AffiliateBrand.com by Gene Kavner

Heading to Ad-Tech in NY

I'm heading over to New York over the weekend for the Ad-Tech conference and would love to meet any of you in the affiliate marketing space.  Drop me an email if you are planning on being there:

Gene Kavner, Former World-Wide Director, Amazon Associates Affiliate Program, 2005-2006.

Should Bloggers Disclose That They Are Compensated?

There is a substantial amount of debate that spread through the blogosphere recently about how much disclosure blog writers should provide to their readers about compensation bloggers receive and who they receive it from.  All this disclosure would serve a presumed goal of allowing readers to make an independent decision as to whether this compensation may in a way influence the blogger to be biased in his or her post.

This debate was sparked by PayPerPost.com, an Internet startup that has developed a broker network between marketers who want to grow sales of their product/service and bloggers who would like to monetize their blogs.  Certainly, many other networks give bloggers an ability to monetize their inventory, but what makes P3 unique is that they may be implicitly encouraging bloggers to offer positive commentary in their posts because they are being compensated for their writing.

Michael Arringon of TechCrunch expressed in strongest terms that P3 is a "virus" in his post titled PayPerPost Is Now Officially Absurd.  In his perspective,

PayPerPost bloggers should also be disclosing the fact that they are being paid for their post prominently within the post...

Another post by a notable Internet analyst, Dave Taylor, titled PayPerPost creates DisclosurePolicy, TechCrunch calls it absurd?, questions Arrington's tough stand:

Exactly where is this a problem? The fact is, PayPerPost has no responsibility to enforce any sort of disclosure policy nor is there any requirement that bloggers be transparent.

This pretty much sums up the current Internet controversy.  This is just the latest bout between Internet puritans and Internet marketers and that their conflict will not be solved any time soon.  I see this as another evolution of the same old debate between Open Source backers and Microsoft backers as to whether companies should charge for software and enforce their intellectual property rights.

I will be upfront in disclosing my bias here: if someone believes that it is possible for someone's commentary in an Internet posting to be absent of bias, this someone was probably born yesterday.  We all have our biases and everything we do in our lives and say in our blog posts reflects those biases.  I have little doubt that Arrington, Taylor, and I have our biases, whether financially motivated or not, for our perspectives.

In the offline world, there is little expectation on our part that NBC's Apprentice will disclose that their episode where contestants market Domino's pizza is actually sponsored by Domino's.  One rarely expects that your financial planner who offers you a life insurance policy to disclose that he is being paid by the policy provider.  A writer in New York Times writing a story on the race for Congress is certainly not going to disclose his personal voting record.

In the online world, on the other hand, somehow there is this tendency to assume that we are living in a more refined world where "public trust" as Arrington describes it rules. There is no more public trust in the online world than there is in the offline world and expecting the online world to somehow take the high road is unrealistic.  We should all take everything we hear on the Internet and cross that information with the credibility value we implicitly assign to the source of the information.  Basically, it's the eBay seller model applied to the blogger -- we observe the credibility value assigned to the blogger by other bloggers and readers and if the value is high, we can assign more trust to their posts.  If the blogger is fairly new, we take their message with a bit more grain of salt.  If a blogger pushes a "broken" product or service simply because he or she is being sponsored, blogger's credibility will permanently suffer.  On the other hand, there is absolutely nothing wrong for a blogger to comment on a product he or she believes in, despite being compensated for it.  At the end of the day, we have to trust those we read and follow regardless of whether they are or aren't being paid for their communication.  Considering how easily and irreparably trust can be broken, no reputable blogger will be quick to alter his or her perspective on an issue solely based on the value of compensation they receive.

Would love to hear your thoughts.

Gene Kavner, Former World-Wide Director, Amazon Associates Affiliate Program, 2005-2006.

What Every Affiliate Program Should Have

I've been looking at various affiliate programs on the Internet and having run the largest affiliate program in the world, I feel that overall, affiliate programs are lacking some critical components that every affiliate program should have.  Let's take a look at some of these important affiliate program features.

1.  One of the most important components of any affiliate program is the relationship between the merchant (site with an affiliate program) and the publisher (site that drives traffic to the merchant). 

Typically, publishers know what merchants' products appear on their sites.  Unfortnately, the same does not typically apply in reverse.  Merchants frequently do not have any idea who their affiliates are, how much each one sells and how each of the affiliates is driving business to the merchant.  If one of the publishers suddenly stops driving traffic to the merchant, the merchant has no means to call the publisher and address the problem they may be having.  In the current day and age, if your affiliate program does not give you means to establish a direct relationship with the affiliate, you need to take a look at other affiliage technologies.

