We’re making updates to Zazzle’s Terms of Use, including the Creator License Agreement, and introducing our new Ambassador Program Agreement, which replaces our Associates Program Agreement. While the onsite experience will not be updated until April 1st, you can preview the updated Terms of Use here.
We understand you might have additional questions or feedback. Please use** this form** to share them directly with us. While we may not be able to respond individually at this stage, we’ll review all submissions and address frequently asked questions after the Terms of Use go into effect.
To keep the conversation organized, all community discussions on this topic will be redirected to this thread.
Thank you for your understanding and for helping us make Zazzle a thriving community for all Creators!
Best,
The Zazzle Team
UPDATE 3/24/25:
Hi Creators - Thank you all so much for your valuable feedback and for taking the time to submit your questions through our form. We truly appreciate your engagement and insights. Rest assured, we are carefully reviewing each question and will address the most commonly asked ones soon.
Timely Update Regarding Royalty Rates: We understand your concerns about adjusting royalty rates, and to support you through this transition, we will be processing royalty rate changes daily from now through April 15th , allowing creators time to make any necessary adjustments. Please note that updates may take 24–48 hours to appear. After April 15th, we’ll return to our regular schedule, with royalty updates processed on the 20th of each month.
*To clarify: Setting your royalty to 10% exactly will not trigger the Excess Royalty Fee. Royalties above 10%, will trigger the Excess Royalty Fee when changes go into effect 4/1.
UPDATE 4/7/25
This forum post is now closed for new replies. Please see our most recent update for information about the Terms of Use Changes and information about the new Ambassador Program. Thank you!
I tried to lay that out but they didn’t like that I used GPT to do it I guess or didn’t like everything it pointed out. Copy and paste the whole thing and ask for a summary of important things you should know about the new terms as a Zazzle designer.
Am I reading correctly that self-referrals have increased from a flat 35% on all but one category of products? Regarding the Referral Commisions Table here mentioned in the 4. Referral Commissions section.
So, the Marketing Royalty Fee I am assuming is the amount that Zazzle will deduct from our royalty when a customer clicks on one of their links or ads. They seem very high to me, up to 50% of our royalties.
At the moment I am not aware of any way to differentiate those sales from other 3rd party sales. Will this be changed in our royalty history to separate these transactions from other 3rd party sales? Right now I just assume that all 3rd party sales are Zazzle “marketing fees” and if those are going to jump up to 50%, which unless I am wrong is currently 15%, that is going to take a huge bite out of my royalties considering most of my sales are 3rd party.
I am very concerned about this portion in the new user agreement:
26.2.1. However, by submitting Content to Zazzle, (i) you grant Zazzle a nonexclusive, worldwide, royalty-free, sublicensable (through multiple layers) and transferable right and license to use, copy, reproduce, prepare derivative works of, modify, publicly display, perform and distribute your Content in connection with the Site and Zazzle’s (and any of its successors’) business, including without limitation for promoting and redistributing part or all of the Site (and derivative works we may create) in any media now known or hereafter developed; and (ii) you grant other Users the license rights detailed elsewhere herein (e.g., for Collaborative Content, per Section 6).
Though I continue to hold copyright, does this essentially mean you can also reproduce items with my artwork, (and create derivatives via AI) if I continue to have my work on the site after March 31? Or is this specifically about creating things from our works for the purpose of marketing/advertising (not offering, for example, a variation of my work on a new card). I hope that makes sense.
I would appreciate your clarification soon, as I may want to remove some of my original photography and art.
I’m sure I’ll understand the new terms as soon as I do something wrong - hopefully not! I actually just wanted to say that I clicked on your website link above, and WOW! It’s amazing.
I *WILL* say, I am so glad that I can now easily earn associate income for referring the creations for others without sacrificing my own referral if I use the wrong type of link (as a Promoter 2.0 program member currently). I think this will build much more of a sense of community and rooting one another on!
From what I can make out that % is not just referrals but royalty + referral Commission..
