Amazon Cutting Commissions on April 21st

mylastvacation said:

For everyone complaining, remember the cookie is what counts. It happened twice already that someone made very big orders and I got a bit commission, one it was 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.

It's not about margins is about volume with them. If you want to play margins you need to approach the suppliers of the products you promote directly and offer them a deal.

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You are getting 1/3 of it anyway lol

we're gonna create our own amazon, with blackjack and hookers

this is the biggest slap to the face I have ever seen a company do it's actually insane. I just read a news article about how Amazon because of the increase of e-commerce from stay at Homer's has had one of the best quarters in its history. Some affiliates are actually increasing commissions you would think that having your best quarter you would want to give back but somehow they decided that it would be the perfect time to take even more money and completely destroy the affiliate commissions.

Let's be honest here Amazon is the biggest e-commerce retailer out there by a massive margin these typesof cuts is huge to the entire affiliate marketing sector. Sure you can move to other affiliates and go off and say they offer more commissions by the conversion is never going to be the same as Amazon conversion it's just not going to happen they have the monopoly and they are the most trusted name.

A cut like this during a pandemic when a lot of people are relying on this income to feed their families and survive is absolutely disgusting even Google has been postponing updates because they don't want to rock the boat during the shaking times.

honestly at this point building websites and micro niche sites to try and make Amazon commissions is just completely a dead art. The cost and time investment to do this is nowhere near the return you would be better off trying PPC or a sass product. If you do have your own products or find a great affiliate this is the way you can continue on. But I suspect after this change there is going to be a lot of saturation in those little shareasale niches that offer good affiliate programs.

Make no mistake a lot of people are still going to continue with Amazon because they don't have anything else and the conversion is so high also the workload to change a average site with over 150 pagesto another affiliate is pretty taxing so they're going to bank for quite a while.

RRunner said:

Walmart has been targeting Amazon and the Amazon affiliate program for a while. This may help them.

With this change, Walmart now offers higher commissions on many categories and has a cookie duration 3x longer.

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https://ibb.co/n7b8Vxk

Here's what I emailed to the feedback link (https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/home/contact?feedbackSource=/help/operating/compare), you're welcome to use this template:


Edit the "half" and "twice" for whatever happened to your niche(s). I know it's a long shot but let's fire all the shots we have.

Look to other companies to affiliate with.
Like CJ.

Can you link to amazon and Walmart on the same page?

Anyone know how much traffic they get from affiliates?

Amazon is not the only option for US traffic. Just need to do some research.

nandrase said:

We have freaking promotion channels (thousands of our websites), only thing we need is to come together and make it. Only crowd from BHW would cover most of categories, so what stops us. We can even introduce payments with crypto along the way, and we are one step in front of them, as they are big, equals slow. So, let's use that and make something better out of it.

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Amazon has plenty of promotion channels too. Are you seriously hankering to take on Amazon with a bunch of retarded made for amazon "niche sites"?

rafark said:

Just checked best buy. 0.5%.

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Stop looking at what they list on generic sign up pages. Basically every retailer or manufacturer that I have emailed (other than Amazon and Walmart and Apple) was willing to offer better terms than what they list as the default commission. (Best Buy in particular might not since electronics is a damn low margin business.)

You really have to do some leg work if you're going to make other programs work.

AmazonMan said:

Can you link to amazon and Walmart on the same page?

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Yes, of course.

nandrase said:

, only thing we need is to come together and make it. Only crowd from BHW would cover most of categories, so what stops us. We can even introduce payments with crypto along the way, and we are one step in front of them, as they are big, equals slow. So, let's use that and make something better out of it.

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Instead of whinning I think this can be done. We have resourceful minds to pull this off. Just need to start thinking how to start it. #Unimind

Here is their reply: http://prntscr.com/rzdmcr though they utilized the situation well.

What the actual crap is this? Amazon Commissions were already crap, now they are even crappier.

Massive fee changes for some categories on the Amazon Associates program, starting on 21st April.
Home improvement, Garden, Pets, ... goes from 8% to 3%

Official info here:
https://affiliate-program.amazon.co...ef=oa_update_change&ref_=pe_3519780_489849800

This is so brutal to so many people.

I'm glad I'm not 100 % dependent on Amazon Associates to earn money online, but this just sucks. Big time.

mylastvacation said:

For everyone complaining, remember the cookie is what counts. It happened twice already that someone made very big orders and I got a bit commission, one it was 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.

It's not about margins is about volume with them. If you want to play margins you need to approach the suppliers of the products you promote directly and offer them a deal.

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Yeah but eventually every category is getting hit you will still make less % whatever cookie that is.

Surprised electronics hasn't been hit.

Panther28 said:

Affiliates is what built that company, we should demand more in some sort of affiliate union

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Maybe the same success as the employees? ...not

youtube1001 said:

It is high time for me to move onto other streams. I was already contemplating moving away based on how Amazon treats its employees.

Thanks,

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K114a said:

Holy fucking shit. 8% to 3%.

Like everyone says to move to other affiliate programs, but guys amazon is the one thats converts very well

Now this commission cut is going to affect many, specially in times like now.

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lifehero said:

think that soon amazon will terminate their affiliate program?

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TheVigilante said:

It's high time we diversify imagine how many publishers they gonna lose with this go with shareasale or something similar

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MisterF said:

Greg from Empire Flippers mentions other options here;

https://empireflippers.com/best-affiliate-networks-programs

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Jeepy said:

The problems with these are that you can't just make top 10 bla bla website and bank six figures. You need to apply to each programm and wait few weeks.to get accepted and actually most of the time they don't convert at all.

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Right, how many people buy from Amazon, how many from Walmart, Target and then how many from specialized retailers? Just because the commission sucks, the consumer would not give a shit about it. Which of the competitors will be around, strong enough to still push great offers? It was foreseeable they would do this, everybody knows Amazon, every person starts really on Amazon if they have no clue but just looking for something.. then you may look for reviews.

From consumer perspective here again why most will choose Amazon > XYZ
- Had ordered some masks like a month ago when this all just started, got refund on both easily from Amazon just telling them how they are crap and not as described. How much effort would that take with ebay,walmart,paypal...you'd have to wait here on chat --> refund
- Large item was not as described, return with free pickup from ups
- Another item some minor damage, easily got $30 discount instead of sending it back

So , yes sucks royally for all affiliates, but think through which products
a) can be offered at same price
b) free shipping as tons of ppl now have Amazon prime they won't spend money if it costs shipping , and no shipping on Amazon
c) customer service that is not just some bs reply etc.

But you may be able to get some stuff with Walmart I'd say as the closest competitor all others to me are not even close. If price is cheaper on Amazon still be prepared for users to juts buy it there.

1) How does this impact the valuation of current affiliate sites?
2) What will be its ripple effect? Demand for content writers, PBNs, Cost of Links, etc?