2.  Each merchant needs to have a clear way to understand how elastic their affiliates are.

Elasticity is the measure of how a group of publishers will respond to either increasing or decreasing of fees they are paid.  Every merchant will typically have affiliate that drive traffic to them in different ways. Affiliates that drive traffic in a similar way would be typically be described by the merchant as an affiliate segment.  Each affiliate segment would respond differently to changes in fees by a merchant.  Let's take a look at two sample segments of affiliates and how one is more elastic than the other:

Redirectors are typically affiliates that purchase inventory, typically from Google AdWords or AdSense (they could purchase this inventory elsewhere as well) where they display only one merchant's offer.  They hope that they will make more from the merchant's commissions when their customers purchase merchant's products than they will spend on bringing those customers to the merchant's site.  Redirectors frequently do not even need to have their own web site to generate business.  Redirectrs have to have a way to measure which campaign makes money and which campaign loses money for them; they would then quickly need to abandon money-losing campaigns while focusing on purchasing more profitable inventory.  Typically, redirectors respond very well to any increase in fees that a merchant would pay them.  Higher fees allows them to purchase keywords that would otherwise be unprofitable. If a merchant were to pay redirectors a higher amount, redirectors would typically sell more of the merchant's products -- a win/win scenario.  Redirectors are therefore considered to be an elastic affiliate.

Bloggers, on the other hand are typically considered to be inelastic.  Bloggers typically participate in affiliate programs of merchants who sell products that are aligned with the content of the blog.  Blogs about electronic products would do very well displaying products from electronics merchants and are likely to do poorly promoting financial products.  Of all the merchants in their space, certainly, bloggers would like to promote the merchant that pays them the most.  However, there is so much that typically goes into the commission (such as click-through-rate and conversion) that bloggers are more likely to stay with the merchant that they trust to pay them consistently and that is a recognized brand than the one that pays them a bit more.  Thus, if a merchant were to offer additional fees to the blogging affiliate segment, it is not likely to result in additional sales.

3.  Merchants need to provide tracking id's to their affiliates.

Because certain affiliates are sophisticated enough to measure various campaigns separately (and these affiliates are likely to be the most successful), each merchant needs to offer tracking id's to the affiliates.  Each tracking id would then need to have its own section in the report that the merchant provides to the affiliate.  Each tracking id has to report impressions (if applicable), clicks, conversions, and resulting fees.  This report will allow affiliates to understand which of their campaigns is working and where to allocate their expenses.

4.  Merchants need to be able to offer ladder commission structures for affiliates based on volume of leads.

Not all affiliates are the same.  It is likely that every affiliate program will follow the 95-5 rule:  5% of affiliates will generate 95% of the sales. The most successful merchants will figure out a way to reward those affiliates that generate the most sales.  At the same time, each of the smaller affiliates should have a realistic goal to shoot for.  This goal, if met, should result is higher fees, going back retroactively.  This is a great incentive for affiliates and bonds them closer with the merchant.  eBay Affiliate Program and Amazon Associates Affiliate Program have done a good job at their compensation tiers.

5.  Merchants need to be able to compensate different affiliates with different commission structures.

Some affiliates are just better at negotiating.  Some affiliates are able to drive so much traffic and sales to a merchant that this business needs to be fought for and won by the merchant.  As a result, merchants' affiliate programs must have a way for the merchant to find and sufficiently compensate those affiliates that can really contribute to sales.  At the same time, those affiliates that are not as good at negotiating, even if they do drive as large or even larger sale volumes, should not receive as an attractive compensation structure.  This commission "gap" will allow the merchant to fund those hard-to-please affiliates and keep them happy bringing signficant sales to the merchant.

6.  Affiliates should have direct links to the merchant.

Once a merchant finds a number of different affiliates, the merchant should do everything to signficantly leverage those affiliate links.  One way to leverage these links is to obtain the best possible Google PageRank.  An excellent PageRank has potential to generate a tremendous amount of search traffic, all of which is free.  If your affiliate program creates links that redirect through their site, you will not get the same PageRank benefit; and it could result is tremendous loss of sales.  The right way to track affiliate clicks is via the tag on the URL going directly to the merchant instead of a redirect.  Better yet, affiliate clicks should be tracked via the Referrer field for those affiliates that have a consistent domain from which they generate traffic.

7.  All affiliate programs should generate 2nd-tier commissions.

2nd-tier commissions reward affiliates for finding other affiliates.  There are many affiliates who are simply not in the community of potential consumers but instead, are in the community of other affiliates.  Typically, those sites that offer 2nd-tier programs will pay 10% of all 1st-tier affiliate revenues to those 2nd-tier affiliates who have found the 1st-tier affiliates.  Thuis will allow more excitement, more discussion, more promotion of your affiliate program.  Everything your program can do to allow you to get above the Internet "noise level" is important.  2nd-tier affiliate programs will get your program beyond the 1st-only-tier programs.

Gene Kavner, Former World-Wide Director, Amazon Associates Affiliate Program, 2005-2006.

What does Amazon Consider as the Order?

Gene, In the past there have been questions concerning what Amazon considers an order. Would you please explain this procedure? Does payment need to be made first? I ask because some orders never ship and others are refunded.    myhart

Thanks for your question, myhart.

