Wow, that's a very thorough list of possible scenarios. Thankyou. But they all hinge on " ... and makes a purchase". My question is, if you replace that with " ... and adds to cart" is all of the above still true? I've often wondered what happens if someone coming in with all the properly timed cookies to earn you a referral adds something their cart but then for whatever reason waits over the 7 days to actually place the order. Like maybe they are waiting for a sale or waiting for feedback from friends they've shown the listing to or something. Or maybe they need that much time to customize it and be sure of their choices before hitting the trigger. Who knows why but they don't order immediately after adding to cart. So a week or two later they decide to place the order but meanwhile maybe they've clicked a link in a Zazzle email reminding them they've left something in their cart or they've picked up another affiliate cookie viewing Pinterest ideas or something. You haven't quite nailed the sale yet but you've got them as far as putting the item in their cart. Is that still a lost referral?
Real life scenario: bride-to-be comes in on your link and adds STDs to her cart. But she's still shopping around for the perfect invites, too, which she finds a week later (picking up a new cookie somewhere in the process), adds to cart, and places order for both the STDS and Invites. In this case the cookie for the invites gets the referral for the STDS as well and that original referrer is out of luck?
