Archive for July, 2010

How to Add a Tracking ID to Your Amazon Product Review

Tuesday, July 20th, 2010 at 11:22 pm  
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We have a number of affiliate marketing websites. These are a hangover from when we first came into affiliate marketing when we felt that having more websites meant making more money. If we were starting out now we would only have a couple as it is so much more manageable. But having lots of websites means we have lots of product reviews and we realized early on that if we were going to keep track of where sales were coming from that we needed to start using Amazon tracking ids.

If you have begun to add product reviews to your own website and are using Amazon then you should really be doing the same thing. This will make it so much easier to check your sales on Amazon as you will be able to see exactly from which pages on your website the sales came from.

Choose Your Tracking IDs Carefully

Be very selective in how you want your tracking ID’s to look as you cannot delete or change them once they have been approved by Amazon. Bummer I know.

We found this out the hard way, we had started using a set of ID’s and then found it didn’t really help us when we came to determining which products were performing the best and we had to start over, but the original ID’s could not be deleted or changed, and keep in mind that you can only have 100 tracking ID’s per account. This may sound a lot but once you get started you will find it doesn’t take long to start using up your quota.  Having said that, we haven’t used ours up yet but that is because we track a mix of websites and products.  So we only bother about tracking products that meet our product review criteria.

We use one tracking ID per product review page so it will be used for both the images and the text links on that page. However, if you want to go even deeper and see which individual links are performing the best, you can use a tracking id for each individual link. So you might have a tracking id for the image link, a different tracking id for the first link in your product review, a different tracking id for the second link and so on. But as we said previously, you only ever get 100 tracking ids per Amazon account so doing it this way will mean that you have the potential for running out of tracking ids fairly quickly.

So how do you Create a Tracking ID in Amazon?

1. Sign into your Amazon Associates account.

2. Click on Account Settings in the top right hand corner of your screen.

3. In the Account Information Section find the bullet point “Manage your tracking IDs” and click on it.

4. Click the Add Tracking ID button and you will be presented with a page where you can add a tracking ID (see image below). Add the tracking ID that you have decided to use for a particular product or website in the blank box. We usually type in a word that relates to the product we are promoting. So for instance, say that we have written a product review for the iPod Touch. If we wanted to create a tracking ID for that page we might enter the words “ipod-touch” into that tracking ID field. So the tracking ID would look like this - ipod-touch-20 (Note that Amazon IDs end in ’20′ in North America).

5. Click the search button and Amazon will do a search to make sure the Tracking ID is unique. Amazon will let you know straight away whether the ID is available and if it is you can start using it on your product review page.

How to Add the Tracking ID to the Product Review

1. Open your product review post in WordPress. Also open your Amazon Product page in a new tab or window, whichever suits the way you work with multiple internet windows.

2. On the top line of the product page in Amazon you will find the words “Link to this page”. Click on that link. This will open the ‘Customize and Get HTML’ pop-up.

3.You will see two drop-down boxes – one says “Signed in as” and the other says “Tracking ID” Click the down arrow and select the Tracking ID for the product review you just created (see image below). Amazon will automatically change the code in the HTML code box so that it now includes your tracking ID.

4. Now, you can simply grab the code and add it to either your image or text links as you would normally do and the tracking id will be included. (For instructions on adding Amazon links to images click here.)

So there you have it a quick and easy way to keep track of where your clicks and conversions are coming from as your Tracking ID will show in your Amazon Tracking ID Summary report.

You will be able to see at a glance, how many clicks, items ordered, items shipped, shipped item revenue and commissions or Advertising Fees each product is producing.

What a Week It’s Been! – A Quick Wrap Up

Sunday, July 18th, 2010 at 1:53 am  
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Well it’s certainly been an absolutely amazing week. We are so glad that our ‘Amazonian Profit Plan‘ ebook has finally been released, and the response has been quite overwhelming, which makes all the time and effort to get it finished, well worthwhile.

A great big thank you to everyone who provided such wonderful feedback. We are still getting through the questions so don’t be concerned if you haven’t had a response, you will be hearing from us fairly soon.

It’s also nice to finally get some time back for our business. For those that have read the ebook, you will know that we focus on five product reviews at a time and we had developed another five a couple of months ago. The only problem was that we didn’t have much time to focus on them as we were spending most of our time on the ebook. So we will be starting back on those in the next couple of weeks as things  quieten down a little.

We will also be getting back to our regular posts so you will see the first of those in the next day or so…Wanda is working on a blog post as we speak.

And finally for those that have been asking about an affiliate program for the ebook, it is ready to go, and here is – the Affiliate Program Link.

We still haven’t had a chance to get any banners created as yet, so there are only text links available for the moment. However,  those of you who are regular readers to our blog will be aware that we tend to find that text links work way better than widgets or banner ads.

If you have any questions about the Affiliate Program please contact us here.



