Affiliate marketing is a very lucrative option to generate passive income from your blog. And, if it dome properly it can bring financial freedom to you. There are so many options available for affiliate marketing like commission junction, ShareASale affiliate program, etc. Among these Amazon Affiliate Programme is the most famous and popular.

There are several reasons behind its so much popularity. First of all the brand Amazon, has a huge reputation and trusted by people across the world. And because of this trust, people mostly choose Amazon to sell their product instead of any other marketplace.

As an associate, your choice should be Amazon Affiliate Marketing as here the conversion rate is much much higher than any other platform. Buyers simply love to buy from Amazon again and again and as a marketer you also get a very fair share as commission.

The best part is even if buyers buy any other products instead of the product mentioned on your website then too you get the credit of driving buyers to Amazon through your Amazon referral link.

So, if you have your own blog and planning to earn from affiliate marketing, you should try Amazon affiliate marketing.

What is actually an Amazon affiliate marketing program?

Amazon Affiliate Programme or Amazon Associates is one of the oldest affiliate marketing program launched way back in 1996. Since then Amazon is helping marketers, bloggers to earn by advertising Amazon products on their websites and to earn tons of money therefrom.

Anyone who has a website can monetize it and obtain an amazon referral link. If you own a blog or any website of your own and have joined the Amazon associate program (the process has been covered in details later in the article) then you will earn referral fees each time any user clicks your affiliate link.

After getting the referral link, your main task is to create a good copyrighting content that should be compelling enough to make the visitors buy the product or at least click the referral link. Through this, you can earn up to 10% as referral fees. 

Is not it great! You don’t have to have your own product or shop; you have to simply review any product available at Amazon and provide the referral link within it for your target audience. If you are writing your blog for Indian customers then you may want to get associated with the Amazon India Affiliate marketing program.

Can you earn more from the Amazon Affiliate marketing program than Google AdSense?

If you are an Indian and write your blog for Indian audience then from Google AdSense you will earn $0.5 to $3 US Dollar which is called Cost Per 1000 Impressions (CPM). Now if you have 60 to 70 blogs on your website and each of these blogs has 1000 page views per month then you can expect an earning around $100 per month from Google AdSense.

To know about how to earn from Google Adsense click here

On the other hand, if you have an amazon referral link and per day your blog is driving 100 potential buyers to amazon then with a very safe conversion rate of 2%, there will be 1-2 sales every day. Then depending on the product, you are using the referral link, you can expect to earn from $150 to $2000.

So you can clearly understand now that the earning potential of Amazon Affiliate Programme is much much better than that of Google AdSense.

Where Google AdSense is somewhat like income from the fixed deposit, safe and secure but less; the earning from Amazon Affiliate Programme is like stock market earning not fixed and secured but much more than AdSense.

Positive sides of Amazon Affiliate marketing program

Here are some more facts about the reasons behind the Amazon Affiliate Programme’s popularity. The program has lots of positive sides to attract bloggers and website owners to get associated with it like:

The brand value

I have already mentioned it above. The brand Amazon is already very popular and trusted by all walks of people, be it marketers, customers or website owners & bloggers who get associated with Amazon. 

People feel safe when they deal with such a large eCommerce site. People keep faith on such a big brand and even promote products that are not manufactured by Amazon itself. So, its a matter of mutual trust and highly correlated with the brand value.

The start is really smooth

To get associated with Amazon Affiliate Programme is as such is a breeze. Only the prerequisites are, you should have a well-designed website or blog with a good amount of traffic. Once you achieved this level you are good to proceed with Amazon Affiliate Programme.

There is no fee to become an associate. You have to just apply to the program Amazon Associates and get Amazon referral link.

No threshold criteria

There are no threshold criteria fixed for traffic or other metrics to be eligible for Amazon Affiliate Programme. At any stage of your blogging, you can join it. But without huge traffic, you can not make significant earning.

Not niche-specific

You search any product you use in your daily life in Google and you are highly likely to get directed to Amazon. The reason is it is an online store of almost every physical product of our daily needs you can think of.

Likewise, you can create your website on any physical product and get associated with Amazon Affiliate Marketing Program. Any physical-niche can be very profitable if planned well and content are useful.

Hassle-free payment

You will get what you earned directly to your bank registered with Amazon Associates.

Problems with Amazon Affiliate marketing program

Till now all the good things are discussed about  Amazon’s Affiliate Program. But there is nothing under the sun with only good sides. So do this Affiliate Program. Here now I am going to reveal some concerns about this program which you may not like but are facts.

Fierce competition 

Gone are the days when Amazon Affiliate Program was launched and even until 5-6 years back any basic site reviewing any product can expect to earn a significant amount from it. It was gold mine then and the competition was very very less. 

Today if you are just starting a blog or website then it is not that easy to start earning from Amazon Affiliate Program. Especially when popular brands and pro bloggers are ready with their articles on every profitable super niche. You have to face fierce competition.

Another big problem arises with all those blogs and websites which 100% depend on Amazon Affiliate Marketing Program. They built their sites focus only on the products which can bring referral earnings. This approach has a far greater risk as they are susceptible to any algorithmic change from Google. 

