Amazon Associates Vs ClickBank.

 

Chances are you’re new to affiliate marketing, but keen to learn more, right?  You’ve heard about ordinary people earning real passive income online and you want a slice of the action!  Good on ya, I say! Or, you’re confused about whether to start with Clickbank or Amazon Associates. Well, in this article, I will compare and contrast both affiliate marketing platforms and help you decide which one is great for you.

 

There are hundreds if not thousands of affiliate networks out there with different vendor offers. However, Amazon Associates and ClickBank are two of the most popular ones. So, you must choose the right network because it will greatly influence the products that you promote, and overall the sales and commissions you generate.

That being said, let’s dive right into the differences between these two platforms.

 

 

What Is ClickBank And Who Is It For?

ClickBank is a place for lesser-known digital product creators to connect with affiliate marketers. So, the affiliate marketers take these digital products, sell them and earn a commission off of these sales. It is a large marketplace that specializes in digital products, this means you can sell or promote products ranging anywhere from eBooks, video tutorials, software, and many other services.

This makes ClickBank great for beginners who are interested in selling digital products. If you’re looking to promote a product on ClickBank or maybe you just wrote an eBook and you’re looking for a way to sell that, then you can go to https://www.clickbank.com/ and sign up.

 

 

What Is Amazon Associates and Who Is It For?

Amazon Associates is the affiliate platform for people who are looking to promote Amazon products via a website or YouTube channel. So, if you’re looking to promote physical products then Amazon Associates is the option for you. You can go to https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/ to sign up.

 

 

What Are The Differences In The Features of Both Platforms?

 

1.Type Of Product

Amazon Associates primarily focuses on physical products, whereas, ClickBank primarily focuses on digital products such as eBooks, videos, courses, and many others.

 

2.Registration

Amazon is quite demanding and picky. To get registered with Amazon Associates, you’ll have to meet some requirements. One of the requirements is that you’ll have to have a website ( content creation website) or a YouTube channel. With ClickBank on the other hand, the registration process is quite easy; all you have to do is to fill out their registration form, and then you get the account.

However, ClickBank and Amazon Associates are restricted in certain countries– this might make you ineligible to apply.

 

3.Commissions

When it comes to commission, Amazon Associates gives you anywhere from 1% to 10% commission of each product you sell. With ClickBank, you’re getting anywhere from 20% to 75% commission on each product you sell. ClickBank is far superior in this sense.  For instance, several people are earning $10k a day on ClickBank.  Imagine that??  Crazy amount of money.

 

4.TOS and Policy

Just like the registration, it is strict with their terms of service and policies. As an Amazon Affiliate, you’re required to disclose on your website or YouTube channel that you’re affiliated with Amazon and that you’re getting a commission on the product you’re advertising. Second, you’re not allowed to put the prices of the product you’re promoting on your website. Third, you’re not allowed to copy feedbacks and reviews from Amazon to your website.

There are more rules to follow, and I highly recommend you read Amazon’s TOS before promoting any product else you run the risk of your account being banned.

 

ClickBank’s TOS is easy and simple. You can pretty much do everything you want. Their TOS aren’t that strict and I haven’t heard anyone’s account being banned.

 

5.Cookies

Amazon Associates offers cookies for only 24-hours. This means that if someone clicks your affiliate link and goes to Amazon and doesn’t buy anything at that moment, the person will have 24 hours to come back and make the purchase for you to earn a commission. If the person buys the product using your link after 24 hours, you won’t get a commission. So, anyone that clicks on your Amazon Associate link has 24 hours to purchase a product for you to earn a commission.

Also, with Amazon Associates, if when a visitor clicks on your link and buys another product besides the one you’re promoting, you get a commission for those purchases as well.

ClickBank, on the other hand, offers a 30-day cookie. So, if someone clicks on your affiliate link, the person has 30 days to purchase for you to make a commission.

 

 

6.Commission Payment

For this, I can only share my personal experience and for this, it mainly depends on the country. For example, I live in Europe, and to get paid by Amazon US, the only viable solution is getting paid by check. So, Amazon physically writes out a check and sends it to me via mail. this means I’d have to wait a few weeks for my payment to arrive.

 

However, ClickBank does a direct deposit right into your bank account with no hassle.

 

Pros and Cons Of Amazon Associates:

Pros:

Millions Of Products To Choose From

We all know Amazon is one of the biggest retailers in the world, and this means it is going to have millions of products for you to choose from. This means you’re going to find some sort of niche and products you can promote; it is going to be easy to find such niches and products.

 

 

Higher Credibility

Amazon again being one of the biggest retailers in the world has so much credibility, millions of people already have their credit card info stored on Amazon, and there is so much trust when it comes to Amazon. This plays a huge role when it comes to marketing and sales because if someone feels comfortable purchasing from a website, they are going to purchase a lot more which gives you a lot better commissions.

