Amazon - 24 hr cookie become worse?

If that's how it work then that sucks

I just read the before and after paragraphs. It sure sounds like your interpretation is right. So you NEED to presell and get people to be in a buying mood. Otherwise if they visit later via amazon.com you wont get paid.

There are also a number of other very concerning issues, concerning copyrighted, material, and content that you submit to Amazon, (which they state then becomes their intellectual property,) Yes, you heard right, they have the right to do what ever they want to do with it, and anyone they work with can do what ever they wish to do as well.

I took about an hour last night reading through the new TOS and it is confusing, difficult to understand, often branches into illegal activity, unconstitutional procedures, evoked without the users knowledge, using methods that a thug on the street would blush about.

There are some very serious concerns, and get this if you upload any content or provide any content you have to prove that the content is yours and you have to pay them a reasonable fee to provide that proof, to their satisfaction.

I do not think that this will stand, but it is something to seriously consider if you know the rules you have a better chance of not getting banned by Amazon, but with all the pages of "New Rules" its like playing in a mine field.

From what I can tell this does not apply to European associates YET!

I'm still a bit confused, so if a person clicks on an affiliate link and goes back to google to do a product search then clicks on the amazon link (amazon.com's own link), this will end the cookie for the affiliate? If that's going to be the case, I'm pretty sure this will have an effect on earnings.

Wow that is awful news to hear, I don't understand why they would even do that! That is super lame.

Edited: Just read a new interpretation of the updated wording and I see how it can affect the length of the session. I suppose we just have to take it as it comes. Best of luck to everyone.

If I'm understanding the newly worded agreement, I don't see how what will happen now is any different that what was happening before.

Here's the full excerpt:


Second Paragraph of Section 7

February 2, 2012 version
"A "Session" begins when a customer clicks through a Special Link on your site to the Amazon Site and ends upon the first to occur of the following: (x) 24 hours (except in the case of Special Links to the myhabit.com site, in which case 30 days) elapses from that click; (y) the customer places an order for a Product that is not a Digital Product; or (z) the customer follows a link to the Amazon Site that is not your Special Link."

September 23, 2011 version
"A "Session" begins when a customer clicks through a Special Link on your site to the Amazon Site and ends upon the first to occur of the following: (x) 24 hours elapses from the customer’s initial click-through; (y) the customer places an order for a Product that is not a Digital Product; or (z) the customer follows a link to the Amazon Site that is formatted with an Associate’s tag that is not assigned to you."

Both say that the session begins when someone clicks your special link and, from the updated TOS, ends as soon as one of three things happens. First, if 24 hours elapse (x), the session ends. The difference now is that if you're promoting something on myhabit.com, you have a thirty day cookie. The second condition that will cause the session to end is when the customer orders a product that is not a digital product (y). The third condition that will cause the session to end is when the customer follows a link to Amazon that is not your Special Link (z).

In my opinion, the condition is the same, but is now worded differently. The September 2011 wording says that the session ends when the customer follows a link to Amazon that is formatted with an Associate's tag not assigned to you. Isn't that essentially a link that "is not your Special Link"?

The wording, to me, seems to state the same thing, just in a different way. If someone comes to Amazon through a link with your Associate ID embedded, a session begins. If that person doesn't make a purchase, and leaves the Amazon site to do some more research, the session remains open. If they find a new link to the same product elsewhere and follow it back to Amazon, your session ends and a new session begins for the person whose link was followed. That seems to be the same thing that was happening under the September 2011 wording.

Let's say that someone comes to an Amazon product page through a Squidoo lens. A session is established for that Associates ID, whether it's Squidoo's or that or a contributor. If the person doesn't complete the purchase and goes back out to do more research and finds the same product on your site and then follows your link back to Amazon, Squidoo's session has ended for that customer and yours has begun.

Both TOS say to me, the commission goes to the affiliate who sent the customer to Amazon immediately preceding the purchase. For the above example, if the infomation on your site is what finally prompted the customer to return to Amazon, would you rather see the commission go to Squidoo, because the customer followed their link first?

We have to have our content written in such a way, they have no choice but to buy when they follow our links.

That's not too hard, right?

@Media_Mogul Did you know for instance that in the new updated terms of service, if you post any of the Terms of service, (copy and paste) your account can be terminated without notice, (yes it sounds in sane right how are people to learn about it if some one does not publish it, but those are the rules)

I would quote it but that would be a violation of the TOS and I am making money with Amazon so I am still reading, there are pages of data, and in some cases it is really difficult to understand ( not simple at all ) again I would post it but I recommend you read every page, and it is not just on one page there are actually several pages, with links, like the main page has two links to two more pages.

Each of those pages has in turn more links you have to literally drill down deeply into the content to see all the rule changes and there are a lot of them.

So far I have been reading for more than 4 hours, in some cases the terms they use are so vague that you literally have to do research to see what they are talking about.

For example you cannot do certain things that you used to be able to do, they are prohibited, and they will ban and terminate your account if you break the rules.

