If you are an Amazon affiliate, chances are that you may have faced the following issue. You are getting Amazon affiliate orders but no earnings are being reflected, right?
There can be many reasons for this to happen. The most common reason for this is that Amazon only shows the earnings once the product has been shipped and not when they are ordered. So, that means you will have to wait for another 3-5 days for the earnings to show up.
If the order has been shipped and still the earning hasn’t been reflected on your dashboard, there might be other reasons which I have discussed below.
3 Reasons Why This Problem Occurs
1. Shipment Time
As I said before, The earnings will only be updated once your customer’s product is actually shipped to his/her location.
Now, the time taken to reflect the commission amount on your dashboard might take a while depending on your customer’s place and the delivery type he/she chose.
2. Orders from Family Members and Friends
If you are asking your family members or your friends to order from your affiliate link, chances are that you won’t receive your affiliate commissions.
Amazon uses various ways to check if you are somehow connected with other people. So you won’t receive commissions –
- If the ordered item arrives at an address that was linked to you before.
- If you and the customer share the same address. (like living in a flat).
- If you both share the same IP address
- If you share the same credit or debit card for ordering the product.
- If you have sent gifts to the customer through Amazon, they are all considered to be your close friends.
Related Article – Is Amazon Affiliate Program Worth It?
3. Some Products are not Eligible for Commissions
Some products on Amazon are not eligible for commissions and you won’t receive anything for such type of orders.
Those Products are
| Product | Commission Rate |
|---|---|
| Gift Cards | 0.00% |
| Wireless Service Plans; | 0.00% |
| Alcoholic Beverages | 0.00% |
| Digital Kindle Products purchased as a subscription | 0.00% |
| Amazon Appstore and Amazon Pay Places | 0.00% |
| Prime Now | 0.00% |
| Food prepared and delivered from a restaurant | 0.00% |
The above list of products is currently not eligible for any commissions. However, This list of products may change over time.
How to Solve this Problem?
To maximize your affiliate earnings, you would need to solve the above problems.
1. Orders From Family
You can solve this problem by asking your friend or family to order it to a different address than yours.
If you guys live in the same flat, ask them to order it from a shop nearby your home. That way, you may receive the required commissions.
Also, ask your friends or family to use their own devices to order the items and not yours.
2. Zero Commission Products.
The answer for this is simple, Go find other affiliate programs that do offer commissions. If you want, I have listed 3 different affiliate programs down below. Feel free to check it out.
Related Article – Is Affiliate Marketing Free to Start?
Amazon Associates Alternatives
Amazon associates is a good affiliate program however, it’s not the best. They offer very low commission rates and have the above problems too.
The only reason why I still promote products from Amazon is due to the fact that they have a very high conversion rate and you get commissions for all the products that he/she has in his/her cart.
If you want to get a bit higher commissions, I would highly suggest you try out the following affiliate programs too.
1. Target
Target has a good affiliate program. It surely doesn’t offer huge commissions. However, some niches do offer pretty good commissions when compared with Amazon.
What I would suggest would be to use both Affiliate programs and then when you promote a product, compare both the Commission structure and select the one who pays more.
Target also offers a better cookie duration (7 days) which when compared with Amazon (only 24 hours) is very good. However, in the case of Amazon, if the product is added to the cart, the cookie duration extends to a whopping 90 days.
Commission Rate based on Different categories is as follows.
| Monthly Net Orders* | Apparel & Accessories | Home & Outdoor Living | Baby Gear & Furniture | Health & Beauty |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 – 10 | 5.00% | 5.00% | 3.00% | 1.00% |
| 11 – 50 | 6.00% | 6.00% | 3.50% | 1.00% |
| 51 – 300 | 6.50% | 6.50% | 3.75% | 1.00% |
| 301 – 1,000 | 7.00% | 7.00% | 4.00% | 1.00% |
| 1,001 – 2,000 | 7.25% | 7.25% | 4.25% | 1.00% |
| 2,001 – 4000 | 7.50% | 7.50% | 4.50% | 1.00% |
| 4,001 – 10,000 | 7.75% | 7.75% | 4.75% | 1.00% |
| 10,001+ | 8.00% | 8.00% | 5.00% | 1.00% |
2. ShareASale
ShareASale differs from all the other alternatives here. It’s somewhat like a marketplace where you have to join different affiliate programs in order to promote their products.
There are a lot of products here and you will somehow find something to promote within your niche. The best part about ShareASale is that they provide much higher commissions when compared with the likes of Amazon and Target.
The painful part of using ShareASale is that you will have to apply to each of the affiliate program to promote them and sometimes it’s hard to get approval from companies if you are just getting started.
3. Walmart
Walmart is surely a good option too. The commission rate is almost similar to that of Amazon but some categories do offer 1-3% more than that of Amazon.
Here are the commission rates of Walmart based on different categories –
| Category | Commission |
|---|---|
| Baby | 4% |
| Books | 1% |
| Beauty | 4% |
| Kitchen Appliances | 4% |
| Clothing | 4% |
| Contact Lenses | 10% |
| Home | 4% |
| Electronics | 1% |
| Gifts & Registry | 4% |
| Health | 4% |
| Patio & Garden | 4% |
| Jewelry | 4% |
| Movies | 1% |
| Music | 1% |
| Video Games | 1% |
| Photo | 1% |
| Sports & Outdoors | 4% |
| Toys | 4% |
| All Others | 4% |
Related Article – Why Start An Affiliate Marketing Business? (6 Reasons Why You Should)
Conclusion
I hope you now know why your amazon affiliate dashboard doesn’t show the sale amount. Hope I have answered your question.
If you are very much new to Amazon affiliate marketing, I suggest you sign up on all the above alternatives too because sometimes, the alternatives do offer a bit higher commissions than Amazon.
Best of luck!
Peace!