 

Products

Most of the products you would be advertising are products people are already buying. So, it is very easy for you to interject within that stream and be able to put in your affiliate link you’re getting a commission for that sale.

 

Make Money through Friends and Family

You can easily send Amazon product links to your family and easily make money off it. So, let’s say your uncle Billy is like ” hey, what’s that mattress pad that I slept on last weekend?” You can send him a link to that Amazon product and make a commission off that. This might not be the most sustainable way to build a business but you might as well make money where the opportunity is.

 

 

Cons:

 

Low Commission

As discussed earlier, Amazon only gives you a 5- 10% commission of every sale which is honestly very low compared to the rest of the affiliate marketing industry.

 

Saturation

A lot of products on Amazon are very saturated meaning that the market for them is very condensed with a lot of other sellers( a lot of other affiliate marketers). This means it can be pretty hard for you to make sales especially when you’re only making 5 to 10% commissions, a lot of people are going to be trying to pump a lot of Ads and rank as many pages as they can to make enough sales to make more money.

 

Majority Buy Through Amazon Search

 

Very few people usually go through an Amazon link or review site to purchase a product, that does happen but when most people want to purchase something, they go to Amazon, type it in and make their purchase.

 

Reviews Are Super Competitive

If you are creating a review site or creating a review video on YouTube, a lot of those products are supersaturated. So, if you’re planning on going the Amazon niche route, I recommend you find a less popular niche so, that you can create content and worry about competing.

 

Pros and Cons Of ClickBank:

 

Pros:

Wide Variety Of Products

So, there are tons of products on ClickBank, this makes it easy for you to find a niche and a product you want to choose from. When you go to ClickBank and you hit the ” Affiliate Marketplace”, you’re going to see 24 broad niches on the left-hand side. Each of these niches has tons of sub-niches you can choose from.

 

High Commissions

One of the best parts of ClickBank is that they offer 20% to 75% commission, which is good especially when the product is less than $100, you’re making $20 or more instead of $2 on Amazon. If you’re trying to make a good amount of money off affiliate marketing, ClickBank is going to be better.

 

Recurring Commission

Another great thing about ClickBank is that they offer recurring commissions on a lot of their products. So, if you sell a product that has a monthly subscription of $50, assuming you get a 50% commission which is $25 off that sales, you’re going to make $25 each month the person renews their subscription.

On Amazon, they do not have any of those subscription plans, so, you cannot get recurring commissions.

 

Less Competition

Since the products on ClickBank are more unique, there’s going to be less competition because you won’t have a lot of people promoting products that have to do with making money online or living a happier life or whatever it is you decide to sell. So, when promoting a lot of these unique products, there’s going to be a lot less commission when it comes to running ads, doing reviews, and such.

 

 

Higher Margin

Since ClickBank only has digital products, it is going to have higher margins. This is because, with physical products, there is a lot of costs when it comes to production, housing the products in a warehouse, and also shipping the product. A lot of the sellers and manufacturers do not get enough margin so, they are not going to pay out as much to the affiliates. However, with digital products, with an email address, the seller can email the product to the buyer with no hassle.

 

Cons:

Products Have to Be Sold Not Bought

What I mean by this is that on Amazon Associates, people are going to buy the product anyway, so, they are just looking for reviews. However, with this, there are a lot of products that people do not know about so, they need to be sold on the product. This means you do have to be a bit of an advanced marketer or salesman to make sales on ClickBank.

However, if you if you’re able to have those skills then you’re going to be able to make sales easily.

 

Less Credibility

There is a lot less credibility with ClickBank than there is with Amazon Associates. Not a lot of people know what ClickBank is, so, if they are going to some random website, they are not going to be as comfortable purchasing as they would with Amazon.

 

A Lot Of The Top Products Are Saturated

Top products on ClickBank are saturated by people who have a really large email list or big ad budget. So, if you’re just getting started, it can be a lot harder for you to produce sales on those top products.

 

Which One Is Best?

 

Clickbank is better with affiliate marketing because they offer top quality products and you can either advertise someones else’s or create your own. Well, on the one hand, it is and this is one of the reasons why I use it.

However, it boils down to the kind of affiliate product you’re looking to sell. If you’re looking to promote digital products with higher commissions percentages, then ClickBank is going to be the better option. No doubt about that, at all.

I do recommend Amazon Associates if you run a blog and have a high level of traffic looking to buy physical products. To earn any decent money from it you will need a LOT of traffic as the commission is really low.  With ClickBank, the commissions are as high as 90%.

If you want to be a successful affiliate marketer, you have to have some salesmanship ability if you’re not using Amazon Associates. So, if you’re using any affiliate platform besides Amazon, you need to know how to sell and take people through the process from being a cold lead to a warm buyer.

I recommend using ClickBank University to learn. It will skyrocket your chances of success!

 

 

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