from your WP admin dashboard.
2. Replace [site_login_url] with the code snippet i have added here on paste bin: https://pastebin.com/MrkVDgAF in the notification templates where it is used.
3. Save changes.
Problem #2:but instead returns me to the Affiliate Login page.
I tried using the details marra and the password mentioned and it didn’t log me in. On checking the backend, I noticed you don’t have any affiliate name marra. I then proceeded to use the test affiliate account I signed up with and it worked as supposed to.
Test logins:
username:test
password:P@55w0rd!
I wish you an awesome day and week ahead. Once again thank you so much for using Affiliates and for being a valued customer of Affiliates.
STAY SAFE!
Kind regards,
Eugen.