I have a good friend that has been an amazon associate for ever, like years and years, and they got banned for something they did not even realize was against the rules.

So read every page, and make sure you understand what they are talking about and good luck with that last part because some of the language they talk about is so confusing that only the Pope knows for sure.

It's hard to tell exactly what the implications of this are. I certainly hope that clicking an Amazon result in Google doesn't end the session.

It says that this went into effect Feb 2. Did anyone notice anything on their Feb 2 reports? I had a large spike in the number of unique Amazon clicks yesterday, but also the worst-converting day of the year so far. I can't tell if that's just coincidence or this new rule coming into play.

Does anyone know how the Amazon cookie technically works? I tried figuring it out a while ago, but as far as I could tell most of it was handled by Amazon making it impossible to understand how it worked. For example, if you click an affiliate link you get a cookie with a session ID, but clicking a different affiliate link didn't change the session cookie. The cookies that DID change were gibberish and encoded so you couldn't understand the data they were storing. There was no literal "24 hour cookie" either, which further made me believe that Amazon handles most of it server-side.

Another thing of interest are the daily emails Amazon has been sending out to customers recently. I guess those will now not count as affiliate sales, either.

Has anyone seen any change in conversion rate in todays report compared to your usual? My conversion rate today was 6.67% which is higher than usual.

I guess we need a good 3-4 weeks to see what the real effect is though.

I don't think it changes anything about getting your commission.

I tell you a story - one day I clicked on an ad I have on one of my websites for Amazon. That set the Amazon cookie on my computer, and if you have ever read one of their cookies, it only says time: date and that's it Not even what product I click on.

Later that same day I ordered up some thing from Amazon through my customer account login - separate from my affiliate account login - and next day i look at the stats on Amazon under my affiliate commissions, and I spied that i got commission on my own order the previous day!

Go figure.

I was thinking of starting an Amazon affiliate website very soon.
Should I find an alternative to Amazon after this bad news

Maybe this is the reason they are trying to save some cash?

Did anybody email them? I tried calling them but they are closed and I don't want to flood their inbox if they already got emails....

If this is the case where they are trying to save alot of money then after that they might implement a new rule where you only get credited for the product u referred.. basically even if the customer buys more than 1 product and you only promoted one of what he/she bought.. then u only get a credit for that item.. I hope they won't do this but seems they are trying to cover their loss..now I am skeptical abt my amazon review site damn..this is not looking good..

I wonder if the longer shopping cart cookie and astore get the same treatment?

The help section of Amazon didn't seem to change though.... or am I missing something?

"How long do visitors have to add an item to their Shopping Cart after clicking on one of my Amazon links until I no longer earn advertising fees on their purchase?

In most cases, you earn advertising fees for visitors that come to an Amazon site and place any qualifying items in a customer's Shopping Cart within 24 hours of their arrival at most Amazon sites.com or 30-days for MyHabit.com.

However, this 24-hour window for most Amazon sites and 30-day window for MyHabit.com will end before it expires once the customer submits his order or reenters Amazon.com through a Link that is not your Special Link.

Once the window is closed, you will not earn advertising fees on any subsequent purchases.

However, if the customer then returns to Amazon.com through one of your Special Links, this opens a new 24-hour window for most Amazon sites or 30-day window for MyHabit.com.

It is of course possible that a customer may arrive at an Amazon site (including MyHabit.com) via your Special Link, add an item to his Shopping Cart, and then leave Amazon.com or MyHabit.com without placing an order.

As long as the item was added to the customer's Shopping Cart during this 24-hour window for Amazon.com or 30-days for MyHabit.com, you will still earn an advertising fee if the order is placed before the Shopping Cart expires (usually after 90 days).

The advertising fee will not be credited to your Associates account until the customer has purchased the item, accepted delivery, and remitted full payment to Amazon.com. For complete details, see the Operating Agreement"

I'm reading their terms and I also think you are right, the affiliates got them to where they are.

I emailed them.. lets see what will be their response..

After Google Amazon Sucks. A bad news for my new project of amazon i think i must drop it now, they will do anything at anytime they want.

I have made a deal with a guy in this forum. He will make me an Amazon website.
Should I reconsider this deal now?

It is said that if someone directed to Amazon with your affiliate link buys a different product
(not the you promote), you still earn commission.
Is it still possible after this cookie change or not anymore?

You still earn regardless of what they purchase as long as they purchase before they revisit Amazon via any other Amazon link (including Amazon's own links).

I agree that it ideally wouldn't affect most sales when it comes to proper marketing, but even some of the top-performing Amazon affiliates admit that a large percentage of their profits come from extra items they weren't even promoting. I guess you could call those "luck" commissions.

If you're working on promoting, converting and making a profit on item A, then you hopefully wouldn't be too badly affected by a change like this. However, even a master marketer is going to see some kind of tangible effect on their income, big or small as far as luck commissions go.

