In this tutorial, we will describe several different ways to display Amazon products on
your WordPress blog. Since so many people shop at Amazon, and Amazon has such
a huge variety of products, many websites earn hundreds (even thousands!) of
dollars in monthly revenue with the Amazon Associates affiliate program.

These instructions assume that you’ve already signed up for the Amazon Associates
program. If you have not, you can join for free here.  The Amazon Associates program allows you to earn up to 10% in advertising fees. The more sales you make, the more you earn.

How to Add Amazon Text Links to Your WordPress Website

Adding text links is very easy! You can do it manually or use the code that Amazon
generates for you.

Here’s how to do it manually:

1. Find the Amazon product.
2. Copy the URL.
3. Delete everything after the ?
4. After the question mark, add this: tag=YOUR_TAG
For example, this is a valid URL, just replace the words YOUR_TAG with your tag:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/020161622X/?tag=YOUR_TAG-20
Note, that for the U.S. website, all tags end with “-20”

Other Amazon international websites have different numbers for the last part of the tag.

5. Open up your WordPress blog, find the post you want to add the link to, and click edit.

6. Highlight the text that you would like to turn into a link.

7. Click on the add/edit link button:

8. Paste the Amazon link into the URL field and click on Add Link.

9. Click publish to update the blog post.

Here’s how to insert a text link that Amazon generates for you:

The advantage of manually creating the links as described above is that you can literally add your Amazon affiliate tracking code to any Amazon page.  You can link to Amazon search result pages, Amazon category pages, and any Amazon product.  The disadvantage is that a plain text link can not track impressions so you will not be able to determine your click-through rate.  If you want to track impressions and your click-through rate, you can use Amazon’s text link insertion tool which adds a tiny invisible image to your page (a 1 pixel x 1 pixel square) and it also adds a linkId to your affiliate link.  In no way is this linkId or small image required, but it enables automatic tracking.

1. Log into Amazon.
2. At the top of Amazon’s website, you should see a gray banner that has choices like “Link to this page.” This banner is called the Associates Site Stripe.  If you do not see this at the top of the Amazon site, you can turn on and customize the Associate Site Stripe here.
3. Navigate to the Amazon product you’d like to link to and click on “Link to this page.”
4. Select the “Text Only” tab.
5. Customize the link anchor text.
6. Click “Highlight HTML” and right click on the highlighted text and click on “Copy.”
7. Navigate to the WordPress post that you would like to add this link to. Click “Edit Post.”
8. Click the “Text” tab at the top of the post edit box to switch to the text editor.  You can NOT add HTML to the Visual editor.
9. Find the correct location and Paste the HTML into your blog post by right clicking and selecting paste.
10. Click Publish to update your blog post.

How to Insert an Amazon Product Link with the Product Image and Current Price

Amazon makes it very easy to add an attractive box featuring a “Shop now” button, the current price, and the product picture. For example, here’s a text and image link to the Star Wars Trilogy on Bluray:

To add this to your website, follow these easy instructions:

1. Log into Amazon.
2. At the top of Amazon’s website, you should see a gray banner that has choices like “Link to this page.” This banner is called the Associates Site Stripe.  If you do not see this at the top of the Amazon site, you can turn on and customize the Associate Site Stripe here.
3. Navigate to the Amazon product you’d like to link to and click on “Link to this page.”
4. Select the “Text and Image” tab.
5. Customize the background and font colors for the title and price so that it matches your website or stands out.
6. Click “Highlight HTML” and right click on the highlighted text and click on “Copy.”
7. Navigate to the WordPress post that you would like to add this link to. Click “Edit Post.”
8. Click the “Text” tab at the top of the post edit box to switch to the text editor.  You can NOT add HTML to the Visual editor.
9. Find the correct location and Paste the HTML into your blog post by right clicking and selecting paste.
10. You can switch back to the Visual editor by clicking on the Visual tab and then click on the gray box and then click “align left” or “align right” to move where the Amazon product box will be positioned.  You can also drag and drop the box to a different location in your post.  If you’d like to preview how your post will look, click “Preview” (just above the publish button).
11. Click Publish to update your blog post.

How to Add Amazon Links to Your WordPress Sidebar

You can add the Amazon links to your sidebar or any widget area.  Follow the above instructions, but instead of pasting the HTML code into your post, follow these instructions.

1. Log into your WordPress Dashboard and navigate to Appearance->Widgets.
2. Click on the “Text” widget and add it to the sidebar or widget area.
3. Paste the HTML code into the Content box of the Text widget and click save.

How to Add “Buy From Amazon.com” Buttons to your Website

It’s a hidden feature, but Amazon provides buttons that you can use on your website.  Here is an example of one such button:

Please note that you can not create your own buttons with their logo on it.  People have had their account cancelled for doing so.

To add that button to your website, right click on the button and click “save as” and save it to your computer.  Then go to your WordPress dashboard and click on “Media” and “add New.”  Upload the image you saved.  Then on the WordPress post edit page, click on “Add Media” and you will see the button.  Click on the image and click edit.  In the “Link To” section, enter the Amazon url that has your tracking ID.

How to Add Banner Amazon Advertisements

(Pictured above is an official banner advertisement from Amazon.)

Log into your Amazon Associates account and click on “Offers – Deals & Promotions” in the left side bar.  Amazon provides a selection of current banner advertisements that you can link to on your website.  Just click on “Get Banner” and copy the HTML into your post in the same way as described above for other types of links (using the Text editor — remember you can NOT post HTML into the Visual editor).

Any other questions?

If I did not answer your question about how to add Amazon links to your WordPress website, please post a comment below.  I will try to help.  I will also try to answer any other questions you may have about making money with the Amazon affiliate program.