Prime Day comes but once a year and luckily this year it's coming for longer than ever-- a full 48 hours starting at midnight PT on July 15 through July 16! But, as an Amazon Associate and Influencer, Prime Day is more than just an opportunity for you to score a good deal on a TV or a discounted Fresh membership for yourself. It's a major shopping day that you should be poised to take advantage of on your website or social channels to boost your earnings.

These five tips will take you through the basics of Prime Day planning--from creating a buzz with your audience to finding the best deals for your audience. Prime Day will be here before we know it, so let's get started!

The time to start planning for Prime Day is now! Although July 15-16 may seem like it's far away, you'll want to get a jump on your planning if you want to maximize your earnings during that 48 hours.

Not to mention that building anticipation with your audience is a great tactic for improving your Prime Day performance. To help build the excitement and get the word out, plan a Prime Day preview post that introduces your audience to what Prime Day is and offers a preview of some of the deals (or at least types of deals) that you plan to feature. To find those deals, check out the Prime Day page on Amazon, which includes plenty of lead-up deals that you can take advantage of before the big day. Take a look at our other article here about building Prime Day buzz.

Prime Day offers run for a limited time only on the day-of, so you'll also want to make sure that your Prime Day preview post contains all the specifics for when and where users will be able to access deals. And then just keep reminding them! Send out social media blasts with Prime Day reminders or schedule a few shorter preview posts leading up to Prime Day to build ever more anticipation.

Now is also the time to start planning, creating, and scheduling your content. If you try to create everything and post it while Prime Day is happening, you won't be able to take advantage of all the deals and you'll probably go crazy in the process. Choose the deals you'd like to feature, build quality content around those deals, and schedule all your content in advance so that when Prime Day hits you'll be ready to roll.

The star of Prime Day is the deals, so here's you'll definitely want to be keep a close eye on lead-up and day-of Prime Day promotions that you'd like to feature on your site.

Prime Day promotions work the same way as any other Amazon promotion: you browse available promotions, feature the deals you think your users will like, and we send you a commission or bounty for every purchase they make. Remember, there will be over one million deals available on Prime Day, so your audience will be counting on your recommendations to help them wade through everything and get to the products that are interesting to them.

You can learn about available Prime Day deals and promotions in the Promotions page of Associates Central, or by looking at the Prime Day page on Amazon. More promotions will be added regularly leading up to Prime Day, so make sure that you check often for updates.

You can always look at your own reports to get a better idea of what products and services are popular with your audience, but Prime Day also comes with its own data that could be useful to you when planning out your strategy.

There are also lots of websites and blogs that post data about what their most popular Prime Day deals were. (For example, here's one on Mashable, and here's one on Business Insider). Although it's important to keep in mind what deals are appropriate and exciting for your users specifically, these lists are great for understanding what kinds of deals are generally available and popular on Prime Day. You can take a look at this article to find more examples of other associates.

Also be sure to check out lists of Amazon top sellers from past prime days and, if you participated in Prime Day last year, be sure to take a close look at your own data from that time for any insights you can glean.

Product promotions are great, but they're just one part of the Prime Day puzzle. You can drive even bigger Prime Day commissions for yourself if you also focus on some of Amazon's most popular services, many of which will be offered discounted on Prime Day.

Since Amazon bounties offer flat rate commissions, this is a real opportunity to rack up some high earnings, so you may want to reacquaint yourself with the Amazon Bounty Program in advance of Prime Day.

And, since users need a Prime account to access Prime Day deals, consider promoting Prime Day subscriptions alongside any product or service promotions you feature. This will let users who don't already have a Prime account access deals while you earn additional commissions.

Same as with product recommendations, though, don't just throw everything to the wall and see what sticks. Try to pick services that are relevant to your audience and always bolster your recommendations with engaging content. Which brings us to...

Prime Day is definitely all about the deals, but that doesn't mean you should leave your users hanging when it comes to content. Since you're able to access deal and promotion info ahead of time, take that opportunity to select promotions that are specifically relevant to your audience and create posts that are meaty and interesting-- not just running lists of random deals.

We're already mentioned a few ways you can brainstorm about what products and services to feature during Prime Day, but when you're making these decisions always remember your audience and your brand. They're way more likely to respond to a quality recommendation from you (someone they trust) rather than be tempted to buy something just because it's on sale.

If you follow these steps, you'll be all ready to reap the rewards of a bountiful Prime Day! Also, as Prime Day approaches, be sure to keep a close eye on Amazon's Prime Day page to see all of the lead-up deals and promotions before the big day, as well as in the Associate Central Resource Center for more news, tips, and information (hint: just search for 'Prime Day' and find all of our relevant articles)!