Amazon considers an order when someone makes a purchase of any one item from the Amazon catalog.  If the same person purchases two products at the same time, this is considered as two different orders.  It is therefore possible for someone to purchase 10 different products on the same purchase and for you to be credited for 10 orders towards your next payment tier (see my post on the Amazon Associates Payment Tiers).

If you referred a customer who purchases an item, you will receive credit for the item as long as it is sold or placed in the cart within the 24-hour period of the original click (for more details see my post on how Amazon tracks affiliate orders). If the customer places an order and then returns immediately to make another purchase directly to Amazon, you will not receive credit for the second purchase, unless the customer returns through one of your links.

On your Amazon Associates Central report, you will see a separate Orders Summary and Earnings Summary. The reason for this separation is because while you see the order placed right away (usually within 24 hours of the order), you do not receive any earnings on the order until the order actually ships.  This can be the next day or it could be a week later, depending on the shipping preference made by the customer at check-out.  Because Amazon makes it easy for the customer to cancel the order before it ships out, Amazon waits to make sure the order ships before you are credited with the sale.

If the customer cancels an order or returns an order after he/she receives it, the Amazon system is smart enough to track it and reduce your fees by the amount you originally earned on the product purchased and then returned.

Hope that answered your question!

Gene Kavner

Does Amazon store cookies on people who bought through your affiliate program?

I've been reading the varoius forums on Amazon Associates and found the following interesting question.    

Does Amazon store cookies on people who bought through your affiliate program? Here is the senario: User comes in the 1st time through your link, and doesn't buy. One week later, user types in the amazon main website url, and buys from there. My question is: Do you get credits for that?

This question is the most fundamental to any affiliate program.  Ultimately any affiliate program is not going to survive if it is not able to establish a trusting relationship between a merchant running the affiliate program and the publisher driving traffic to the merchant. The affiliate needs to feel 100% comfortable that they will get compensated based on the terms of the agreement.      

Having taken another look, I see that the Amazon Associates Operating Agreement dated August 17 2006 does not fully address this question.  Thus, let me address this critical question here.

When you build any link to Amazon.com from Associates Central, Amazon tags the link with your Amazon Associates ID.  When you click on the link you may end up on a page with a very long URL.  Typically, you will see one of the parameters on the URL called "tag".  This is the tag that specifies your Associates ID:

If you click on any link on this page, you will redirect to a different Amazon.com page but your tag will be replaced with the Session ID that looks like 102-8430161-8248922:

It does not mean that your tag is no longer associated with this transaction.  Amazon still "remembers" your tag and it is now associated with the entire session that this customer has established on Amazon.com.  Because your Associates ID gets attached with the Session ID and the Session ID gets passed from page to page in the URL, the customer does not even need to have his cookies enabled for your Associates ID to be linked with this session -- until the customer closes his browser.  If the customer comes back to Amazon within 24 hours of the initial click, even if he types "http://www.amazon.com" in his browser, Amazon will attempt to re-esatblish the original session from the customer's cookie.  If cookies are enabled, the session tagged to your Associate ID will get re-established.  If the cookies are not enabled, a new session not tagged with your Associates ID will be established.  I find that about 85% of the users run their browsers with cookies enabled.

From the moment a customer clicks on a link on your site and ends up on the Amazon site, his session will last for 24 hours.  Any purchases during this period will be credited to you as an affiliate as long as:

1.  A purchase is made in the same browser as the original click within the 24 hours of the first click, OR 2.  Customer clicks to Amazon, exists the browser and comes back to Amazon directly within 24 hours while his cookies are enabled.

Lastly, there is one more way you can get credited with the purchase even if the purchase is not made within the first 24 hours of the click.  If the customer adds an item to his cart within the first 24 hour period, those items may be purchased within the next 90 days and you will still receive affiliate credit for those items. 

So, the answer to your original question is:  If the user doesn't buy on the first visit and then comes back one week later to buy, you will not get credited if the user hadn't added the purchased item to the shopping cart within 24 hours of the original visit.  If the user had placed the item into his shopping cart, then you will receive the affiliate credit.

Gene Kavner

P.S. Go Tigers!

Details About Amazon Text Links

In my prevous posts about the Amazon Associates link types, I have provided a general overview of the types of links Amazon offers affiliates and about the Amazon Associates Product Links. In this post I will address the Amazon Associates Text Links. You may reach the Text Link section by logging into Amazon Associates Central, clicking on the "Build Links" menu item and then clicking on the icon next inside the "Text Links" section:




Text Links are Page Content Links (see Link Type Overview) that give you an opportunity to link to a specific page on the Amazon site. As you can see from the options provided to you, you can:

1. Link to Favorite Destinations.
2. Link to Search Results.
3. Link to Any Page at Amazon.com.


Link to Favorite Destinations

In this section you can build a link that will lead your visitors to any of the major product lines that Amazon distributes and a subcategory within those categories. The following is an exhaustive list of categories / subcategory pages that you can link to:

Apparel & Accessories Accessories General Bestsellers Kids & Baby Men Shoes Women	Automotive Car Care Exterior Accessories General Bestsellers Interior Accessories Oils & Fluids Paint, Body & Trim Performance Parts & Accessories Replacement Parts Tires & Wheels Tools & Equipment	Baby Apparel Bathing & Skin Care Bedding Car Seats Diapering Feeding For Moms Furniture Gear General Bestsellers Gifts Health & Baby Care Nursery Décor Potty Training Safety Strollers	Beauty Bath & Shower Fragrance General Bestsellers Gift Sets Hair Care Makeup Men's Grooming Shaving & Hair Removal Skin Care Tools & Accessories
Books Arts & Photography Biographies & Memoirs Business & Investing Children's Books Comics & Graphic Novels Computers & Internet Cooking, Food & Wine Entertainment Gay & Lesbian General Bestsellers Health, Mind & Body History Home & Garden Law Literature & Fiction Medicine Mystery & Thrillers Nonfiction Outdoors & Nature Parenting & Families Professional & Technical Reference Religion & Spirituality Romance Science Science Fiction & Fantasy Sports Teens Travel	Camera & Photo Accessories Camcorders Digital Cameras Film Cameras General Bestsellers Optics Printers & Scanners	Cell Phones & Service All Bluetooth Camera E-mail Flip General Bestsellers Kid's MP3 PDA Prepaid Unlocked Video Wi-Fi	Classical Music Ballads Canons Concertos Etudes Fantasies Fugues General Bestsellers Inventions Lullabies & Berceuse Oratorio Preludes Requiems, Elegies & Tombeau Rondos Serenades & Divertimentos Short Forms Sonatas Suites Symphonies Theatrical, Incidental & Program Music Toccatas Variations
Computers Computer Add-Ons Desktops General Bestsellers Handhelds & PDAs Notebooks	Computer & Video Games Game Boy Advance GameCube General Bestsellers Mac Games More Systems Nintendo DS Nintendo Wii PC Games PlayStation 2 PlayStation 3 Sony PSP Xbox Xbox 360	DVD Action & Adventure African American Cinema Animation Anime & Manga Art House & International Classics Comedy Cult Movies Documentary Drama Educational Fitness & Yoga Gay & Lesbian General Bestsellers Horror Kids & Family Military & War Music Video & Concerts Musicals & Performing Arts Mystery & Suspense Science Fiction & Fantasy Special Interests Sports Television Westerns	Electronics Accessories & Supplies Audio & Video Camera & Photo Car Electronics Computers & Add-Ons GPS & Navigation General Bestsellers Home Automation & Security Office Electronics
Gourmet Food Appetizers & Hors d'oeuvres Baking Supplies Beverages Bread Candy Chocolate Coffee & Tea Cookies Dairy Foods & Eggs Desserts Fruits & Vegetables General Bestsellers Gourmet Cheese Jams, Jellies & Preserves Meat, Game & Pâtés Oils, Vinegars & Salad Dressings Pasta, Beans, Grains & Rice Prepared Meals Restaurant Gift Certificates Salsas & Condiments Seafood & Caviar Seasonings, Herbs & Spices Snack Food Soups & Stocks	Grocery Baking Supplies Beverages Boxed Meals & Side Dishes Breads & Pastries Breakfast Foods Canned & Packaged Goods Condiments, Sauces & Spreads General Bestsellers Health & Family Herbs, Spices & Seasonings Household Supplies Pasta & Grains Pet Supplies Snacks, Cookies & Candy	Home & Garden Backyard Birding Bar Tools & Glasses Bed & Bath Coffee, Tea & Espresso Cook's Tools & Gadgets Cookware & Baking Cutlery Fresh Flowers & Indoor Plants Furniture & Décor Gardening Tools General Bestsellers Grills, Smokers & Outdoor Cooking Heating & Lighting Housewares Kitchen & Table Linens Kitchen Plumbing Fixtures & Sinks Large Appliances Leisure & Fitness Outdoor Décor Patio Furniture Pest Control Pet Supplies Plants, Seeds & Flowers Small Appliances Tableware Weather Instruments Wine Accessories	Health & Personal Care Baby & Child Care Food & Snacks General Bestsellers Health & Personal Care Outlet Store Health Care House Supplies Nutrition & Fitness Personal Care Sex & Sensuality
Jewelry & Watches Accessories Body Jewelry Bracelets Brooches & Pins Charms Children's Jewelry Earrings Engagement General Bestsellers Jewelry Sets Men's Jewelry Necklaces & Pendants Religious Jewelry Rings Watches Wedding & Anniversary	Kitchen & Housewares Bar Tools & Glasses Coffee, Tea & Espresso Cook's Tools & Gadgets Cookware & Baking Cutlery General Bestsellers Housewares Kitchen & Table Linens Kitchen Furniture Kitchen Plumbing Fixtures & Sinks Large Appliances Small Appliances Storage & Organization Tableware Wine Accessories	Magazine Subscriptions Arts & Crafts Automotive Bridal Business & Finance Children's Computer & Internet Electronics & Audio Entertainment Family & Parenting Fashion & Style Food & Gourmet Games & Hobbies Gay & Lesbian General Bestsellers Health & Fitness History Home & Garden International Lifestyle & Cultures Literary Men's Interest Music News & Politics Pets Religion & Spirituality Science & Nature Sports & Leisure Teens Travel & Regional Women's Interest	Music Alternative Rock Blues Broadway & Vocalists Children's Music Christian & Gospel Classic Rock Classical Country Dance & DJ Folk General Bestsellers Hard Rock & Metal International Jazz Latin Music Miscellaneous New Age Opera & Vocal Pop R&B Rap & Hip-Hop Rock Soundtracks
Musical Instruments General Bestsellers Instrument Accessories Instruments Sound & Recording Equipment	Software Business & Office Children's Software Education & Reference General Bestsellers Graphics Home & Hobbies Language & Travel Linux Macintosh Networking Operating Systems Outlet Personal Finance Programming Software Downloads Software for Handhelds Utilities Video & Music Web Development	Sports & Outdoors Accessories Airsoft Apparel Archery Badminton Ballet & Dance Baseball Basketball Boating Bowling Boxing Camping & Hiking Cheerleading Climbing Crew Cricket Curling Cycling & Wheel Sports Disc Sports Diving Dog Sports Equestrian Sports Exercise & Fitness Fan Shop Fencing Field Hockey Fishing Football Game Room General Bestsellers Golf Gymnastics Hockey Hunting Jai Alai Kayaking Lacrosse Lawn Games Martial Arts Motor Sports Paddle Court Sports Paintball Pilates Polo RV Equipment Racquetball Rodeo Rugby Running Scooters Shoes Skateboarding Skating Skydiving Sledding Snow Skiing Snowboarding Snowmobiling Snowshoeing Soccer Softball Sports Equipment Sports Medicine Squash Surfing Swimming Tennis & Racquet Sports Track & Field Triathlon Volleyball Water Polo Water Sports Windsurfing Wrestling Yoga	Tools & Hardware Agricultural Equipment Cleaning Supplies & Equipment Construction Machinery General Bestsellers Hand Tools Home Improvement Hot Deals Outlet Hydraulics Job Site Lawn & Garden Lighting Power Tools
Toys & Games Action Figures Activities & Amusements Arts & Crafts Bikes, Skates & Ride-Ons Building Sets, Blocks & Models Dolls Electronics for Kids Furniture for Kids Games General Bestsellers Hobbies Learning & Education Music Party Supplies Play Vehicles Preschool Pretend Play & Dress-up Puzzles Sports & Outdoor Play Stuffed Animals & Toys Toy Figures & Playsets Video Games	VHS Action & Adventure African American Cinema Animation Anime & Manga Art House & International Boxed Sets Classics Comedy Cult Movies Documentary Drama Educational Fitness Gay & Lesbian General Bestsellers Horror Kids & Family Military & War Music Video & Concerts Musicals & Performing Arts Mystery & Suspense Science Fiction & Fantasy Spanish Language Special Interests Sports Television Westerns Widescreen

