In the digital marketplace, the Amazon affiliate program, one of the largest and most popular, is a vital income source for many blogs monetized through affiliate marketing. However, prolonged and cumbersome URLs can deter potential customers and reduce click-through rates.
Amazon URLs are lengthy because they include parameters and identifiers for internal tracking and analytics. These elements provide robust data to streamline your business but can make links unwieldy. Fortunately, URL shorteners offer a solution by transforming these lengthy links into manageable, shareable ones that enhance engagement and clicks.
In this tutorial, you’ll learn how to optimize your Amazon affiliate marketing workflow by creating concise affiliate links, integrating them automatically into your WordPress website, tracking their performance, and targeting them to your content and audience for maximum impact.
Table of Contents
Why use Amazon short URLs for affiliate marketing?
Shortening Amazon affiliate links transforms long, awkward URLs into simple, appealing ones. These shorter variations attract more clicks and also boost overall performance. Sharing a long, messy Amazon link can look spammy and deter potential customers, whereas a shortened link looks cleaner and more trustworthy.
For example, compare these two links:
Long link:
https://www.amazon.com/Gardena-Micro-Drip-System-Irrigation-Above-Ground-Underground/dp/B0BNLWVZ36/ref=sr_1_17?crid=1BP173HJZQ81G&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.M3PlDCGymlCGndpbIa1HaaMyVvw7j6mXddsECCi4PmAAUhcpLL5P9CVKMA3OMI5I3mx6mi0rwn5wCPGoPuKYQm7W6nlGTigmDvzPB0HwH4IBsb9VM55Jc2rc6-F324O7fy4xGz542cYujY9TogdicoC5XkGipHaH_grmpyn2TX0npBs48zl4QNjn7pcR2fUtAjYrN73hU.LJNq_FgJZEKfPZXdO0eKidKPxQaZTQgCi9vrwdXBmt0&dib_tag=se&keywords=drip+irrigation+system&qid=1718623149&sprefix=drip+ir%2Caps%2C197&sr=8-17
Short link:
https://amzn.to/4b8Q8eK
Both links lead to the same product, but the short link is cleaner, more attractive, and more likely to get clicks.
Short links are also much easier to share on social media and other platforms. They fit neatly into Twitter posts, YouTube video descriptions, and emails, ensuring your content looks professional and inviting. Additionally, they are more straightforward for customers to copy and paste and appear safer and more legitimate, encouraging clicks.
Shortening your Amazon affiliate links makes them more appealing and practical, leading to higher engagement and better affiliate marketing performance.
Understanding Amazon link structure
Grasping the link structure of Amazon products is key to simplifying URLs and maximizing affiliate earnings. Without using a link shortener, you can create a cleaner version of an Amazon link than what you typically see in the browser’s address bar.
When creating a simple text link to an Amazon product, follow this basic structure:
Replace ASIN with the product’s unique identifier and YOUR-ASSOCIATE-ID with your Amazon associate ID. This format is concise and qualifies for the affiliate commission.
ASIN
ASIN stands for “Amazon Standard Identification Number” and is a 10-digit product code. Every item in Amazon’s catalog has a unique ASIN, which you can find on the product page under “Product Details” along with other information like the product’s sales rank.
Your associate ID
When you join the Amazon referral program, Amazon assigns you a unique user ID to track clicks from your website to your Amazon affiliate account. This ID is crucial for accurately attributing sales and commissions to your efforts. Make sure it’s not missing and doesn’t have a typo to secure your accurate payout amount.
Creating additional sub-IDs within your account is beneficial if you manage multiple websites or campaigns. These sub-IDs help you differentiate results across various sites or campaigns in your analytics, allowing you to track performance precisely and optimize your strategies based on specific data insights.
Understanding Amazon’s guidelines regarding link masking vs. URL shortening
Link masking and link shortening are two common techniques in online marketing. Each transforms long, unattractive URLs into short, customized ones. While they may seem similar, there are important differences between them.
Link masking
Link masking, also known as link cloaking, involves altering URLs on your website so that the original link is hidden, and users see a URL that appears to be part of your site. For instance, a masked Amazon link might look like this: https://example.com/product/drip-irrigation
.
The primary concern with link masking is transparency. Users cannot see where you will redirect them, which may lead to distrust. Therefore, Amazon’s guidelines prohibit link masking among their affiliate publishers because it obscures the link’s final target. While there haven’t been widespread reports of account bans due to link masking, it’s crucial to comply with Amazon’s policies to maintain trust and integrity with your audience.
Link shortening
Link shortening typically involves using an external service like TinyURL or Bitly. This process converts a long URL into a shorter one, such as https://tinyurl.com/example. However, just as for link masking, the destination is not immediately apparent to the user. Consequently, using third-party link shorteners violates Amazon’s policy.
For more in-depth information, check out our detailed tutorial on link masking and cloaking, particularly their use in affiliate marketing.
Amazon’s link shortening solution
Fortunately, Amazon offers the dedicated in-house URL shortener amzn.to. This tool allows you to create appealing URLs that comply with the Amazon affiliate program guidelines. It ensures that users can see that they will be directed to Amazon and maintains trust and transparency.
In the next section, I’ll show you how to build an Amazon short URL using this tool.
Utilizing the official Amazon short URL service, Amzn.to
A more compliant option for creating short, appealing URLs is to use Amazon’s official URL shortener. This tool simplifies the process by automatically generating a brief and unique link for you.
