Level Up Adventuresparticipates in affiliate programs. That means: when you click an affiliate link in a blog post or YouTube description and then make a qualifying purchase, we may earn a commission, at no additional cost to you. This page is the canonical, plain-English description of how that works, consistent with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR Part 255 (“Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising”).
§ 01The short version
— What you can tell another reader in one sentence.Some links on this site are affiliate links. If you click one and book or buy, we may earn a commission. We don’t accept payment to cover specific destinations or products, and we never let an affiliate link change what we say about a place.
§ 02Affiliate networks we participate in
- Amazon Associates— gear and book recommendations. As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases.
- AWIN— affiliate network with merchants including Xcaret, Traverseon, Tour of London, USA Guided Tours, GolfBreaks, and Space Suitcases.
- Partnerize / Expedia Group Travel Creator Program— covers Expedia, Hotels.com, and Vrbo.
- Viator Partners— tours, day trips, and excursions.
- CJ Affiliate (Commission Junction)— affiliate network with merchants including Undercover Tourist (theme-park tickets for Walt Disney World, Disneyland, Universal, SeaWorld, LEGOLAND, Busch Gardens, and Epic ski passes) and Vail Resorts (direct Epic Pass affiliate for the official epicpass.com destination).
We add or remove networks over time. The list above is updated to reflect what is actually in place.
§ 03What happens when you click an affiliate link
Your browser is redirected to the affiliate network (or directly to the destination merchant). The destination may set its own cookies and receive standard browser metadata (IP address, user-agent, referring page) so that any subsequent purchase can be attributed back to us. We do not receive any payment information from these networks. We see only aggregate click and commission counts in the affiliate dashboard.
The links carry the destination network’s credential (?camref=..., ?pid=..., ?tag=..., ?awinmid=...) plus our internal utm_source=lua_blog&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=<week> tag so we can see which posts drive bookings. These parameters are visible in the URL when you click.
§ 04What stays the same regardless
Reading the blog or browsing this site sets no first-party cookies and runs no first-party analytics, regardless of whether you click affiliate links. The affiliate-network cookies are set on their own domains, not on level-up-adventures.com. Editorial coverage is independent: a deal isn’t flagged as good because we earn from it, and a destination doesn’t get covered because a network is paying us to.
§ 05What we don’t do
- No sponsored editorial. We do not accept money to feature destinations, properties, products, or merchants. We are not a sponsorship-funded blog.
- No comp’d trips, no comped tickets, no sponsored staysin exchange for coverage. If a post ever describes a comp, the comp will be disclosed in the post’s first paragraph, not its footer.
- No paid placements within posts.Affiliate links are inline references in ordinary editorial text; we don’t sell ad units, sponsored slots, or pay-to-rank in roundups.
- No undisclosed AI testimonial generation.We do not generate fake reviews or fake firsthand “experiences.” See the Editorial Standards for the full AI-use policy.
§ 06Per-post disclosures
In addition to this canonical document, every blog post and YouTube video carries an FTC-compliant disclosure as close to the top as the format allows, plus an end-of-post footer disclosure on the website. The post’s disclosure language identifies which of the affiliate networks above are in play for that specific post.
Posts that contain only non-affiliate references (editorial mentions of deals where we don’t earn anything) carry a corresponding disclosure that says exactly that.
§ 07Opting out of affiliate tracking
You can avoid leaving an affiliate trail by clicking these links from a private / incognito browser window, by clearing cookies after visiting the destination, or simply by visiting the destination merchant’s site directly without using our link. Doing so doesn’t change what we recommend — it just means we don’t earn from your purchase.
§ 08Where to read more
- Editorial Standards— sourcing, fact-checking, AI use, corrections, and how affiliate independence is enforced.
- Privacy Policy— data flow when you click affiliate links, plus the third parties involved in operating the site.
- Terms of Service— including the FTC disclosure clause incorporated by reference.
- FTC Endorsement Guides – What People Are Asking — the FTC’s own plain-English explanation of these rules.
§ 09Contact
For questions about this disclosure or about a specific affiliate relationship, write to support@level-up-adventures.com.