The above categories put the size of the Amazon catalog in perspective -- it's enormous. This makes Amazon Associates one of the premier affiliate programs on the Internet. No matter what your site is about, chances are you will find something in the Amazon catalog to link to.

If you do not wish to link to a particular subcategory, each category has a special "General Bestsellers" section that you can link to.

Unfortunately, Amazon does not provide as part of its associates central web site an ability to use image links into each particular category. However, you may find excellent images on each of the subcategory pages of Amazon.com, so you may consider putting one of those images on your site. Of course, you should download the image to your server to ensure that delays on the Amazon site do not impact your performance and that the image will continue to be served if Amazon chooses to remove it at some point in the future.

Link to Search Results

The next option that Amazon provides is an ability for you to link to the the search result page of the Amazon site. When you visit Amazon.com you typically see a search box at the top of the page giving you a way to search for a particular product within a product line. Linking to search results gives you a way to link to a result page for the key words of your choice. Take a look at the following few examples:

• Books on Affiliate Marketing
• Clothing for University of Michigan Fans
• Lots of Wi-Fi products
• Items to Make Your Picnic Perfect

You can come up with almost an infinite list of product searches. I suggest that you always try to specify a product line when you enter your search keywords as Amazon search engine is not very accurate and brings up unrelated products frequently. After creating a link, make sure it leads to the page of products that you expect to see for your keywords.

Link to Any Page at Amazon.com

Lastly, the Text Links section gives you an ability to link to ANY page on Amazon.com. You can use this option as the text link to any product detail page, any product-line page, any sub-category page, or a search results page. In effect, this text link can do what any other Product or Text link can do, but without the images.

The most common use of this option is to link to Amazon.com home page. The interesting peculiarity of this link is that you cannot link to http://Amazon.com (with the capital A). You have to have the lower-case 'a' as in http://amazon.com.

