Make Money with Amazon Associates

Did you know that it is easy to make money with the Amazon Associates Program? The Amazon Associates Program is a free affiliate marketing program for website owners and bloggers.

If you are a website owner or a blogger, you can advertise Amazon products through your sites by creating Amazon affiliate links. When your readers click on the links and buy those products from Amazon, you earn referral fees.

In this article, we’re going to show you just how to make more money with the Amazon Associates Program.

 

What is the Amazon Associates Program?

 

When the Amazon Associates Program started in 1998, there wasn’t much opportunity for entrepreneurs to make money on the platform.

Making a profit was possible only by selling books from the Amazon list. Amazon then changed their policy, expanded their product line, and became a big name in the market.

Most online shoppers go to Amazon to look at product reviews and decide on what to purchase. They also love the convenience that Amazon Prime gives them. Although Amazon has a lower payout rate than most affiliate programs, you can still make more money through Amazon because of the number of products they sell. Now, it’s much easier to make money through the Amazon Associates Program.

Here’s how you can get started.

 

Requirements to Join the Amazon Associates Program

 

You must have a website, blog, or YouTube channel to become an Amazon Associate.

Also, you have to describe the purpose of that channel, the reason why you created it, your target audience, and how you drive traffic to it.

Read the rules of the Amazon Associate Program carefully. Here are some crucial rules to keep in mind:

• You must be eligible to earn from your recommendations.
• You must state on your channels that you earn referrals from purchases.
• Don’t make false claims in your recommendations.
• Avoid referring to prices.
• Do not use Amazon Affiliate links in offline promotions, eBooks, and emails.
• Do not use link shorteners.
• Make sure that you suggest products according to the topic of each of the channels that you use. For example, if your website is about cooking for busy people, you should promote kitchen appliances that help make cooking easy.
• Recommend products carefully. Don’t recommend any random product just to earn money. Don’t promote something you wouldn’t buy as a consumer. You’ll lose credibility with your visitors and your website traffic will drop if you do.. If you don’t have experience with the particular product, at least check some reviews to know others’ experience with it.

 

Create your Amazon Associates Account

 

Once you have all of the above, you can create an account for the Amazon Associates Program:

 

#1 – Sign Up

 

Visit the Amazon Associates homepage and sign up. To create your Amazon Associates profile, log in, click “New Customer”, and enter your account information. (Your name, address and phone number).

 

#2 – Store ID

 

After entering the address of your website(s), app(s), or YouTube channel(s), specify your preferred store ID for the channel that you want to sync with the Amazon Associates Program.

 

#3 – What is the purpose of your website?

 

Explain the purpose of your website, select the topics you’re likely to target, and how you drive traffic to your channel(s).

This is how you use your website or app to generate income, how you usually build links, and how many unique visitors your channel gets every month. Then, elaborate on why you’d like to join Amazon Associates Program.

You don’t have to meet any specific traffic threshold to be accepted into the program.

 

#4 – Credit card info

 

Enter your phone number and click “Call Me Now” and wait for the call from Amazon. They will ask you to input a four-digit code, then your account will be approved.

Choose a payment method and enter your credit card and tax information. You also need to choose whether you want to pay immediately or later..

After that, you’ll get access to your personal Associate homepage. Here you’ll find your performance dashboard, including earning overview, monthly summary, and total clicks

 

#5 – Searching for links

 

Now it’s time to search for the links of your desired products that are relevant to your website content and create your Amazon Affiliate links:

Make sure to log in to your Amazon Associate Program account to ensure that the product links match your account and channels.

Click on “Product Linking” on the top navigation bar of your Associates account and select “Product Links”. This will take you to a page where you’ll create your links.

Enter the ASIN (Amazon Standard Identification Number) of a product or Search Amazon’s catalog for a product using a keyword.

Verify that you have the correct product then click the “Go” button.

Click the “Get Link” button on the right side to copy the Amazon Affiliate link of that product to your clipboard. You can now use that link across your channels to promote the product, and you will earn referrals when people buy through that link.

Note:  An alternate way to get your Amazon Associate links is using the SiteStripe bar on product pages. To do this, click on “Text” from the “Get Link” selector, then copy the link generated in the popup.

 

A few things to keep in mind…

 

Amazon provides some ad scripts that you can use on your channels to promote the products you choose.

You can use these or create your own.

Include a disclosure that the links in the text are affiliate links per the FTC blog disclosure and guidelines and GDPR.

Build traffic and a good funnel to earn more money. (Affiliate income depends on how many visitors you can convert.)

