Jessica Larrew has been sharing her entrepreneurial journey at TheSellingFamily.com since 2012 and has taught many side hustles to her followers over the years. After making millions online and reaching F.I.R.E (Financial Independence Retire Early), she took a much-needed sabbatical for a year. She is now focused on side hustles that are low-pressure, flexible, and offer passive income potential.
If you’re curious about how you can earn passive income as an Amazon Influencer, keep reading!
Tell us a little about yourself and your history
I’ve been an online entrepreneur since 2008.
Since then, I’ve done many things to earn income online.
Things like reselling used stuff on eBay, reselling retail products using Amazon FBA, blogging, creating and selling online courses and memberships, making low-content books, creating print-on-demand t-shirts, and probably a few other things along the way that I’m forgetting!
Overall, my businesses have been extremely successful.
But, behind the scenes, I was feeling a ton of anxiety, self-inflicted pressure to ‘do more,’ and a serious case of burnout.
So, in 2023, I decided to shut down my multi-six-figure online course business and take a much-needed break. I wanted to give myself a year off to see what I really wanted to do next, if anything, to make money.
If I never came back to ‘working,’ I was okay with that and knew our family would be okay because we had achieved ‘financial independence’ already.
As an entrepreneur, I felt in my heart there would likely be something else. I just needed the mental space and freedom to figure it out without the pressure of having another business going at the same time that I felt like needed my attention.
Little did I know, my time of sabbatical was not going to be meant for relaxing. My husband was diagnosed with leukemia, and we were thrown into the crazy world of cancer treatment.
I am so thankful for the timing of it all, though.
Because I had already shut down my business, I was able to focus on helping him 100% without also trying to work at the same time.
He is now cancer-free, and our life has started returning to normal.
After being home again for a few months and having so much time off, I finally felt the desire to get back on the horse.
The burn-out was gone, my family was healthy again, and I felt the freedom to just have fun with a new side hustle.
Tell us how you got started reviewing products on Amazon.
Since I have been in the Amazon space for so long already, I have been hearing people talking about making money reviewing products on Amazon as influencers.
I set up an account and wanted to give it a shot.
That was 3 days before my husband’s initial leukemia diagnosis.
So, needless to say, it was out of sight, out of mind for almost a year!
When we were back home and getting back to life, I started thinking about what side hustle I wanted to try, and I remembered the influencer account I had set up.
I logged back in and realized those 3 videos had made me almost $200 completely passively.
So, I decided to hop back in and see what I could do with it.
It was perfect for me because I didn’t have to be the face of the brand, as my videos are completely faceless, and there is no pressure to meet quotas or anything like that. I could do as little or as much as I wanted.
I could just make videos when I felt like it, upload them, and then go back to normal life.
I started adding new videos, and my commissions started going up right away.
Between March and April, I added 25 videos to my account and started making $75 per month.
So, I kept going!
By June, I had about 45 videos and had my first $100 day.
That’s when I really knew this was a completely viable side hustle.
I had been sharing this journey with my email list, and they were very intrigued, so I started documenting the steps I was taking so I could share the processes.
For those who aren’t familiar with it, can you explain what being an Amazon influencer means?
Yes, absolutely!
The Amazon Influencer Program is a program that Amazon created as a way to bring influencer marketing to the Amazon platform.
Typically, an influencer has to build a brand and audience, and then they send that audience somewhere else to make a purchase. If they make a purchase, the influencer will make a commission from the sale.
Well, Amazon flipped that around!
With the Amazon Influencer Program, we create videos about products that we own, and Amazon shares those videos directly on the product pages where the customer already is.
So there is no need to find our own customers anymore.
When a potential customer is looking at a page on Amazon, they can watch the influencer videos to get more information about the product (like a demo of how it works, an unboxing of everything that is included, tips and tricks, etc.).
If the customer watches an influencer video and then makes a purchase, Amazon pays the influencer a commission based on the purchase price and a set commission structure (between 1-5%, depending on the category of the product).
If you are on Amazon, you’ll see a section called “Videos.” This is different from the customer review section, where there may also be videos.
These videos shown are made up of customer reviews, influencer videos, and the brand’s own videos.
The influencer videos will have a title for the video and an influencer name underneath.
When you click the video, you’ll see a spot that says “Earns Commission” below their influencer name.
So, if I were to watch the video above and then buy the vacuum in the video, Marc would earn a commission.
The commission is given to the creator of the last video watched before clicking the buy button (i.e., the person who ‘closed the sale’).
Typically, these videos are between 1-5 minutes long.
So, when someone says they get paid by Amazon to review products they already own, this is what they mean.
Do you need any special tools or equipment for this business?
One of the best things about being an Amazon Influencer is you do not need to buy a bunch of tools or pay for a bunch of subscriptions in order to be successful!
There are a few things that you have to have in order to do this business.
