Frequently asked questions

PulseLink is a Shopify app that lets you create branded trackable short links, run an affiliate program, organise links into campaigns, and see full-funnel analytics (click → cart → checkout → order) — all without leaving your Shopify admin. No coding or external tools required.

Yes. PulseLink works with all Shopify plans — Basic, Shopify, Advanced, and Plus. It uses only Shopify's native Web Pixel and official APIs, so no third-party scripts are injected into your theme.

No. PulseLink does not have a free tier. However, every paid plan includes a 14-day free trial — no charge until the trial ends and you can cancel any time during the trial at no cost.

No. All data — clicks, sessions, orders, affiliate details — is stored in your PulseLink account and never shared with or sold to any third party. PulseLink uses only Shopify's official APIs and Web Pixel infrastructure.

Each store requires its own PulseLink installation and subscription. Data is fully separated between stores — affiliates, links, and analytics in Store A are not visible in Store B.

After installing, the onboarding wizard opens automatically. It takes about 5 minutes:

1. Review the Welcome screen overview
2. Optionally set your custom domain and tracking preferences
3. Follow guided walkthroughs for links, affiliates, and campaigns (all skippable)
4. Set up the affiliate portal (skippable)
5. Select a plan — required to unlock the app

Once the plan is active, the Dashboard unlocks and you can start creating links.

Most steps are skippable. The only required step is Choose a Plan — you cannot access the Dashboard until a paid plan is active. All skipped settings are available in Settings any time after onboarding.

Go to Settings → Shopify Integration. The Web Pixel row should show Connected.

If it shows as inactive, contact support from the Settings page — we will re-activate it for you.

• Orders (read) — to attribute revenue to affiliates when a sale is made
• Products (read) — to show the product/collection/page picker in the link creator
• Customers (read) — to match affiliate portal logins to affiliate records
• Discounts (read/write) — to create discount codes for affiliates
• Content / Pages (read/write) — to create the affiliate portal page in your store
• Web Pixel (read/write) — to install the tracking pixel for funnel analytics

No permission is used for any purpose other than the one listed.

All plans include the full feature set. Limits apply to active resources only. All plans include a 14-day free trial.

Your trial starts the moment you select a plan during onboarding. You will not be charged for 14 days. Shopify sends a reminder email before the trial ends. If you do not cancel before the trial ends, the first charge is applied automatically by Shopify. Your trial end date is visible in Settings → Plan card.

Go to Settings → Plan card → Cancel subscription. A confirmation dialog appears explaining what will happen. After confirming:

• Cancellation takes effect immediately
• All short links stop redirecting
• All affiliates and campaigns are locked
• Your data is preserved — resubscribing restores everything

Go to Settings → Manage plan. This opens Shopify's billing page where you can switch plans. Upgrades take effect immediately. Downgrades take effect at the end of the current billing period. If you downgrade to a plan with lower limits and you have more active resources than the new limit allows, the oldest resources are locked until you are back within the limit.

A locked link, affiliate, or campaign is inactive — it will not redirect or track. Resources get locked in two situations:

• No active subscription — your trial ended or subscription was cancelled. Resubscribe from Settings → Manage plan.
• Plan limit exceeded — you downgraded to a plan with fewer allowed resources. The oldest resources are locked first. Delete some resources or upgrade to unlock them.

Yes. Cancelling a subscription does not delete any data. All your links, affiliates, campaigns, orders, and analytics are preserved. Resubscribing unlocks everything instantly. Data is only deleted 48 hours after uninstalling the app — not after cancelling the subscription.

No. Slugs are permanent once the link is saved. This protects any existing shares, QR codes, or bookmarks pointing to the URL. If you need a different slug, create a new link with the desired slug and delete the old one.

Yes. Edit any link and update the destination. The short URL slug stays the same — only where it redirects changes. This is useful for seasonal promotions: point the same QR code from a summer product to a fall product without reprinting anything.

