There are four major players in the affiliate marketing industry.

1. Merchant – Retailer or company/Individual who offers a product to the marketplace.
   
   
2. Affiliate –Markets for the Merchant.  Typically is not directly associated to the Merchant but brings customers/clients/sales to the Merchant through online marketing and through other creative channels.
   
   
3. Network – Acts as an intermediary between the Merchant and the Affiliate.  Allows the affiliate access to products.  Typically Networks track sales, generate reports, and process payments.
   
   
4. Customer – What every affiliate marketer is trying to attract.  All of the affiliate’s work is rewarded when the customers purchase products.

Affiliate Marketing Programs are a great way to help supplement income in this world ruled by the Internet and we hope Affiliates That Work will be your first step towards becoming successful in affiliate marketing.

How Affiliate Marketing Programs Work
As an affiliate, sign up with a particular affiliate program of some company. Once this process is complete, you will then have an account with the Merchant.  The merchant will provide links, banners and other advertisements with a unique code specific to you.  The advertisements will then need to be place on your web sites.  Each time a customer clicks through the links or banner ads, or buys a product, you will earn a commission. This commission is usually a percentage of the sale price.

The concept of Affiliate marketing is simple.  Advertise a product, Customer clicks advertisement, customer purchases product, you get rich.  However, even though it may sound simple, there is an art to the process.  Just because a webpage is built does not mean that traffic will arrive.  As in every successful venture, it takes diligence, hard work, education, talent, and ambition to become profitable.

Types of Affiliate Marketing Programs
There are many different types of affiliate programs, but the most important are the pay per lead, residual income, affiliate networks, CPA networks, two tier programs, ad networks and contextual ads.

Higher Education

As in any business, jumping in without the proper education can many times be detrimental to you and your pocketbook. Just like a stockbroker takes a Series 7 or a Real estate agent must retain a license, the same goes for Affiliate marketing, the affiliate marketer must be educated.  There are no affiliate marketing licenses, but like the stock broker or real estate agent, the affiliate marketer must retain as much information and education about the affiliate marketing field that they can in order to be successful. 

We recommend that before building a website or signing up for any affiliate programs, that you become educated in the affiliate marketing field.  Some of the education materials available cost money, but in our experience, the education received and the time saved from the affiliate education far outweighed the price of the course.

There are many great affiliate marketing courses and educational courses available. Our editors have added a top 10 list for the following categories of educational tools; Affiliate Marketing Courses, Affiliate Marketing Books, and SEO Tools.