Amazon
Amazon has a strange lack of an affiliate programme. Yes, I know they have a very well known affiliate programme. Yes, I know I spell programme with an extra m and an e, but I'm English. Live with it.
They don't push the affiliate programme any more, probably because they feel they don't need it. They have no real online competition in the online shopping marketplace. Even when we see products elsewhere, we turn to Amazon for value and reassurance.
But if I worked at Amazon, I think I'd resurrect the scheme. Supermarkets have shown that loyalty card schemes are valuable, because the perceived value is high even when the actual payback is marginal, so I think it's still worth it.
A low rate of payback will let us incorporate more affiliates into the scheme. Let's start with ... everyone. Everyone. No sign up required, we're all in.
Ok, now for my blog, I want to get some Amazon points. What I really want is a one-click buy button. No need to go anywhere else, no popups, just one click buy. A bit like a tweet button. And hey, that could be used for anything, from buying some baby supplies to a blog subscription.
Ok, that's the obvious bit. We'll put the code for that in an 'embed' link on the Amazon site, under the existing one-click buy button.
Next, we're going to tweak all the site urls. Every URL you see on Amazon, in the address bar, will contain your affiliate code. That way, every time you paste a link into a tweet, or a Facebook page, or anywhere, you get affiliate points. Don't need the dumb grey affiliate bar. Just cut paste tweet. Cash.
That way I get more serendipitous referral points, which will bring me back to Amazon, to buy another book, another Kindle, or whatever. Each time I get points, I'll get an email. This will make me happy.
Actually I believe I earned about five bucks this year through serendipity. No idea how. I think if the referrals worked across countries, I'd get more. Drives me crazy that the UK and US stores are different. I'd fix that too.
So, in summary, more affiliate payments. I'll admit right here right now that I'm not going to spend much more - I really only shop online at Amazon or Apple already. But a few kickbacks will probably make me feel better about doing so.
Thanks for reading! I guess you could now share this post on TikTok or something. That'd be cool.
Or if you had any comments, you could find me on Threads.
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