Make Money with Amazon.com Associates Program
A while back I wrote a post on "Motivation for the New Guys", which focused back on when I used to promote Amazon.com’s Associate program many years ago. I went on to make over $100,000 in commissions, but the actual commission per sale was low, so I moved onto bigger markets. Amazon.com is still thriving and many affiliates are still making good money with their program, especially now that they sell almost everything.
I was just checking out a blog of someone I recently met at BlogWorld. In addition to them having a nice and helpful money making blog, I also noticed a new widget on their site. This was the Amazon.com Deal of the Day Widget. It’s been a while since I last checked out the Amazon.com Associates Program, so it was pretty cool to see they actually had a decent amount of widgets to choose from. An example of their 468×60 "Deal of the Day" widget is shown below.
If you already have an affiliate account with Amazon.com, you can login right from their Widgets area and it will create your selected widget, imbedded with your affiliate id of course. If you aren’t a member, simply signup to their Associate Program. Amazon.com offers linking and widget methods for many of their different categories and store sections, such as aStore Widget, Product Links, Product Previews, Text Links, Context Links, Omakase, Banners, Search Boxes and Recommended Product Links.
Amazon.com might not offer the best commission rates around, however they have a well branded name that almost everyone has already shopped at. You can also take advantage of their product database by using it for actual site content and being able to offer targeted ad/sales to customers actually looking to buy this product.
We are able to go full swing into Money Making Holidays season, so if you aren’t already testing out these widgets, give them a shot. If you don’t make any money, you might actually just come across a hot "Deal of the Day" which you can buy through your affiliate link!
Wait... before you leave, consider these top resources:
Interesting widget. I also noticed that you can create a slideshow widget with the amazon affiliate program where you chose the products that get displayed. It looked quite good.
Awesome. They are providing some decent widgets for their affiliates.
they have tons of widgets, but like you said, it performs low. for me atleast. besides, i find it kinda annoying to shop from them sometimes. not always, just sometimes.
There are 2 nice things with Amazon.
1) People trust buying from them.
2) When you refer someone there to get one thing, they usually buy a lot more stuff 😀
Even though Amazon is a major brand, it really is performing very poorly on my blog.
I am also suspect of it tracking system. I have friends that told me that they bought this and that from my aff links but it doesn't show on my associate account.
Thanks for the tip on the widget. I've been using Amazon for a long time and I hadn't realized they had this widget. I think I might look at installing this weekend.
Btw, Amazon works really well if you look at the long tail. The more items you have, the better it works. It takes time. For a new blog it's a little discouraging, but as you add more and more articles with time, the revenue slowly keeps slowly. It's a slow and steady earner.
Darren Rowse wrote an article on his blog a while back entitled 9 Reasons Why I AM an Amazon Affiliate. It's worth checking out.
Great advice, as usual, Zac! I've had amazon for a long while now but haven't taken the time to check it out or figure out how to market it on my sites or ppc. But this definitely is the perfect season for playing around with it. Now just need to stop talking myself out of starting yet another project lol.
I have never made any sales with amazon before, so i am not sure how it can help, might give it a try.
I make some desctent money using this amazon program.