Are you looking for profitable ways to boost sales on Amazon?
Perhaps you’ve tried running external traffic to your listing but haven’t been able to make the numbers work.
Well, by activating Amazon’s Brand Referral Bonus program you can earn cashback for every sale you make from external traffic.
This helps offset external traffic costs and drive up your overall profit margins.
In this article, we’ll take a look at what the Amazon Brand Referral Bonus is all about and how sellers can set up their own referral campaign in just a few steps!
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What is the Brand Referral Bonus program?
The Amazon Brand Referral Bonus is a program that rewards Amazon sellers for driving external traffic to their listings.
When you activate the bonus, Amazon will pay you a percentage of each sale that is generated as a result of driving new, external traffic to the platform.
This percentage varies depending on the product category and is paid as a credit against referral fees Amazon sellers pay on each sale made.
How much does each category earn?
Amazon gives estimated bonus rates which are subject to change at any time.
Here are the most recent rates.
| Brand Referral Bonus Categories | Estimated Bonus Rate |
|---|---|
| Amazon Device Accessories | 30% |
| Amazon Explore | 20% |
| Clothing & Accessories (including active wear) | 11% |
| Books (including Collectible Books); Music; Software & Computer/Video Games; Video & DVD; Collectible Books; Home & Garden; Kitchen; Mattresses; Musical Instruments; Office Products; Outdoors; Sports (excluding Sports Collectibles); Pet Supplies; Toys & Games; Luggage & Travel Accessories; Shoes, Handbags & Sunglasses; Everything Else | 10% |
| 3D Printed Products; Industrial & Scientific (including Food Service and Janitorial & Sanitation) | 8% |
| Camera and Photo; Cell Phone Devices; Consumer electronics; Full-Size Appliance; Personal Computers; Video Game Consoles; | 5% |
| Tools & Home Improvement | 10%, except 8% for base equipment power tools |
| Automotive & Power sports | 8%, except 7% for tires and wheel products |
| Baby Products (excluding Baby Apparel); Beauty; Health & Personal Care (including Personal Care Appliances); | 5% for products with a total price of $10.00 or less, and 10% for products with a total sales prices greater than $10.00 |
| Collectible Coins | 10% for the portion of the total sales price up to $250, 7% for any portion of the total sales price greater than $250 up to $1,000, and 4% for any portion of the total sales price greater than $1,000. |
| Compact Appliances (including parts and accessories) | 10% for the portion of the total sales price up to $300.00, and 5% for any portion of the total sales price greater than $300.00 |
| Electronics Accessories | 10% for the portion of the total sales price up to $100.00, and 5% for any portion of he total sales price greater than $100.00 |
| Entertainment Collectibles | 14% for the portion of total sale price up to $100, 7% for the portion of total sale price greater than $100, up to $1000, and 4% for the portion of total sale price greater than $1000 |
| Fine Art | 14% for the portion of the total sales price up to $100, 10% for the portion of the total sales price greater than $100 up to $1,000, 7% for the portion of the total sales price greater than $1,000 up to $5,000, and 3% for the portion of the total sales price greater than $5,000 |
| Furniture (including outdoor furniture) | 10% for the portion of the total sales price up to $200.00, and 7% for any portion of the total sales price greater than $200.00 |
| Grocery & Gourmet Food | 5% for products with a total sales price of $15.00 or less, and 10% for products with a total sales price greater than $15.00 |
| Jewelry | 14% for the portion of the total sales price up to $250.00, and 3% for any portion of the total sales price greater than $250.00 |
| Sports Collectibles | 10% for the portion of the total sales price up to $100, and 7% for any portion of the total sales price greater than $100 up to $1,000, and 4% for any portion of the total sales price greater than $1,000 |
| Watches | 11% for the portion of the total sales price up to $1,500.00, and 2% for any portion of the total sales price greater than $1,500.00 |
| Gift Cards | 14% |
As you’ll notice, the vast majority of private label brand owners will be operating in the 10% range.
This means that when you make a sale from external traffic you will receive a 10% bonus on the final selling price credited against your Amazon fees.
