How to become an eBay affiliate

If you want to become an eBay affiliate you need to sign up to the eBay Partner Network.

A scheme for generating commissions from the world's biggest auction site seems an obvious choice to me, it's such a well known, quality brand and offers such a diverse range of linking opportunities.

Signing up with the scheme

You have to add a few basic details like:

• Your business name and type
• How you want to be paid (I’m using my Paypal account)
• Which countries you’re doing business in
  
  After that, it’s pretty straightforward to get stared as an eBay affiliate.

You get four ways in which to link to the main auction site and take commissions:

• Links in pages
• ‘Off the shelf’ creatives
• Widgets
• APIs (advanced - I won’t deal with APIs in this post as they're for advanced users)

You can also set up campaigns for each of your websites so that you can track and monitor their progress.

Useful tools to use on your website

The simplest way to take a commission as an eBay affiliate is via a text link within a page.

When you click on that link, it has your personal information embedded in it which means that you will take a commission if your website user goes on to buy something on the main auction site.

The tools provided allow you state exactly what you want to feature in your product adverts - laptops, exercise bikes, umbrellas or even top hats, it depends what your niche is.

The eBay Partner Network website takes care of the difficult coding bits, you just enter simple, non-technical information to get what you want.

Creatives

A 'creative' simply means a combination of logos, products and search boxes.

Once again, don’t worry about the coding, all the work is done for you.

If a user clicks on the creative and go on to make a purchase, and you’ll take a small commission.

Finally to the widgets, which are always my preferred choice.

Once again these are fully customisable and you can determine the size of the adverts, what products are displayed, the look of the ad and so on.

Interestingly, to make widgets, you have to link your business account with your regular account, so if you don’t have one already, you need to get one.

They’re very simple to create, you’re talked through it all the way.

I much prefer custom widgets on my websites, they look far more integrated with the rest of the content.

Is it worth using the eBay Partner Network on your website?

I’m amazed that more isn't made of it on the main auction site … you have to know what you’re looking for to be able to find it.

I’m a big user of eBay - as a buyer and a seller - so this is a service that I use on my websites and I'd encourage you to sign-up, take a look around and see if it's something that you can use as part of your affiliate marketing strategy.

Return from eBay affiliate to Best affiliate programs

Return from this page to Home Internet Businesses homepage