Where links are clickable on YouTube
YouTube's help center lists which link placements work. For affiliate links, these are the ones that matter:
- Long-form video descriptions and comments: clickable, but your channel needs access to advanced features before you can add external links.
- Channel profile links: up to 14 links on your channel page, clickable for everyone who visits it.
- Shorts descriptions and Shorts comments: URLs are not clickable. @mentions and hashtags still are.
- YouTube Shopping affiliate program: products tagged through YouTube's own program are clickable inside the app.
Long-form videos: put links where people look
Most viewers never expand the description, so put the product you talked about most in the first two lines, then a link to your full list. If a video covers ten products, link the shelf that holds all ten instead of pasting ten links. One link is easier to keep working when a product sells out.
Use a tracked link so you can tell YouTube traffic apart from Instagram and TikTok. InfluShop's share links can carry ?src=yt, and InfluShop Pro's analytics group traffic by platform.
Shorts: send viewers to your channel links
A Short can't carry a clickable outside link, so the video has to tell people where to go.
- 1
Make your storefront the first link on your channel profile.
- 2
Put every product you show in Shorts on that storefront, grouped into shelves by series.
- 3
Say the shelf name in the Short ("it's on my Kitchen shelf, link on my channel") and repeat it in the description.
- 4
Feature the product from your newest Short at the top of the store while it's getting views.
YouTube Shopping and outside affiliate links
YouTube Shopping's affiliate program lets eligible creators tag products from participating brands, and those tags work inside YouTube. Amazon, Walmart, Target and network links from Impact or LTK live outside that program and go in descriptions or your channel links. Plenty of creators use both.
Disclose in the video
The FTC expects the disclosure where people see the recommendation. Say it in the video and put a line such as "I earn a commission from links in the description" above the links, not at the bottom of a long description.