Amazon Influencer Products: How to Pick What to Film
The hardest part of being an Amazon influencer isn't filming. It's deciding what to film. Picking Amazon influencer products is where your time and money go. Every product means buying it or waiting on a sample, shooting, editing, uploading, and waiting on approval. Pick well and that video can earn for months. Pick badly and it sits on your storefront doing nothing.
This guide walks through a repeatable way to choose products: what to look at, in what order, and how to find low-competition products without spending your whole evening scrolling listings. For how the program works overall, see the Amazon Influencer Program guide.
Why product choice matters more than you think
Onsite commissions come from shoppers who are already on Amazon, watch your video, and buy. That means three things have to be true for a video to pay:
- Shoppers have to be on that product page. No traffic, no sales.
- Your video has to be visible there. If the listing already has a wall of videos, yours may land at the bottom or not show at all.
- The sale has to be worth something. Your commission is a percentage of the sale price, and the percentage depends on the product category.
Most creators only think about the first one, or none of them. They film whatever's on their kitchen counter. That's a fine way to reach your first 10 approved videos, but after that, being picky pays.
The four checks for the best Amazon influencer products
Run these four checks on every product you're thinking about. They take a minute once you're used to them.
1. Competition: how many creators already have videos?
Scroll the product page and count the influencer videos, top and bottom. A listing with a handful of videos is a much easier place to stand out than one with dozens. This is the single most useful number for finding low-competition products, and the most tedious to check by hand.
2. Demand: is it actually selling?
Look for signals that people are buying. Amazon often shows a "bought in past month" line on listings, and Best Sellers Rank gives a rough idea of how a product sells relative to others in its category. A high number of ratings tells you it has sold over time, but not necessarily recently.
3. Price and category commission
Higher-priced products earn more per sale at the same rate, but they also tend to sell less often. Category matters too: Amazon pays onsite commissions at fixed rates that differ by category, so two products at the same price can earn quite differently. Check Amazon's current commission income statement for the categories you film most. Rates change, so check the source rather than relying on a screenshot from last year.
4. Your fit: can you make a genuinely useful video?
Amazon's best practices for shoppable videos say detail-page placement is earned by showing the product in use, telling shoppers something useful, and making it clear which product the video is about. Ask yourself: can I actually do that with this product, in my space, with my setup? A product you understand and use will almost always beat one you're filming just because the numbers look good.
How to find low-competition products
"Low competition" doesn't mean "obscure." The sweet spot is a product with steady demand and only a few videos. Here's where to look.
Products you already own
Start in your own house. Look at your order history for things you use daily. You already know their quirks, which is exactly the firsthand perspective Amazon wants. Check each one's competition before you film.
Variations and close alternatives
When a best-selling product is packed with videos, look at the slightly different version: a different size, a bundle, a competing brand with good ratings, or the newer model. Shoppers comparing options often land on those pages too, and they may have far fewer videos.
Accessories and add-ons
The main product might be crowded, but what about the case, the refill, the replacement part, the stand? Accessory listings can have real demand and very little video coverage.
Seasonal products, filmed early
Holiday décor, back-to-school supplies, summer outdoor gear. Competition on seasonal listings often grows as the season approaches. Filming a bit ahead gives your video time to get approved and placed before the rush.
Search result pages
Instead of checking one product at a time, run a search for a category you know and scan the results. This is where a tool saves the most time, because you can compare many products side by side.
Doing it faster with ReelVine
Checking competition, demand, price, and commission on every listing by hand is the part that burns creators out. ReelVine is a Chrome extension built for this exact job. As you browse Amazon, it puts a card on every product, search result, and order with:
- Competition: how many creators already have videos on that product (Platinum).
- Potential income per month: an estimate built from sales, price, commission, and your share, to help you compare products (Platinum). It's an estimate for comparing, not a promise of what you'll earn.
- Your placement: top carousel, bottom carousel, or not showing, for products you've already filmed.
- Creator Connections commission on search results, so you can spot higher-commission campaigns.
- Price, commission, bought past month, rank, rating and more, arranged the way you like.
ReelVine only reads the Amazon pages you open yourself. It doesn't click, scroll, or post anything for you. You can see what's in each plan on the ReelVine pricing page.
A simple scoring routine
If you like structure, give each candidate product a quick score from 1 to 3 on each check:
| Check | 1 | 2 | 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Competition | Crowded | Some videos | Few videos |
| Demand | Little sign of sales | Moderate | Clearly selling |
| Value per sale | Low price or low rate | Middle | Higher price or rate |
| Your fit | Hard to show well | Okay | You use it and know it |
Film the high scorers first. Products that score low on fit go to the bottom of the list no matter how good the other numbers look. A weak video on a great listing still won't place.
Mistakes that waste filming time
- Buying first, researching second. Check competition before you add to cart.
- Ignoring variants. Onsite video commissions are tied to the same ASIN variant featured in the video, per Amazon's terms. Tag the exact one you show.
- Hauls with ten products and ten seconds each. Amazon says a video only reaches a product's page if it clearly features that product.
- Chasing price alone. An expensive product nobody buys earns nothing.
- Never revisiting. Products that were crowded six months ago may have opened up, and vice versa.
Where Creator Connections fits
Creator Connections campaigns let brands offer bonus commission on top of your standard rate, under the campaign's terms. When two products score about the same, a campaign can be the tiebreaker. Read Amazon Creator Connections explained before you join one, because budgets and dates matter.
And once you've picked well, make sure the video itself earns its spot. How to reach the top carousel covers that side.
Amazon Influencer Products FAQ
What products should Amazon influencers review first?
Start with products you already own and use, so you can make genuinely useful videos while you work toward your first 10 approved videos. After that, prioritize products with steady demand and few existing videos.
Do I have to buy every product I film?
No. Many creators film products they already own, and some get samples through brand deals or Creator Connections campaigns. Amazon's Creator Connections materials note that if you accept a campaign sample, you're expected to use it in the content you create for that campaign.
Is a product with zero influencer videos always a good pick?
Not always. Zero videos can mean a wide-open opportunity, or it can mean nobody buys it. Check demand signals like "bought in past month" and Best Sellers Rank before filming.
How do I know how much a product could earn?
You can't know for sure. Your earnings depend on your video, your placement, and shoppers. You can compare products using price, category rate, and sales signals. ReelVine's potential income figure combines those into an estimate to help you compare, not to predict your actual earnings. For more on income, see how much do Amazon influencers make?