Let's be honest for a minute. As much as the Internet marketing industry talks about building community and participating in the conversation, most of us are in the game for one reason, and one reason only. We want to make money.

There are the select few who don't care about making money, and are truly happy with trying to change the world. But for 90% of us, that just isn't the case.

Affiliate programs pay web site owners (host sites) for sending people to their sites through referral links/banner ads. Affiliate programs use a web application to allow host sites to track the results of their participation. The affiliate program will assign the host site an ID and provide instruction on how to set up links. Links are typically in the form of banner ads or sent in e-mails.

Payment is typically based on:

• Click through:
  Number of visitors that travel to the affiliated site.
• Leads: