Walmart Affiliate Program Vs Amazon Affiliate Program 2021

Introduction

Affiliate marketing is one of the popular ways of making money and generating revenue online without putting in much effort.

It is a process whereby retailers and wholesalers give you a percentage of the sale made as a commission when you promote and sell their products to customers.

As an affiliate marketer, your primary job is to search for customers, introduce them to the brand you are promoting, and ensure that they buy a product.

According to the statistics, the annual affiliate marketers spend is over $10 billion. And affiliate marketing is responsible for e-commerce sales of over 15% in the US and Canada.

These statistics are proof to show just how affiliate marketing is growing. There are lots of affiliate programs you can join to make money online. Walmart affiliate program and Amazon affiliate program are two of the best affiliate programs that have been on top of the game helping people generate sales and make money online over the years.

In this Walmart Vs Amazon Affiliate program, we’ll put both programs to the test and see how they compare.

We will take a look at each program’s benefits, commission structure, disadvantages, and more so you can make an informed decision at the end.

Let’s dive into this post and see who wins this Walmart vs Amazon affiliate program battle?

What is Walmart Affiliate Program?

Walmart Affiliate program is an affiliate program hosted by the company Walmart where website owners get a commission for promoting Walmart products.

In this affiliate program, you insert links and ads on your website to refer customers to Walmart. And if they make any purchase on Walmart, you get paid a particular percentage out of the total amount.

Sounds interesting right?

The more people that make purchases through your affiliate link and ads, the more commission you earn.

What is Amazon Affiliate Program?

Amazon Affiliate Program is an affiliate program that’s free to join for bloggers and website owners and they get to generate revenue by promoting Amazon products.

As an Amazon affiliate, you promote products from Amazon on your site through ads and links.

When customers click your ads or links and buy products from Amazon, you earn affiliate commission from that sale.

How To Join The Walmart Affiliate Program?

It’s very simple and straightforward to join the Walmart affiliate program. And you don’t have to pay to join the affiliate program.

It’s free for anyone who wishes to make money from selling Walmart products.

To join the Walmart affiliate program, follow the following steps:

Go to the Walmart affiliate program page and click on the link to sign-up for the affiliate program.
You’ll be asked your name, address, location, company name and URL, and some other important information while registering.
After you have signed up, you’ll have to wait for around 24 hours to be approved as an affiliate.
After then, you’ll be provided with various banner ads and text links as well that you can use to promote Walmart products on your website.
If you’re approved to join the Walmart affiliate program, you can get Information on their top-selling products so you can advertise them on your website.

How To Join The Amazon Affiliate Program?

Here’s how you can join the Amazon affiliate program.

You need to have or create a blog, an app, a website, or a YouTube channel before you can apply to be an Amazon affiliate.
Next, go to the Amazon affiliate program webpage and click the link to join now for free.
If you already have an Amazon account, you should log into it at this point. If not, you’ll need to create an Amazon account.
Start your affiliate profile by clicking on the option ’new customer’.
Enter your contact information which includes your name, address, phone number, and name of your website/app/blog/youtube channel.
Enter your store ID and choose the topics/niche on Amazon your audience is likely to buy from.
Receive your unique affiliate ID

Commission Structure of Walmart Affiliate Program

Walmart is a company that makes a lot of money but incur a lot of cost in advertising, shipping, production, and other expenses which is why their affiliate commission rates are pretty low.

The commission you earn as an affiliate on Walmart differs and depends on the product category.

For most categories on Walmart, you get between 1% and 4% commission rate. Also, Walmart offers you a cookie duration of three days. This means if someone clicks on it, they have three days to buy the product for which you’ll still earn an affiliate commission. Unlike Amazon that offers only a one-day cookie duration.

Commission Structure Of Amazon Affiliate Program

Amazon also offers you different commission rates depending on the product category you’re promoting.

And as mentioned earlier, they offer a cookie duration of 24 hours (1 day). This means your referrals need to purchase the product not more than 24 hours after they clicked on your affiliate link for you to get a reward for that sale.

Let’s take a look at Amazon’s product categories and rates.

Amazon Product Category & Commission Rates

Televisions, Computers, Consumer Electronics & Accessories (excl. Data Storage Devices) – 5%
Grocery & Pantry – 8%
Home & Baby – 6%
Kitchen Appliances & Kitchen & Housewares – 9%
Furniture, Outdoors, DIY & Tools – 9%
Automotive, Lawn, Garden & Sports – 6%
Large Appliances, Movies, Music, Software & Video Games – 5%
Books, Office Products, Industrial & Scientific Products, Pet Products & Toys – 5%
Mobile Accessories & Musical Instruments – 4%
Apparel & Accessories & Luggage & Bags, Watches & Shoes – 5%
Health, Beauty & Personal care & Personal Care Appliances – 2%
Jewelry (Excluding silver & Gold coins) & Gourmet – 5%
Bicycles & Heavy Gym Equipment, Tyres & Rims – 2.5%
Data Storage Devices – 2%
Mobile Phones* – 1%
Gold & Silver Coins – 0.2%
All Other Categories – 5%

Pros of Walmart Affiliate Program

Wide Selection of Products

Walmart has a wide selection of products. You get a variety of products to promote from entertainment, educational material to decoration, and more.

As an affiliate marketer, there’s a lot of niches to choose from in Walmart which is one of the important aspects when picking an affiliate program.