Think about the situation of Amazon suddenly revises its commission rates or removes the particular product you are bating on; your all efforts are gone in a flash. So try to build a stable business model rather than building an Amazon-specific affiliate blog.  Focus on quality content which will grow slowly but the income it will generate will be stable and sustainable.

A cookie period of 24 hours limit the revenue

Amazon has a cookie period of just 24 hours. That means if any visitor purchases anything from Amazon through your referral link 24 hours after visiting your website/blog you will earn no commission.

And it is very common if your blog or website deals with some product which is costly or complex, then usually any user does not buy the product immediately reading the review. So, in this case, this 24 hours window is pretty less. Like other affiliate programs that of Walmart, target generally offer a cookie period 3 to 7 days.

The commission is comparatively low

Generally, the starting affiliate income is just 4%, it may increase depending on the volume of the sale later. But at the start, the earning is much lower compared to other affiliate marketing programs. 

So, should you get associated with Amazon Affiliate marketing program?

The straight forward answer is YES, you should get associated with Amazon Affiliate Programme. But you should never rely completely on this single source of monetization. That is you should not make an Amazon Affiliate Programme focussed any particular product based website.

That policy will be very vulnerable and anytime any policy change by Google or Amazon can cause great loss to your hard work and huge time that you invested. So, always use a mixture of more than one monetization policies, which will greatly diversify the risk.

Finally… how to boost income from Amazon Affiliate marketing?

Now here is the main part I know you were waiting for. The million-dollar question is how can you make money from Amazon Affiliate Programme. The prerequisite of making money from any affiliate program is having a well-designed website with a good amount of traffic where you can promote the product with a referral link. 

I here assume that you already own a website. Then the steps to become an associate in Amazon Affiliate Programme are as below:

SEO optimize your blog/website

This is crucial to increase the organic traffic to your website or blog. There are several SEO plugins for WordPress and SEO tools available, make use of them.

Sign-up as an associate through Amazon website

It is a very easy step. You just have to go to the Amazon website and click on the Amazon affiliate link at the bottom of the page. But keep in mind, in this process, your website should be at the basic stage as Amazon will review your website manually before approving it.

Creating the referral link

Now you have to visit Amazon Associates account and look for the specific product you want to review and use for referral. As you select any product you can obtain your personalized referral link for that product from the top of the screen (in grey stripe)

Writing a useful review

Ideally, you should review any product based on your personal experience. Otherwise, it will not be of any value to your readers. Sites like best reviews employ a group of employees to test rigorously any item they are going to review. 

The testing team tests the item every single way possible and come up with a genuine product review. Such a product review presents a really helpful guideline for the customers to make their minds about whether to buy the product or not.

There are lots of blogs and websites there which are writing reviews just for the sake of affiliate earning. These reviews are generally just compiled from different other articles available online. The authors never tried the products themselves and their reviews clearly reflect that. Such reviews can not sustain for a long time. The bounce rate will go higher and gradually Google will index out your page.

So, you have to write such product reviews that can compete with the best reviews available online. Your content should be very useful with your unique insights about the product. 

Increase the number of products with referral links over time

As your site grows, try to incorporate a number of products with referral links. As you will get a commission for all the products purchased and not only the product with a referral link.

Target high valued products

It is simple mathematics. If the product you are reviewing is costly, then you will earn more money as a commission.

Target different events

Round the year there are several occasions when people tend to buy event-specific products. So, create a list targeting different occasions like Navratri, Diwali, Eid, Christmas, etc. when sales go up significantly of particular products and make use of these opportunities.

Promoting your website

Once you have created your content and prepared your affiliate site well, it’s the time to promote it. Because if no one knows about it there will be less traffic and the very purpose of becoming Amazon Associate gets defeated.

Social media is a very effective way of promotion. Use Facebook, Pinterest, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and other social platforms to get connected with people.

Build a strong network with other players in the field. Interact in different question-answer forums like Quora, Reddit, etc. Millions of people use these platforms to get the answer to their queries. 

Try to provide useful answers to those queries and let people know about your existence and domain knowledge. Provide a link to your website anywhere in your answer. If readers find your answer really helpful, they will certainly visit your blog and start to recognize your expertise.

Conclusion

Right now you must have gained a good idea about Amazon Affiliate Programme its earning potential and highly motivated to become an associate. Then good to get you encouraged. But my advice will be if you are already using Google AdSense, then continue using it too. Don’t get 100% dependent on the Amazon Affiliate Marketing Programme.

Use both of the monetizing strategies at a time in your blog and have close look at their performance. Gradually increase the proportion of the better performing strategy.

Finally, the most important thing is to keep your expectations as practical as possible. There are so many blogs and videos you will get on youtube to earn crores from the Amazon Affiliate Marketing  program within years. For getting motivated these contents are okay. But don’t get carried away by them as when you are just starting and alone, it will take time to grow in this highly competitive marketing sector.

Any business model needs initial establishment time and investment. Amazon Affiliate Marketing program is also no difference. At the initial stage, you have to focus just on providing value and wait patiently. Time will come when your hard work will start to pay.