Make Money On Wizzley - Making Money With Amazon

by Lissie

I love Amazon. But you need to understand how the Amazon affiliate scheme to make the most from it. Check out how I use Amazon on Wizzley

Amazon is one of the largest retailers in the US. There are also local Amazons in Canada, France, UK, Germany, Spain and Italy. You can be an affiliate of each but they are entirely separate programs: separate acceptances, separate payout levels etc. However the best commissions, and the only program that most people focus on is Amazon.com's. Beginners will look at Amazon though - and think 4% commission - that's rubbish. However they are missing the important thing about Amazon and why its one of my favourite programs. Read on to find out how the Amazon affiliate program works in general, and on Wizzley.com specifically.

How Does Amazon Affiliate Program Work?

If a customer uses your Amazon link, Amazon will pay you if they buy within 24 hours. Amazon will pay you commission for ANY item that your customer purchases within a 24 hour period, (or 7 days if they put an item in their checkout basket without buying). Most affiliates note that up to 50% of their sales are for products they don't even promote. I've sold items that it didn't even know what they were, until I looked them up! This is why Amazon affiliates typically make a lot more money at the end of the year (Thanksgiving to Christmas) than any other time. Because Amazon sells items (in the US) in every product range under the sun - the amount of money that someone can spend on Amazon in one shopping session is simply stunning.

Amazon is also the world leader in "cross-selling" - the box at the bottom of the page that says -"customers who looked at this page also bought ..." Trust me, all those $0.20c commissions do add up.

Quick Facts About Amazon Affiliate Program

Ease Of Becoming An Affiliate - Americans Easy (unless you are a resident of specific US States) 
Ease Of Becoming An Affiliate - Non-Americans Easy
Percentage of sales:

up to 6 items (in the month) - 4% 

7-30 - 6% 

31 - 110 - 6.5% 

111 - 320 7.0% etc - full list here 

NB - flat $25 for computers/laptops/netbooks

Payout levels and methods:

$10 Amazon gift card, $10 direct deposit (US only), $100 check. If you don't make payout one month, your balance rolls-over until you do. 

Payments are made near the end of the month for the previous month's earnings ie 2 months in arrears. 

Fees 

$15 for a check - waived if you are resident outside of the US and not eligible for direct deposit

Sales Tracking

Medicore. You can set up separate tracking ID's as required (recommended), but you can't track down to the link, which is often useful information. 

Tips To Maximise Your Amazon Commissions

Focus on some cheap and easy to sell items to put your sales level up into the higher percentages. A sale is a sale whether is a thousand dollar watch or a $1 USB cable. If Amazon stocks a product I attempt to use them to sell it rather than competitors companies - that's why I use Amazon for links to posters at Wizzley, rather than AllPosters.

Amazon has huge customer trust - I have plenty of friends who would "never use the credit card online - because it's dangerous", but will regularly order from Amazon (using a credit card!). Amazon has stunningly good after sales service and their dispatch and tracking are much better to New Zealand than couriers within the country can manage!

Recommended Book

The author was the person who got me excited about Amazon
Make Money With Amazon Associates

Avoid the $15 check fee by opting for direct deposit (if you live somewhere that has this option). 

How to Apply To Become An Amazon Affiliate?

Use this link to apply. You will need to provide tax information, or statement of non-American residency, to get paid.

There is no fee to apply, no inactivity fee, and no limit to how long you can keep rolling over cents to make payout - it took me 18 months to get to $100! In short there is no reason why you shouldn't be an affiliate of Amazon.

Unless you are unfortunate enough to be resident of Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, North Carolina, Rhode Island or Connecticut who are prohibited, because of Sales Tax leglisalation in those states.

So long as you don't live in the wrong state though its rare to hear of anyone being denied access to this program, or them being dropped from it.

If you do live in the wrong state - there are a number of ways to have an out-of-state "residence" - or use Viglink to access Amazon.

Non-Americans seem to have little problem becoming affiliates.

Note that if you enrol in other Amazon's programs e.g. amazon.co.uk you will need to make the minimum payment threshold for that program separately from the amazon.com program. You will also be paid in the local currency (stirling or euros) for other Amazon affiliate programs.

How To Use Amazon on Wizzley

There are two options for those wanting to use Amazon on Wizzley: Amazon modules and text links. There is an excellent page on using Amazon modules by Lou already - so I'm not going to repeat that here. 

Using direct links (i.e. html links in text) - will see affiliates automatically redirected via Viglinks. This does mean that your sales won't count to your personal sales counts, but it does give another option. Many successful affiliates report that text links convert much better than pictures and images for Amazon.

 

How To Use Wizzley's Amazon Module

How Well Does Wizzley Work With Amazon

In my experience: Amazon works really well with Wizzley. I particularly like the "gallery" module that I am using on this page - its click through rate can be up to 10% if you have the right traffic coming to your page, and Wizzley's statistics do give you that detailed information - which is better than Amazon's own! 

Making Money On Wizzley - The Series

This article is part of a series of pages on making money with Wizzley.com - which focuses on picking the right monetisation method to make money from the type of visitors you have to your website. Other articles in this series are: 

  1. Make Money On Wizzley: Find The Right Readers
  2. Make Money On Wizzley: Introduction to Monetization 
  3. Make Money On Wizzley: Making Money With Amazon - you're reading it! 
  4. Make Money On Wizzley: Using Direct Affiliate Links 
  5. Make Money On Wizzley: Making Money With eBay 
  6. Make Money On Wizzley: Making Money With Clickbank 
  7. Make Money On Wizzley: Making Money With ShareASale
  8. Make Money On Wizzley: Making Money with Commission Junction (CJ) 
Updated: 03/13/2012, Lissie
 
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Comments

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Lissie on 12/26/2012

I think people look at the pictures and forget to click!

Mira on 11/16/2012

So text links work really well, huh? I haven't set up VigLink. Maybe I should, although I do like the pictures myself :)

tribute_to_erasmus on 05/01/2012

This article was ridiculously informative! The most concise and informative I've come across on the subject so far. As a newbie, I was hoping you could clarify one little point for me. I wasn't quite sure what you implied when you said: "Using direct links (i.e. html links in text) - will see affiliates automatically redirected via Viglinks. This does mean that your sales won't count to your personal sales counts, but it does give another option. " Any insight you can offer would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Regi_B on 03/14/2012

Good stuff, Lissie.

Angel on 03/09/2012

I really like Amazon so far. I have done better than I ever thought I would with my sales pages using Amazon. Thanks for the great info on Amazon. I need to change my settings to have direct deposit and avoid the $15 fee for a check. Did not realize that.


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Disclosure: This page generates income for authors based on affiliate relationships with our partners, including Amazon, Google and others.
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