Amazon Cutting Commissions on April 21st

[RealDaddy]

kindly share some light on this. What are your thoughts about ShareASale

ShareAsale is a great affiliate network.
Go for It!

 

[MEng]

i always had a feeling amazon will someday stop their affiliate program. This is almost that day.

sad part is i invested high percentage of my income on a amazon affiliate site.

 

[Toz]

someone who was building a house and bought like 10k worth of tiles and I got $100 just from that order and other time someone bought like 5k worth of sanitizer gel and I got $50 just from that order.

Call me crazy, but I don't see this as being an example of good math or being fair. Amazon may not have ever seen that $10,000 if it weren't for however you managed to convince the customer to spend such a high amount of money on their platform. I know that Amazon won't get the full $10,000 (unless the purchased products were Amazon products), but with those numbers, and I'm assuming they were Prime products, the FBA fees would be in the thousands.

Giving you $100 for bringing them thousands in profit? I understand the whole "volume" argument, but if you need to make someone $100,000 before they thank you with $1,000, then perhaps it's time to seek partnership elsewhere.

 

[Sanjuwa]

Ok. Finally. Bye Amazon.

 

[Stable Genius]

Doing this move at this point in time is shameless. Amazon sales are going thru the roof, I tried to get Amazon Prime Now or Amazon Fresh delivery for last 3 weeks and its been completely sold out (just like Instacard + Peopod, etc). They hired 100,000 more delivery people just to meet the surging demand for their sales & deliveries and they're making 3-5X their normal volume.

Remember my words when I say this but Google will be next. They're already trying to hide their sponsored links on first page of results, they started Google Shopping and this is just the beginning. I believe that Google will eventually become an affiliate for other companies and start indexing their own affiliate links. For example lets say you have a page that ranks to promote some product for sale @ Best Buy and Google can instead index new page that Best Buy creates just for Google's affiliate link redirect.

 

[new_don]

I just checked on my own dasboard and here in Europe, they haven't changed our commission rates; at least for now.
I can confirm for the following: .uk, .fr, .de, .es, .nl, .it

Indian Amazon also

 

[JayDee1984]

Call me crazy, but I don't see this as being an example of good math or being fair. Amazon may not have ever seen that $10,000 if it weren't for however you managed to convince the customer to spend such a high amount of money on their platform. I know that Amazon won't get the full $10,000 (unless the purchased products were Amazon products), but with those numbers, and I'm assuming they were Prime products, the FBA fees would be in the thousands.

Giving you $100 for bringing them thousands in profit? I understand the whole "volume" argument, but if you need to make someone $100,000 before they thank you with $1,000, then perhaps it's time to seek partnership elsewhere.

Exactly! That’s why I’m staying away from this affiliate programs, it’s more like “slavery” programs where you make hundreds of thousands of dollars to companies in exchange for peanuts

 

[T2000]

Does anyone know if this is applicable to Amazon UK? As i cannot see any notice to change commission for UK.

 

[ranga]

I LOve Crisis.

It makes me feel alive. Motivate me to try new things and go out of my comfort zone. Inspire me to take risks. From now on I will work only in Crisis Mode.

That said, its a very bad time for few additional reasons:

1. Changing to a different affiliate is very difficult at this time as many smaller site are having delivery issues and its one area where Amazon is excellent.
2. Amazon is thinking due to reason 1 many associates will stay with them for some time till coronavirus issues subside and by then we will be back in our comfort zone and not many people will shift

This made me realise a few things, never depend on anybody in your business. Google is giving you traffic but it may not in future, Amazon is working now may not work in future. So best is to create a loyal audience which nobody can take away from you.

 

[theRevolt]

Doing this move at this point in time is shameless. Amazon sales are going thru the roof, I tried to get Amazon Prime Now or Amazon Fresh delivery for last 3 weeks and its been completely sold out (just like Instacard + Peopod, etc). They hired 100,000 more delivery people just to meet the surging demand for their sales & deliveries and they're making 3-5X their normal volume.

Remember my words when I say this but Google will be next. They're already trying to hide their sponsored links on first page of results, they started Google Shopping and this is just the beginning. I believe that Google will eventually become an affiliate for other companies and start indexing their own affiliate links. For example lets say you have a page that ranks to promote some product for sale @ Best Buy and Google can instead index new page that Best Buy creates just for Google's affiliate link redirect.

Remember, surging demand is without the need of affiliate traffic. 82% of US households are prime members, and you can assume everybody else still knows and still uses Amazon at one point.

