Ok, here’s a new low…I earned $5.99 on the royalty and $0 on the self referral of a digital download sale. (sigh) It’s not making me feel like promoting at all.
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@OrchardBerry Yep - it’s a stinger - there are no self referrals on digital downloads as the royalty you earn cancels out the “self referral goal” https://help.zazzle.com/hc/en-us/articles/30810357489175-Ambassador-Referral-Commissions-Creator-Royalties
“* If your Royalties earned on a digital Product exceed the Self-Promotion Link Earnings goal for a Product in that relevant Product Marketplace Department (i.e., 35-50% of Net Referral Sales), you will not earn a Referral Commission for that Referred Sale.”
Congrats on the sale! 🎉
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Thanks for the explanation, still hurts though lol
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Yes, Digital Downloads are deceptive, because even with self-referrals we can’t earn more than 50% of whatever royalty we set. This really is unfair and needs to be changed.
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Totally. It’s the one that has been the biggest bummer. Not sure why it’s a punishment for promoting them. I’m trying to shift my mindset to ‘It is a sale I wouldn’t have gotten’. But still sucks knowing we used to receive $8-11 on a digital even with promoter 2.0.
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Just want clarify - it’s 50% of the total the customer paid, less the Excessive Royalty Fee.
I don’t know because I don’t do Instant Downloads but I would guess that the majority of of them do fall into the 50% bracket as they’re mostly tied to stationery products. But isn’t there a poster with a digital option too? I’d think those would be at 40% or whatever the Wall Art category is.
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My posters are wedding related, so they are still at the 50% rate. Yes, self-referrals are 50% of what the customer paid, but that’s still awful, because we used to get 90-something percent of what the customer paid! And for 3rd party it’s even worse- it’s not 50% of what the customer paid, but 50% of 92% or whatever we have our royalty set to, because for 3rd party sales Zazzle takes 50% of that royalty with the marketing fee. Plus 5% for the Excess Royalty fee DEFINITELY shouldn’t apply to digital downloads!
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Right. Sorry. We were just thinking of different sale types.
Just for fun, I looked at this breakdown again to compare actual % of sale the total earnings come to.
None = $10.73 is 88.3% of 12.15
Cross-Promo = $6.91 is 56.9% of 12.15
Self-Promo = $5.51 is 45.3% of 12.15
3rd Party = $5.08 is 41.8% of 12.15
Obviously, None is the most profitable as there’s no referrer/MRF, but how things come through as None is a mystery.
If one’s actively promoting them, the old RF style link for Cross-Promo is more profitable than a clean Self-Promo link as the earnings cap doesn’t apply to that type sale. And then of course the dreaded 3rd Party sale where your Royalty gets slashed but you don’t earn anything back as Referral.
Here’s a comparison of this particular sale (not mine) the new way vs the old way. (Note: the PP2 total on bottom left doesn’t apply as Instant Downloads weren’t eligible for the 35% referral, they earned the same 15% as a regular referral.)
Whether a 3rd Party sale (8.47 vs 5.08) or a Cross-Over sale (10.30 vs 6.91), the earnings difference is “only” $3.39. That is a bite and it’ll add-up if one is selling lots of them. I’m just showing this because I think that psychologically it might be easier to accept if we break the difference down to that smaller number ($3.39 in this case) than if we keep focused on “they’re taking half my Royalty”. And if we look at the worst-case scenario above (3rd Party = $5.08 is 41.8% of 12.15), one’s still pocketing roughly 42% of the sale, leaving Zazzle 58%.
Not going to be a popular opinion but I honestly think that’s a fair split, 42/58, when all we’re doing is creating a design and uploading it. (And in many cases, the design was already long done & published, all we had to do was click a button to make it available as a download.) Zazzle is doing everything else from creating the platform to hosting the files; handling all the ordering & payments, paying the programming engineers who make it possible for customers to customize and download in multiple high-res formats …
I know it sounds like I am advocating for this new system. I’m not. It’s overly complicated and there’s the whole “cookie” issue (but that’s another topic in itself). I try to just look at the bottom line and consider anything above that as imaginary money that was never earned to begin with. I rarely even do breakdowns like this on my own sales. I’m just, “cool, X sold and I made X$”. Focusing on the fees (the imaginary money) is just bad for mental health and takes away the joy of having made a sale. Not trying to be a pollyanna, but if we all look back and remember the thrill of our first sales, that wow, a complete stranger paid money for MY art/design … if we can recapture that thrill as artists instead of focusing mostly on the dollars, maybe we’d all feel a little happier.
To get back to Instant Downloads specifically … Because they are a unique situation with such an unusually high royalty % I honestly don’t think Zazzle really thought through how the new structure would effect them. So I think given all the complaints, it’s possible they may cave and make an exception for how Instant Downloads are calculated in this new system. But… on the other hand there is ample evidence that Zazzle isn’t really supporting or encouraging Instant Downloads anymore. Products with the option are no longer flagged on MP result pages as downloadable as they once were, it’s no longer an obvious option on the product pages themselves, and even if one specifically wants that type design, the option to filter to them is buried where noone will find it. It’s not a choice in the Type filter. Instead a shopper would have to know to click to Add Filter, then choose Special Picks, then choose Downloadable. All that tells me it probably was not a profitable venture for Zazzle, maybe even contributed to a decline in print sales which has been their bread & butter. So maybe they absolutely knew how the new system would reduce earnings on them and it’s just another way of discouraging them. I don’t know.
Sorry I am all over the map with this post (which is not directed specifically to you @Connie ) it just seemed a good place to drop all my thoughts on the matter.
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If I am not getting the self referral fee, why am I being charged 50% of marketing fee?? I just sold a holiday card as a digital download- a self referral sale but I am still getting half of the royalty fee since 50% of it is deducted as marketing fee. Can somone explain ?
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I turn down work for digital down loads now. I’m not going to spend hours working for 50% because I referred the customer. That’s the craziest decision Zazzle has made so far. And it doesn’t appear that they plan to change their minds since it’s been this way since new Ambassador program rolled out.
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Assuming your DD was in the weddings/stationery category @50%, the max you can earn on a Self-Promotion referral is 50% of the total cost to customer, less the Excessive Royalty Fee. Royalty + Referral + ERF = 50% of the total the customer paid. It doesn’t matter how it’s broken down between “Royalty” and “Referral” or that they are showing a 50% MRF being deducted from the royalty side … your total earnings plus ERF will add up to 50% of the total sale. Under this new system, looking at royalty and referral earnings and MRF fee on a Self-Promotion sale as separate things will drive you batty. You have to look at the total you earned on the sale.
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