More royalty and commission changes at Zazzle

[fieldsphotos]

And not for the better.   They are removing the volume bonus program for sellers and moving it to affiliates only.   Also, they are now encouraging folks to lower their royalty rates to the new lower limit of 5%. 
 
http://forum.zazzle.com/news/important_news

The news not mentioned in this announcement but was announced in the Town Hall forum "meeting" was that any royalties set at 15% or greater will now be subject to their 5% transaction fee.   The transaction fee comes out of the royalty you made.   So if your royalty rate is set at 15% and you sell a shirt for $20, your royalty would have been $3.00.  They will then take the 5% transaction fee out of that and you will get $2.85 instead.  (assuming my math is correct). 
   
Town Hall discussion:  http://forum.zazzle.com/townhall/town_hall_iv

The volume bonus thing won't affect me too much, since my port is still small there, but it was a nice incentive for growing my port there that is now gone.   Some more established sellers were making 30% of their income from the volume bonus amounts, so it will be a kick in the teeth for them. 

The new lower limit on royalties just doesn't bode well for the future IMHO.   I fully expect we will see the new royalty "cutoff" for promoting etc lower to 10% in the near future (down from the 15% it is now). 

[Ron]

I am going to wait until I get my payout and delete my store. Made 45 dollar in 13 months. Not worth my time. I am doing better on FAA, which suits my images better. Thanks for the update.

[Pilens]

A while ago I figured out zazzle is not worth my time spent. I see no reason, however, to delete my store (i.e. devalue my time spent there). My stuff still averages a whooping $5 per month 

[luissantos84]

so its time to raise them 5%

anyway was there a fee before at 20%? if so I had no idea, they need to start emailing us, not posting on the forum

[stockastic]

As if Zazzle could be a bigger waste of time than it already is.   :-(

[luissantos84]

As if Zazzle could be a bigger waste of time than it already is.   :-(

you can say they aren't worth your time (not surprised!) but they are certainly worth for other, too bad we don't know exactly how much money Zazzle is doing, I would say a ton more than most middle tier

actually I have one for you (don't tell anybody) but I do more $$$ there than in all agencies beside SS

[fieldsphotos]

As if Zazzle could be a bigger waste of time than it already is.   :-(

you can say they aren't worth your time (not surprised!) but they are certainly worth for other, too bad we don't know exactly how much money Zazzle is doing, I would say a ton more than most middle tier

actually I have one for you (don't tell anybody) but I do more $$$ there than in all agencies beside SS

I am the same, they are my second best agency and worth my time.  (i am not a big player in any of this, though). They did e-mail this to sellers, but you have to have emails turned on in your profile to get them.

Based on the comments in their Proseller forums, some folks will be losing $1500 to $2000 a month from the VB change, which implies they are doing as well there as some of the bigger players at the micros.   Mostly designers seem to do well with lots of illustrations.   You can also do very well selling the various niche markets, ie wedding invitations and stuff.    Design all matching themes invitations, envelopes, thank you cards, stamps, etc and buyers often buy the whole kit.   

EDIT:  wait, what am I saying?  Zazzle is a waste of time, don't bother. 

[luissantos84]

Hi Sarah!

was there a fee before this last change? (see my picture above)

[fieldsphotos]

Hi Sarah!

was there a fee before this last change? (see my picture above)

Yes, the fee has traditionally been set at twice zazzles default royalty rate.  Up until these new changes, the fee kicked in at 20% which was twice the default 10%.  I believe you can see that info on one of the royalty screens in your account, but I am not sure where.  I think it used to kick in at 25% when I first started there.

Edit:  found it in the FAQ under the question about recommended royalty rates.
http://www.zazzle.com/sell/designers/nameyourroyalty

Now the default rate is 5%, but zazzle is giving us a "break" by setting the new fee royalty cut off at 15% instead of 10% (which would be twice the new default)

That's part of the problem with zazzle- keeping up with all the changes.  You leauve it for a month or two and 15 new products are out or these type of things have gone down.  And it gets hard to catch back up since so much of the details are buried in the forums.  I only caught this change because of the email they sent out. 

