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Switching

Moving from Trackdesk to AffiliateRail

This guide starts with the hard part. Trackdesk links redirect through their tracking domain and land with a click id, not an affiliate identity, so no tracker can keep them working and every affiliate gets a new link from the AffiliateRail portal. The people and the history move by CSV: Trackdesk exports affiliates and reports, and AffiliateRail's importer loads them with a dry run first. Plan a month of both running. Or hand it to us.

Published 3 September 2026. Every price and technical claim checked against its live source on 3 September 2026. Written by Jimi Barkway, who built AffiliateRail. Jimi has run affiliate programs from both sides of the link. Corrections go to support@affiliaterail.com.

Moving from Trackdesk in four stagesThe four stages of moving a program from Trackdesk: links keep working, export and import, run both for a month, then switch payouts.1Links keepworking2Export andimport3Run bothfor a month4Switch payoutsAAn afternoon of your time, or an hour of oursNothing your affiliates published has to change.

01 Stage 1

Your existing affiliate links need re-issuing

Not this time, and this page says so. Trackdesk tracking links redirect through their tracking service and land on your site with a mandatory cid parameter, a click id (their landing pages article and their glossary, checked 3 September 2026). A click id names a click in Trackdesk's database, not an affiliate, so no script on your site can credit the right person from it.

So every affiliate gets a new link from the AffiliateRail portal. Stage 3 is the month that makes the swap painless.

Said plainly

  • Trackdesk tracking links redirect through their service and reach your site carrying a click id, cid.

  • A click id names a click in Trackdesk's system, not an affiliate. Nothing on your site can credit from it.

  • Each affiliate gets a new link from the AffiliateRail portal. Stage 3 is the month that makes the swap painless.

  • The day a tracker could honestly read a Trackdesk link, this guide will say so.

02 Stage 2

What comes over, and how

There is no Trackdesk importer yet, so the move runs on CSV. Trackdesk exports your affiliates from the Affiliate list, with referral id, email, name, tier and status (their help centre, checked 3 September 2026), and reports to CSV. The importer takes three files:

  • Partners: one row each, email required.
  • Customers: one per referred customer, with their affiliate.
  • Transactions: one per conversion, with the amount and date.
What the importer brings overThe importer reads the Trackdesk account through their CSV and writes partners, customers and commissions. A second run matches records instead of duplicating them.Your Trackdesk accountread through their CSVThe importermatches, never duplicatesPartnersCustomersCommissionsRun it again and records are matched, not doubled.
A dry run first, every time. Run it again and records are matched, not duplicated. One click rolls it back.

03 Stage 3

Run both for a month

Add our script beside Trackdesk's. Both trackers run. New links credit on our side, old links keep crediting on theirs, and nothing is lost while both are on.

Trackdesk's default cookie lasts 30 days (their help centre, checked 3 September 2026). A visitor referred last month still carries it. A month of overlap lets those referrals convert on the old side while your affiliates swap to their new links.

Run both for a monthA four-week timeline. The old tracker stays on for three weeks while rail.js reads both sets of links; once the two dashboards agree, the old one is switched off.week 1week 2week 3week 4their tracker, still onoffrail.js, reading both sets of linksACompare the two dashboards. When they agree, switch the old one off.

04 Stage 4

How do payouts change after the switch?

On Trackdesk you pay affiliates yourself. Settle balances, export a CSV, and upload it to your own PayPal Business account for Mass Pay, or connect your own Tipalti account on the Business plan and above and fund it (PayPal, Tipalti, checked 3 September 2026). Trackdesk holds none of the money and publishes no platform fee.

AffiliateRail keeps that principle and removes the file. From the $59 Grow plan, payouts run through your own PayPal or Wise account on a schedule, at 0%. They never pass through us.

The AffiliateRail payouts screen: a scheduled run through the merchant's own PayPal account, the amount owed to each partner, and the 0% platform share
Exported a settlement file before? Now it sends itself. The custody page has the full difference.

Step by step

The switch, step by step

Most merchants do this in an afternoon. If you would rather hand it over, we run migrations white-glove: a screen-share and an hour, and we do the rest. Email support@affiliaterail.com.