The eBook is Finished…Special 72hr Introductory Offer

Tuesday, July 13th, 2010 at 7:08 pm  
Comments (35)

This is just going to be a fairly short post to let everyone know that the ebook is finished. We have just released it to our email list and I have to say that we are quite overwhelmed with the fantastic feedback we have received so far. We were trying to deliver something worthwhile so from the comments received, we think we achieved it.

So it  is now ready to be released to the rest of the world – if you are interested please click on the link below. We are offering the ebook at a discounted rate for the next 72 hours after which the price will be going up.

The ebook includes our complete blueprint for making money online by promoting Amazon products. You will learn our criteria for choosing products that convert, how to write a product review from start to finish and you also get to see an actual finished example. And we will also detail our main method for getting traffic to our reviews.

It includes step-by-steps for everything so you won’t be left thinking what to do next. This is 75 pages of solid information.

Click the link for the Amazonian Profit Plan

How to Weave a Story into Your Product Reviews

Saturday, July 10th, 2010 at 12:10 am  
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Continuing on from our last blog post, today we are going to go through how to include a story in your product reviews. The reason we add a story is that it makes the story more interesting and entices the reader to continue reading. Let’s put it this way, which version do you find more interesting?

This one:

“Today I am going to review the iPod Touch. This has just been released by Apple and is the equivalent of the iPhone without the phone. This makes it perfect for those who don’t need another phone or want to sign up to a phone plan.  The features of this great little device are extensive and I will be going through each of them today.”

Or this one:

” When Wanda and I were in the US attending a conference, we happened upon the Apple Store in New York. If you’ve ever been there you’ll know what an experience that is, but we happened to be there the day after the iPhone was released to the world, actually we were on a hop on hop off tourist bus and when the guide pointed out the iPod store – we hopped off. Well, what can I say, we were hooked, but unfortunately we couldn’t buy one because they wouldn’t have worked back home in Australia. It was only later when the iPod Touch was released that we ended up buying one of those instead and we are so glad we did.”

The first one is okay but I much prefer the second one. I know I would keep reading to see what happens next.

Weaving a story into a product review lightens up the post and makes it more readable. It also lets the reader know that you are a real person and most people love reviews written by real people.

But what do you do if you don’t have a story?

First of all, you don’t need to have a story for every single product review you write. We have hundreds of reviews online and believe me, they don’t all have a story. But when we do have the opportunity we use a story. And that means when we have a real life story to use.

So we don’t recommend you making one up. You want your readers to trust you. If they see a whole lot of different stories on different reviews on your website they are going to start to get a little suspicious and the trust factor will disappear in a flash.

The story about me and Wanda in New York was 100% accurate. We did get off the bus to check out the Apple store as we really wanted to see the iPhone and we did end up buying an iPod Touch when they were eventually released in Australia.

But let’s assume that didn’t happen and I don’t own an iPod Touch. What I would do is try and create a story out of my personal feelings for the product or those of family and friends.

For instance:

  • my opinion of the iPod Touch before I purchased it was that it looked like a lot of fun and I really had to have one
  • a work mate at my last full time job loves gadgets and discussed this product with me a few times
  • I know my niece would love one of these if she saw it in action

So that’s just three simple (truthful) statements that relate to me and family and friends. Now I take those statements and see if I can create a story from one or all of them. Just remember that a story doesn’t mean making something up – it simply means making the product review more personal.

So my opening paragraph for my review might sound like this:

“My nieces birthday is coming up and I have been thinking about what to get her. I am a real fan of gadgets and I know she is too so I thought that perhaps an iPod Touch might be a good choice. I personally want one of these myself so may just end up buying two but either way I think it might be a great gift. So because I never buy anything without doing the research, I’ve spent a considerably amount of time checking them out to see if they are actually worth the money. Here’s what I found out…”

You can see how I took something as simple as one statement about a family member and created a story from it.  It’s only a couple of sentences of personal stuff but it gets the reader in and interested in what I have to day.

Here’s another version:

“In my last job, I had a work mate who loved gadgets. Since I am the gadget queen we would speak extensively about the latest devices and gizmos. One gadget that came up often in our discussions was the iPod Touch.  This is one amazing little device. Some call it the iPhone without a phone and that is essentially what it is. It can pretty much do everything the iPhone can do except make a phone call or take photos. This means the iPod Touch is cheaper and you don’t have to sign up to any lengthy phone plans. I like that!”

For the rest of your review you can just get on and talk about the product and its benefits and if you like throw in a few personal touches as you go. For instance:

  • “I really like this feature”
  • “I really like how the iPod Touch has a wifi function so you can connect to the internet and email when you are out and about.”
  • “This isn’t a feature I would use but I know others would find it super convenient”
  • “When my friend spoke about this, he mentioned that…”

Making your reviews more personal really does improve conversion rates so take a little extra time if you can to come up with something to suit your product review.