Amazon recently announced a significant change coming to Amazon Associates site links that could lead to broken links and lost commissions if publishers don’t take action. As of January 1st, 2024, Amazon will stop supporting SiteStripe affiliate image links.
For years, SiteStripe has been a popular URL shortening tool used by publishers to shrink lengthy Amazon affiliate links for better visibility and tracking. However, any existing SiteStripe links directing to Amazon products using images will break when the changes take effect in just weeks.
This means publishers need to act swiftly to audit their sites, identify where SiteStripe affiliate links may exist, and replace them to avoid losing out on potential affiliate revenue in 2024. Waiting risks losing hard-earned commissions.
So how can publishers find and fix affected Amazon affiliate links?
The best approach entails generating fresh links through Amazon’s Affiliate program dashboard and pasting the updated HTML code anywhere links currently reside – whether display ads, product roundups, resource pages etc.
Specifically you’ll want to:
- Find your affiliate links
- If you don’t know, or haven’t created your credentials, go to https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/assoc_credentials/home.
- Go to scratchpad: https://webservices.amazon.com/paapi5/scratchpad/index.html
- Enter partner tag, acces key, and secret key
- Next section (Search Items) go to resources drop down and make selections
- Search ASIN and click run request
- Under “response types” grab the html, copy/paste
- This will help make sure you don’t lose any commissions from broken links when the SiteStripe change happens.
Taking some time upfront to tackle this project will ensure your website keeps earning maximum commissions directing traffic to Amazon after the SiteStripe disruption takes effect January 1st. Don’t leave it until New Year’s Eve!