Add multiple links and linkable photos in your promotional content. Readers prefer to click on contextual links and linked photos rather than on ads.

 

Ways to Promote Your Amazon Affiliate Links

 

Here are some effective ways to promote your Amazon Affiliate links:

 

Blogging

Blogging is the most common way to make money through the Amazon Associates Program. Some successful affiliate bloggers have a general topic site and on which to promote a variety of product links.

Others have niche sites and are allowed to promote different products related to each of their websites.

These are some topics you can write about to make money with the Amazon Associates Program:

• Picking or buying a product from Amazon
• Writing reviews of new products available on Amazon
• Best-sellers listed on Amazon
• Promoting special offers on the blog, specifically, on a daily blog

 

Social Media

 

Social media can be a good platform to share your site and affiliate links. You can either share your content with affiliate links, or you can share the links directly. Remember, though, that you should give a clear indication that what you are sharing is an affiliate link so that your followers don’t get annoyed and the purpose of your post remains clear.

Therefore, try to mix the affiliate links in with non-sales posts, too — people don’t want to be sold to all the time.

They want information about products and want to feel like the purchase is completely their idea.

 

YouTube Videos

 

A video works almost the same way as written content does, but works more effectively. When you come up with visual content, people feel more comfortable deciding whether to buy or not. This is because they can actually see the product in action. You can generate more income through the Amazon Associates Program by creating review videos and tutorial videos.

 

Lead Magnets and Email

 

Most successful affiliate marketers have two-page websites and an email marketing system for affiliate promotions. This keeps everything simple so that people don’t get distracted by too many options for where to go on a website.

One page is the landing page, and it includes a lead magnet that lures people to subscribe to the email list. (The emails promote the affiliate products.) The second page contains the information about the affiliate products so that people can check them out.

 

Add Amazon Offers to your Existing Business

 

Suppose you sell kitchen appliances, as in the example above. You can also promote kitchen utensils available on Amazon. In that way, you and your customers will both benefit from the Amazon Associates Program. You help them to find the tools that will make the task of cooking easier and more enjoyable for them while you earn for your efforts.

 

Boost Your Sales and Amazon Associates Income

 

Here are some additional tips to boost your income through the Amazon Associates Program:

1. Discuss and promote accessories — Many products work best with or are enhanced by accessories and other products. You can promote those related products or accessories on your site alongside the main ones to increase your income.
2. Check out what other items your referrals are buying — One of the amazing features of the Amazon Associates Program is that you can get paid when people use your link to buy products that you didn’t actually refer. You will also get information about what your referrals bought from Amazon through your account stats. If the products are related to your website niche, you can then start promoting those product, too, so that you can increase your reach and profitability.
3. Monitor your analytics — Always check on what’s getting clicked on your website, what’s being sold, and what your market wants and is paying for. This is very valuable information that you can use to adjust your offerings to maximize your profits.

 

Cons of the Amazon Associates Program

 

In the interest of full disclosure, here are some negatives that you should know about the Amazon Associates Program:

As mentioned above, the commission rate is low compared to other affiliate programs (6-10%). There are also flat rates for the bounty programs:

 

Affiliate cookies only last 24-hours, so if your referral doesn’t buy within that time frame, you won’t get credit for the purchase. They need to add the product to their cart to extend the validity of the cookie to 90 days.

You can’t send Amazon affiliate links in emails, which includes blog posts that get sent as emails. This means that your options for sending out offers is limited.

You can only get credit for purchases made on the marketplace where your store is registered. For example, if you have a US site promoting products on Amazon.com, you won’t get credit for purchases you referred if they buy the product through another Amazon marketplace.

You can get paid only through direct bank deposit, check, or Amazon gift card. There’s no PayPal option.

The minimum payout for you to be able to withdraw is $100, so you need to make lots of sales before you can touch the referral money.

Some of these may be deal-breakers for you, but there are also a lot of workarounds. You should consider how you can make it work for you since the Amazon Associates Program has a lot more benefits than disadvantages.

 

Final Thoughts

 

It’s easy to make money with the Amazon Associates Program. Anyone who owns a website, blog or YouTube channel can easily grab this chance to tap into an effective source of income.

The best thing about it is that you can receive payments by direct deposit into your bank account. All you need to do is set it up and get paid without working on it every day.

Turn your website into a cash machine simply by monitoring the needs of your target market and providing them with information and resources to meet those needs. You don’t even have to provide customer service because Amazon takes care of that for you so you don’t have to deal with any issues related to the actual product.