The way it usually worked
- I want to buy a camera , you check on Amazon but not sure
- Read review blow --> Aff link --> Amazon

So you are not bringing anybody new to Amazon anyway. If you now change it to say walmart then they will still check on Amazon, if its same price/cheaper they will order from there (especially if they have prime)

I LOve Crisis.

It makes me feel alive. Motivate me to try new things and go out of my comfort zone. Inspire me to take risks. From now on I will work only in Crisis Mode.

That said, its a very bad time for few additional reasons:

1. Changing to a different affiliate is very difficult at this time as many smaller site are having delivery issues and its one area where Amazon is excellent.
2. Amazon is thinking due to reason 1 many associates will stay with them for some time till coronavirus issues subside and by then we will be back in our comfort zone and not many people will shift

This made me realise a few things, never depend on anybody in your business. Google is giving you traffic but it may not in future, Amazon is working now may not work in future. So best is to create a loyal audience which nobody can take away from you.

Yep, affiliates are replaceable we know that. Sure new brands need them, but once they become a trillion $ company they just do not need them. Even if they lose some actual traffic they would never have gotten (doubtful),in the picture it just does not matter.

Well said, if you create your own brand you may have a shot depending on what your product is. If its just whitelabel etc then watch users go to where it's cheaper, faster, better service.

 

[yherrliche]

Well, it appears that commissions will be cut once again on April 21st. Highest rate is now 3% for some shopping categories, while many have fallen to 1%.

Unreal, looks like this is going to affect a lot of people. They just sent out an email.

For the non-amazon people, so we can compare, what were the commissions before ?

 

[b2mcd]

For the non-amazon people, so we can compare, what were the commissions before ?

8% for most big categories. Standard was 3-8% I believe

 

[Berta77]

BE CAREFULL... All this is a game of numbers.


I'm in the joke in one of the European amz markets as an affiliate by 2017,
I red all the posts in this thread and this is my opinion.

1) If the amazon affiliate income is 1% or less why they cut off 50% the affiliate rates? They need some little dollars more....NO This does not make sense at all! So probably amazon income from affiliate stream is much higher than 1%.
They dominate the SERPS and there isn't any other ways to do it. If they switch off the affiliate program how do you think they can do that? In any ways!

2)Someone as already posted this image

Unfortunately this chart will be more explanatory with the trend of conversion % and earn per click.

Probably who has been in the game for many years has experienced that other the years the conversion rate has increased and the earnings per click have remained more or less constant.

What makes sense to be analyzed is the earnings per click, not affiliate rates!
Why Adsense has missed the game...because earns per click have decreased over the years.

3) WHY NOW, and WHY noticed only a few days before?
Because a giant like amazon is a balance!
From 20 March here in Europe I noticed a huge increase in my affiliate income, I think the same is happening in the US. Both conversion rate and earn per click are increased. More or less both conversion rate and earn per click are more than 2 times the same period last year.

So Amazon balance for affiliation was upset by this pandemic and Amazon urgently needed to remedy this insane increase in conversion and earnings per click and so make this insane cut in affiliate rates.

4) What will come after this?
There are 3 possibilities:
a) Earn per click and conversions will remain on the nowadays values so Amazon will not revert affiliate rates.
b) Earn per click and conversions will decrease and slowly return to the values of a year ago and so affiliate rates will revert more or less to last year value
c) The market goes into recession so earn per click and conversions will go down and so Amazon will increase affiliate rates.

 

[thegoldeneye]

BE CAREFULL... All this is a game of numbers.


I'm in the joke in one of the European amz markets as an affiliate by 2017,
I red all the posts in this thread and this is my opinion.

1) If the amazon affiliate income is 1% or less why they cut off 50% the affiliate rates? They need some little dollars more....NO This does not make sense at all! So probably amazon income from affiliate stream is much higher than 1%.
They dominate the SERPS and there isn't any other ways to do it. If they switch off the affiliate program how do you think they can do that? In any ways!

2)Someone as already posted this image

Unfortunately this chart will be more explanatory with the trend of conversion % and earn per click.

Probably who has been in the game for many years has experienced that other the years the conversion rate has increased and the earnings per click have remained more or less constant.

What makes sense to be analyzed is the earnings per click, not affiliate rates!
Why Adsense has missed the game...because earns per click have decreased over the years.

3) WHY NOW, and WHY noticed only a few days before?
Because a giant like amazon is a balance!
From 20 March here in Europe I noticed a huge increase in my affiliate income, I think the same is happening in the US. Both conversion rate and earn per click are increased. More or less both conversion rate and earn per click are more than 2 times the same period last year.

So Amazon balance for affiliation was upset by this pandemic and Amazon urgently needed to remedy this insane increase in conversion and earnings per click and so make this insane cut in affiliate rates.