To use Amazon’s affiliate short link service through their SiteStripe generator, follow these steps:
- Navigate to the Tools section in your Amazon Associates dashboard and enable SiteStripe. Once activated, the SiteStripe toolbar will appear at the top of any Amazon page.
- Go to the Amazon product page for the item you want to promote.
- Choose the link option on the SiteStripe toolbar (Text, Image, or Text+Image).
- To create a short link, select the “Text” link option and then click on “Short Link.”
This method ensures that your links are short, user-friendly, and compliant with Amazon’s affiliate guidelines.
Using alternative URL shorteners
Another option for shortening your Amazon and other affiliate links is to use third-party services like Bitly or TinyURL. However, it’s important to note that using these link shorteners can technically violate Amazon’s guidelines on link masking.
One exception is Bitly, which allows you to convert link URLs from bit.ly to amzn.to, to ensure compliance with Amazon’s requirements. Many of these third-party services offer free options, with some providing additional features like UTM parameters or advanced tracking through paid subscriptions. Unfortunately, Bitly limits the number of links that can be created to 10 per month, which is far too few for most serious affiliates.
The main drawback of using third-party services is the dependency on their continued operation. If these services suddenly shut down or start charging high fees, you need to update every instance of the shortened links, which can be daunting.
Integrating Amazon short links with Advanced Ads
Advanced Ads is the perfect tool for embedding Amazon links into your WordPress website. Here are the key benefits of using this plugin:
- Automatically insert links into your website’s content
- Manage links in a central place
- Target links precisely to specific content and users
- Monitor the performance of each link with detailed statistics and email reports.
- Set up optional link masking
Creating ad units for your Amazon short links
Once you’ve generated a product link manually through the Amazon short link generator SiteStripe or an external link shortener, the next step is to integrate it into your website. A key benefit of using Advanced Ads is its centralized link management. If a link needs updating, you don’t have to edit every page that includes it manually. Instead, make the change in one central location, and it will automatically update across your site.
To create a new ad unit featuring a text link, follow these straightforward steps:
- Go to Dashboard > Advanced Ads > Ads.
- Click on the “New Ad” button.
- Choose a clear name.
- Select the “Plain Text and Code” ad type.
- Paste the link into the ad code field and specify the anchor text.
- Publish the ad.
Check out our comprehensive tutorial on affiliate links for more detailed information and instructions on effectively utilizing text links.
Embed Amazon short links into your website
Now, you can decide whether to manually integrate these link ads into individual posts or automate their placement across your entire site. Advanced Ads offers versatile placement options, allowing you to position them, for example, at the start, in the middle, or at the end of posts.
Furthermore, you can easily incorporate these text links into your existing ad rotations and customize their visibility using Display or Visitor conditions. This improved targeting ensures that Advanced Ads displays the links selectively, appearing only on pages that fulfill specific criteria, such as containing designated keywords.
Tracking clicks and performance data for Amazon short URLs
When you embed short links using Advanced Ads, you gain the ability to track impressions and click numbers and calculate the click-through rate (CTR) for each text link. This feature eliminates the need for Pro licenses from third-party link shorteners like Bitly. Instead, you can utilize Amazon’s official link shortener and monitor the usage of these links clearly through Advanced Ads.
Moreover, integrating Advanced Ads with Google Analytics enhances your tracking capabilities significantly. This integration lets you capture extensive data, empowering you to make informed decisions and continuously refine your advertising strategies.
Conclusion about Amazon short links and affiliate marketing
Using full-length Amazon product links is problematic due to their lengthy and cryptic structure. They result in lower click-through rates (CTR) than shortened counterparts. These long links are also less shareable, particularly on social media platforms. Therefore, I advise shortening these links to make URLs more concise and clear.
Since Amazon prohibits its affiliate partners from masking product links, the only viable options are Amazon’s in-house short link service, amzn.to, and a few select third-party link shorteners, some of which may require payment.
I recommend utilizing Amazon’s reliable link shortener because it eliminates the need for additional steps in link generation. It allows you to create short links directly while searching for products on the Amazon website. Coupled with an ad or link management plugin like Advanced Ads, you can smoothly integrate these links into your website, centrally manage them, and focus on maximizing your commissions.
Frequently asked questions about Amazon short URLs
Amazon links are long due to essential parameters such as the ASIN (Amazon Standard Identification Number) and your associate ID, which are crucial for tracking referrals and commissions. Other parameters embedded in the URL also contribute to its length and complexity.
To shorten Amazon links, you have two options. First, use the official Amazon short link generator SiteStripe by enabling it in your Amazon Associates dashboard under Tools. On the product page, select Text link, then click “Short Link” to generate a compliant Amazon shortlink. Alternatively, you can use third-party services like Bitly to convert links to amzn.to to avoid violating Amazon’s publisher guidelines.
Amazon URL shorteners are not restricted solely to Amazon sellers. Anyone looking to share Amazon products, including affiliates, content creators, and everyday users, can utilize these tools to get shorter, more manageable links.
The official Amazon short link generator Amzn.to does not provide any tracking options to measure engagement with your links. But if you embed those links with Advanced Ads, the most popular ad management plugin for WordPress, you can monitor clicks, impressions, CTR, and more detailed insights.