No, that wasn't affected at all.

Now i understand why im seeing far few clicks and conversion only the recent few weeks.. Another twist in a bad way for IM

Hi

I'm wondering if Amazon was thinking:

"Holy cow! 80% of our affiliate traffic retuns by Google before purchasing. We could make a bundle by cutting them out of the loop!"

or

"Well, 80% of customers buy during the first affiliate visit anyway so this will be a minor change that shouldn't significantly impact our partners."

Mahlon

Has anyone heard back from Amazon?

Not yet.. waiting them to email me back..argh now I am not sure if I should go with my Amazon review site! that took months and months of planning!

Agreed that a list would help, but for many people that doesn't really work with their existing sites (how do you build a list on a website selling dog collars?)

The problem with building a list when you run something like an Amazon review site is that by trying to get the opt-in, you are hurting your chances (to some unknown degree) of getting the affiliate link click-through you are looking for from that visitor.

To be honest, I'd love to add a way to list build on my Amazon sites. However, I've yet to come up with an effective strategy. Anyone else doing so with success?

I have not seen a change in sales yet so doesn't look to be a big deal really, just my opinion though

GUYSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!

I just got an email from Amazon.. things didn't change! I think it was all rewording the my habit thing.. the support told me if someone clicks on my link and go to Amazon then come back within 24 hours using Google or a direct link and make a purchase then I will get the credit, the only time where you lose the credit is if they visit another associate site and they click on their link so it gets replaced..which we all know that...

I know ! I am going to call them tomorrow and make sure they read the new agreement and answer me.. but for now I am happy with what I got.. and I see some users are reporting nothing has changed in their earnings..

Thanks Sojourn, I guess now I can continue working on my Amazon website hopefully they won't come up with more changes.

Anyone hear any other confirmations? The actual affiliate forum over on Amazon seems to think customer service may be out of touch with the recent changes.

Hey cooler1, and thanks for the post. I never knew about the changes to Amazon. I am going to have to get a deeper look into this issue because if it continues I most likely won't remain an affiliate of amazon.

Amazon confirmed again that there is no change and they explained it to me..the only time u lose commission is when they visit another affiliate link that has the affiliate tag...

Thanks zaco. Did they say why the wording was changed?

Why would they change the wording to something that implies a large change, and specifically point it out to make sure everyone knows about it, but not actually make that change at all?

Not really I didn't want to question them lol but from looking at the agreement, I think they wanted to add myhabit site so people would notice it and start jumping there..

Has anyone else called Amazon to confirm what zaco said?

OK, I've been waiting patiently for some meaningful statistics before forming an opinion on the recent Amazon Operating Agreement changes.

Now, I know some have said they've spoken to Amazon but I must say my conversions are way down over the last week or so. Coincidence? Maybe. That said, I sure would feel more comfortable right now had they changed the operating agreement wording back.

As it stands now, I'm becoming convinced something has changed for the worst.

Anyone else seeing lower conversions over the last week or so? Mine are down 50% in Feb vs Jan. That's a significant drop.

That is still a little ambiguous. What does Amazon's "own advertising activities" include, exactly?

I'm sure that clearly means the daily emails they've been sending to customers suggesting items.

But does it also mean their Google results? SEO could definitely be considered advertising efforts to many people.

Then again, they say it was only intended to clarify the existing policy. Sooo, I guess that means there are no changes at all.

Amazon is trying to do everything in it's power to cut out affiliates. It's like they reached the point where they are big enough to eliminate 80% of their affiliates and they won't suffer a single thing.

People will still buy because... they are so established.

Yes but consequently, as my experience say that I've found that my conversion rate for Amazon affiliate links is generally higher than it is for other affiliate programs. I might be earning less per conversion, but the number of visitors I'm able to convert makes up for this disparity.

However, I will admit that selling Amazon affiliate products presents some challenges. If you aren't 100% sure you'll be selling a high volume of products (which is likely the case with affiliate niche marketing), then you've got to choose products with a high enough retail price to make up for the fact that you're only receiving 4-8% of the sale.

For example, say you want to build an affiliate niche website around coupon organizers. Clipping coupons is a hot topic right now, and there's certainly money to be made from this niche in a down economy. Unfortunately, coupon organizers average around $10 a piece on Amazon. Even if you sold 631 coupon organizers (the minimum # of items you'll need to sell to qualify for an 8% referral rate), you'll still only receive around $500 for your troubles.

To compensate for this, I prefer to only promote Amazon products or product lines with an average selling price of over $100 per piece. I will occasionally make an exception if the product line has a number of different add-ons that might increase the total price of the sale. For example, the machines I sell on my scrapbooking site often need additional pieces (such as cartridges, paper, etc) in order to run. Even if the particular machine I sell is under $100, these extras can bump up the final total significantly.

Amazon's affiliate program isn't right for everyone, but the worst thing you could do would be to dismiss it entirely, just because the cookie lengths and referral rates don't measure up to affiliate programs.