With the growth of the Internet, there has become a surge in a secondary income for many.

There are now approximately 126 million Americans now online, according to Pew Internet and American Life Project. With this large number of online users has no doubt, sprouted many business opportunities. One such opportunity would be the increasingly popular “affiliate program” that allows a participant to earn money by simply having a Company’s sponsor banner on their web site.

It works like this. You have your own personal homepage that has something unique where you are able to attract hundreds, or in some cases, thousands of unique visitors to your site. You decide that because your site is popular, you will a lot some space (via a banner ad or text ad) on your site to place an ad for a related product.

In order to proceed, you need to sign up with an affiliate program, such as Commission Junction, or Shareasale. These web sites provide you with easy to implement code that you place on your site, to track when someone clicks on the banner ad on your site. At the time of registration, the Company you wish to be an affiliate of will specify what amount you will receive. This amount is either a fixed dollar amount or a percentage of every sale you generate from a lead. Most sites offer between 5% - 10% of the sale.

Many popular web sites will also have sign up programs to become an affiliate of their product. One such site is the popular Angelbodywear Lingerie. They have a link at the bottom of their page that will take them directly too their affiliates program page and explains all the details (http://www.angelbodywear.com/catalog/lingerie_affiliate_prog.php). Iwasaki of Angelbodywear Lingerie explains, “we have had a huge success from our affiliates, largely due to the quality of our web site, and the reputation of the affiliate we are aligned with. People are guaranteed to be paid, simply because we have to front the money before hand. We encourage anyone to join our affiliate program. You can’t go wrong.”

This type of cross platform advertising has been greatly successful with not only online retailers such as Angelbodywear Lingerie but also the people who have joined these programs. Some have done so well they don’t even hold a day job!