This is a good question because you are probably reading about how easy it is to make money with affiliate programs. What is an affiliate program?

Affiliate programs (also called Referral Programs or Partnership Programs) are essentially commission-based income opportunities. With an affiliate program, you get paid for sending customers to other company’s websites. Affiliate programs are widely believed to be the easiest way to start making money online. Here’s how it works: When you sign up to become an affiliate for a company, you receive a special link with your own unique affiliate ID embedded into it to promote that company’s product(s).

Example:

AffiliateCompanyWebsite.com/YOUR-AFFILIATE-ID. Next, you simply add your new affiliate link to your website, newsletter or anywhere else. Then when people use your link to get to the other company’s website and subsequently buy a product from them, YOU earn a commission.

You benefit from the commission earned and the affiliate company benefits from sales it would NOT have otherwise made without your promotional efforts. For example, if you’ve ever gone to a website and seen links to Amazon, those were affiliate links. If you click those links and end up buying the product on the next page, the webmaster whose website you originated at will earn a commission from Amazon.

Personally 100% of the money I make online is from affiliate programs. I view myself as a singles hitter. I remember talking to Brian Garvin a few years ago when he was one of the top affiliate marketers in the world. He said it is better to make $200 a month on 100 products or programs then it is to make $20,000 on 1.

Tomorrow we will look at how easy it is to join and affiliate program.