  1. Create your program

    Connect Stripe or Paddle. The connection is read-only: we read billing events to credit sales, and we cannot write to your account.

  2. Export from Trackdesk

    Affiliates from the Affiliate list, conversions from Reports, each to CSV.

  3. Run the CSV import

    Map the columns, read the dry run, then run it. Check the counts against your Trackdesk dashboard.

  4. Add the script and invite

    Each affiliate gets a new link in their invite. Their email, history and balance are already there when they arrive.

  5. Run both for a month, then close

    Remove the Trackdesk script once the old links have gone quiet, and pay any final balance from Trackdesk's settled-balance export.

Said plainly

What does not carry over

A migration page that lists only the good news is an advert. These do not come across.

  • The links themselves

    Trackdesk links redirect through their domain with a click id. Every affiliate gets a new link from the new portal, and stage 3 is the month that makes the swap painless.

  • Portal passwords

    Your affiliates set a new password from their invite to the new portal. Their identity, history and balance are waiting for them. Their old login is not.

  • Raw click logs

    We import people and money, not click-by-click traffic records. Click counting starts fresh on our side.

  • Cookies already set on visitors' devices

    A visitor referred last week carries Trackdesk's attribution, not ours. The moment they click a new affiliate link, we credit them. No vendor can transfer another vendor's cookies.

  • Multi-level trees and offers

    Trackdesk supports multi-level structures and many offers per program. AffiliateRail has no sub-affiliate tiers, on purpose, so every affiliate imports at one level, and one program holds one set of links.

Cost

What the same program costs on each

Trackdesk is not banded by revenue: clicks, conversions and affiliates are unlimited on every plan, and the plans differ by seats, offers and coupons. Checked against Trackdesk's pricing page on 3 September 2026. Business is $399 a month, or $299 a month billed yearly, shown with a 40% off annual badge that runs to 30 September 2026. Enterprise is $599, or $359 yearly on the same promotion. Enterprise PLUS starts at $1,199.

TrackdeskAffiliateRail foundingAffiliateRail list
Entry price$399 (Business), or $299 billed yearly to 30 September 2026$29 (Launch)$59
Revenue ceilingNone$10,000 a month on Launch, $50,000 on ScaleSame bands
Seats5 on Business, unlimited on Enterprise3 on Launch, unlimited on ScaleSame
Affiliates, clicks and conversionsUnlimitedUnlimitedUnlimited
Automated payoutsYour own Tipalti account, on Business and aboveFrom Grow ($59), through your own PayPal or WiseFrom Grow ($89)
Payout feeNone published0%0%
Trial14 days14 days, no cardSame

Trackdesk's price buys breadth a SaaS program rarely uses: networks, iGaming, multi-level tiers. If you use it, Trackdesk is the right tool and this page is not a like-for-like. Run the totals at your own volume.

Questions

Common questions

Will my affiliates' Trackdesk links keep working?

No. Trackdesk links redirect through their tracking domain and reach your site with a click id, which names a click in their system rather than an affiliate. No tracker on your site can credit from it. Each affiliate gets a new link from the AffiliateRail portal, and a month of running both makes the swap painless.

Is there a Trackdesk importer?

Not yet. The importer reads Rewardful, FirstPromoter, Tapfiliate, Tolt and Affonso directly, and takes a CSV from anything else. Trackdesk exports affiliates and reports to CSV, which is what the importer needs. We build a direct importer when a customer asks for one.

What does not come across from Trackdesk?

The links, portal passwords, raw click logs, cookies already set on visitors' devices, and multi-level trees. Affiliates, their referred customers and their conversion history do come across through the CSV.

How long does the switch take?

The import takes an afternoon. The link swap takes the month you run both. If you would rather hand it over, give us a screen-share and an hour and we do the rest.

All product names, logos, and brands are property of their respective owners. Comparisons are based on publicly available information as of 3 September 2026. If a linked source has changed since, tell us at support@affiliaterail.com and we will correct this page.

Sources

Where these facts come from

Every claim about another product here was read off their own pages on the date shown. Prices change, and then this page is wrong until we fix it. Email support@affiliaterail.com and we will correct it and move the date.

Start

Fourteen days to see it work, with nothing on the line

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