Amazon wants its affiliates to be more social. Recently, it launched a Share on Twitter feature making it easy for affiliates to tweet affiliate links.
The push to make its affiliate program more social is no doubt based on the idea that social media and shopping have what it takes to form a long-lasting friendship. The logic: you'll trust a product recommendation from someone in your 'social graph' more than you'll trust an ad from some anonymous marketer. This isn't a new idea, but it is increasingly gaining traction.
Expanding on its effort to cash in on social media, Amazon has launched Amazon Associates for Blogger, which is designed to give bloggers on Google's popular blogging service the ability to easily add links to relevant Amazon products when they post.
Amazon Associates for Blogger has two integration points:
- A Product Finder that enables bloggers to highlight text in a post and get recommendations for Amazon products that would provide for a suitable link, and to easily insert such a link.
- Various sidebar 'gadgets' that promote and link to Amazon.
For Blogger bloggers who aren't already Amazon affiliates, signup functionality has been built into Blogger. Amazon is also encouraging affiliates who don't have Blogger accounts to sign up for one.
Obviously, this isn't entirely groundbreaking stuff, and there's never been anything stopping bloggers from adding affiliate links and promotions to their blogs. But what Amazon is clearly trying to do is make the process so simple that just about anybody can promote Amazon through social media channels.
That's certainly a good thing for Amazon, as it only pays for performance. But I'm not so sure it's a good thing for Blogger, or the internet as a whole. Blogger is already a haven for spam blogs, and encouraging individuals to sign up so that they can produce content with Amazon affiliate links probably isn't going to lead to quality content.
In my opinion, the relationship between retail and social media does have a lot of potential, and that means that the relationship between affiliate marketing and social media does too. For affiliate program operators that aren't 800 pound gorillas like Amazon, however, getting the most out of those relationships will probably require a targeted approach that relies more on quality than quantity.
Photo credit: Akira Ohgaki via Flickr.
Patricio Robles is a tech reporter at Econsultancy. Follow him on Twitter.
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12:34PM on 17th December 2009
It is a little harder to get news out today with the Twitter tubes so clogged up but it appears that Amazon & Blogger messed up and decided to insert iframes in blog posts, that then get stripped out of feeds.
http://andybeard.eu/2609/amazon-blogger.html
For an average user this is just broken
3:17PM on 17th December 2009
I have tested the Amazon Associates for Blogger. Yes, it is easier now to insert the link and image to my blog with product finder. But, I wish the easier integration is not limited to link and image in the future, as I believe, it should cover more access like customer reviews and more images options...I hope my wish will come true
3:22PM on 17th December 2009
@Andy - What gets inserted is up to the user, no differently than existing options for associates: either a straight link, an image w/a link to the Amazon product listing, or an iframe including the image, buy now data and pricing info.
@Patricio - While I agree that spam was an historical problem on Blogger, we have thrown a ton of effort at the problem in the last 2 years, and the % of pageviews on Blogger that are spam is down to a very small fraction of what it was. We still have more work to do, but I think the assertion that Blogspot is a current "haven for spam" is unfounded. (That said, if you have evidence to the contrary, please send it my way - rklau -at- google.com - and we'll look into improving our detection and take-down routines.)
3:24PM on 17th December 2009
This is very interesting. First time I heard about it. Thanks for sharing it. I will look into it more.
Social Media Consulting at MikeStenger.com
4:21PM on 17th December 2009
Hmmm. I like this and then I don't because of all the spammers that are around on Twitter. Guess we'll just have to wait and see what happens
10:24PM on 17th December 2009
This article is very interesting and I too am interested to see how effective this will be. Will be interested to see how this works long term.
3:25PM on 18th December 2009
Paynet Systems offers an opportunity to make $100 for every approved merchant account generated by your website or referred to us verbally. Join our Affiliate Program and make money for every approved merchant account.
3:32AM on 29th December 2009
But what Amazon is clearly trying to do is make the process so simple that just about anybody can promote Amazon through social media channels.
8:11AM on 9th March 2010
Really well to read.
Thanks for your sharing.
7:36AM on 19th May 2010
But considering the flack that marketers are getting for tracking consumers via cookies, it's hard to imagine that companies will start tracking people by unique browser now. What would be the point in investing in the area when it's sure to be a huge red flag for regulators?
11:32PM on 2nd June 2010
It's definitely tough to create compelling content with Amazon and not seem like spam. What do you guys think about Ucubd's way (http://www.ucubd.com/AmazonMatchMaker.html) of integrating Amazon Associates directly into your blog? For instance, you can embed a YouTube video with your Amazon Associates Sales widget directly in the body of your blog article.
3:59PM on 7th June 2010
we have more choice in selling amazon product. In contrast, it would be more spammer on the internet
12:00AM on 13th July 2010
Hmmmmmm........ well I loved this article. Hey I just heard of this new affiliate contest and I wanted to see what affiliates really do,it lead me to this site. I'm going to paste the advertisement (which I think is excellent by the way) below: "Bttb - $20k+ Affiliate Contest For July! $10k Top Prize In Blogging To The Bank's July Affiliate Contest ::: Plus Apple IPads To Be Won ::: Massive Prizes + Huge Conversions So Get Involved By Visiting This Link... http://307ff8feyjz000d51fqm0o1q0x.hop.clickbank.net/?tid=PRIZEWINNER101" I hope someone wins this, it seems pretty cool. I did not really understand it so I'll just pass it on. GOOD LUCK!!!!
12:01AM on 13th July 2010
Hmmmmmm........ well I loved this article. Hey I just heard of this new affiliate contest and I wanted to see what affiliates really do,it lead me to this site. I'm going to paste the advertisement (which I think is excellent by the way) below: "Bttb - $20k+ Affiliate Contest For July! $10k Top Prize In Blogging To The Bank's July Affiliate Contest ::: Plus Apple IPads To Be Won ::: Massive Prizes + Huge Conversions So Get Involved By Visiting This Link... http://307ff8feyjz000d51fqm0o1q0x.hop.clickbank.net/?tid=PRIZEWINNER101" I hope someone wins this, it seems pretty cool. I did not really understand it so I'll just pass it on. GOOD LUCK!!!!