Do You Use Amazon Images? You May Be In Violation Of Their TOS Now Thanks To An Update Last Year

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First, as I’ve said before, I absolutely love the Amazon Associates Program. While many people fled the service earlier this year, I have stayed on board and even been seeing some significant growth. With that said, earlier today I found out about a change that was put into effect last year that I had somehow missed, and it’s VERY IMPORTANT!!

In the past, you could download and save Amazon images so long as they were not “customer uploaded images.” This is still a common practice, and as I found out today, in direct violation of Amazon’s current TOS.

A fellow marketer on Facebook messaged me earlier to inform me that his new site that was earning well into 4 figures, 3 months out of the gate, was now earning $0 as his Amazon Associates account was shut down effective this past Saturday.

The reason? He was informed that it “appeared as if he was using images from Amazon that he was hosting himself, which was a gross direct violation of their Operating Agreement, with the only recourse being immediate account termination.”

This is a HUGE issue as many older marketers use this practice on their sites. After a quick phone call to Associates Central this morning, I found out that this rule was put into effect last year, and now you must utilize proper image links from the Amazon Site Stripe instead of hosting your own images.

How You Should Be Adding Amazon Images To Your Site

That sounds very confusing, right? Well, it can be a bit of a headache, and if you find that you’re confused on what I’m talking about, you can check out a training video that I’ve created by clicking this link: https://my.wealthyaffiliate.co...

Hopefully this can help some of you avoid having your Associate’s account closed because of an update that has slipped through the cracks for a lot of us.

Best wishes, Tony

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Recent Comments

18

Do you know if EazyAzon plugin complies with their rules about images?

In my opinion, it is a YES. I have tried the old version of EasyAzon early on and with valid API credential keys, no problem at all. Just use the images generated by the software.

One more thing, handle all the stuff with care, I mean over extracting (import) the items and listing. Around 10 items per category or niche are fine. More than that? I do not recommend so or else it will unstable next and also Amazon, not very keen if we extract too many stuff at once.

Thank you for your response. How long have you been using EazyAzon?

Also what do you mean 10 items per category/niche?

I usually write lengthy article with at least 3,000 words. If it's best of posts then max 3 per product but I try to limit to 2 whenever possible. All links are no follow.

10/05/2016 5:18 PM, the exact date and time I exercise the offer option but I am no longer use it anymore. Might be during that period, the stuff a bit unstable and when another co-founder take more control the stuff relaunch with different web sale page with a further one-step update, the license is already different and I am not into pay for another license for the same type of stuff.

It is the same time EasyBayPro also on offer but if anything stuff to do with eBay, I will never count myself in anymore. I have a bad experience with eBay when first 2 days looks rosy we follow exactly as per instructed. Then, next 3 days get declined for a clueless reason. :)

So if I understand you correctly, as long as I use Amazon's images and not my own, I'll be okay, right.

This is a great help!

I am just getting ready to start adding links from my posts to Amazon and this article and training video was timely. Thanks Tony.

I was also wondering if you or anyone else knows of an up to date training to learn the best practices as an Amazon Assoc? or since you say you have been successful as an Amazon Associate if you would have any training on this?

I would like to set myself up properly from the get go and don't like to blindly go into it.

RP

The search bar above is your best friend. I am sure there are plenty of posts on that subject.
Damo

So this means that you can't use Amazon images as your featured image then...correct?

What you however can do is utilize a plugin that uses the Amazon Product API that directly accesses these images from Amazon and uses them on your site. When Amazon cuts the images out of their site, it is also gone from the API and your site.

The API or the siteStripe generated codes are the two only ways that are allowed through the Amazon TOS.

Steven

Hey Steven,

Thanks for taking a little bit of time out of your day in order to comment and share your knowledge about the Amazon Product API.

I personally use an API plugin, and will be updating my training that I mentioned in this post in the near future to reflect that.

With that said, one important thing to make certain of is that the images sourced by the plugin are actually hosted by Amazon and not being hosted on your own site.

I recently noticed that one of the more popular plug-ins on the market that uses Amazon's API actually saves the images on your site rather than hosting them from Amazon.

Sadly, as verified by an Amazon Associates representative, this would still be considered a violation of their TOS and could result in an account ban.

Unfortunately, many newcomers to affiliate marketing may not be aware of this issue and place their trust in plugin creators who are actually violating the TOS with their plugins.

Do you have any recommendations for an Amazon plugin to use? This really seems like a good way to go. I have been searching and found various plugins, but I don't want to just pick one since I don't really know much about them (Amazon plugins). Thanks!

I am not an active Amazone partner, but this is always good to know, thanks!
Gerlinde

Hey Gerlinde,

Thanks for taking the time to comment and I'm glad that you found this helpful!

I did! :) Thanks and good luck for your business! ;)

thanks that are interesting,
thanks for sharing

You're very welcome. Hope it helps you out some.

Thanks for sharing this Tony, I'll be updating my tutorial soon to make sure that this is covered.

Sounds great Craig. I swear it seems like there's new rules over there all the time, LOL.

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