Tips on using Amazon affiliate links effectively for blogs

s0sunz1m Active Member

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#21

got any real site example?

s0sunz1m, Feb 21, 2009 IP

laostravel Peon

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#22

Thank for your sucgestion. it helpfull for me ... i start some blog for amazon too.

laostravel, Feb 21, 2009 IP

Parka Well-Known Member

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#23

s0sunz1m said: ↑

got any real site example?
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, I can't provide my website link because I don't want to skew my statistics. Can't separate unrelated traffic after that.

Parka, Feb 21, 2009 IP

habitatfranklin Peon

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#24

Good, practical tips. Thanks for sharing!

habitatfranklin, Feb 22, 2009 IP

kashifmahmood Well-Known Member

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#25

Some very important points discussed in the above post by OP. Overall a really helpful article.

kashifmahmood, Feb 22, 2009 IP

indrazz Peon

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#26

Hmm yummy tips! I'll try it in my pendant necklace blog, but all business always take a long time to get success

indrazz, Mar 12, 2009 IP

bruce_robart Member

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#27

nice guidance buddy may it will help to Affiliate marketing new bie

bruce_robart, Mar 12, 2009 IP

indrazz Peon

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#28

Hi It's me again.. i just wanna ask you, how to place contextual amazon widget?? Because my contextual widget never show contextual ads..

indrazz, Mar 26, 2009 IP

Parka Well-Known Member

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#29

indrazz said: ↑

Hi It's me again.. i just wanna ask you, how to place contextual amazon widget?? Because my contextual widget never show contextual ads..
Click to expand...

Unfortunately, I've never used contextual ads before.

Parka, Mar 26, 2009 IP

conflictuniverse Peon

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#30

great information, thank you

conflictuniverse, Mar 26, 2009 IP

grgnng Active Member

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#31

Parka said: ↑

(Initially I wanted to post this on my blog with a text link here on digitalpoint. I really want to get some traffic from this post but that would not be targeted traffic and would skew my blog statistics.)

Here's a guide on how to make money with Amazon affiliate links on your blog.

It's a long guide. It contains what I've learn for the 4 months since I started using Amazon Associates. This guide will contain actual concrete examples compared to conceptual strategies like "get traffic", "target a niche", "build your blog".

It's guaranteed to make money if you work hard. Results will come as quick but I can't give you a time frame because I'm not god. In fact, if you earn money, which you will, you can donate $1 (or more) to my Paypal account (teohyc at gmail dot com). I'm saving up for Comic Con 2009.

To start things off, remember this principle that I base all my work on: In order to get something in value, you must sacrifice something of equal value. I apply that to everything in life. In the case of Amazon affiliate links, you must create something of value to the reader or why would they want to return that value to you? It is also the reason why I include "if you work hard" in the previous paragraph.

My blog's on book reviews. Currently, I'm earning about US$100 per month. Not a lot, yeah. That's after 4 months of consistent work. It will grow. Content I have last month is still around in addition to new content added consistently.

Note that this guide is for blogs. I've no success with my Astore as yet.

Let's get started with things I learned

Know what you like
It is crucial to know your passion. Write something that you like. I've created countless blogs all to die within months simply because it became a chore to find content to write about.

You're naturally more knowledgeable when you write about something you know.

For example, I buy books. I know what people look for in books because I'm one of them.

It is no coincidence that every business book or entrepreneur preaches this: Follow your passion.

This is also the reason why you shouldn't be afraid of competition. People who have no passion will eventually find whatever they are doing a chore. I've no doubt writing about financial banking products can make money, but after a while I'll definitely be bored.

Do what you do best and it takes you less effort. E.g. If you're pro soccer player, teaching soccer can't be too hard.

Provide information the reader lacks in order to make a purchase
I sell a very simple item, a book. Simple as that, I do book reviews to tell people about the book. What's inside, why it's good.

I've absolutely no problem criticizing a book if it's bad. In fact, I've people that bought books from my blog that I thought was bad. Apparently, that book is bad for me only. So nowadays, for my reviews, I mention the type of people that might find the book interesting.

Then I refer them to Amazon where they can read more reviews. If they buy anything, I make a little commission. I tell my readers I make a commission, whether that had any effect on conversion rate I've not tested yet.

The reason why people are on your site is because they are looking for information on the subject. Provide them with that information, point them to where they can get more information, in this case the Amazon site. This helps them (first) and you (second).

This works for simpler items like books. For more pricey items like electronics, people will want more information before they make any purchasing decision. For that reason, they will probably leave your site in search for more information. So just point them to Amazon where they can read more reviews.

