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Information from Amazon.com concerning their referral fee structure What items qualify for fees
and how are the fees calculated?
Associates earn referral fees when a visitor follows a link from the Associate site to Amazon.com and makes a purchase and the item ships. Please note that referral fees are calculated from the sale price, not the list price for each qualifying item. Referral fees payments are as follows: 5% of the sale price of retail items sold by Amazon.com. Items purchased from all of the Amazon.com storefronts listed below will earn a 5% referral fee: o Books *** 15% of the sale of individually linked books listed in our catalog at 10% to 30% off the list price via Direct Links. In order to be eligible for 15%, the book must be added to the customer's Shopping Cart directly from the product detail page they land on at Amazon.com. Indirect sales of books from Amazon.com storefronts earn 5%. Referral fees for non-media products are limited to a maximum earning of $10 per item. Amazon.com Gift Certificates and products sold by a third party through a site to which Amazon.com links, such as Drugstore.com or Expedia.com do not qualify for referral fees. Marketplace products sold by third parties will qualify for a referral fee of 2.5%. A qualifying Marketplace product is defined as any product sold by a third party seller on our site other than our "Auctions" or "zShops" services. Such items appear on the detail page for an Amazon.com product as new, used or refurbished. This includes items from Target, Marshall Fields, Office Depot, Circuit City, and others, as well as items sold in our Amazon.com Apparel and Accessories store. (Target and Circuit City products shipped by Amazon.com qualify for a 2.5% referral fee. Items ordered directly from Target.com or ordered from Amazon.com, but picked up directly at Circuit City do not qualify for this fee.) 5% of the sale of Marketplace products sold by ToysRUs.com, BabiesRUs.com, and Imaginarium.com. What is the distinction between a Direct and an Indirect purchase? Our system tracks the paths your customers take to the items they purchase. If a customer follows a direct link to a title and then adds it to his shopping basket, it is considered a direct purchase. If, after following a direct link, the customer browses Amazon.com before deciding on an item to purchase, then he is considered to have arrived at the item indirectly. Any non-title specific links (Home Page, Searchbox, Redirect or Programmed Search link) are considered indirect. The 15% referral fee
is designed to compensate Associates for successfully marketing specific
books (those discounted 10%-30%) related to their Web sites' subject matter.
If the customer makes a purchasing decision before or as they arrive at
the title's detail page, then the Associate's marketing efforts are primarily
responsible for the customer's purchasing decision. If, on the other hand,
the customer feels the need to look for other titles at Amazon.com before
making a purchasing decision, then these indirect purchases are compensated
at 5% of the sale price. Once visitors click through my link to Amazon.com, how much time do they have to put an item in the shopping cart before I stop earning referral fees on their purchases? You may earn a referral fee for any qualifying items placed in a customer's shopping cart during a 24-hour window. This window begins at the time a visitor clicks through your Associates link. However, the 24-hour window will close if the customer submits his/her order or reenters Amazon.com through another Associate's link. Once the window is closed, any additional purchases will not earn referral fees for your Associates account. If the customer returns to Amazon.com through your Associates link, this will generate a new 24-hour window. Please note that a customer may follow your Associates link, add an item to his/her shopping cart and then leave Amazon.com without completing an order. As long as the item was added to the shopping cart during the 24-hour window, you will earn a referral fee on this item even if the actual order is placed several weeks later. Of course, the customer must purchase the item, accept delivery, and remit full payment to us before the referral fee is credited to your Associates account. |