Amazon applies Brand Referral Bonus payments as a discount to referral fees after a two-month holding period to accommodate order cancellations and customer returns.
Why is Amazon offering this bonus?
Amazon wants to encourage sellers to drive more external traffic and believes that offering this bonus will incentivize them to do that.
External traffic is vital for Amazon to find new customers and continue its growth trajectory whilst satisfying its investors.
As the eCommerce market matures it gets harder for Amazon to continue to post such large growth numbers year on year so it is forced to innovate with new strategies.
One of these strategies is using this new program to encourage sellers toward driving traffic with off-Amazon advertising, growing its overall audience.
Learn 7 effective ways to drive external traffic to Amazon listings.
Brand Referral Bonus program eligibility requirements
The bonus is available to all brand owners selling in the Amazon US marketplace.
Brand owners must be registered with Amazon Brand Registry in order to be eligible to apply for the bonus.
How to activate the Brand Referral Bonus
Once you’ve enrolled in Brand Registry, setting up your Amazon Brand Referral Bonus is relatively straightforward.
1. Enroll in the Brand Referral Bonus program
Head to Seller Central, open the menu and navigate to Brands > Build Your Brand.
The ‘Brand Referral Bonus’ menu item as seen in this screenshot from my account won’t be visible until you activate the service.
Next, scroll down to the ‘All Brand Programs’ section and here you’ll find the Brand Referral Bonus page where you’ll be able to activate the program.
2. Create Amazon Attribution tags
Once you’ve activated the bonus you will then need to generate a unique Amazon Attribution tag for each separate source of off-Amazon traffic you are looking to run.
To do this, head to Seller Central and in your menu navigate to Advertising > Campaign Manager > Measurement & Reporting and then Amazon Attribution.
Scroll down to the campaigns section and click ‘Create’ to get underway.
Once you have your campaign set up, grab your Amazon Attribution tag ready for the next step.
3. Launch your marketing campaigns
If you’re looking to drive external traffic to an Amazon listing for the first time, I’d recommend starting with one campaign – keep it simple.
You might try Google Ads, an influencer marketing campaign, or any number of other options for driving external traffic, but stick with one at first.
Learn the step-by-step process of how to run Google Ads for Amazon products.
Then, as you add more non-Amazon marketing efforts to your strategy, make sure you create unique Amazon Attribution tags for each individual campaign so you can track performance.
4. Maximize the impact of the Brand Referral Bonus
Finally, to get the most out of this extra referral fee credit, consider running some internal marketing alongside the Amazon Brand Referral Program.
For instance, you could drive external traffic to Amazon with an Amazon Attribution tag whilst also running a special offer or lightning deal on your products.
Then, you could retarget customers who visited your listing but didn’t purchase with an Amazon Sponsored Display campaign.
How do I check the amount of Brand Referral Bonus I’ve received?
Once you’ve got your campaigns running and Amazon Attribution tags are tracking the performance of each campaign, you can easily check the amount of bonus Amazon has given to you.
Head to your Amazon Brand Referral Bonus page, scroll down to the ‘How does it work?’ section, and under section 3 you’ll see a button to download your report.
The report is a rather basic Excel spreadsheet that shows the amount of bonus earned, paid, and used.
Driving profitable growth with the Amazon Brand Referral Bonus
Now you’ve got the Brand Referral Bonus program set up, the Amazon Attribution program activated, and are driving off-Amazon traffic to the platform you can begin to reap the benefits of this generous program.
By being credited 10% of the sale price of all external traffic-driven sales in the form of a referral fee credit, you can factor extra profit into your external marketing efforts.
For example, this means that a Google Ads campaign you may have capped at a $0.50c cost per click could be pushed out to $0.65c bids to attract more clicks generate more traffic and increase overall sales volumes.
So, what are you waiting for? Follow the steps outline in this article to get your Amazon Brand Referral dashboard set up today and start making the most of your Bezos Bonus (trademark pending).
And, if you want more help with topics like this, consider joining us inside Brand Builder University.