People don't like it when they are told to buy, buy, buy. Hard sell is a turn off. Focus on giving them value through either information or helping them save time. Sales will come.

You can get started easily just by thinking from the buyer's perspective and writing down a list of things people care about when making a purchased. E.g. Warranty period, value for money, quality product.

Put your links surrounded by context
If you're using Adsense, you've probably sick from reading that the best position for placing ads on a page is under the title, beside the content. That's called placing the ad in context. The context is the title and content, information that people actually want. So people will look there and see the ad.

For Amazon affiliate links, it's important to put them in context also.

I've put text links in a list before to promote some products. They have incredible click-through rates (CTR) but they do not convert because there's no context. I didn't explain to my readers why those products are great. And I can't explain because I've not used them myself. Any attempt to do a writeup without using the product is no different from lying. People can detect lies and they hate lies. People leave.

CTR is useless if people don't convert. So focus on providing useful context.

Be authentic.

(By the way, my Adsense earns single freaking digits. I still don't get how Adsense clickers think.)

About using the different widgets, links, banners
They each have different CTR and conversion rate depending on the context they are placed in. All you have to do is test them out.

Test them out one by one and monitor your statistics. Never try to modify two variables at the same time because you won't know exactly which one is producing the change.

Have Amazon Associates account from different countries
You should know that Amazon Associates is available for different countries. They are USA, Canada, French, German, UK and Japan currently.

Basically, using the same content, you can create links to the different Amazon sites all over the world.

The problem here is not about making money which you will. It's about how you're going to get the money from Amazon after they pay you. As you know, they have only cheques, direct payment and gift certificates.

It's important to check your web statistics to see where your readers are from before creating these links. Creating these links represents an investment of time. If there's no value return, there's no value creating the links.

For me, I've noticed my readers are from these countries as well, which is why I create links to the various Amazon sites. It doesn't help Germans if you point them to the US site when they have a local German Amazon site already.

And if your readers are French, do they read English? Don't assume. Translate your site into French (with the help of Google Translate).

Lesson here is don't do things just because you can. Know why you're doing that in the first place.

Did I mention that the US$100 I earn is from US alone. The rest add up to an additional $US100 (equivalent).

REQUEST: If you know how to apply for a bank account in a foreign country where Amazon is located, please share with everyone here!

Choosing between gift certificates, cheques and direct deposit
It really depends on where you are and what are the options that are viable. If you're outside of the country where Amazon is in, you can only choose between gift certificates and cheques.

Darren Rowse of problogger.net has an entry relating to this so I don't want to waste time writing the same thing.

Gift certificates come approximately 2 months later from the month you made your earnings. Sales I made in October came in the last few days of December. Amazon is an efficient company, even on paying out commissions.

About that low 4% commission rate and 1-day cookie
If you sell more than 6 items, you'll be receiving 6% commission rate.

When I first started out, I'm not surprised if I don't make any sales. Nowadays, with more traffic on my blog, I'm surprised if I don't make any sales. That traffic comes from helpful content. Crossing over to the 6% tier isn't really that hard. Currently, I'm at 6.5% going to 7% (that's 100 over items). I enlisted the help of my book loving friends to provide me with books also.

Anyway low commission rate is a personal opinion.

About that 1-day Amazon cookie, you can't change that so why waste time complaining? For the commission rate, you can change that, so change that.

How much will you make
It depends on the type of items you're selling and how many you're selling. Pricey items earn more but sales quantity are lower.

When your visitor reaches Amazon from your links, anything they buy will grant you a small commission. I've people buying underwear through my book links.

The important thing to note here is to do some financial projections. Look at your statistics in a few months to see if doing this will be a return on your investment (time and money). Not everything returns financially. See if it's worthwhile to do it for long term.

It comes back down to why you create your blog in the first place. For me, I love reading books and collect books primarily. Doing reviews is just something that comes next naturally.

Notice that I didn't mention that making money is the priority of the blog? Because it's not! In reality, you don't make money. You sell a service or product and make money. "Make money" has absolutely no meaning without context.

Don't provide unrelated links
This is very tricky because I'm not sure it actually true because I've no extensive numbers to back up what I say.

If you're doing a review on golf balls, post links only to golf balls. Don't flood your entry with links to golf shirts, golf shoes, golf books, golf everything. That's hard sell. It turns your blog into a very hostile commercial platform. People hate hard sell and hostile environment. They leave by clicking the close button (or Ctrl+W) and not the Amazon links. And they never come back again.