4) What will come after this?
There are 3 possibilities:
a) Earn per click and conversions will remain on the nowadays values so Amazon will not revert affiliate rates.
b) Earn per click and conversions will decrease and slowly return to the values of a year ago and so affiliate rates will revert more or less to last year value
c) The market goes into recession so earn per click and conversions will go down and so Amazon will increase affiliate rates.

This makes sense because I saw that too, the conversion is higher than ever, so that could be a reason for cutting affiliate rates. We can only hope that's the reason.

 

[please read]

Even with the lower commission I still feel a little lucky to be able to use their affiliate program. I have mostly plain, made for Amazon type sites so I feel fortunate to be making anything from them. Soon that style of site might be obsolete like made for Adsense sites.

 

[yogi31286]

BE CAREFULL... All this is a game of numbers.


I'm in the joke in one of the European amz markets as an affiliate by 2017,
I red all the posts in this thread and this is my opinion.

1) If the amazon affiliate income is 1% or less why they cut off 50% the affiliate rates? They need some little dollars more....NO This does not make sense at all! So probably amazon income from affiliate stream is much higher than 1%.
They dominate the SERPS and there isn't any other ways to do it. If they switch off the affiliate program how do you think they can do that? In any ways!

2)Someone as already posted this image

Unfortunately this chart will be more explanatory with the trend of conversion % and earn per click.

Probably who has been in the game for many years has experienced that other the years the conversion rate has increased and the earnings per click have remained more or less constant.

What makes sense to be analyzed is the earnings per click, not affiliate rates!
Why Adsense has missed the game...because earns per click have decreased over the years.

3) WHY NOW, and WHY noticed only a few days before?
Because a giant like amazon is a balance!
From 20 March here in Europe I noticed a huge increase in my affiliate income, I think the same is happening in the US. Both conversion rate and earn per click are increased. More or less both conversion rate and earn per click are more than 2 times the same period last year.

So Amazon balance for affiliation was upset by this pandemic and Amazon urgently needed to remedy this insane increase in conversion and earnings per click and so make this insane cut in affiliate rates.

4) What will come after this?
There are 3 possibilities:
a) Earn per click and conversions will remain on the nowadays values so Amazon will not revert affiliate rates.
b) Earn per click and conversions will decrease and slowly return to the values of a year ago and so affiliate rates will revert more or less to last year value
c) The market goes into recession so earn per click and conversions will go down and so Amazon will increase affiliate rates.

Great observation and there's a logic there! We all affiliates do not want the higher earnings in this pandemic for no reason or hard work!

It does make sense to decrease the fees for now as the number of orders people are placing won't be from the click I sent to Amazon!

Thanks a lot man for sharing this eye-opening insight!

 

[neo]

.

The way it usually worked
- I want to buy a camera , you check on Amazon but not sure
- Read review blow --> Aff link --> Amazon

So you are not bringing anybody new to Amazon anyway. If you now change it to say walmart then they will still check on Amazon, if its same price/cheaper they will order from there (especially if they have prime)

Whole i agree with you this is mostly the case with the "amazon affiliate" sites, it is not the case with a good quality site or blog.

Use search "how to take stunning landscapes" >>
Reach on a photography tips blogpost >>
Blogger recommends a wide angle lens and refer him B & H./ Amazon

Now if course the reader may search on Amazon. even if the blogger did not refer him to Amazon. But this traffic was bon existant to Amazon prior to the reader going through the blogpost and figured out that he needs t a wide angle lens.

Like you said Amazon has grown to be the richest ecommerce firm and they will do fine without affiliates. But affiliates contributed a lot to their success.

I can understand a company cutting down expenses ( commisions) when the business in trouble. But screwing affiliates when they are making the most money shows that they don't give a fu@k about us affiliates anymore.

 

[mqsss]

Whole i agree with you this is mostly the case with the "amazon affiliate" sites, it is not the case with a good quality site or blog.

Use search "how to take stunning landscapes" >>
Reach on a photography tips blogpost >>
Blogger recommends a wide angle lens and refer him B & H./ Amazon

And conversion rate drops to 0.1%.

 

[TooCorny]

Amazon Stocks all-time high. This is a decision from the top. They've decided we're expendable from here on out.

Even though they are growing they are loosing a huge amount of traffic from this, I am so curious of what made them take that decission, now everybody running affiliate sites will sen dtraffic to they competition.

I think this will hurt hurt them long term.

Another question here is, if the comissions for affiliates went down, that means that the fba fees for suppliers will be noticeably lowered

 

[punk434]

It's even better than unemployment guys. Don't worry. We are going to see lots of lay offs.