[shiyali]

There must be an oversupply of designers/photographers which gives the agencies leverage, as usual presented as a positive change.

[donding]

Feildsphotos thanks for posting this. I don't have the e-mail option turned on so I wouldn't have known what was going on. I don't understand why they don't automatically send e-mails out that are as important as major changes. It upsets me because I make extra money off that volume bonus. I guess another site on its way into the greed and feed world.
 

And not for the better.   They are removing the volume bonus program for sellers and moving it to affiliates only.   Also, they are now encouraging folks to lower their royalty rates to the new lower limit of 5%. 
 
http://forum.zazzle.com/news/important_news

The news not mentioned in this announcement but was announced in the Town Hall forum "meeting" was that any royalties set at 15% or greater will now be subject to their 5% transaction fee.   The transaction fee comes out of the royalty you made.   So if your royalty rate is set at 15% and you sell a shirt for $20, your royalty would have been $3.00.  They will then take the 5% transaction fee out of that and you will get $2.85 instead.  (assuming my math is correct). 
   
Town Hall discussion:  http://forum.zazzle.com/townhall/town_hall_iv

The volume bonus thing won't affect me too much, since my port is still small there, but it was a nice incentive for growing my port there that is now gone.   Some more established sellers were making 30% of their income from the volume bonus amounts, so it will be a kick in the teeth for them. 

The new lower limit on royalties just doesn't bode well for the future IMHO.   I fully expect we will see the new royalty "cutoff" for promoting etc lower to 10% in the near future (down from the 15% it is now). 

[donding]

Hmmmm.....what's the deal?   Did they get lessons from iStock or what??

[fieldsphotos]

Hmmmm.....what's the deal?   Did they get lessons from iStock or what??

LOL.  Sad, but true.    Many submitters are comparing this move to what Cafe Press did.  I was never there, but apparently they forced all royalties from their marketplace to 10%.  After that designers fled to Zazzle in droves (which helped Zazzle grow tremendously).  So many folks feel pretty betrayed.

Now I suppose folks will start looking for the next POD site to migrate to. 

[Freedom]

It is certainly a worrisome trend.

For those items which I set at 15%, I will change my rate to 14.99%.

[madelaide]

I have not receive any announcement from their side, thanks for posting.

If there was a change in volume bonus, I wished it was putting all the currencies together. It would make sense since there aren't really separate sites for each of them. I would understand if they had different offices with separate account management. Oh well, it doesn't have any importance anymore.

[donding]

I have not receive any announcement from their side, thanks for posting.

If there was a change in volume bonus, I wished it was putting all the currencies together. It would make sense since there aren't really separate sites for each of them. I would understand if they had different offices with separate account management. Oh well, it doesn't have any importance anymore.

I didn't get one either. It was like a bombshell. The volume bonus is gone as of July. The 5% default royalty is kicking in on June 17. It just sounds fishy to me. I've tried so many different referral links and not with much success. It really doesn't do much good when most of the sites strip the codes. I'm not going to hold my breath where this is concerned because I got a feeling it's going to blow up in their face. Hopefully I'm wrong.

[borg]

It is certainly a worrisome trend.

For those items which I set at 15%, I will change my rate to 14.99%.

No I will not!

I'll change from 39% to 44%... Will be enough....

[Freedom]

It is certainly a worrisome trend.

For those items which I set at 15%, I will change my rate to 14.99%.

No I will not!

I'll change from 39% to 44%... Will be enough....

Good for you! I am still new to Zazzle and can use their promotion for a while. 

[cathyslife]

Is there a way to globally change my royalty on business cards? I want them all to be 14.9% but too lazy to go into them one by one.

edit: oops, never mind, found it.