In my next post I will take a look at the Amazon aStore.

Gene Kavner

Details About Amazon Product Links

In my previous post I have given you a complete overview of all link types that Amazon Associates affiliate program provides that you can use to link to Amazon.  As I have discussed, these links are broken up into two groups as follows:

Page Content links

• Product Links
• Text Links
• aStore

Advertising Slot links

• Recommended Product Links
• Omakase Links
• Easy Links
• Search Boxes

In this post I will give you some more details about the Page Content links (specifically, Product Links) and in my upcoming post I will give you more details about the remaining Page Content Links and the Advertising Slot links.

Page Content links are the most successful link types in the Amazon Associates program, offering affiliates ways to link directly to the desired products in the Amazon catalog.  Because of this ability to pick products, you are able to specifically match the content of your site to some number of products in the Amazon catalog. 

As an example of this, if your site is about new cell phone gadgets, you may want to link to some products in the Amazon catalog like the Treo 700 or the Blackberry 8700g:

If your site is about affiliate marketing (such as this one), you may want to offer your viewers a web store with books about affiliate marketing. 

The nice benefit here is that while you make suggestions about the products, they are not viewed as simple advertising by your readers.  Instead, these suggestions are viewed as your editorial perspective on what your readers should be reading or using (or buying).  This type of a suggestion carries with it a significantly higher call to action than a simple ad for a product. As a result, you will see a significantly higher level of conversion for your products.  Best yet, because these links live in the main content portion of your page, you can still have your existing advertising links, bringing you additional income.

One note of caution when you use content links.  Because your readers view such links are your editorial opinion, be sure that you have explored these suggestions yourself.  Nothing will ruin your credibility faster than suggesting products that people try and find worthless.  Amazon makes this process very easy with product reviews, so you can be sure to not suggest any products that a large number of existing customers find unacceptable.

Let's take a look at each link type individually.

Product Links

Product link allows you to like to a single product in the Amazon catalog.  You have two ways of creating the HTML code you will need to put on your site:

1.	By typing in the Amazon Standard Identification Number (ASIN).
	You can find this number on any Amazon product detail page under "Product Details" section, ASIN line.  If you see a product you want to purchase, copy this number (or write it down).  Once you are in the "Build Links" section of Amazon Associates Central, simply copy this number in the "keyword or ASIN/ISBN" field.
2.	If you are looking to link to a book and you know the book's ISBN number, you may type it in here as well.
3.	Select a keyword to search Amazon's catalog.
	Tip: You should select a product line before you search for a keyword.  Amazon's product search is not very smart (reminds me of pre-Google web search engines) and you need to give it a lot of help before it will find you the product you are looking for.  Try typing in "Treo" before you select the product line and you will get quite a large number of carrying cases before you get the actual Treo.

Once you've selected the product, you have an option to generate a link that has:

	or		or	Affiliate Selling: Building Revenue on the Web
Text and Image		Image Only		Text Only

Tip: If you choose to use Image Only or Text Only links, I strongly suggest you include the code at the bottom of the page that enables Product Previews that was launched by Amazon Associates recently.  At this time, Amazon does not offer Product Previews for the Text and Image Link type and I hope they add Product Previews for this link type soon.  For more information on Product Previews, refer to my previous post titled Amazon.com Associates Team Launches Product Previews.

In my next post, I will review Text Links and the Amazon aStore; I will then review Advertising Slot Links.

Gene Kavner

Amazon Releases an Early Update to aStore

Early this morning, October 12, 2006, Amazon announced a number of improvements to aStore, a product that allows a quick and easy way for all of you who are Amazon affiliates to build your own store featuring just the products that match the content of your site. These changes provide additional flexibility to you in the way you build your aStore.



On September 27, 2006, the Amazon Associates team sent out an email to all of us who are beta testers of the Amazon aStore product. In this email Amazon announced a number of upcoming changes to the Amazon aStore, scheduled for a late November 2006 release, namely:



With the changes announced today, Amazon released a couple of upcoming improvements ahead of their own schedule. The new features that Amazon has released this morning are:

• For sites that link to an aStore (rather than embed it as part of site), Amazon now allows you to have a back-link to your main affiliate site from the aStore. This is a significant improvement for two reasons: 1) Your visitors clicking off to your store now have a convenient way to get back to your site, and 2) It helps your site's page rank by having a link from aStore which is stored on the aStore.Amazon.com domain.
  
  
  
  Bug? It took me quite a while to figure out why this feature wasn't working when I turned it on this morning. I discovered that for it to work, you must have at least one category page enabled and "Hide category navigation" turned off. I do not see why needing to have category browsing is a requirement for this to work and am hoping that Amazon fixes this in the next release.
  
  
• You may now remove the header of your site. This is a great ability if you are embedding your aStore using an <IFRAME> and already have a header on your pages. If you wish to have the header, it is nice that Amazon is giving you the ability to upload your own graphic or specify size of text should you want to have text-only header.
  
