Where is Creator Connections actually headed next? I’ve been chewing on this one for a while, because if you look at the changes Amazon has already made to the program over the last couple of years, I think they tell you a lot about what’s coming. Most of us forget those changes even happened. But when you line them up in order, a pattern shows up — and that pattern is worth paying attention to before Q4 gets here.

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How We Even Found Out About Creator Connections

Quick recap, because this part still makes me laugh. 2025 was really the first year the Amazon influencer side understood that Creator Connections was available to us at all. Amazon never talked about it in terms of the influencer site. They only ever talked about it in terms of affiliates — it was built for the off-site people.

So at the end of 2024 you had these rumors floating around. A few influencers were quietly making money and nobody could explain why. I remember posting in a group asking, “Hey, did you guys hear something about our videos qualifying?” And if you reached out to Amazon customer support, they’d tell you no, you don’t qualify. Meanwhile we were getting paid.

It turns out we did qualify. Amazon’s own support didn’t know it either. That’s the origin story of the program most of us are now building our businesses on, and I think it explains a lot of what came after.

The One Big Change in 2025: Early Access Campaigns

All of 2025, there was really only one structural change to Creator Connections: the early access campaign system.

If you don’t know what that is, here’s the short version. If you’re Gold or Platinum in the Creator Star tiers, you get access to every new campaign for about a week before Bronze and Silver do.

Some of you just went, “Wait, what?” Yeah. If you’re Bronze or Silver, the campaigns that look brand new to you have already been sitting in front of Gold and Platinum creators for a full week. That was a major benefit to the top tiers, and more importantly, it was the first real structural change Amazon had made to the program in a long time.

The Theory: Amazon Is Moving the Bill to the Brands

During all of this, a lot of us had a theory about why Amazon was pushing Creator Connections so hard to both brands and creators. The theory was that at some point Amazon would start moving the burden of paying Amazon influencer commissions off its own shoulders and onto the brands. Creator Connections style. TikTok Shop style.

I think Amazon took some notes on what was happening over at TikTok Shop and thought, “We don’t have to pay all of this ourselves.”

Then this year happened. The Amazon influencer side reduced commissions, which pushed even more creators over to Creator Connections. That theory we were kicking around in 2025 started to bear itself out in a pretty obvious way.

2026 Change #1: Sponsored Products and EPC

Where 2025 gave us one change, this year gave us two.

The first was the sponsored products rollout — the EPC, or earnings-per-click, system. Most influencers forget this one even happened, because the impact on our side has been really low. You can’t earn from sponsored clicks on your Amazon videos, so nobody in our world talks about it. For the off-site affiliate people, though, it’s a big deal.

Here’s why I think it matters anyway. Amazon walked in and said, “We’re going to slide a whole other revenue pathway in here.” That almost never happens. In this program you usually see things get removed, not added. This was an add. And when a platform starts adding revenue pathways, it’s usually building toward something bigger.

2026 Change #2: Creator Connections Reporting Got Cut

The second change hit in July: they pulled the detailed Creator Connections reporting.

Up until then, Creator Connections still had full reporting for every product that sold, even though the main Amazon influencer side had already consolidated its reporting back in March and April. In July, Creator Connections finally fell in line and matched it.

That one is actually the most interesting change to me, and not because of the reporting itself.

What the Timing Tells Us

Ask yourself the obvious question: why wait five months? If you’re going to consolidate reporting on the influencer side in March and April, why would you leave Creator Connections untouched until July?

I’ll be honest with you about what I think is going on. Creator Connections grew so fast last year that it turned into the Wild West. I think there are parts of Amazon genuinely struggling to keep up with the volume moving through the program. On one hand they’re trying to manage it. On the other hand they’re trying to grow it.

In a well-run rollout, that reporting change happens in April alongside everything else. Waiting five months looks less like strategy and more like an oversight. Mismanagement is probably the word I’m looking for. And that matters, because it means:

  • Some changes you’re bracing for are going to land later than you expect
  • Some things you assume are permanent are just items nobody has gotten to yet
  • Alignment between the influencer side and Creator Connections is the direction of travel, even when it’s slow

Q4 Is Coming and Amazon Knows It

Last year was the first holiday season with Creator Connections really cooking, and it absolutely cooked. So I’d imagine parts of the Amazon and Creator Connections ecosystem are implementing changes right now to prepare for the volume coming in Q4 this year.

We’re already seeing hints of it. Sales data visibility has been flickering. My own visibility on product search pages has been shifting around. There was a new blue button that showed up that I’d never seen before. They’re moving furniture, and they’re moving it now.

The creators telling you to plan for Q4 today aren’t being dramatic. Amazon is planning for it too — trust me.

My Prediction: An Overhaul Before Q4

Here’s my actual guess, and I’ll own it if I’m wrong.

The Creator Connections platform itself has had almost no overhaul in years. We are looking at essentially the same page we were looking at a few years ago, except now there’s a sponsored products section bolted on. It’s clunky. The messaging system is not great. And I think the sponsored products inclusion is going to force some kind of layout overhaul, because you can’t keep stapling new revenue systems onto an interface that old.

My guess is we see that overhaul this year, before we get deep into Q4. Maybe I’m wrong. But it seems a little silly to run the volume of a holiday season like last year’s through a platform that hasn’t been meaningfully touched.

What You Should Actually Do About It

Whatever comes — Creator Connections or the influencer side — there have always been changes in this program. Some have looked far more detrimental than they turned out to be.

Back in March when reporting got pulled, plenty of people said the thing was over. Dead. When related products went away: over, dead. When commission rates dropped: over, dead. And somehow the program is more popular now than it was back then.

Because the one thing that consistently wins is consistency. We aren’t doing the same things today that we were doing before those changes. Stuff changed, stuff evolved, and people are still winning. So here’s how I’d handle the next one:

  1. Don’t panic when a change lands. Ask whether the fundamentals of the program are still intact. They almost always are.
  2. Treat it as a strategy shift, not an ending. The people who adapt fastest take the share the panickers give up.
  3. Keep your own data. Every time Amazon trims reporting, the creators who tracked their own numbers keep their edge.
  4. Get positioned for Q4 now, while everyone else is still arguing about the last change.
  5. Protect your time. The more of your workflow you automate, the less a platform change costs you to absorb.

That last one is the whole reason I built Oink. When Amazon keeps trimming what it shows you, the creators who win are the ones doing faster product research, tracking their own Creator Connections campaigns, and not losing hours a week to manual submissions and brand messages. You can’t control what Amazon changes. You can absolutely control how long it takes you to react.

Final Thoughts

Nobody knows exactly what Amazon does next. But the changes we’ve already seen — early access campaigns, sponsored products and EPC, reporting consolidation — all point the same direction: a bigger, more brand-funded, more tightly managed Creator Connections. Get ready for that version of the program rather than mourning the old one.

If you want the research and workflow side handled so you can spend your energy on strategy instead of busywork, come check out Oink for Influencers. It’s the tool I use every day to find products worth filming and to keep my Creator Connections campaigns from falling through the cracks.

I'm an Amazon Influencer since 2023 and blogger since 2021. My goal is to help you succeed in the Amazon Influencer Program.

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