Curated Collection Store

[Alissanos]

Hi

I know its allowed to add other designers products to a collection. What I am considering doing is along those lines but I dont know if it is okay..

I have a website I am building for affiliate purposes. On it I will be featuring articles with a curated collection of products from Z. I have created a new store on Z with the same name as my site. I want to add collections to it of the products that i feature on my site. So for instance, if I have a page on my site about the best mid century modern throw pillows, i want to be able to choose products that are not my own and put them in a collection together on my matching store. If that makes sense? So i can link to the whole collection from my website page.

Essentially this zazzle store of mine would be a curated collection of other peoples products, promoted by my website. I will probably add in a couple of my own products, but I simply dont have enough of each type to fill a collection for each page on my site that I make.

I have other stores for my own design, but they dont fit my niche the same way as the curated one would, does anyone know if this is allowed? 

[PacifierCity · Accepted solution]

@Alissanos 

You could use curated links instead of building a whole store.

I'd have to dig around a bit in Z help to try and find the article describing the link and how to build it.  But the link itself basically generates a collection of products, your or others.  You would get better aesthetics building your own collection though, as you can add a banner...

I'm unsure if people create a whole store the way you are mentioning, but I have seen plenty of collections from other designers where all the products are not theirs.  It has become a little more difficult to do, but it is still possible.  As far as I know it is not against any rules.  Although a designer could potentially get upset over it... thinking your claiming their works as your own.  Most affiliates operate in a quiet way.... probably to avoid upset designers, but to also avoid designers coming to them all the time and asking to be promoted...

PC

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[Alissanos]

@PacifierCity 

Thank you, i will have a look for the curated links, havent come accross that yet so didnt know it was a thing. 

I think you covered all of my concerns re other designers, its why I havent made the collections, I was concerned others would think I was somehow using their products as my own. I am promoting others work on my website, and was worried that would be an issue too. 

[PacifierCity]

@Alissanos 

In the user agreements designers give affiliates the right to promote their products... well, Zazzles products, really.  On your site you have to make sure it is clear that you are advertising or marketing someone else products.  It's a legal thing.  Look up "affiliate marketing" and disclosure requirements.  You will find plenty on the subject.

This is an example of a curated link:

https://www.zazzle.com/pd/collection?rf=238713642921474635&tc=jbs_curated_link&lst=23523033726780645...

it consists of a few parts.

zazzle.com/pd/collection is the first part, then

?rf=yourrfidnumber followed by

&tc=whateveryoudlike ending with

&lst=pidnumber,pidnumber,pidnumber

pidnumber is the product number found on a product page.  I've included probably around 20 pids and the link has not broken.  So you can make a link that displays up to 20 products at a time.

It is not something that is widely used, but it does work!  And they can be fun to make.  and it is near impossible to find the help article... but hopefully the above explains it well enough...

PC

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[Alissanos]

@PacifierCity 

Brilliant, thank you! That is going to be very useful and I had no idea it could be done like that. 

As for the affiliate stuff, i used to do amazon affiliate sites back befoe they changed their royalties so I have a disclosure, that should be okay, the gray area for me with the collections is that while the agreement is probably for offsite promotion, I dont know how it would work when promoting inside of a zazzle store, but with the curated links, im sure I can make this work now, so thank you so much for finding the info for me. I still get lost trying to find stuff on zazzle! Just today I found the zazzle explore on the home page 😂 and had to search the forums to see what it was. I admit I still dont get the reason for it, it highlights a product but doesnt link to the product itself, only the designers store which doesnt make a lot of sense to me. As a customer id expect the link to go to the product, landing on the designers store and then having to search through it for the product seems more effort than its worth.

I also see a lot of people recommend to browse the bestsellers to get a feel for what sells but I cant for the life of me find the page easily. I did bookmark it when I found it, but its certainly not easy to find!

[ColsCreations]

If you go here
https://www.zazzle.com/collections 
you can view dozens of such Collections so it's definitely allowed.