First off, I would like to state that I am extremely pissed off. I received a call yesterday stating "We are sorry, but we are no longer offering commission on 'hard to get' items. Effective tomorrow, you will not receive commission for these items." How ridiculous is that? Less then 24 hours notice? I have generated millions in revenue for Amazon, and I feel extremely cheated. How can they define a 'hard to get' item? To me this seems like they are opening the floodgates. Now everytime associates make too much money on a specific item, they will discontinue associates from getting a commission from it. I have never been backdoored like this from any other affiliate program. What are other peoples thoughts?
I really feel for you. Is this a change for the whole program or just you and how are these items defined? Is there anything in the Terms and Conditions that protects you from the change ? BAd PR, bad service... surprising.
Honestly, i really hope it is a company wide change, and not just for me. If it was just for me, that seems like a lawsuit waiting to happen for them. They don't state how the items are "defined"? Thats the sketchy thing. You would think they would make an announcement on their blog, or start a monthly newsletter, or something. Also, how can they just make this change? If they did make the change, wouldn't they need to make a change to their terms of use, and wouldn't I have to re-approve the new terms? This whole thing blows my mind. I canno't believe this is coming from such a widely known and respected company as Amazon as well.
i've read a huge blog with 1000's of comments of users who used to sell on amazon... you see countless people who lost $30,000 and up.. where amazon ban them for selling to much.. and then amazon keep the money... amazon in my eyes is EVIL, illegal, and acting the innocent... it always gets away with it beacuse of the millions of happy customers... if all of the unhappy sellers and advertisers got together and with some cash.. i bet they would be taken on... there is also ALOT of unproven corruption.. amazon employees find the best paying niches.. ban all the sellers and sell that niche themselves.... my advice is stay away from amazon... never sell.. never advertise them... one day all the sellers will leave and they will die...
I don't know if it's related, but after a month of halfway decent earnings (right up to the payout point), my conversions are down to practically nothing, even my clicks are down, which is strange because my traffic is the same. I had about 1800 clicks w/o conversion on the first, and since then, total of 123 clicks with one lousy nickel to show for it. Not to be paranoid, but... This stinks because Amazon is the only option with so much variety. Has anyone else noticed this?
Are you selling exotic things in their list which are what they claim "hard to get"? I find it strange, the more the affilate earns, Amazon should be earning many times more. They should be happy rather than upset when affiliates are doing very well.
No, it is a common item, that does not stay in stock very long. But yet there are hundreds of market sellers. It makes no sense. Anyone else get contacted about this change?
So far there has only been one single "hard to get" item that Amazon.com has decided not to give affiliate commissions on and that's the Wii, which I'm guessing you had built a decent business around that they then whacked you. I'm also guessing you had one of the sites that had tools to contact you as soon as Wii's were in stock with a link to go buy it. Yeah, it stinks, but they hold all the cards unfortunately.
Yeah, it sucks, but they call the shots since Amazon is the only retailer to report their "best Christmas ever" when everyone else has had to slash prices by huge percentages this holiday season. Sure, it sucks, but those of us who make money on Amazon have to suck it up or else find other ways to make it up :-(
get in touch with TV news... Your being ripped off as a hardworking affiliate... no company should work like that... good luck dude.
That's the big problem with all Affiliate programs though. Technically you're working for someone with absolutely no transparency whatsoever on a commission basis. It's worse than being a Temp. If any Affiliate program decides not to pay you, they don't pay you and there is very little you can do about it. Houck, if you know of one, please name an Affiliate program that doesn't have this problem so I can go join it.
switch to eBay or some other store. Seriously, amazon is not the only game in town. Sure, the Wii is selling like crazy and you can make some good money pimping it, but this kind of thing happens in affiliate marketing. Get over it and move on.
Or if you are fed up with the affiliate side of the game, create a digital product and sell it yourself. You could even get your own affiliates, then you'll have complete control and have total transparency in your business. I'll bet people would pay to hear about how you made millions of dollars on amazon.com, just leave out the part about them stiffing you.