[Freedom]

Is there a way to globally change my royalty on business cards? I want them all to be 14.9% but too lazy to go into them one by one.

edit: oops, never mind, found it.

I think we only have the options to a) apply the change to all previous products or b) all subsequent products.

[madelaide]

Is there a way to globally change my royalty on business cards? I want them all to be 14.9% but too lazy to go into them one by one.

edit: oops, never mind, found it.

I think you can select them and then edit royalty only.

[EmberMike]

As if Zazzle could be a bigger waste of time than it already is.

There are people who do better at Zazzle than they do at SS. I'm not one of them, but some people do extremely well there.

[madelaide]

I do better at Zazzle than at any microstock site, even after over a year without creating new material.

[Freedom]

Is there a way to globally change my royalty on business cards? I want them all to be 14.9% but too lazy to go into them one by one.

edit: oops, never mind, found it.

I think you can select them and then edit royalty only.

Great to know! Thanks.

[TonyRay]

I have been with Zazzle since 2005 in fact many of us were recruited from Cafepress by Zazzle and many of us ended up making a good living there.  We also referred hundreds of people to Zazzle.  Many of us now are banned from the forums at Zazzle as of last May we saw some disturbing changes coming about.  When we posted about these we were banned some of us even threatened to have our stores closed and our earnings pending ceased.

From what we have all observed first the referral system was changed.  Those of us who were making referrals were now unable to get them almost 90 percent of the times we tried no matter what we have done.  Zazzle refused as it has to date that there were any changes, but blames it on our browsers , time outs, cookies but nothing wrong even though we know how to refer our efforts no longer work,  In fact people that do not refer are now sometimes getting referrals which we have figured to be a glitch on the changes they made this system.

The affiliates came in around this same time frame and pretty much told us who they will and will not promote.  Since that time the game changes every few months.  And yes now the affiliates get it all and all and that is ALL of our incentives have been taken away, or we are punished if we set our royalties above 15 percent and now urged to 5 percent which is just a matter of time that will be set in stone for everyone.

In the town meeting we were also told that it is now at Zazzle's discretion whether they promote our self referrals or even us at the MP sales.

At this same time last May 2012 the groupings were changed at the MP and many of us lost our best selling rankings and were replaced with stores with little inventory we have never heard of.  Some say these are employee's that is speculation but employee's are allowed to have a store.  Zazzle also has their own affiliate marketing team which we also feel is a conflict of interest.  They have run ads for a Affiliate marketing specialist last year, and have a person which ironically has the same name as the affiliate who came into the forums claiming to make well into the high six figures a year with Zazzle.  They claim the two are not the same person but the person employed at Zazzle is their affiliate specialist.

Just a few months ago we were told that the royalty range should be at 10 to 25 percent then changed to 10-15 to be included in sales now again changed. This has levied a ton of work on us sellers changing our royalties which is not easy and only allowed one time per month, just to have it again now twice changed in one year.  Almost like a smokescreen to keep us from seeing what is really going on.

Now we are blindsided with little notice that our VB is going to the affiliates and yes some of us will lose thousands, but that is not the worst part.The VB would not matter anymore as the MP , the rankings, the tag gaming going on all makes it impossible for our best selling items to get the due we worked so hard for, and replaces with vendors, create your own, and now who knows stores for the purpose of Affiliates benefit.

Something is fishy in San Jose California and since we have been over night ruined and banned so we have no voice just like Cafepress did and now the forums are a ghost town we were fooled once but not again.  We will continue to try and find out what happened as we have been told they will NEVER tell us how they do their affiliate program yet they are telling someone and that is not the people that made them what they are today.   

The sad thing is that many still are in shock and denial and even though we tried to warn these people over a year ago, they still think Zazzle has their best interest at hand.  Time to wake up and everyone raise your royalties back up so affiliates get nothing like you will be getting if you do not.  If that does not work then you lose nothing and then close all your stores.  Take pride in your work and self its never going back to the way it was.