So on things like t-shirts it appears (correct me if I’m wrong) you make 35% in total.
My real concern is ‘marketing fees’ .. all I can surmise from that is if it isn’t a self referral we lose between 35 - 50% of that sale. Which would decimate our earnings. Someone please prove me wrong on that because there are many here hanging on by a thread as it is,.
I share the concerns about the “Marketing Royalty Fees.” Here’s what the agreement says:
3.3.1. Marketing Royalty Fee : If the sale of a Product is to a User referred (i) by an Ambassador from Links (as defined in the Ambassador Program Agreement); or (ii) through Zazzle’s marketing efforts (e.g., social media or affiliate networks, search engines, press release(s), tv/media ads, etc.), then a marketing fee (“ Marketing Royalty Fee ”), equal to a percentage of your Gross Royalty for the Product as specified here, will be deducted.
It sounds to me that ANY 3rd party referrals - whether through an independent “ambassador” or through Zazzle’s marketing efforts will result in a royalty hit between 40-50% depending on the department. While I’m not wild about Zazzle wanting to more than double the carve out for referrals that come from them, I can sorta see that they have to cover their costs placing TV ads or whatever, so while I don’t like it, I can see at least some justification for it.
The part that REALLY doesn’t make sense, is that according to the above paragraph, the Marketing Royalty Fees also apply to referrals that come through the “ambassador” program, even though the ambassador only gets 15%. Am I reading this correctly? So if I place a referral link with my ambassador code, and someone buys a product as a result, Zazzle deducts a fee of 40-50% from the designer, but only pays me 15%? What happens to the other 25-35%? Zazzle just takes that fee for what… administration? I hope I’m reading that wrong, because it seems patently unfair to deduct a fee from the designer’s royalty and then pay less than half of it to the referrer.
So if I place a referral link with my ambassador code, and someone buys a product as a result, Zazzle deducts a fee of 40-50% from the designer, but only pays me 15%?
15% is on the product price. 40-50% is from the royalty. If someone buys product for $ 100 and the designers royalty is 10%, the affilate will get $15 ie 15% but for designer they will get a deduction of 40% of their royalty. ie 40% of 10 that is $4. Net royalty will be 10-4= 6, which earlier would have been 8 with 20% deduction. So it works out as a hit of 25% on royalties from 3rd party sale.
This is truly scary. I pay my bills with my Zazzle check, my husband isn’t working at the moment. We both have major health issues. If calculated correctly my current month sales if this was in effect now I would be taking a $600+ LOSS.
This goes into effect April 1st, April fools day. Would be great if they say Surprise! We’re not actually slashing your royalties and charging you for doing your OWN marketing! GOTCHA! But I highly doubt it. Corporate greed at it’s finest. All the POD’s are doing it. I’d rather pay a shop fee than lose a car payment or house payment worth of royalties every month this is insane.
3.3.2. Excess Royalty Fee : Zazzle will retain an excess Royalty fee of five percent (5%) of your Gross Royalty for sales of Products for which you select a Royalty rate that is greater than ten percent (10%) (“ Excess Royalty Fee ”), in order to cover expenses such as payment processing.
“Marketing Royalty Fee” is a term used in franchising and the fee is typically between 2% - 10%. Anything above 15% is grossly excessive imho.
Also, as I asked earlier, we will need to be able to calculate these fees because this will complicate our tax filings. We will need to have access to details of how the fees are assigned and distributed, e.g. pay-per-click advertising, email marketing, and search engine optimization, and documentation and receipts for these expenses because marketing royalty fees placed on franchisees are fully tax deductible. Will these fees be reported on our 1099-MISC?
Wait… I’m confused. So you’re interpreting the self-referral percentage to mean that if I place a “clean link” to one of my products and it results in a sale, I get 35%-50% total (depending on the department) which includes both my referral and my royalty. So… if my royalty was set at 5% or 50% it wouldn’t matter, I’d still get the same amount on a self referral? Is that what you’re saying?