Deep Linking Available

Walmart affiliate program allows you to deep link. Deep Linking means that you can send a customer who clicks on your affiliate link to a specific product page for a specific category instead of sending them to Walmart’s home-page directly.

This helps you boost conversions on your affiliate campaigns.

Trusted Company = Higher Conversions

Walmart is one of the trusted companies in the world when it comes to retail shopping. They have over 2 million associates and offer fair and high conversions compared to some other affiliate programs.

Adequate Promotional Materials

Walmart provides you with promotional materials like banners, ads, and links to ensure you have what it takes to promote their products smoothly.

Link Cloaking

In the Walmart affiliate program, you can cloak your affiliate links. You can have your affiliate links shortened rather than sending your customers to a long, ugly affiliate link.

This is one feature I like about Walmart and makes it better than the Amazon affiliate program.

Cookie Duration

This is another feature of the Walmart affiliate program I love. You get a cookie duration of 3 days.

This means that your customer has to purchase from Walmart within three days after clicking on your link for you to get your affiliate commission.

Cons Of Walmart Affiliate Program

Extremely Low Payouts

The payout and commission structure of Walmart is a little on the downside. I mean, 1% for making a sale on video games is quite low.

But on the bright side, there are some niches in the Walmart affiliate program that have high commission rates so you can go for them.

Overwhelming Choice For a Beginner

The Walmart affiliate program might not be a good choice for a beginner. To succeed at affiliate marketing as a beginner, you need to learn a lot.

And Walmart has little to no educational blogs, podcasts, ebooks, videos out there for a newbie to get started, unlike the Amazon affiliate program.

Pros of Amazon Affiliate program

Popular Brand

Amazon is one of the best e-commerce brands in the world. Almost everyone who uses the internet knows about Amazon and what they have to offer.

As an affiliate marketer, this is a huge opportunity for you because people like buying from websites they trust are aware of, and (likely) have used before.

When people click on your link or ads and it sends them to Amazon’s site, most of your work is done as people probably know the brand, know what it does, and that is an added advantage for you.

Best Converting Website

Amazon knows how to sell goods. Not only do they have a very good shipping-policy, but they have also put in millions in conversion rate and machine learning.

When someone clicks on your link that sends them to Amazon.com, you are leveraging all the money spent and efforts from the smartest marketing people in the world that have created the Amazon purchase funnel.

From the follow-up emails to the “buy it now button” and even related suggested products to buy, everything is optimized for the customer to buy something before they leave. And when they do, you earn an affiliate commission.

People Stay “Logged In”

One of the pros of the Amazon affiliate program is that most of the time, people are logged into their accounts when going around the internet.

This means that if your customer clicks on your links to Amazon and the customer already has an Amazon account, the process of checkout immediately becomes very easy since they already have an existing account.

All they need to do is select the option of the “Buy It Now” button.

Fantastic Tracking Capabilities

Using smart-cookies, you’ll also earn a commission if someone clicks your link on mobile, but purchases at home later via a desktop computer.

Your affiliate cookie tracks the customer for 24 hours after the click. This is typically not a long time but it’s enough time for a customer to buy, and you get your commission.

Millions of Products Available

According to Scrape Hero, there are 200,000,000 products available to promote on Amazon. And every day, they are adding 1,300,000 new products on average.

There’s a whole lot of product inventory on Amazon. And it’s safe to say that if the products you want to promote aren’t on Amazon, chances are that the product is not worth promoting.

And if you send someone to Amazon with a link leading to a “ lounge” but they buy a set of chairs instead, you get paid affiliate commission on all the products also (that’s Amazon’s funnel at work for you right there).

Semi-Decent Commission Rates

Although you will or must have heard plenty of people who complain about Amazon’s commission rates, it is still decent and what is typically offered by most affiliate programs for physical products.

You can’t get a higher commission rate with physical products because of the cost incurred on the shipping and production.

Trusted & Reliable Affiliate Program

There are situations where an affiliate program shuts down and the affiliate commissions go down with it.

Although it’s not impossible, it is unlikely Amazon will ever go bankrupt. It’s also improbable they will stop their affiliate program since it is one of the biggest contributors to Amazon’s impressive growth.

Perfect For Beginners

Lastly, the Amazon affiliate program is one of the best affiliate programs any beginner can jump into to dip their feet into affiliate marketing.

It’s straightforward and a legitimate program that puts beginners’ minds at rest because they know they are promoting a great company with great products.

Cons Of Amazon Affiliate Program

Short Tracking Time Frame

A lot of people think that the 24-hour cookie window given to get a customer to make a purchase is quite short.

And it is. You only earn commissions once your referral completes the purchase within 24 hours from the initial link click.

No PayPal

This is one of the biggest cons of the Amazon affiliate program. Most affiliates outside of the US will need PayPal to receive payments.

However, PayPal is not one of the payment options of Amazon. Instead, they offer Checks, gift cards, and bank transfers.

Final Words

There is no clear winner between the Walmart affiliate program and the Amazon affiliate program.

Both affiliate programs are free to join and have a decent commission structure.

If you want a program good for beginners and have high conversion rates, the Amazon affiliate program is better.

But when it comes to payment method and cookie duration, the Walmart affiliate program is a better pick.

Let me know your thoughts on the Walmart affiliate program and Amazon affiliate program in the comment section below.

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