One of the major pain points with operating affiliate sites is that products are frequently going out of stock or are removed from Amazon. This results in lost revenue, but there is also the potential quick win opportunity to increase revenue on your affiliate site or an acquired site by fixing broken Amazon links.
In this review, we will cover how to use AMZ Watcher to increase your affiliate site earnings and determine the potential for fixing Amazon links on a website for sale.
Let’s get to it!
4 Main Benefits of AMZ Watcher
1. Find Broken Amazon Links
You can scan your site to get a report on all the links to 404 pages on Amazon, links with missing affiliate ID tags, and links to unavailable products.
2. See What Products a Competitor is Linking To
You can scan a competitor’s site to see all the products they are promoting on their site for ideas of products to feature on new pages or products to add to existing pages.
3. Find Alternative Affiliate Programs With Higher Commission Rates
You can view recommendations for alternative affiliate programs for products you are currently linking to and see the percentage uplift from switching to alternative affiliate programs.
4. Evaluate the Opportunity to Fix Amazon Links on a Potential Acquisition
When considering whether to purchase an existing Amazon Affiliate site, you can run an AMZ Watcher report to determine how much opportunity exists for fixing broken Amazon affiliate links or even replacing low commission Amazon links with non-Amazon affiliate programs with higher commission rates.
Having data on the number of broken Amazon links can give you an advantage as a buyer because you can make a higher bid based on the upside earning potential of fixing the links. Most buyers only consider the current earnings when determining their bid. I don’t hesitate to bid 75x or more because I have factored in the quick win opportunities to increase earnings after the purchase.
How To Use AMZ Watcher: Step-by-Step Walkthrough
To run a new report, first, click on “Add Project” from the dashboard page and enter the URL of the website you want to scan.
You can also select options like whether to recommend Amazon alternatives, how frequently you want the links to be re-checked, and the Amazon store country (you have to create a separate project for each country).
Keep in mind that AMZ Watcher requires 1 credit for each product when it checks for alternatives to Amazon, so you may want to use this feature sparingly.
Once the report is ready, it will appear in the main dashboard.
Click “See Report” and scroll down to the “Broken Links” and “Alternatives Finder” below the “Key Metrics” section.
Select “404” and click on “Export Selection” to export the 404 links as a CSV.
The CSV provides the page with the broken link (source page) and the URL that it is pointing to (target page).
Next, select “Unavailable” and click on “Export Selection” to export another CSV with the links to unavailable products.
You can replace the broken links and unavailable products yourself or hand off this task to a VA.
If you checked the box “Find Amazon Alternatives” when you ran a report, you can click on “Alternatives Finder” to view a table of sortable products with alternative affiliate programs.
You can view the recommendations in the web app or you can export all the alternatives as a CSV.
By clicking on the down arrow, you can view the suggested Amazon alternatives and look for opportunities that will increase revenue.
Call Out: If a product has a higher commission but is sold on a small website that is not well known, the earnings may go down because Amazon has a great conversion rate and you also get credit for additional items added to the Amazon cart.
Case Study of Outdoor Site: 1,420 Broken Links Found!
I ran a report on my outdoor case study site to see how many Amazon affiliate links are going to 404 pages or unavailable products.
Of the 6608 Amazon links on my site, 1,420 were broken (21.5%).
This presents a significant opportunity for increasing monthly earnings by fixing these links.
I can export the broken links and the associated URLs and hand it off to my team to fix them. AMZ Watcher also has a free affiliate link generator, so that you can have a virtual assistant add valid Amazon links to your website without needing access to your Amazon Associates account to generate the links.
I also found several Amazon alternatives that pay a much higher commission rate that I can consider switching to.
Example 1: 3% to 12% commission rate
Example 2: 4% to 8% commission rate
Example 3: 3% to 8% commission rate
SiteBuddy.io vs AMZ Watcher Comparison
I’ve used both SiteBuddy and AMZ Watcher. Read the SiteBuddy.io review here. Here is my summary of the high-level features:
| Category | AMZ Watcher | SiteBuddy.io |
|---|---|---|
| Pricing | $19.95 – $124.95 (monthly) | $12 monthly for 1 site (plus $9 – $11 per additional site) |
| Increased Earnings Guarantee | No | Yes |
| Check for Out of Stock Products | Yes | Yes |
| Check for Removed Products | Yes | Yes |
| Check for Missing Affiliate IDs | Yes | Yes |
| Check for Missing Affiliate Disclaimers | No | Yes |
| Suggest Alternative Products to Amazon | Yes | No |
SiteBuddy.io is a similar alternative to AMZ Watcher that provides much of the same core functionality like checking for broken Amazon links. There are some minor differences like pricing and additional features.
Pricing
SiteBuddy’s pricing is based on the number of websites scanned rather than a credit system like AMZ Watcher. For each website that you want to scan, you will need to pay an extra $10 to $11. With 20,000 AMZ Watcher credits which costs $49.95 per month, you can scan up to 10 sites.
Guarantee
SiteBuddy offers a guarantee that if you make all their suggested changes and don’t see an increase in earnings, they will refund your first month and provide free access for a year.
Affiliate Disclaimer Checker
Another difference is that SiteBuddy scans your site for pages that are missing the Amazon affiliate disclaimer. This is useful for compliance if you are adding disclaimers on a page-by-page basis rather than posting them sitewide.
FAQs about AMZ Watcher
How much does AMZWatcher cost?
The monthly pricing plan ranges from $19.95 (5,000 credits and 3 projects) to $124.95 (50,000 credits and unlimited projects).
There is a discount on annual plans.
What are the alternatives to AMZWatcher?
A similar alternative for AMZWatcher is Sitebuddy.io, which I have also reviewed here.
Another alternative is to hire a virtual assistant to manually check links, although this could be more expensive.
How is the AMZWatcher support?
AMZWatcher offers priority support with live chat and email for subscribers of the Portfolio plan for $49.99 per month (or more expensive plans).
Is AMZWatcher Worth it?
AMZWatcher is a valuable tool if you have an affiliate site that has a lot of Amazon affiliate links since you will want to keep the Amazon links current to maximize earnings.
It is also valuable if you are evaluating Amazon affiliate sites to buy. Getting data on the number of broken links on a site for sale can help you determine if there is a good opportunity to increase earnings quickly by fixing Amazon links.
If you don’t want to pay the subscription fee every month you could fix all of the broken Amazon links and then cancel until you need the service again.
Wrap Up
AMZ Watcher is an excellent alternative to SiteBuddy and is less expensive if you have multiple Amazon affiliate sites or want to collect data on competitors or affiliate sites for sale.