Be focused. This is similar to the tip on following your passion. Create a blog that people can easily see the focus. For example, facebook for social interaction, Ebay for auctions, Paypal for money transfers, Amazon for e-commerce. This is basic marketing.

How long will it take
My first sale was actually a bag that I bought from Amazon. It was the first time I was trying out the Associate link. That was in July 2007. My sale for that was in August 2008.

My reaction to that was "hey, it actually works". If not for that sale, I won't be posting Amazon links on my blog.

It will take time provided you have content. There's no such thing as overnight success. Every overnight success takes months and years to plan and execute.

I've broken even already. So any sales that I make now go into my future book purchases. I chose to receive gift certificates as I'm not in US.

Also, I've thanked by blog readers by holding a small contest and providing an Amazon gift cert (of course!) as prize. The amount is not a lot at $20 but it sure is cool to give back.

Concentrate on providing value, helping people. It's not a matter of when, it's a matter of how much you will make.

Conclusion
My conclusion is just similar to the tip earlier, provide enough information for your visitors to make a purchase. I think I can get how online customers think. If you know their motivation, you can predict what they are going to do and that helps with whatever strategies you make.

My guide is guaranteed to make money. The amount is a totally different story. That's what I told my friend, and I've actually proved it to him with him supplying me some books.

When you make your first sale, do post back here and relate your experience. Do post actual concrete tips people can follow instead of those superficial high level strategic concepts no one can relate to.

Hope this guide is of some help to some of you guys starting out, like I am 4 months ago.

Any questions feel free to ask also. There's nothing better than having a few more actually useful blogs.
Click to expand...

Good article, your effort on this is appreciated, great

grgnng, Mar 27, 2009 IP

360clicks Peon

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#32

great tips!

360clicks, Mar 31, 2009 IP

alphamonk Peon

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#33

Great tips, I am glad you put this up

alphamonk, Mar 31, 2009 IP

Parka Well-Known Member

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#34

Looking at the numbers for March and February

March
166 items shipped (5.35 items per day)
$242.35 total ($1.46 per item)
7.76%

February
158 items shipped (5.64 items per day)
$244 total ($1.54 per item)
7.47%

--

Overall my blog traffic unique visitors increase 40% with a total of 43000++ pageviews.

Earnings this month didn't grow even though there were 31 days.

Parka, Apr 1, 2009 IP

Parka Well-Known Member

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#35

Another month, another ridiculous performance by my Adsense block: $5 from 31 clicks or 0.08% CTR.

This brings me to a new tip I'm trying for April which is

Replace Adsense with Amazon ads

I got this insight when someone actually ordered an electronic related to my blog. When it ships, it's going to get me $10++ in commission. That is more than Adsense for its multiple clicks already.

I basically used the image link (eye catching) for my Amazon ad, with a sentence explaining what it is. Now that ad (in the sidebar) looks even more blended into my blog's content, and my blog actually looks ad-free.

And it's something I imagine my readers will buy also. It's important to know specifically who your readers are. E.g. Kids 12-16 year olds, school teachers, housewives, etc

I'll report the results back end of the month and see if it works.

Parka, Apr 1, 2009 IP

Jenna Appleseed likes this.

markowe Well-Known Member

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#36

Parka said: ↑

Replace Adsense with Amazon ads

...

I'll report the results back end of the month and see if it works.
Click to expand...

Sounds like it's well worth a try! Which Amazon ads do you mean? The contextual ones don't work great as I recall, but it's going to be a pain choosing keywords for every page... Or were you just thinking have the same ad in the sidebar/footer wherever for all pages?

markowe, Apr 2, 2009 IP

jwhite88 Peon

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#37

I used to think about changing adsense for something else but sometimes it really depends on the niche that you are in.

jwhite88, Apr 2, 2009 IP

gabrial Active Member

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#38

The best tips of the year.
wow...

gabrial, Apr 2, 2009 IP

Parka Well-Known Member

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#39

markowe said: ↑

Sounds like it's well worth a try! Which Amazon ads do you mean? The contextual ones don't work great as I recall, but it's going to be a pain choosing keywords for every page... Or were you just thinking have the same ad in the sidebar/footer wherever for all pages?
Click to expand...

Yup. I'm changing them to the same ad on the sidebar every page.

Maybe I'll try the contextual ones somewhere on my page also to see the result.

Parka, Apr 2, 2009 IP

arenecute Peon

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#40

that's a very long post. thanks load for sharing

arenecute, Apr 8, 2009 IP

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