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Cheapbot Co

Affiliate Disclosure

How this site makes money, what that money does not buy, and where the prices come from. In plain English.

Cheapbot Co earns money from affiliate links. If you click one and buy something, the retailer pays us a commission - at no extra cost to you. The price you pay is exactly the same as it would be if you had gone to the retailer directly.

Which links earn us money

Every button on this site that says Check price on Amazon or shows a price is an affiliate link. They carry `rel="sponsored nofollow"` in the markup, they open in a new tab, and they route through a redirect on this domain so we can count the clicks.

Every one of them also has the marker #ad printed underneath it, along with the date we last verified the price and a link back to this page. That is on every single buy control on the site, not just the first one on a page.

Links inside body text that point to other pages on this site are ordinary internal links and earn nothing. Links to a manufacturer's own documentation in a Sources section earn nothing. If we ever link to a retailer we are not in a program with, the button says so explicitly - it reads that the link earns us nothing, rather than letting you assume otherwise.

The Amazon statement

Cheapbot Co is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

What the commission does not buy

This is the part that matters, so it is specific rather than a general assurance.

  • The ranking is computed before any link is attached. Scores come from the published rubric on how we pick - five metrics with stated weights, applied to published specifications. The commission rate on a product is not one of the five.
  • Every roundup names a machine we would not buy. On the main ranking, the machine we steer readers away from is from the best-known brand in the category, and it is one we would earn a commission on if you bought it anyway.
  • One page recommends nothing at all. The troubleshooting guide carries no products, deliberately. Somebody trying to fix a vacuum they already own is not shopping, and bolting a buy button onto that page would be a worse page for a slightly better commission.
  • No manufacturer has paid for placement, and none has been offered it. We have accepted no free products, no review units and no sponsored content. There is nothing to disclose there because there is nothing there.
  • We do not write a price into prose. Every price renders from a live data layer with the date attached. Nobody can influence what a page says a product costs, because no human types it.

Where the prices come from

Prices on this site are read from the retailer directly and stamped with the date they were last verified. They are not typed in by a writer and they are not remembered from research.

If that data goes stale - more than 48 hours old - every price on the site disappears automatically and the buy buttons fall back to reading Check price on Amazon. That is the intended behavior, not a fault. A price we cannot stand behind is worse than no price at all, because it sends you to a retailer expecting something that is not there.

Prices change constantly and retailers change them without notice. Always check the price on the retailer's own page before you buy. Nothing on this site is a price guarantee.

Which programs we are actually in

Amazon Associates, and nothing else, at the time of writing. Cheapbot Co is a new site and affiliate networks approve publishers slowly, so we have joined no other programs yet.

This matters for a reason worth stating: we will never build a tracked link for a program we have not joined. If a manufacturer runs an affiliate program we are not part of and we link to them anyway, that link earns us nothing and the page says so in plain text next to the button.

Why we tell you all this

Partly because the Federal Trade Commission requires clear disclosure of material connections, and a link buried in a footer does not meet that standard - which is why the marker is under every button rather than in one place.

Mostly because the entire value of a site like this one rests on whether you believe the ranking. A ranking you suspect was bought is worth nothing, so the only useful response is to publish the method, publish the sources, publish the money, and let you check all three. The editorial policy covers the rest.

Questions people actually ask

Do I pay more if I buy through your links?

No. The price is exactly the same as it would be going to the retailer directly. The commission comes out of the retailer's margin, not out of your pocket.

Does the commission affect your rankings?

No, and the reason is structural rather than a promise: scores are computed from a published five-metric rubric applied to published specifications, before any link is attached. Commission rate is not one of the five metrics.

Have you received free products from manufacturers?

No. We have accepted no free products, no review units, no sponsored content and no paid placement, and none has been offered. We have also not tested any of these machines, which follows from the same fact.

Why do some links say they earn you nothing?

Because we will not build a tracked link for an affiliate program we have not joined. Where a product is best bought from a retailer we are not partnered with, we link there anyway and say plainly that the link earns us nothing.

Why does a price sometimes just say 'Check price'?

Because our live price data for that product is missing or more than 48 hours old, and we would rather show nothing than a number we cannot stand behind. That is the designed behavior, not a fault.

Sources

Every specification quoted above was read off one of these documents on the date shown. Where a manufacturer does not publish a figure, this site says "Not published" rather than estimating it.