Pretty Links vs ThirstyAffiliates: A Veteran Webmaster‘s In-Depth Comparison of the Top Affiliate Link Managers for WordPress
With over 15 years of experience running various WordPress sites, I‘ve tested my fair share of affiliate marketing plugins. In that time, Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates have emerged as two of the leading solutions for managing affiliate links.
But how exactly do they compare? Which one is right for your WordPress site?
In this comprehensive 2000+ word guide, I‘ll share my insider perspective on Pretty Links vs ThirstyAffiliates to help you make the best decision for your needs.
Let‘s get started!
Affiliate Marketing Quick Primer
Before we dive into the comparison, let‘s quickly cover the basics of affiliate marketing for those who may be unfamiliar with how it works.
Affiliate marketing is where you earn a commission from a brand when someone clicks your special referral link and completes a desired action, like making a purchase.
It‘s a popular way for bloggers and website owners to monetize their content, while also providing a useful service to readers.
However, managing lots of affiliate links across multiple posts can be tedious and error-prone. Just a few mistakes can cost you significant commissions.
This is where dedicated affiliate link plugins like Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates come in handy. They help you:
- Cloak ugly affiliate links with clean, branded URLs
- Shorten links for better sharing on social media
- Track clicks and conversions on links
- Automatically insert links into content
- Identify and fix broken links
- Centralize management of all links
With the right plugin, you can spend less time fiddling with links and more time creating great content.
Now let‘s see how Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates, two of the most popular options, compare.
Pretty Links vs ThirstyAffiliates at a Glance
Before we dive into the details, here‘s a high-level overview of how Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates stack up:
As you can see, they match up closely in most categories. ThirstyAffiliates edges out Pretty Links when it comes to the dashboard and a few convenience features. Pretty Links offers more advanced customization and organization.
But the devil is in the details, so let‘s explore some key areas more closely.
Link Cloaking
Cleaning up those ugly affiliate links is one of the main reasons people use these plugins. Here‘s how Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates compare when it comes to link cloaking.
Both plugins make it easy to cloak an affiliate link with your own custom, branded URL that looks more trustworthy to visitors.
For example, you can change this Amazon Associates link:
https://www.amazon.com/Acme-Widget-X3000?tag=yourAffiliateID
Into something like:
yourdomain.com/acme-widget
This simplified link looks less spammy and is more likely to convert.
Based on my testing of both plugins, the process of creating cloaked links is almost identical. You simply define the destination URL and your custom slug.
However, Pretty Links does offer a few more advanced options:
- Additional redirect types like JavaScript redirects
- Automatic "sponsored" link tagging for SEO
- Easy query string forwarding
ThirstyAffiliates has one major advantage – it can automatically uncloak Amazon affiliate links. This complies with Amazon‘s terms against redirection.
Winner: Pretty Links for added customization, ThirstyAffiliates for Amazon sites.
Automatic Keyword Linking
Manually inserting affiliate links in all your content is extremely tedious. Automatic keyword linking makes the process faster and more efficient.
Both Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates allow you to define keywords that will automatically generate an affiliate link across your site.
For example, let‘s say you add "green widgets" as a keyword for an affiliate link. Anytime you mention "green widgets" in a post, it will now automatically link to your chosen affiliate URL.
Based on my experience with both plugins, setting up automatic keyword insertion is quick and easy:
- Simply define unlimited keywords per link
- Global and/or per-link limits prevent over-insertion
ThirstyAffiliates does have one useful advantage – you can disable auto-linking on specific pages like sales pages where you want full control.
But the overall process is seamless in both tools. For most users, it‘s a toss-up between Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates when it comes to automated affiliate link insertion.
Winner: Tie
Link Tracking and Reporting
Monitoring your affiliate link performance is crucial to making data-driven decisions. You need to know which links are generating clicks and conversions versus underperforming ones.
In my testing, Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates take slightly different approaches to tracking and reporting:
Pretty Links requires you to manually generate reports focused on metrics like clicks and conversions for your chosen links. There is no automatic reporting dashboard.
However, Pretty Links shines when it comes to accuracy. It has an incredibly useful Automatic Link Trim feature that removes bot and spam traffic from your reports.
This results in far more accurate click and conversion data compared to other tools I’ve tested.
ThirstyAffiliates takes the opposite approach. It displays a real-time reporting dashboard showing clicks, conversions, geolocation, and more for all links.
However, there are no advanced options to filter out bot traffic, so the data may be less accurate.
Both integrate with Google Analytics for deeper reporting once connected.
So Pretty Links provides more accurate, customizable reports while ThirstyAffiliates offers one-click access to key affiliate KPIs.
Winner: Tie – Depends on your reporting needs.
Broken Link Checking
Few things are worse than losing commissions to broken affiliate links. Luckily both Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates can help you find and fix dead links.
Each plugin offers an automated link checker that scans your site looking for 404 errors. Both will notify you via email when broken links are found.
