The purpose of the affiliate program is to bring in new purchases from customers who wouldn't have otherwise purchased. Not to be a rebate for purchases one would have done anyway.
They do have a policy that they deduct purchases for friends/family, but the tone of the wording is that they seem to recognize it happens:
"Why is there a deduction for personal use of the program?
We do not pay referral commissions for products you purchase through your own links. This includes orders for customers, orders on behalf of customers, and orders for products to be used by you, your friends, your relatives, or your associates in any manner. Due to the proprietary nature of the way we determine if the order was personal, we can't share the full list of criteria by which we detect these ineligible orders."
I don't read anything there, or in further text that sounds like you'll get banned. Just that they might exclude those purchases from paying out affiliate fees.
That's a really curious policy. In my family I know of at one person who after an 18th birthday discovered they were adopted. People they thought as on unrelated were actually sisters and brothers etc. How would you square that up with Amazon's policy?
"friends" and "associates" is easy to square up and try and define. My business partner is obviously an associate, my neighbor I cook BBQ with is a friend. How would I know who is my relative? What defines relations?
ovi256|2 years ago
This, btw, is the hardest problem in marketing.
coldtea|2 years ago
OTOH, disgruntled friends and family can also take their business elsewhere.
Not to mention Amazon tracking what your "friends and relatives" buy, not individually but as correlated back to you, is problematic in itself...
_boffin_|2 years ago
tyingq|2 years ago
"Why is there a deduction for personal use of the program?
We do not pay referral commissions for products you purchase through your own links. This includes orders for customers, orders on behalf of customers, and orders for products to be used by you, your friends, your relatives, or your associates in any manner. Due to the proprietary nature of the way we determine if the order was personal, we can't share the full list of criteria by which we detect these ineligible orders."
https://affiliate-program.amazon.com/help/node/topic/G46FTB8...
I don't read anything there, or in further text that sounds like you'll get banned. Just that they might exclude those purchases from paying out affiliate fees.
failTide|2 years ago
sidewndr46|2 years ago
"friends" and "associates" is easy to square up and try and define. My business partner is obviously an associate, my neighbor I cook BBQ with is a friend. How would I know who is my relative? What defines relations?