Affiliate marketing is one of the ways to make passive income. If you ever thought about making money in that way, you certainly came across Amazon affiliate program. It is among one of the most known affiliate programs on the market. So what are the good and bad sides of it? Let’s dive in.
Amazon affiliate program advantages
Well-known brand
I think I don’t have to explain how important a strong brand is for success in sales. This is the case with Amazon. The company is known for very good customer service, so it is not so difficult to convince users to buy a product on their site. People are not suspicious, so you don’t have to lead them through a long process of preselling.
Wide product selection
One of the biggest advantages of Amazon is the wide product selection, so for sure you’ll find products that you will feel comfortable with. You can select a niche of your focus and recommend products from that category. In an ideal scenario, you would encourage people to buy products that you’ve already tested yourself because then you will be more credible and effective.
You make a commission on other products as well
You will get paid for all products bought on Amazon site, not only for the product to which you were linking. So if you were recommending a book and that person buys a laptop during their visit on Amazon, you will get commision from that laptop as well!
24-hour cookie
The cookie validity is 24 hours so, you’ll get money for any order made on Amazon within that time!
High level of customization
Amazon provides a wide selection of advertising formats, so you’ll easily find an ad or link suited for your site. It is also possible to open an Amazon store, which is a site with Amazon products that you have selected.
Amazon affiliate program disadvantages
Low commission
The downside is the amount of the commission that you get, that vary for different product 
categories. The average is around 4% and the maximum you can get is 10% for fashion products, luxury beauty, and Amazon coins. So if you don’t want to recommend the products with the highest commission, the money you can earn in a month is rather limited.
24-hour cookie
I put the 24-hour cookie in both advantages and disadvantages. Many people are of an opinion that 24-hours is a long time, but sometimes it’s not, especially in case of more expensive products. Just imagine that a person was not really thinking about buying this expensive product, but was interested because of your ad.Will this person buy straight away, or maybe just look at this product and then think about it for 2-3 days before making the final order? So, in the end, I think the 24-hour cookie is a long enough time for products that are not expensive but may be a little bit too short in the case of the expensive ones.
Summary
What you have to take into consideration is that making money through Amazon affiliate program is not something that will happen overnight. And although you can find a lot of success stories on the Internet about people who make living from it, it is not so easy. Certainly, it does not happen for everybody.
You should also remember that it will take you time to analyze which ad formats work better for your site, which products does your audience prefer etc. Therefore it’s important not to discourage yourself at the beginning of the journey. Take some time before making the final decision, whether Amazon affiliate program is for you or not.
