If you have been looking for new ways of monetizing your content, no matter the type of media property you own, you’ve ended up in the perfect place. For today’s article, we have prepared a review of the ebay affiliate program, complete with everything you should know about it.
So, if you’re thinking of becoming an eBay affiliate, keep on reading!
eBay Affiliate Program Review
A note on eBay
There’s not a lot to add when it comes to eBay since pretty much anyone across the world has at least once heard of this massive marketplace. It’s not as popular or readily available as Amazon is these days, but people who have been on the Internet for a good decade or more know how big it used to be.
eBay was founded back in 1995 and is available across 1,500 cities. More than 170 million people have bought something through eBay, regardless of the type of product.
Believe it or not, a gadget, appliance, or any other type of electronics are sold in the United States through eBay once every 3 seconds. Therefore, if you decide to become an eBay affiliate, you’ll be able to recommend a brand to your audience that they probably already trust.
What products can you promote?
When it comes to the eBay partner network affiliate program, the variety of products available on the platform is absolutely breathtaking. You can find pretty much anything from musical instruments to vintage furniture.
There are several major categories one can pick from, and they range from motors and electronics to collectibles, home and garden, fashion, sporting goods, business and industrial, jewelry and watches, and the all-time favorite ‘refurbished’ category, where anyone on a budget goes in hopes to find a steal.
Similarly to Amazon, here you can find pages that the companies have created themselves – look for Adidas or anything else, for example, and you’ll come across products sold both by the brand directly and by middle people.
But do keep in mind that while you can be in any possible niche, the best one to achieve some success with at least in this case would have to be the electronics one. So, if you regularly review gadgets or your blog or website is heavily geared toward electronics consumers, you can definitely consider becoming an eBay affiliate.
Other categories that have more than decent performance are things like power tools, video games, pet supplies, musical gear, golf gear, personal care treatments, and travel accessories.
How to join the eBay affiliate network
First of all, you’re not going to find eBay on any affiliate network that we might have reviewed in the past, and the reason for that is that the program is self-managed. You will have to go on the eBay website and look for the page pertaining to the affiliate program where you will submit an application.
Someone will then analyze your application and provide you with a response in a couple days’ time. Usually, this process lasts for less than 24 hours, especially if you’re applying on behalf of a well-established, authoritative website.
Once you are accepted into the program, you will gain access to all of the marketing materials available on the platform. For example, there’s a quite nifty Bookmarklet that lets you create links from any eBay page right from the comfort of your browser.
Other tools you might be interested in checking out range from Smart Placements and Smart Links to the Link Generator, the Smart Share feature (which is a Chrome extension that works similarly to Bookmarklet), or the Creative Gallery.
Important things to consider with eBay affiliate marketing
Before we move on to describing the rest of the things that you should know about, including the eBay affiliate commission rate, for example, we strongly suggest that you take the time to read the terms and conditions of the program before joining.
Otherwise, you run the risk of being booted out of it without even knowing what you have done wrong. There are two main rules that we would like to note here and that not a lot of affiliates abide by, unfortunately.
They both deal with the same thing, meaning the FTC regulations, according to which you are obligated to specify to your followers that you are linking to products that could generate a commission for you.
The disclosure, for this reason, needs to appear right around your affiliate link – sometimes right under it, with clear hashtags such as #sponsored or #ad or #commissionsearned.
Some affiliates circumvent the rule of having to write this after each of their affiliate links by simply putting a disclaimer in the header portion of all of their pages. If you have a social media channel or page, you will have to specify the disclosure in the description of all of your posts, whether they be on YouTube or anything else.
The rest of the rules you should abide by are pretty common sense, such as the fact that you shouldn’t engage in any practices such as cookie stuffing or any type of spam whatsoever or you shouldn’t recommend potentially dangerous practices, including gambling, violence, or the construction of firearms.
How much does the eBay affiliate program pay?
The eBay affiliate commission is obviously the main thing most affiliates are interested in in the first place. So, what is the eBay affiliate program percentage?
You’re going to be disappointed if you expect to make a fortune with this network, and the reason we’re saying that is that in many ways, it resembles what Amazon Associates now has to offer – and we all know how bad that became a couple of years ago, right at the start of the pandemic.
The good news is that you can make commissions on pretty much anything that’s sold on eBay, from computers and tablets to cell phones and video games, along with consoles. The rates range from 1% to 4%, which makes them quite similar to the Amazon Associates program we have previously mentioned.
