Amazon has one of the most profitable affiliate programs in the world. It allows you to promote the wide range of products listed on the Amazon website. You get a commission for every successful sale via your affiliate link.

How much can you earn as an Amazon affiliate?

There is a myth floating around over the internet that Amazon pays only 4 percent commission. The commission for basic products starts at 4%, but the amount you get is highly dependent on the number of sales you make. After you’ve sold 7 items, for example, the commission rises to 6 percent. The percentage keeps on rising until it has reached 8.5%. One great feature is that, every time you reach a higher level, the new commission percentage is applied to all the sales made in that month, not just ones made after the higher commission slab is reached.

Here are some tips on how to make money with Amazon’s affiliate program

Stick to products that are relevant to your niche

If your website’s niche is compact cameras, trying to sell SLR digital cameras just because they bring in a higher commission might be a mistake. Focusing on products related to your website’s niche will get you higher click through rates.

Try to focus on selling averagely priced items

Inexpensive items easily fly into shopping carts because buyers don’t have to think much before buying them. But, the problem with such items is that the commission you get is too low to make a substantial difference in your income. On the other hand, costly items bring in a higher commission but it is not easy to sell them as people hesitate a lot before buying them. Therefore, the best approach is to sell items that are averagely priced. Stick to the items in $150 – $300 price range. The products falling in this range bring in good commission and they sell quite easily.

Find a good niche

Successful marketers always work on a niche that has people with good purchasing power. When you log into your Amazon account, you will find recommendations by Amazon on newly launched products. There are also recommendations on products that sell best. If you feel that these recommendations are not relevant to your website, you can start looking for products of your own choice.

Write honest reviews for the products you intend to sell

The best way to sell a product is to write an article that highlights its benefits and drawbacks. You should try to make it clear how the product will solve the problems of your readers. Make sure your reviews are engaging, honest and straightforward.

If you don’t have a website to post your review, there is no need to worry. There are a number of websites that publish user-submitted content. These websites include Expertscolumn, Squidoo and Hubpages. An added advantage of joining one of these sites is that they also share their Google Adsense earnings with their members.

Keyword research is extremely important

If you are using keywords that have low search volumes, then doing affiliate marketing will be a waste of time for you. You should look for keywords that are lucrative as well as uncompetitive. Doing so will improve your traffic and will give you higher conversion rate. You also need to steer clear of highly competitive keywords, since these keywords are very hard to rank.

Use social media to attract traffic to your product page

Social networking websites, when used properly, can get you a lot of traffic. The more traffic your website gets; more are the number of sales you are likely to make. Twitter and Facebook are the most effective in this regard. For quick results you could also purchase advertisements on these websites.

WordPress Plugins for Amazon Affiliates

Amazon affiliate link localizer – This plugin makes it easy for you to add your affiliate link in posts and pages. It automatically creates a link and sends the visitor to the product page when the link is clicked.

Amazon product in a post – Using this plugin, you can add formatted Amazon products to your website. This plugin is great for monetizing your posts.

Money press – Here you can use a short code to display Amazon products in your posts. The plugin serves good purpose in terms of earning affiliate revenue.

Amazon post purchase – Using this plugin, you can display Amazon products related to your page in a sidebar widget.

Conclusion

Holiday season is great for pitching your products. During this time affiliates usually make twice as much money as they normally do. Keep an eye on Amazon affiliates blog. This is the place where you can locate upcoming holiday deals.