How does amazon associates program work

You can enter up to 50 websites and mobile app URLs combined. From here, you can choose whether to enter your payment and tax information now or later, and then proceed to your dashboard to begin creating Amazon affiliate links. The Product Link Tool is the most common way to create an affiliate link. This will take you to a screen where you can search for a product.

A box will pop up with your affiliate link, and you can copy the HTML code for your site as-is, or you can customize it first. Your ad can be an image and text, just text or an image only. You can also customize the look of the ad. For example, you could change the title or price color to match the branding of your website.

The SiteStripe bar at the top of the page enables you to create several different types of links. You can create a native ad as illustrated above, or you can get a plain text link, an image with an embedded link or a text plus image ad. You can also click to share on Facebook or Twitter. Payments can be made by direct deposit, by check or via Amazon gift card.

Looking to turn your website into a profitable Amazon affiliate site? Try these tips to grow traffic to your site and maximize your Amazon payouts.

Before settling on a niche, do some keyword research to determine how competitive various niches are and which keywords you could most easily rank for. While you can promote Amazon products on social media or on YouTube, most people — including those making six figures from affiliate links — do it by blogging. While writing single product reviews of various Amazon products is a popular option, there are other ways to create review-oriented content that can be more engaging.

Writing roundups of a few similar products can be effective. Most traffic to affiliate websites comes from product-related searches or searches for reviews of specific products, so use long-tail terms and use the exact keyword in your URL.

Link localizers enable you to redirect visitors from certain countries to a specific site. For example, if a UK-based user visits your website and clicks an Amazon affiliate link, a link localizer will direct the user to amazon. As an affiliate, you only make money once the link is used in a transaction. Affiliate marketing is right for you if you already own a website or blog and your content offers opportunities for product mentions. For instance, if you own a recipe blog, you can create links for product ingredients.

In the Amazon Affiliate program, associates earn commission by creating unique product links, promoting the links on their website, and driving referral traffic back to Amazon. The commission rate differs depending on the product category. For instance, if you run an automotive blog, you can earn 4.

In the beginning of your Amazon Associate journey, the numbers can skew on the low side, so be sure to have another form of income in addition to being an Amazon Associate. Being an Amazon Associate is a great way to monetize passion projects or make supplemental income from your brand. However, Amazon has guidelines for associates to follow, so it's best to understand those before you dive in. Noncompliance may result in being banned from the program. The majority of the rules are in place for ethical promotion as well as preventing associates from gaming the system.

Here are some of the big ones to keep in mind:. You can read Amazon's full policy here. To become an Amazon Associate, you must have an active website, blog, app, or YouTube channel. It's also helpful if you've pre-populated that site with content, so it appears active and authentic to both users and Amazon.

Remember, you must be able to describe the purpose of your website as part of the application process. So, have a firm idea of why you're creating your site, the audience you'll target, and how you'll bring in traffic. In order to become an Amazon affiliate, you'll need to create your Amazon Associates account. To do that, visit the Amazon Associates homepage and click Sign Up.

From there, you'll be prompted to log in to your existing Amazon account or create one. Enter your preferred store ID usually the same as your primary website name , explain what your websites hope to accomplish, and select Amazon topics your links will likely target.

Explain how you drive traffic to your websites, how you use your website or apps to generate income, how you usually build links, and how many visitors your site brings in each month.

Choose whether to enter your payment credit card and tax ID information now or later. Then proceed to your dashboard. Once you've created your account, you'll be sent to your personal Associate homepage. This is where you'll find your performance dashboard including an earnings overview, monthly summary, and total clicks. This dashboard is also where you'll search for relevant products to link to from your content.

Here's how:. Doing this ensures that the link text is generated in a way that associates the product you're promoting with your account. That means you'll have to grab it within another window. Alternatively, if you can't find the ASIN, Amazon will allow you to search the catalog for the product you're promoting. This will generate a result at the bottom. Be sure to verify that this is the intended product you wanted to promote.

This will copy your new Amazon Affiliate link to your clipboard, and you can now use that link in your promotions. A simpler way to generate your Amazon Affiliate Links is by using the SiteStripe bar that shows up on product pages when you're logged in to your Amazon Affiliate Panel.

Just click the Text button in the Get Link selector. Then copy the generated link that is provided in the popup. Just remember that Amazon's guidelines prohibit the use of the link in offline promotions, email, and eBooks or PDFs. As with most marketing and sales, quality content is at the heart of success.

Ensure you're attracting your audience with quality content and share relevant affiliate links with them on your site or YouTube channel. Each link you generate will have a cookie that will then follow your website visitors after they click on the link.

This is highly beneficial to you, because it increases the likelihood of you receiving commission for the sale. The only problem is that it only lasts for a limited amount of time. The Amazon Affiliate cookie lasts for 24 hours after a website visitor clicks on the affiliate link. The cookie stays in their browser for that entire length of time. That way, if they check out at any time in those 24 hours, the purchase will be credited to you. These include:. Of course, if you want to participate in the program, you need to have a website or blog.

Once you have an active website, it is time to sign up for the Amazon Associates program. All you must do is visit the home page and click the button to sign up. From there, you will either be asked to log in to your Amazon account or create a new one. The process should only take a few minutes. You will need to enter all your account information including your name, address, and phone number.

This is a relatively straightforward process, and you will need to indicate the main contact of the account. This is probably going to be yourself.

You will also be asked to enter the preferred store ID, which will probably be the name of your website. Amazon is going to ask you the main goal of your website. That way, you can figure out what types of products and services might be best for your affiliate strategy.

Next, you need to share information about all the websites you will use to promote the product and services provided by Amazon. Amazon is also going to ask you how you plan on driving traffic to your website. This information is going to be important for helping you construct a well-rounded strategy.

You may drive traffic to your website using social networks , SEO, blogs, shopping portals, or even paid search strategies. You will also be asked to share your tax ID information. You can skip this step and choose to come back to it later. Finally, you will need to create Amazon affiliate links that you can use to send your visitors to Amazon.

This will also give you a summary of your total clicks, the total amount of money you have made, and give you access to the information you can use to follow trends over time. You simply must click on the product linking area in the top banner, add the ASIN of the product or service, then click the button to generate a link.

Your Amazon affiliate links will be most successful if you are providing high-quality content that helps your readers. Robyn has been SEJ » Digital Experience. Screenshot from Amazon. Screenshot from Affiliate-program.