Deleting a link permanently removes it and all associated click and funnel data. This cannot be undone. PulseLink shows a warning if the link has existing click history. If you want to stop the link from redirecting without losing historical data, edit it to point to a neutral URL instead of deleting it.

Use Links → Bulk Import. Download the CSV template, fill in your link data (one row per link), and upload or paste the content. Columns are: destination URL, slug (optional — auto-generated if blank), title (optional), affiliate handle (optional), campaign name (optional). The header row is optional.

A Checkout link sends customers directly to the Shopify checkout page with specific products and quantities pre-filled — skipping the product page and cart entirely. This reduces friction for high-intent audiences. You can also attach a discount code that applies automatically at checkout.

When creating or editing a link, toggle Add Discount in the link form and enter an existing Shopify discount code. When a customer clicks the link, the discount is automatically applied to their cart. The discount code must already exist in your Shopify admin — PulseLink does not create it from the link form. (Affiliate discount codes are created automatically in the affiliate form.)

From the Links table, click the ⋮ (three dots) action menu on the link row and select Download QR Code. The QR code uses the profile assigned to that link, or the default profile if none is assigned. To customise the style, go to Settings → QR Code Profiles.

Two ways:

• You create and share it — create a link in Links → Create Link, assign it to the affiliate, and send them the short URL.
• Affiliate portal — if the self-service portal is set up, affiliates log in and see all their assigned links themselves.

Yes. Every affiliate has their own commission type (percentage or fixed) and rate. You can give your top affiliate 15%, a new affiliate 8%, and a brand partner a flat $10 per sale — all simultaneously. Commission settings can be changed at any time from the affiliate edit form.

• Order value — the full order total including shipping and tax
• Subtotal — the order total before shipping and tax (most common — industry standard)
• Product price — the line-item product prices, excluding shipping, tax, and any discounts

In the affiliate form under Automatic Discount Code, click Generate discount code. PulseLink auto-creates a unique Shopify discount code based on the affiliate's handle (e.g. JOHN20). You can also type a custom code. The code is created in your Shopify Discounts section automatically.

You can, but PulseLink warns you first. Deleting does not cancel the owed commission — the records are permanently removed. Process a payout and confirm the balance is $0.00 before deleting if you want to settle first.

• Pending — newly added; tracking is live; change to Active once you've confirmed the relationship
• Active — normal operating state; clicks and commissions tracked
• Suspended — temporarily paused; no new commissions but existing ones are preserved
• Rejected — application declined; no tracking

A Link is a single trackable short URL. A Campaign is a container that groups multiple links together. For example: a Summer Sale campaign might contain 5 links — one per product. The campaign analytics shows combined clicks and revenue across all 5 links as a single figure, so you can measure the campaign as a whole.

No. Deleting a campaign removes the campaign container only. All links assigned to it remain active and continue tracking. They simply will no longer be grouped under that campaign name.

Yes. A link can be assigned to multiple campaigns simultaneously. Its clicks and revenue will appear in the analytics of every campaign it belongs to. This is useful for cross-referencing — a link that belongs to both a "Summer Sale" campaign and an "Instagram Channel" campaign will appear in both.

Check in this order:

1. Confirm your subscription is active (Settings → Plan card shows Active)
2. Confirm the link is not locked (Links list — no lock icon on the row)
3. Test by clicking the short link from a real browser (not the Shopify admin preview)
4. Wait 1–2 minutes — analytics data processes asynchronously
5. Verify you are viewing the correct date range in Analytics

PulseLink only shows orders attributed to a tracked link. An order will not appear if:

• The customer did not click a PulseLink link before purchasing
• The customer purchased after the cookie duration window expired
• The customer cleared their cookies or used a different device (the pixel may still catch these — check the Data Source column)
• The Web Pixel is not active (Settings → Shopify Integration)

• Last Click (default) — the affiliate who sent the customer just before purchase gets credit. Rewards conversion-focused affiliates. Industry standard for most programs.
• First Click — the affiliate who first introduced the customer gets credit. Rewards top-of-funnel discovery affiliates.

