By definition, the word affiliate is another yet commonly used term for internet marketer. By action, affiliate marketing also means internet marketing which is primarily promoting other people's products online in exchange for commissions.

Compared with other marketing methods, affiliate marketing is the easiest way to make money. Firstly you do not have to fork out thousands to rent an office, shop or stall. All you need is a PC, internet access and membership with a few affiliate programs and you will be on your way. Best of all, you can work anywhere be it your home, cybercafes or any place with power point and internet access.

Getting started as an affiliate is easy and only takes a few minutes. There are plenty of online marketplaces such as Amazon, Clickbank, Commission Junction, Paydotcom, Plimus etc. There are literally thousands of products put by merchants everyday. Those products range from digital, IT to even physical products. You can also sign up for independent affiliate programs such as the ones by top internet gurus Michael Rasmussen and Stephen Pierce.

Once you become a member, you will be given an affiliate link. The minute you promote your products using the affiliate link instead of the normal conventional web link, you can start earning commissions once people click on your affiliate link and buy from that website. However should you find your affiliate links, you can simply shorten them via url shorteners which you can also find via search engines. Alternatively you can buy a domain name to replace your affiliate link.

To be able to market effectively, you need to know what the market wants before selecting a product. You can do your research through 43things.com, Google Trends and Search Engine Optimization or SEO. Next you need to know the most common keywords people type into the search engine to find what they want.

There are eight ways to promote as an affiliate. The first way is through article marketing whereby you can come up with at least a 400 word article on a particular product or service you promote. There are various article directory sites that you can sign up as free member and post your article. Alternatively if you find manual submission to be a chore, you may consider purchasing article submission software and blasting them to various sites at a click of a button.

The second way is through blogging. You can easily set up one or two at either Blogger or Wordpress. Though blogging is similar to article where you need to write a detail description of your promotion, you can also upload images and videos into it.

The third way is through classified advertising. Simply go to any search engine and do a search for free classified advertising sites. Click on a few links displayed and sign up as a free member. Once your accounts are activated, you can start posting ads immediately.

The fourth way is email marketing. To do these, you need an autoresponder and landing page although the latter is optional. Autoresponders are software that enables to compose a few messages once and blast them to your list of subscribers. Most autoresponders such as Aweber and Get Response charges a small fee monthly. Once your autoresponders are set up, you can create an optin box on your blog or landing web page to record names and email addresses of anyone who is interested to know more about what you want to promote. If you want to create a landing page, you need to register and purchase a domain name first.

The fifth way is forum marketing. Forums are online arenas whereby people in various niches gather and exchange their views and opinions on the latest products available in the market, the latest news or even controversy. For instance, people in guitar niche will communicate with other about the latest guitars, exchanging guitar tips and providing solutions for newbies. Same goes for those in golf and work from home niches. However forums do not allow you to post ads or affiliate links but you can put them under your signature box which they created for you.

The sixth way is pay per click advertising or PPC. Though I will not recommend to newbies as this costs money, I have to admit that this is the quickest way to earn having tried it myself. You can set up an account at either Google Adwords, MSN or Yahoo Advertising, create your campaigns and determine how much you are going to spend on the keywords you put for your ad.

The seventh way is through safelists. This serves as an excellent alternative to email autoresponders for those who finds having to pay month after month tedious from their financial aspects. You can sign up as a free member and upgrade later. Using these tools, you can post email messages to other members without being accused of spamming.

The eighth and final way is web 2.0 or social networking. Social sites like Direct Matches, Facebook, Hubpages, Squidoo, Tweetglide and Twitter. Once you create your accounts and become a member, you can get to know other members and make friends with them while exchanging info. You can also create networking groups with those in your niche or write a brief description of what you promote. They are similar to forum marketing but you can see other members' pictures and those they know as well.