Amazon‘s Influencer Program designed to help promote the company’s offerings is now accepting applications from popular YouTube users, though the Seattle, Washington-based company has yet to explicitly publicize this change. The expansion of the program was first noted by TechCrunch, with initial reports suggesting that the initiative was made available to YouTube stars last Thursday. The move is understood to signal that the platform is leaving its beta stage of development, with Amazon now offering online forms that famous social media users can fill and submit in order to apply to become one of Amazon’s influencers.
Originally introduced in March as part of a closed beta, Amazon’s Influencer Program remains one of the pickiest affiliate platforms on the World Wide Web, with the e-commerce giant only approving applications for well-qualified high-profile individuals. Having a large and engaged social media following is just one aspect of your online identity that Amazon will be vetting if you apply to become one of its influencers, with the company also looking at the quality and quantity of your content, as well as its relevance in regards to its own offerings. In a short statement on the matter issued to TechCrunch on Thursday, Amazon confirmed that it launched what it describes as “a self-service tool” aimed at YouTube users with significant online presence who can now use it to apply for the Influencer Program.
The initiative itself seeks to better integrate Amazon’s offerings into the online discourse by providing influencers with a more direct line of communication with the firm whose products they’re already promoting with the goal of driving affiliate sales or fulfilling their contractual obligations with individual brands. As such, the platform is meant to build on the existing Amazon Associates program and consequently provide social media influencers with more tools to serve recommendations to their followers, including their own page on Amazon. The description of the program indicates that it’s currently primarily open to YouTube creators but will add more social media platforms in the future. It’s currently unclear whether Amazon is also providing its vetted influencers with higher commissions, though more details on the platform may emerge in the near future.
Amazon Influencer Program