— Are we still able to use a search parameter to our store and have it be considered a clean link? Ex: ?qs=wedding
Boy I am lost after that question. I have only been doing this for 15 ? years. After a couple years with only a few referrals I gave up on trying to figure that part out.
Exactly. Deleting/clearing cookies can be disastrous. Last time I did that in my primary every-day browser, it was all kinds of agony. Every site I needed to log into after that, including of course my bank and sites I pay my bills on, needed me to re-log in which meant not only having to find my password and sometimes the secret questions to manually enter it again but also two-step verification via either email or phone text. ARGGGGGGG. I do NOT want to have to go through that again and would never ask a potential customer to do so!
A link like this
https://www.zazzle.com/store/kahmier
would be considered a Self-Promotion link.
A link like this that includes your RF ID / Member ID / Ambassador ID
https://www.zazzle.com/store/kahmier?rf=238207742997519561
would be considered a Cross-Over link.
As a SELF referral on a Cross-over link, you would earn 15% of the order total paid by the customer as your referral commission no matter what they bought from who.
As a SELF referral on a Self-Promotion link, you will only earn a referral commission if they buy your own product. You’ll earn zero on anything they buy from another designer.
My sales are almost dead. also the royalties. why I don’t have non-Referred Sale now. If I Unenrol the Zazzle Ambassador program, can I have my previos sales asusual
New creator here and generally new to Zazzle. I’ve found this thread using ChatGPT because of the partial documentation in the site’s help section. The chat did direct me to this thread but did not read the attached pdf, therefore it has a partial understanding of the program terms.
This pdf is quite comprehensive, but it lacks the definition of a ‘direct’ link, the kind of link that triggers a self-promoted sale , therefore the following questions:
Is the link considered direct when I link from :
-My blog, which has its own domain and includes subdomains?
-My social channels, as a link in the bio, description or comments?
-Do my blog and social channels have to be stated in advance under store options?
Is the link considered direct when I link to :
-A single product with my design on it?
-A collection created by me within my store?
-My store’s main page?
(edit) -A search result page which includes my own and other creators’ products, all of them tied to a certain subject I want to promote?
For the long run:
The actual help pages for earnings and affiliates should be as detailed as the attached pdf, for users (and LLMs) to find all the info easily.
The split between self-promotion and cross-promotion should not be, because (1) Questions just like I’ve asked can be asked by many users, each one with their unique edge case, making the technical realization of recognizing a direct link not scalable, and (2) We, as humans, don’t have direct control over other people’s taste.
-Creators and ambassadors should only use a single link type, the one that includes the referrer parameter, because even when a user switches to and from my designs and others’, I am still in charge of leading the user into the platform and deserve to be rewarded for that. In other words: a lead is a lead.
-This approach is more transparent regarding to which links are ‘direct’ and should be simpler to technically implement.
-My suggestion also aligns with many popular affiliate programs which utilize a simple referral link that rewards purchases across the entire platform, including (edit) deep links to categories, tags, individual shops or vendors and product search result pages. Strong examples for this approach are huge marketplaces such as Amazon, eBay and Aliexpress.
Thanks for your time 🌻
After extensive re-reading and consulting with the chat, I was able to find the answers about self-promotion links. The information is technically there but it was fairly hard to get to it. I’m sharing here the relevant parts, highlighting added:
Q: Can I promote Zazzle Products on social media as an Ambassador?
A: Absolutely! You can share your Self-Promotion Links and Cross-Promotion Links freely on social media platforms, blogs, websites, or even via email —just be sure to avoid spammy or misleading promotional practices.
Q: If Self-Promotion Links have no Referral code, how does Zazzle identify and credit these Referrals accurately?
A: When you enroll in the Ambassador Program, we automatically associate your Ambassador ID with all direct visits to your Products, Stores, Collections, Member Profile, and API pages. Zazzle automatically credits these Referrals to the correct Creator without needing URL parameters.
Also, I can understand the logic behind self-promotion links not having a referral code - Promoting creators of shareable and viral products, letting the audience serve as sub-affiliates. I think that’s a smart idea, but I feel it’s poorly communicated.
I still suggest updating the platform help section with the detailed information from the PDF document, for the ease of access and for avoiding dependence on external sources such as LLMs.
Thanks for the reading and generally for being present to answer questions.
Enough typing, I have shirts to design 
Posting AI responses here is against the community forum guidelines. Perhaps on Monday when the mods are in @Heather can assist you further.
No AI was used to write my messages. I only used the chat to find information about the program terms.