  
  
  
• You may now remove category navigation from your aStore. Great feature but has some weaknesses that I hope Amazon improves upon:
  
  1. Link back to your site only works if you have at least one category enabled (see above).
  2. If you add categories but forget that "Hide Category Navigation" checkbox at the bottom is checked, your categories will not show up. Would be nice for the checkbox to automatically turn off when you add categories/sub-categories.
  3. When you change page title to each of the categories (great feature!) you need to remember to hit "Save" each time before you move on to the next category or whatever you typed in for your category title/description will be lost. I believe "Save" should be automatic as it is with other portions of the aStore.
  4. You can only add a sub-category page once you have a category page. If you wish to only display Electronics GPS devices, you need to display all of Electronics and then a separate page for GPS devices. I would have loved to be able to show GPS devices without needing to show the entire Electronics category.
  5. Sub-categories are not visible until your user clicks on the category link. Thus, the user may not even know that you have a GPS sub-category unless he clicks on the Electronics category first.
  
  
• The custom product description length has been extended, allowing you to say more about the products you recommend to your customers.
  
  
• Product detail pages now display a "crossed-out" list price followed by the Amazon.com price.
  
  
• The page title in the browser now displays the name of the aStore combined with the category name or product name, making aStore more search-engine friendly.

Other than above, we are still waiting for an update to aStore that will enable:

• Multiple aStores per Associates account
• Specify products to feature on Category and Sub-Category pages
• Feature up to 54 products on the front page of your store rather than the current limit of nine

I think it is great that the Amazon team is taking steps to release excellent functionality in steps rather than us having to wait until all of them are done. aStore is still in beta but Amazon is making excellent steps towards enabling it to become the easiest means to build your own personal store on your web site. I will be adding my aStore to AffiliateBrand.com in the next day or two.

Gene Kavner

Amazon Associates Link Types - a Complete Overview

A few days ago I made a post about the brand new Amazon Associates Product Preview feature for their Product Links.  This post is going to give you a comprehensive overview of all of the Amazon Associates link types that you may use on your site to link to Amazon.  I will also give you some practical advise on how to taylor some of these links to better suit your purposes.

Before you can take advantage of the Amazon Associate links, you must be a part of the Amazon Associates program.  If you are not a member already, click here to join -- it takes seconds and will enable you to add Amazon content to your site and monetize your traffic.  Don't worry if you already have other means to make money; Amazon Associates program gives you an additional, incremental way to make even more on your site.

Typical Content Site Layout

If you are a typical content site or a blog, you will have the following layout:

While most monetization programs give you a chance to fill up your advertising slots, Amazon provides you a way to link your site to Amazon from both, the advertising slots and the main page content of your site.

To give you a comparison to the offline world of television, the advertising links are similar to watching commercials on TV (e.g. a Volvo commercial) while the content links are similar to products that are part of the main TV program (e.g. a character of a show driving a Volvo).  Certainly, there is room for both ways to monetize your site and if you are focused solely on the advertizing slots, you are missing a fantastic way to make additional revenue.

Amazon Advertising Link Types

Amazon has several link types that are designed to be placed in your advertising slots on the page.  These link types compete for placement with other advertising programs, such as Google AdSense, AdBrite, TextAds, Kanoodle, etc.  However, unlike other advertising programs which provide ads for a large number of potential advertisers, for which you have little control of, Amazon advertising links have only a single advertiser: Amazon.com.

Having Amazon as the sole advertiser has its advantages and disadvantages.  I'll start with the disadvantages first (to end on a more positive note!).

• Disadvantage 1: You only have a single advertiser competing for placement, so there is lack of built-in advertising price inflation.  While various advertisers of other programs bid prices up against each other to win the coveted placement (causing you to make more money), Amazon typically keeps their margins and percentage of payouts steady.
• Disadvantage 2: Because Amazon typically has poor margins (as do other retailers), percentage of their payouts is not as generous as some other programs that solicit advertisers having significantly higher margins, and as a result, being able to afford higher affiliate commission rates.
• Disadvantage 3: Being the only advertiser allows Amazon to pay you on a Cost-Per-Action (CPA) basis.  This means they only pay you when a user coming from your site completes (and does not cancel) a purchase from Amazon.  As a result, you absorb the risk that your site's viewer clicks on an Amazon Ad, goes to Amazon and does not complete a purchase (or completes it more than 24 hours after the click), for which you make nothing.  Other popular advertising programs pay you on a Cost-Per-Click (CPC) basis, which means you get paid (albeit a small amount but it all adds up) on each click your site generates for the advertiser.
• Advantage 1:  With Amazon as the single advertiser, your visitors see a trusted brand on your site.  While most other programs accept advertisers that can be quite shady, without an easy way to tell if you can trust them with a credit card, you can be assured that Amazon will not misuse your customers' privacy or renege on its promise to deliver a product.
• Advantage 2: Because Amazon is a trusted brand, you are likely to see better conversions (higher % of people making a purchase) than with other CPA affiliate programs.  I am sure that you've clicked on many ads but not complete a purchase because the site just did not seem trustworthy.  One advantage of Amazon is that if you trust anybody online, you'll trust Amazon.
• Advantage 3: Amazon has millions of products across 35 different categories in its catalog.  No other advertiser can claim this depth of product offers.  Most advertisers can only boast a few different options for their visitors.  With Amazon, if your viewer clicks on an ad for an iPod and later decides to purchase a windshield wiper instead, you still get the credit and the corresponding commission.
• Advantage 4: Because Amazon pays on a CPA basis rather than on CPC basis, the program removes any incentive for people to simply click on ads.  This significantly reduces general fraud (and eliminates click fraud completely).  With Amazon, you don't have to worry about clicking on your own ads or getting reduced payouts due to click fraud.

