Amazon Associates Program: What has changed over time and what does it mean?

What are the Amazon Associates and Amazon Creator Connections Programs?

The Amazon Associates Program helps content creators, publishers and bloggers monetize their traffic. Amazon provides link-building tools for users to direct their audiences to their recommendations and earn from qualifying purchases and programs.

Amazon Creator Connections is an extension of the Associates program where brands can collaborate directly with content creators and influencers to promote their products on Amazon. It offers a way for brands to target specific influencers and offer bonus commissions, while Associates allows any individual or business to earn a commission by linking to Amazon products.  

As a brand, the Creator Connections program is the only opportunity to connect directly with the affiliates, and we’ve seen varied results. In general, we don’t expect connections to be made with high-quality affiliates that drive longer term relationships as most affiliates are small-scale creators sharing products within Facebook groups or similar channels for social discourse.  

The Creator Connections program is, however, great for getting UGC videos up on your product listings. Many affiliates will post videos to their storefronts which can be added to you PDP carousels, giving shoppers visuals of your products being used by real people in real life.

But what this blog is about is how these programs have changed over time, and how these changes provide insight into Amazon’s broader motivations for the program. It’s a perfect case study of watching Amazon launch a program and strategically update it over time to meet their own evolving needs as well as the needs of the affiliate marketing ecosystem.

What has changed over time with the Amazon Associates Program?

We analyzed program information from 2019-2025 and found that all changes tie back to evolving market dynamics and Amazon’s motivations to drive profitability and recurring revenue within the program. Let’s look at some of the category and commission structure changes over time and what they mean.

Category and commission structure changes

To drive program profitability and follow where consumer demand is, many categories have seen commission rate reductions over time. It’s also possible that many of these categories are driving a healthy amount of organic traffic and do need any kind of affiliate boosting.

• Categories that had higher commission rates in 2019 (e.g., Furniture, Home, Lawn & Garden, and Outdoors) saw reductions from 8%–6% to 3% in 2025.

• Digital Music, Physical Books, Kitchen, Baby Products, and similar categories experienced rate decreases of around 0.5%–2%.

In high-margin categories like Luxury Beauty (10%)  commission rates have seen stability over the years. These categories have struck a balance of profitability and a continued source of traffic generation, proving to Amazon they are worth maintaining as part of the overall affiliate program strategy.

Amazon has introduced new “high priority” categories so far in 2025 (Amazon Games at 20% and Amazon Haul at 7%), and the high commission rates indicate that these are growth categories where Amazon wants to aggressively drive traffic. They may be lower margin categories, but they’re strategic priorities for Amazon. We’ve seen Amazon take a similar approach before, pre-2019 with Grocery and Health & Personal Care, to help establish themselves as a retailer leader in these categories.

Bounty incentives

Another interesting area to look at over time is how Amazon is trying to drive recurring revenue streams through the Associates Program by offering multiple bounty incentives.  

Bounties like Amazon Prime Free Trial ($3) and Unlimited Free Trial ($3) have remained unchanged, indicating Amazon’s confidence in the programs and an ability for these bounties to attract and retain customers.

There have been multiple new bounties added in 2025:

• Audible Premium Plus Annual Membership: $25.00

• Amazon Prime Gifting (12-month): $5.00

• Amazon Haul and Subscription-Based Services: High focus.  

In 2019, bounty events existed but were limited in scope and payout amounts. The addition of these new incentives shows Amazon’s increased prioritization on subscriptions and recurring revenue models, reflecting a shift toward long-term customer retention strategies.

Conclusion

Overall, the Amazon Associates program has always been about Amazon building a robust affiliate marketing program that assists with driving new traffic to certain categories, profitably. Observing the program over time is a study on how Amazon makes decisions based on their business needs and market dynamics, focusing on areas of growth and recurring revenue streams.

We anticipate advancements within the Creator Connections program as Amazon works to attract larger influencers and build out a more robust connective hub between those influencers and larger brands.

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