While I know you are asking this question to likely satisfy a day dream of yours…
Trust me I’ve been there too, it’s very common in the “make money online niche”.
The truth is….
….you can make as much or as little as you want.
You’ll see others answer this question with arbitrary numbers such as $25k / month, etc.
But this all depends on who YOU are and which skill YOU possess.
For example if Kylie Jenner posted only Amazon affiliates links for one month, she’d likely make MILLIONS of dollars from Amazon.
But why doesn’t she?
Because she owns her own store and makes A LOT more money than that each month.
As an Affiliate you are an online sales man.
Your job is to direct traffic that are interested in certain products or services through your affiliate link, to then get a commission.
This sounds easy in theory, but finding targeted traffic like that is difficult.
Don’t believe me?
Companies are paying $1–50 a click on Google Ads trying to direct would be buyers to their store.
My point is that traffic is valuable!
The real question you should be asking is: Is Amazon’s affiliate program worth it?
The short answer is usually NO.
You see, when you start an online business as an affiliate marketer, places like Google Adsense and Amazon associates are easy to join.
However, they are also the bottom of the totem pole when it comes to income potential…
To understand this, you need to understand the value chain of an affiliate marketer (I.E. you).
Amazon is already an established brand, so their affiliate payout rates are going to be VERY low compared to what other brands will pay for the same traffic.
For example, if I was trying to sell a Dehumidifier that costs $100, I would only make $4 of that sale as an Amazon affiliate as it would be categorized as “other” down below.
Making $4 on a $100 sale is extremely low.
Now
I know there is the chance that as someone buys the Dehumidifier, they also buy a PS4 and TV, etc which I would also get paid out on, but even then we would be better off being an affiliate elsewhere.
Doing a quick Google search for Dehumidifier affiliate program landed me on a Dehumidifer vendor site that pays 15% instead of 4%.
The best part about it?
If you send quality traffic, you could easily get that up to 25% a sale….
Try doing that on Amazon.
As Ilya mentioned:
Amazon affiliates competition is very high, because anyone can signup.
You are building your entire business around a 3rd party, is Amazon going anywhere? No. But they can easily close up their affiliate program anytime they want too, then what?
Very low income potential compared to focusing on multiple merchants.
As we already discussed, getting buyer intent traffic is difficult.
Companies are willing to pay a lot of money for this traffic, if you are able to generate it.
I’m not sure if you already have a website or YouTube channel, but if you are starting from scratch it’s going to be a long road ahead.
It’s not impossible to make good money as an Amazon affiliate, it’s just a lot of things are stacked against you.
If you have any questions feel free to reach out here