What is the Amazon Influencer program?
The Amazon Influencer program is an extension of the Amazon Associates program specifically for social media influencers. The purpose of Amazon Influencers is to help Amazon customers discover Amazon products they might be interested in buying. The program allows social media influencers to establish their own pages on Amazon, where they can recommend their favorite Amazon products directly to their audience in one place with a custom Amazon URL. This page is called an Amazon Storefront. For example, Rocky Barnes is one of the top Amazon Influencers, with over 3.4 million followers on her Instagram account. Through the Amazon Influencer program, she showcases all the Amazon products that she promotes on her Instagram account with a single Amazon Storefront page.
What is an Amazon Influencer?
An Amazon Influencer is someone with a social media following on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, or TikTok who promotes Amazon products to earn commission income. Amazon Influencers make product recommendations to their audience. An Amazon Influencer has the ability to impact the purchase decisions of their audience through the content that they create. Considering that over 37% of Amazon traffic comes from Amazon Influencers, according to EngageBay, Amazon influencer marketing is incredibly effective in boosting Amazon seller sales.
What is an influencer?
An influencer is an online personality that has the power to influence other people's decisions through their content. As such, influencers are often used in a marketing context to promote products on behalf of brands. In fact, the influencer marketing industry is worth a sizable $21.1 billion, according to data from Statista. Anyone who has a social media account with followers that they can influence qualifies as an influencer.
What is Amazon Associates?
Amazon Associates is a free affiliate marketing program through Amazon where you can promote Amazon products for a sales commission. Affiliate marketers promoting products through the Amazon Associate program obtain custom affiliate links through Amazon. These affiliate links can be placed inside of an affiliate’s online content, such as blog posts or YouTube video descriptions, so that the affiliate is awarded a commission when a customer clicks on their affiliate link and buys the Amazon product they are promoting. Amazon Associates earn between 1% to 20% of the sale, depending on the product category of the Amazon product.
What is the Amazon affiliate program?
The Amazon affiliate program is Amazon Associate, where affiliate marketers can promote Amazon products to earn sales commissions. The Amazon affiliate program is the largest affiliate marketing program in the world, with over 900,000 affiliate marketers promoting Amazon products.
How does the Amazon Influencer program work?
The Amazon Influencer program works by using social media influencers to promote Amazon products and increase product sales for Amazon sellers. After getting accepted into the Amazon Influencer program, social media influencers get their own Amazon Storefront page where they can create Idea Lists of their favorite Amazon items and post pictures and videos with those items to help customers make purchase decisions. Amazon Influencer product review videos can even appear alongside product videos on actual product pages as related videos. When an Amazon customer purchases a product accessed through an Amazon Influencer’s Storefront page, the Amazon Influencer receives a sales commission of 1% to 20%. An Amazon customer must make the purchase within 24 hours of finding a product through an Amazon Influencer link for it to count as a qualifying purchase because Amazon has a 24 hour cookie policy.
How do Amazon Influencers make money?
1. Idea Lists
Idea lists on Amazon are collections of items on an influencer storefront that anyone with access can shop and buy Amazon products through. Idea Lists can be kept private or shared with others through social media or email. Items can be easily added and removed. When a customer purchases an Amazon product that they find through the Idea List of an Amazon Influencer, the Amazon Influencer earns money.
2. Shoppable Photos
Shoppable Photos are images that are displayed on an Amazon Storefront that have tagged links to product detail pages. Shoppable Photos allow Amazon Influencers to post pictures that feature Amazon products and that take interested customers directly to that product when clicked so that the Amazon Influencer can earn a commission.
3. Video
Videos featured on an Amazon Influencer Storefront allow an influencer to promote Amazon products by providing reviews and showcasing the product in a real setting. Amazon product links appear below the video so that an Amazon Influencer can easily earn money if one of their followers decides to purchase an item they promoted in a video. Video is an integral aspect of the Amazon Influencer program, as uploading videos is part of the approval process.
4. Amazon Live
Amazon Lives are shoppable livestreams that appear on Amazon storefronts and elsewhere across Amazon.com. Amazon Live works by setting up livesteams through the Amazon Live Creator app, which is only available on iOS devices. Before going live, Amazon Influencers choose which products they will showcase in the video. These products are shown in a shoppable product carousel that is visible to viewers during the live stream. Amazon Live Influencers earn money when live viewers purchase products through the product carousel during the livestream.
5. Affiliate links
Amazon affiliate links are custom URLs that allow an Amazon affiliate to earn commission when a customer clicks the URL and makes a qualifying purchase. As an extension of the Amazon Associate program, a creator in the Amazon Influencer program can make money beyond their custom Amazon store URL by generating affiliate links and sharing them through their social media account.
What are the Amazon Influencer program requirements?
The Amazon Influencer requirements are relatively vague, including the required audience size. Even so, many previous influencers advise on a minimum follower count to get accepted. You need at least 1,000 followers to be an Amazon Influencer in most cases.
Does everyone get approved to be an Amazon Influencer?
No, everyone does not get approved to be an Amazon Influencer. Amazon is more selective of who it allows into the Amazon Influencer program compared with the standard Amazon Associates program.