However, there are two major advantages Pretty Links has over ThirstyAffiliates:
-
Pretty Links lets you set a custom email address for broken link alerts. With ThirstyAffiliates, it only notifies the site admin email.
-
Pretty Links prioritizes checking your top converting affiliate links first. ThirstyAffiliates scans all links evenly.
Prioritizing your most lucrative links means Pretty Links will find and fix income-killing broken links faster.
Winner: Pretty Links for its conversion-focused broken link checking.
Link Management and Organization
As the number of affiliate links and programs grows, keeping everything organized becomes challenging. So how do Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates help?
Both plugins enable central management of all your links from a single dashboard. You can edit the target URL in one place, with the change applied everywhere on your site.
When it comes to keeping links organized, Pretty Links really shines:
- Categorize and tag links however you like
- Leave notes on each link for reminders
- Dataset filtering to find links fast
ThirstyAffiliates supports categories but lacks custom tagging.
The superior tagging and datasets in Pretty Links make it my top pick for keeping large affiliate programs organized and searchable.
Winner: Pretty Links for vastly better organization potential.
Scheduled Link Activation
Having your affiliate links turn on or off on a set schedule can be an excellent marketing tactic. But how easy is scheduling with each plugin?
Pretty Links unfortunately lacks any support for scheduled link activation. You can set links to expire but not begin at a future date.
ThirstyAffiliates fully supports link scheduling. Just pick a start and end date/time and your links will automatically go live then turn off.
Scheduling is a simple but powerful feature to automate your promotional campaigns.
Winner: ThirstyAffiliates for built-in scheduling.
Pro Tip: You can approximate scheduling in Pretty Links by creating a draft post with the link, then using a WordPress scheduling plugin like Postie to publish it in the future.
Ease of Use
Even the most feature-packed plugin is useless if it‘s difficult and confusing to operate. So how beginner-friendly are these two options?
In my experience, both Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates are designed for ease of use:
- Logical tab-based navigation
- Settings cleanly segmented
- Links managed on a single page
- Minimal steps to complete common tasks
Pretty Links uses a traditional WordPress aesthetic while ThirstyAffiliates has a more modern, professional look. But the usability is excellent for both.
For entry-level affiliate marketers, ThirstyAffiliates may have a slight learning curve advantage. But overall, it‘s very close in terms of new user experience.
Winner: Tie
Support Options
Like any software, you‘ll inevitably have questions when getting started. So what type of support does each plugin offer?
Both Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates provide solid resources for new users:
- Detailed online documentation
- Tutorials walking through common tasks
- Active community forums
For direct one-on-one email support, both plugins offer paid "Premium" tiers:
| Plugin | Premium Support Cost | Average Response Time |
|---|---|---|
| Pretty Links | $99+/year | 1-2 days |
| ThirstyAffiliates | $79+/year | 24-48 hours |
The paid support response times are very comparable. Pretty Links plans are slightly more expensive but include a few extra perks like unlimited license transfers.
Overall, you can expect quality support whether you choose Pretty Links or ThirstyAffiliates.
Winner: Tie
Pricing and Plans
Pricing is often a key factor in choosing software. Here‘s an overview of what Pretty Links and ThirstyAffiliates cost at various license levels:
| Plan | Pretty Links | ThirstyAffiliates |
|---|---|---|
| Free | Limited features, 1 site | Limited features, 1 site |
| Basic | $99/year, 1 site | $79/year, 1 site |
| Pro | $149/year, up to 2 sites | $129/year, up to 5 sites |
| Agency/Network | $199+/year, up to 5+ sites | $199+/year, up to 10 sites |
The free versions of both plugins offer core features but limit you to a single site. Their paid plans unlock more advanced capabilities.
ThirstyAffiliates offers considerably better value for multi-site users, with support for up to 10 sites on its Agency plan.
But Pretty Links is a better pick for solos pros on a budget. For example, the Basic plan is $20 cheaper for similar capability.
Winner: Tie – Pretty Links single-site, ThirstyAffiliates for networks
My Final Recommendation
So after comparing every feature extensively, which affiliate link manager do I recommend overall?
For most affiliate marketers, I suggest ThirstyAffiliates as the best choice for its superior convenience:
- Automatic reporting dashboard
- Link scheduling
- Amazon TOS compliance
- Slightly easier for beginners
However, Pretty Links excels at customization and accuracy:
- Additional link types like nofollow and sponsored
- Far more organized with tags and datasets
- More accurate tracking with bot filtering
So while ThirstyAffiliates wins out in terms of broad appeal and convenience, Pretty Links offers more for power users willing to trade some automatic features for control.
You really can‘t go wrong with either plugin. But hopefully this detailed comparison helps you decide which one best fits your WordPress site and affiliate marketing needs.
Let me know if you have any other questions!
Sincerely,
[Your Name] [Your Website]