You can change the model in Settings → Attribution & Tracking. The change applies to new orders only — past attributed orders are not re-calculated.

• Impulse / low-consideration products (cosmetics, accessories): 7–14 days
• Mid-consideration products (clothing, home goods): 30 days (default — industry standard)
• High-consideration products (furniture, electronics): 60–90 days

A longer window means more sales are attributed to affiliates, but may credit affiliates for customers who would have purchased anyway. 30 days is the recommended starting point.

Depends on your Commission Qualification setting in Settings:

• Paid — when Shopify captures payment for the order
• Fulfilled — when you mark the order as fulfilled (shipped)
• Paid & Fulfilled (default) — both must happen. Most protective against paying commission on refunded or unshipped orders.

This only moves the commission to Pending status. You still manually Approve it before it reaches the affiliate's payout balance.

Add-to-cart and checkout data comes exclusively from the Web Pixel. Without an active pixel, only click and order data appears. Go to Settings → Shopify Integration and verify the Web Pixel shows Connected. If it's disconnected, contact support to reinstall it.

CVR = Orders ÷ Sessions × 100. It measures how many of the unique visitor sessions initiated by your tracked links resulted in a completed purchase. One person clicking 10 times is counted as 1 session, so CVR reflects real buyer intent rather than raw click volume.

Yes. PulseLink does not auto-approve commissions. Every attributed order starts as Pending. You approve or reject from the Orders page, individually or in bulk. This gives you full control and protects you from paying commission on refunded orders.

Reject when the underlying order was refunded, cancelled, flagged as fraud, or otherwise should not count toward affiliate earnings. You can reject at any time before processing a payout. Rejection permanently removes the commission from the affiliate's pending balance.

• Commission not yet paid — go to Orders, find the order, click Reject. The commission is removed from the affiliate's balance.
• Commission already paid out — PulseLink does not automatically claw back paid commissions. Deduct the amount from a future payout using the notes field, or contact the affiliate directly to arrange repayment.

• Webhook — attributed via the Shopify order webhook and affiliate cookie
• Pixel — attributed via the Web Pixel tracking event
• Webhook + Pixel — both methods confirmed the same order. Highest confidence attribution.

No. PulseLink is a commission tracking tool, not a payment processor. You pay affiliates through your preferred method (bank transfer, PayPal, Wise, etc.) and then record the payment in PulseLink to keep balances accurate. This keeps you in full control of timing and method.

Yes. In the payout modal, enter any amount up to the full pending balance. A banner confirms the remaining balance. The affiliate stays on the Pending Payouts list until their balance reaches $0.00.

Go to Payouts → Payout History. Apply date range and affiliate filters if needed, then click Export. A CSV downloads with columns for Affiliate, Amount, Method, Status, Notes, and Date.

1. In Settings → Branding, enter your domain with https:// (e.g. https://go.yourstore.com)
2. In your DNS provider (GoDaddy, Cloudflare, Namecheap, etc.), add:
   Type: CNAME   Host: go   Points to: cname.pulselink.app   TTL: 3600
3. Save Settings
4. Wait 5–48 hours for DNS propagation

1. Verify the CNAME is correct at dnschecker.org — search for your subdomain and confirm it resolves to cname.pulselink.app
2. Make sure the domain in Settings includes https://
3. Clear browser cache and test in an incognito window
4. If still broken after 48 hours, contact support with a screenshot of your DNS records

No. The model change applies to new orders only. Past orders keep the attribution that was applied when they were recorded. This protects commissions your affiliates have already earned.

A QR profile is a saved style preset — colours, dot pattern, corner style, logo, and export size. Create profiles once (e.g. "Print Black", "Instagram Dark") and select the right one when you create or edit a link. Each link can have a different profile.