How to get approved for the Amazon Influencer program? 6 Tips
- 1Build a social media following of 2,000 to 3,000 followers on at least one of the following social media platform options: Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, or TikTok
- 2Choose a specific niche for your content to attract the right target audience
- 3Put resources into creating high quality content
- 4Establish a consistent posting schedule
- 5Adhere to Amazon’s program terms and conditions for Amazon Influencer program content
- 6Apply to Amazon Influencer with your Amazon Associates account, especially if you have a history of success already
These tips can improve your chances if you want to get approved for the Amazon Influencer program.
How to sign up for the Amazon influencer program?
1. Start your application on the Amazon Influencer program sign up page
Navigate to the Amazon Influencer program sign up page and click “Sign up”.
2. Choose an Amazon account to sign up with
Choose an active Amazon account to sign up with or create a new account if you don't want your previous shopping history or content to be associated with your Amazon Influencer account. If you have an existing Amazon Associate account, use that account to sign up for the Amazon Influencer program.
3. Check your eligibility
Check your eligibility by linking your social media account so Amazon can verify that you have a sufficient social media presence for the program. Link the account with the greatest audience engagement. Checking your eligibility is automatically completed by a robot so you'll receive an immediate response approving or rejecting your Amazon Influencer application.
4. Unlock onsite commissions
To fully sign up for the Amazon Influencer program and maximize your earnings potential, you'll need to unlock onsite commissions. Onsite commissions are additional placements on Amazon where customers can see your content beyond just your Amazon Storefront page. For example, your video content can show up on actual product pages to help customers make buying decisions. To unlock onsite commissions, you need to submit 3 videos on your Amazon Creator Hub page. These 3 videos will be assessed by an Amazon human employee in conjunction with your social media accounts to determine if you are eligible for full Amazon Influencer program access. According to Amazon, it typically takes 2 business days for an Amazon employee to review the 3 videos and provide a decision.
What are the differences between the Amazon Influencer program and Amazon Associates?
Amazon Influencer | Amazon Associates | |
|---|---|---|
Who? | Social media influencers with established follower bases. | Website owners and content platform users. |
Custom Amazon Storefront? | Yes | No |
Easy to get accepted? | No | Yes |
International promotion? | No | Yes |
How much do Amazon influencers make with Amazon affiliate marketing?
Amazon influencers typically make between $1 and $5,000/month with Amazon affiliate marketing, according to Sr. Social Media Content Creator at Helium 10, Sydney Meeuwsen. In an interview with Business Insider, YouTuber and Amazon Influencer Jeremy Sciarappa was earning $16,000/month through his Amazon product review videos. Therefore, Amazon Influencer earnings can vary substantially depending on factors like:
- Type of products
- Audience size
- Engagement rates
- Commission rates
Is Amazon affiliate program worth it?
Yes, the Amazon affiliate program is worth it. Although Amazon commission rates are relatively low at around just 4% on average, the average conversion rate on Amazon is around 10%, according to JungleScout. This is much higher than a typical Ecommerce store, meaning influencers and affiliates in the Amazon Associate program convert customers into sales at a much higher rate than with many other affiliate marketing and Ecommerce opportunities. Considering that the Amazon Associate program is free to sign up, it can definitely be worth it for those who want to make money online with affiliate marketing.
Amazon Influencer program FAQs
You know when content is from an Amazon Influencer because it will have the Amazon Influencer program name alongside the content.
Amazon does not validate or express the opinions made in Amazon Influencer content. Amazon Influencers make independent product recommendations without oversight from Amazon. Influencer content is not edited or changed by Amazon in any way.
Amazon Influencer content comes from participants in the Amazon Influencer program. Amazon can use this content throughout relevant customer shopping experiences on the Amazon platform.
You can learn more about the Amazon Influencer making the recommendation by clicking on the influencer's name provided with their content. This will take you to their profile page where they have a bio and a link to their Storefront page so you can see more of their content.
Amazon Influencers are not expected to only write positive reviews. Amazon expects that Amazon Influencers will help customers to discover and research new products while providing honest critiques along the way. However, the nature of influencer marketing pushes influencers to focus on positive reviews in order to make money, so many Amazon Influencers are likely to publish positive reviews rather than negative reviews.
How does the Amazon Influencer program compare to local lead generation?
The Amazon Influencer program requires that you actively work to publish consistent content on the internet in order to make money. You need to put your face on the internet and you’ll often need to disclose facts about your private life in order to attract a loyal audience. As an Amazon Influencer, you rely on Amazon to operate your business. If Amazon decides to remove you from the program or lower Amazon Influencer commission rates, your business will suffer as a result.
On the other hand, local lead generation is an online business model where you build websites to attract customers for local service businesses. You completely own these websites yourself, so you have greater control over your business than you do as an Amazon Influencer. Furthermore, you can make passive income with these local lead generation websites, so you don’t always need to work in order to generate income online.
Local lead generation works by targeting local services in specific geographic locations and building websites that rank on the first page of Google for potential customers that search for those services in those locations. When those customers click into your website, you obtain a valuable customer lead. You can then sell these leads to a real local business in the location where your website is ranking on Google for between $500 and $3,000/month. Once you partner with a local business to take the leads, they’ll usually stick with you for the long run because your website provides them with a stable and consistent marketing channel, so you can make passive income online. If you’re interested in learning more about local lead generation, check out this lead gen program where over 7,000 students have learned how to make passive income online by ranking websites on Google.