The following are Amazon link types that are designed specifically for the advertising slots:

• Recommended Product Links
• Omakase Links
• Easy Links
• Search Boxes

Page Content Links

Other than Amazon, there are few programs that provide you with the wealth of opportunities         to monetize the main content of your web site or blog entry.  Amazon's page content links allow you to offer your readers a way to purchase a product that you specifically discuss in the main portion of your site.  Because these offers are so directly related to what you are discussing on your site, they are typically not associated with "advertising".  Instead, this is what typical users would consider to be part of the main site content. 

What differentiates these links from other links is that they allow you to pick the specific product or page from the Amazon catalog that you would like to feature and discuss on your site.  For example, being an entrepreneur myself, I have read an excellent book on formation of Google.  The book gave me a glimpse into the passion and drive of two college friends and how they decided to take a chance on an idea of building a new paradigm for a search engine.  The link I provided is a perfect example of a content link (I strongly suggest that all current or aspiring entrepreneurs read this book).

As you can see, product links give you an ability to send a powerful message to your readers.  As a result, these links are able to give you click-through and conversion rates much higher than anything you can get via the advertising links.  In the end, if you match products with the content of your site well, you have a chance to make as much if not more from your content links as you would with your advertising links.

The following are Amazon link types that are designed for the main content of your site:

• Product Links
• Text Links
• aStore

Continue to the next post about Product Links.

Gene Kavner

Can Amazon Associates Pre-Sell Amazon Products on eBay?

I recently received the following question from John Morrison:

I have recently conducted some investigative reporting on Simplx. I discovered one of their tactics is to presell Amazon.com items on eBay and then purchase the item using affiliate links and having Amazon ship it directly to the customer. I asked Amazon if this was an acceptable practice and was told it could get me banned. However when I reported the behavior and gave specific examples I got the impression it wasn't a matter of concern. As a result I have stopped reporting the infractions as I come across them. Did I misinterpret or does Amazon not really care?

John, thanks for the question.  I love discovering ingenious ways to take advantage of the Amazon Associates program. The model you described is indeed clever.

To understand whether it represents legitimate use of the Amazon Associates program, it is good to understand the big-picture rationale of the program itself. The purpose of the Amazon Associates program is to allow millions of web sites to offer their readers an opportunity to purchase a particular product from Amazon as opposed to purchase this product from a competitor or as the case may be, not make any purchase at all. It is also the purpose of the program to introduce new customers to Amazon, to the breadth of its catalog and to its exemplary customer service.  In the end, Amazon certainly hopes that this program not only brings new consumers to Amazon but that they also establish a long-term direct relationship with the company.

In my opinion, the model you described certainly violates both the spirit of the program and the Amazon Associates Operating Agreement. By making Amazon catalog available on eBay, these associates allow eBay to become the destination site for consumers in their effort to purchase certain products available at Amazon.  These customers do not get introduced to Amazon, preventing Amazon from establishing a direct relationship with them. Lastly, if those customers return products to Amazon, they do not get their credit cards refunded since Amazon would be refunding the credit card of the associate and not the end consumer. This may create serious implications for Amazon if the consumer does not get a corresponding, timely refund on their own credit card (or via PayPal).

With regard to the Amazon Associates Operating Agreement, these associates violate the following paragraph:

   

You may not purchase products during sessions initiated through the links on your site for your own use, for resale or commercial use of any kind. This includes orders for customers or on behalf of customers or orders for products to be used by you or your friends, relatives, or associates in any manner. Such purchases may result (in our sole discretion) in the withholding of referral fees and/or the termination of this Agreement. Products that are eligible to earn referral fees under the rules set forth above are referred to as "Qualifying Products."

My interpretation of the agreement is based on my experience as the Director of the Amazon Associates Program.  Since I am no longer in this position, this interpretation does not necessarily represent the opinion of Amazon.com.  Since it is completely up to Amazon.com as to how they enforce any violation of this agreement, I will leave it in their able hands.  I suggest you document any violations of the Amazon Associates Operating Agreement in the response section to this post.  I know that the Amazon Associates team reads my blog and will take the necessary action if they believe they need to terminate any Associate relationship due to any violation.

Thanks again for your question.

Gene Kavner