1. Host your logo as a transparent PNG (minimum 200×200px recommended)
2. Copy the direct image URL
3. In Settings → QR Code Profiles, paste the URL into the Logo URL field
4. Set Error Correction to High — required when a logo covers part of the code
5. Adjust the Logo Size slider (20–30% is typical)

• If using a logo, confirm Error Correction is set to High
• Check contrast — light grey on white will not scan reliably
• Print at minimum 2×2cm — very small QR codes often fail
• Increase Export Size (px) and re-download before printing
• Test with multiple scanner apps (iOS camera, Google Lens, dedicated QR apps)

In the self-service portal, affiliates can see only their own data:

• Their clicks, orders, and revenue
• Their commission rate and pending earnings
• All their assigned tracking links
• Their payout history

They cannot see other affiliates, your full store analytics, or any app settings.

During onboarding, go to the Affiliate Dashboard step and click Create Dashboard Page. PulseLink creates a Shopify page and installs the portal block in your active theme automatically.

If you skipped that step, find the Dashboard Setup section in Settings and click the setup button there.

Affiliates visit the portal URL (the Shopify page PulseLink created on your store) and enter the email address you used when you added them to PulseLink. No password is needed — they receive a one-time login link by email. Share the portal URL with your affiliates to get them started.

The portal URL is the Shopify page PulseLink created — typically https://yourstore.com/pages/affiliate-dashboard. You can find it in your Shopify admin under Online Store → Pages. You can rename the page; just make sure the portal block stays on it.

1. Hard-refresh the browser: Ctrl+Shift+R (Windows) or Cmd+Shift+R (Mac)
2. Clear browser cache and cookies, then reopen PulseLink from your Shopify admin Apps list
3. Try a different browser
4. Disable browser extensions (ad blockers, VPNs) which can interfere with Shopify admin frames
5. If still blank after the above, contact support from Settings with your browser and OS version

After selecting a plan in Shopify's billing window, Shopify redirects back to PulseLink. If the redirect did not complete correctly:

1. Close PulseLink and reopen it from your Shopify admin Apps list
2. The onboarding wizard should detect the active plan and advance to the success step
3. If still stuck after 5 minutes, contact support — Shopify's billing webhook may have been delayed

Yes, as long as you reinstall within 48 hours. Shopify sends a data-deletion request 48 hours after uninstall — before that point all your data is preserved and fully restored on reinstall. After 48 hours, data is permanently deleted per Shopify's privacy compliance rules.

Click data typically appears within 1–2 minutes of a click. Order attribution may take 2–5 minutes after an order is placed, depending on Shopify's webhook processing time. If data has not appeared after 10 minutes, verify the Web Pixel is active and that the link used is not locked.

• Confirm the discount code exists in Shopify admin (Discounts page)
• Check the discount is still active and not expired
• Verify the discount applies to the products the link targets
• Some discount types (buy-X-get-Y) may not apply automatically on redirect — test manually
• If the code was deleted from Shopify, re-enter or regenerate it in the link edit form

When a customer submits a data access request via Shopify, PulseLink automatically receives the request and logs it. Your team must fulfil the request within 30 days by providing the customer with a copy of any data PulseLink holds about them (click sessions, order attribution data). Contact support if you need help generating a data export for a specific customer.

PulseLink automatically receives the deletion request and erases all personal data for that customer: IP address hash, country, city, device, browser, OS, referrer, and email. Financial aggregates (revenue totals, commission amounts) are retained for accounting record-keeping — this is standard practice under financial record-keeping laws.

You have 48 hours after uninstalling to reinstall and restore everything. After 48 hours, Shopify sends a shop-redact webhook and PulseLink permanently and irreversibly deletes all data for your store — links, affiliates, campaigns, orders, sessions, and analytics. This is required by Shopify's privacy compliance rules and cannot be reversed.

PulseLink uses a first-party tracking cookie scoped to affiliate attribution. It does not track personal information — it stores only the affiliate ID, link ID, and campaign ID of the most recent click. Whether a consent banner is required depends on your jurisdiction and existing cookie policy. We recommend consulting your legal advisor. PulseLink does not set any third-party cookies.