- A smartphone or camera to record your product review videos
- A computer to apply for the program and upload those videos (once approved, you can upload videos directly from your smartphone to the Amazon App if you prefer)
- Products to review – these are found in your home. You don’t have to buy anything new.
Aside from those, I do recommend eventually getting a couple of other things that help improve the quality of your influencer videos. But they are not necessary when you are just getting started.
- A tripod to keep your phone steady as you record.
- Some sort of lighting. This can be a ring light, a light box, or even a portable light that hooks onto your phone.
- If you do walk-around videos, I recommend a small microphone to keep your sound even.
These influencer tools are all things that can be added as you start making money and should run you less than $100 in total.
How much money can you earn as an Amazon Influencer?
Like any business, the amount of money you make will depend on how much effort you are willing to put into it.
I’ve found that most people can get to $500 per month by creating 100-200 high-quality videos.
I also know people who have over 1,000 videos up and are making $5,000+ a month.
As I mentioned before, I had my first $100 day when I had less than 50 videos published.
What sort of personality does best with this business?
That’s a great question!
A lot of people would think you need to have a very outgoing personality in order to be successful with the Amazon Influencer Program.
But that’s not necessarily the case.
The thing that first intrigued me about it was the ability to make videos and never show my face.
I had been building ‘brands’ around myself for over 10 years, and I really wanted to try a business where I wasn’t the ‘face’ of it. It didn’t matter if people liked me personally or not.
Since I focus on faceless videos, it doesn’t matter if I’m in my pajamas, my hair is in a messy bun (which it is 95% of the time), or my face is broken out. I don’t have to worry about those things because no one sees them.
I know in the grand scheme of things, those really don’t matter, but it’s hard to get in front of the camera if you’re feeling bad about yourself.
So, if you are an introvert like me, faceless videos are great.
On the flip side, if you are super outgoing and love being in the spotlight or don’t mind being on camera, you can make a totally different type of video!
You can be the personality of the video.
You can sit in front of the camera holding your product and let everyone see and hear your enthusiasm.
That’s what’s so cool about this.
Some people are never seen at all, some are in every video, and some are producing studio-quality reviews.
Tell us about your online course.
Sure!
I created the Amazon Influencer Mastery course because as I was sharing my influencer journey with my friends and email list, people had so many questions about how to get started and how to do it successfully.
When looking online for how to do something like this, there is always a bunch of conflicting information, and it can take days/weeks to get through it all.
Since I have over 10 years of experience teaching people how to make money on Amazon, it made sense for me to create a step-by-step course that would walk people through the whole Amazon Influencer process in just a couple of hours.
I know how hard it is to piecemeal information together, so I wanted to give people a place to go where everything is up to date and all in one place.
The course starts with a thorough overview of the program, including how it works, how you get paid, my experience, etc.
Then, we move into getting you approved for the program, which is a multi-step process. Many people try this on their own and just give up completely!
So, I show you how to get approved so you can start making money!
Once approved, we get into the video creation process. All the different types of videos you can make, how to edit them, how to upload them, how to make good captions, etc.
Then, we finish off with some FAQs and how to manage your account moving forward.
Basically, everything you need to be a successful Amazon influencer starts from the very first step.
The course is mostly video, where I’m sharing my screen, talking to the screen, or recording myself actually doing the stuff like making videos and editing them.
There is also an optional support group available for those people who prefer more interaction and a place to ask me and the other members questions.
What will people learn in your free ebook?
The free ebook “7 Steps To Becoming A Successful Amazon Influencer” is a great overview of all of the steps that go into getting started as an Amazon Influencer.
It covers the 2 part application process and what to expect along the way. Plus, things like creating videos and managing your influencer storefront.
This free ebook will really help you know what you are getting into and if this is the type of side hustle you want to start.
Anything else you’d like to share?
With this business, getting started and approved is the hardest part. Because there is a two-part application process, a lot of people will give up before they’ve even had a chance to upload any review videos.
The first part of the application is having an engaged social media account. This means you have either an Instagram account, Facebook Page, or TikTok account that people follow and engage with.
If you don’t have one already, this could take anywhere from a couple of weeks to a couple of months to get to the next phase of the program.
The engagement part is the most important, not the follower count. So, you could have 50 followers and get approved as long as they are actually liking, commenting, and interacting with your posts.
That’s why I have the option available in our course support group to request engagement if you want.
Fortunately, once you are approved, you don’t have to keep building the social media account; you can focus just on the Amazon part for uploading videos. You don’t need to post your review videos anywhere else since Amazon already has the audience in place.
Where can people get to know you better?
Thanks for letting me share! It’s been fun!
I’d love to continue the conversation with anyone who wants to know more 🙂
You can find me hanging out on TikTok @JessicaLarrew and at my site, The Selling Family, where I share about the Amazon Influencer Program, other side hustles I do, and ways to save money.
Head over here to learn more and enroll in Amazon Influencer Mastery.
