Link cloaking refers to hiding your web/affiliate links from website visitors. This is done by redirecting from one link to another, hiding the destination link from the web page visitor.

If you are promoting a product as an affiliate, you would be using your affiliate link to send visitors to that web page. Visitors can easily see that the link is an affiliate link and prefer going to the website directly. Link cloaking hides the affiliate(s) link and replaces it with a tidy, short URL.

Affiliate commissions can be easily stolen. This is done by substituting the original link with the new affiliate id. Link cloaking hides the affiliate id from the visitor, and thus can prevent your commissions from being stolen.

It is also easy to track your links and obtain traffic statistics by using cloaked URLS/LINKS

Another reason for cloaking is probably become one of the most common complaints that most ISPs face when someone complains that their bulk emails from a marketing campaign or a newsletter/ezine are blocked out as spam. This can cause problems for the the person(s) and their ISP as well.This problem may result in blacklisting from ever mailing again and the chances of the end users marking your emails as spam are pretty good.

Spam filters are the ones responsible for this action. Even legitimate mails get lost in the process.

So, when you are in a position in which spam filters have blocked you out, the first step that you should take is to check if you have gotten a report from the domain that you were mass mailing to. Some filters will actually send you back a mailing stating that your activity seemed like you were spamming and are now blacklisted. The site will also give you the option of getting yourself delisted.

Spam filters are a fact of life and the chances of blacklisting are quite good, unfortunately. One good remedy for this is not to mail at domains but rather to mail to webmail accounts.

A good link cloaker is Tiny Url, and free to use. http://www.tinyurl.com