Manual link checks vs automated monitoring

Manual link checks vs automated monitoring
Everyone audits links "when they remember." Which is never, until revenue drops.

Manual checking: free, but you only catch a dead program after you've already lost weeks of commissions to broken or expired links. By the time you notice the dip, the damage is banked.

Automated monitoring (a cron job pinging your redirect destinations): catches a 404, a redirect-to-homepage, or a discontinued program the day it breaks, not the quarter you finally look.

The tradeoff:
— Manual: zero cost, slow detection, guaranteed silent losses.
— Automated: a little setup, but it turns "why did income drop?" into an alert instead of a mystery.

The sneaky failure isn't the dead link, it's the vendor silently switching you to last-click or quietly cutting the rate.

Verdict: unmonitored affiliate links don't fail loudly. They leak. Automate the check, or pay the silent tax.