If you’re in the right niche and you promote things like vehicle parts and accessories, for example, you can expect to make 3% out of whatever in this category is ordered by your referrals after clicking on your link. Motors, clothing, shoes, health and beauty, and anything in the jewelry and watches category will bring you a rate of 4%.
Two bad things that we have to note here, though, is that there are some limits in certain categories. For example, in real estate, no matter the value of the sale that you facilitate, your maximum commission will be $100.
The second negative thing is that the cookie lasts for just 24 hours. It used to be a couple of days, but eBay decided to slash it, so now it is identical to the tracking cookie used by Amazon Associates. Therefore, if you don’t manage to intermediate a sale during the first day after someone clicks on your link, you have nothing to gain from your affiliate activity whatsoever.
eBay affiliate payout
From what we found about this program, it seems that there are roughly two ways of receiving your eBay affiliate program percentage.
You can opt for PayPal, and we’ll go into more detail as to why this might not be the best option immediately. First off, the threshold you need to reach for commissions in order to be able to withdraw your earnings if you opt for this payment method is $20, twice as high as the other method. Secondly, you’ll be charged a $2 processing fee every time you withdraw those twenty bucks.
The other payment method currently available is an Electronic Funds Transfer, which obviously means that you need to have a bank account – be it virtual or not – based in the United States or at least one of the countries supported by the affiliate network.
With this second payment method, you have no fees to worry about since EFT withdrawals are completely free of charge. You will need to provide your bank details, such as the beneficiary account name, bank account number, type of account, and ABA routing number.
eBay affiliate program pros and cons
As you might have noticed by the information that we have showcased above, there are both advantages and disadvantages that you need to mull over before deciding to become an eBay affiliate.
The biggest drawback when it comes to this network is that the commission rate can be considered quite low. Sure, it’s a huge platform, so people aren’t going to be as wary to order from eBay, even from individual sellers instead of companies, especially when compared to newer eCommerce platforms, but even so – your earnings are not going to be worth writing home about.
On the upside, you can withdraw your earnings through PayPal if you don’t have an electronic bank account, and if you don’t want to pay for any processing fees, you can rely on the EFT withdrawal with a threshold of just $10.
In the end, you’ll have to figure out on your own whether it makes sense to become an eBay partner network affiliate or not – keeping in mind that the cookie lasts for just 24 hours.
Ebay affiliate marketing program alternatives
If you’re not exactly eager to give this opportunity a shot, whether because of the eBay affiliate program commission or for any other reason, here are a few alternatives you may want to consider.
Target
This one is probably one of the best choices you have available right now and the commission rates are quite better. The cookie last for seven days instead of 24 hours and you can make as much as 8% out of the value of the products you refer to.
There are quite a bit of payment methods available and they range from PayPal to bank deposit, but the payout threshold for most is $50, so that could be a little more restrictive. Read our Target affiliate program review here.
Wayfair
This one works with CJ Affiliate, a network that we have also reviewed in the past. Wayfair is pretty well known especially in North American countries, so you do have a pretty good chance of making a decent buck with this opportunity.
The commission rates range from 5% to 7% depending on the category of products that your referrals pick. The cookie now lasts for just 7 days, but it used to be that the Wayfair affiliate program ran through ShareASale, where the cookie duration was 30 days. Still, it’s much better than what eBay is offering.
Walmart
We’ll note this one here only as an alternative if you’re looking for more variety as the maximum commission rate you can expect from Walmart these days is 4%. The good thing is that the cookie does last for three days instead of 24 hours, so at least there’s that.
Read more: Does Walmart have an affiliate program?
eBay partner network vs Amazon affiliate
Oddly enough, the maximum commission rate that you can make with Amazon Associates these days is 5%, so it’s actually slightly better than what eBay is offering these days.
For categories such as toys and home improvement, you can expect to make 3% out of what your referrals are spending whereas for gift cards, digital Kindle products, or alcoholic beverage, you can expect a commission of 0% – yes, you read that right, those products are not going to bring you any commission whatsoever.
All of the other categories besides the ones showcased on the Fixed Standard Commission Income Rates table available on the Amazon website will bring you a rate of 4%. The cookie lasts for 24 hours, too, but there is no way of withdrawing your earnings through PayPal with Amazon.
Home Depot
The Home Depot affiliate program is actually not one, but two systems. You can either be paid for products that you refer to through your website and by their sale, respectively, or you can become an affiliate of the Home Depot Installation Program.
Depending on the product category, the rate varies from 1% to 8%, so we’d say that this one is quite a bit better compared to the eBay affiliate network. The program is available through the Impact Radius affiliate network. The cookie lasts for 24 hours, so no surprise there.
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