AFFILIATE BUSINESS seems to be the big thing on the net. Keep seeing these

you kind of answered your own question. what the heck are people buying that's making all those affiliate members so rich? they're buying the affiliate marketing programs. and it's hard to search for accurate info on these programs, because if you do a search on the program you'll come up with reviews by all the people trying to sell the program raving about how awesome it is. but if you're patient and go into about the 40th(more or less) search page or so, you'll start to see the complaints in the REAL reviews. I've dabbled in affiliate marketing and even spent $25 on an e-book which has a lot of good info, but nothing I couldn't find for free if you search enough. so I gained some knowledge on the subject and some affiliate marketer made their commission off of me. it's a lot of work, you have to find the right thing to sell, you have to come up with a website to sell whatever it is you're selling, then you have to get BUYERS to visit your website by posting unique content with keywords and all that marketing mumbo jumbo. plus there's a lot of competition out there, so you have to stand out in the crowd. that's why I just look at my affiliate marketing as a side project(which I haven't worked on in a long time now) anywho, if you want a good FREE affiliate marketing program, I recommend Amazon.com's program......it's free and they have tons of products and a forum where you can look at other marketer's sites and get ideas. NOT A REFERRAL LINK

Hi, Having read the other responses to this discussion I don't really have much more to add other than for me personally it seems that since the 'economic downturn' I actually seem to be earning more from my affiliate marketing etc. The thing is, no matter how bad the economy gets people will always need certain things and if you can fulfill that need then you're on the right track. I have a variety of blogs and sites online covering many different topics, some of these have pretty much been sitting there for months (or years) and not doing too much at all, but now they're actually starting to earn for me. While others have started earning within days of me setting them up. If you're looking at going into affiliate marketing you do need to understand that it can take time to really start earning from it (but bear in mind that once you have a site set up with an affiliate product it's pretty much there for life, so even if you don't earn from it within the next few months, a year or two down the track it may become a big earner - as some of my older blogs have started doing) and remember too that there are ways you can look into just what it is people are after. By going to places like ebay and seeing what they're buying, yahoo answers to see what people need help with are just a couple of ways to get ideas on what to set up a site on and what type of affiliate product you may be able to promote. Then there's the fact that with the economy being what it is, not only are people looking at ways to make extra money, they are also looking at ways to save it - whether that's saving money on food or learning how to do certain DIY projects etc. Find the right product/niche and you're on your way, just take the time to have a look around and be prepared to have some patience to see some results before giving it up as too hard.

Sergeantrom To answer your question, I guess what most people are buying is information on how to make money, as money is what most people need right now. Still, even in bad economic times people will still shop. Just look at Walmart and the like. They may say sales are down, but they don't go out of business because of bad times. And as for the high end stores, well the rich will always buy their luxury items because they don't have to worry about money. Coffeebreak, I guess you and I are in the same boat. I also have an Amazon affiliate account, but I guess what we need is the action plan to market more effectively. According to my research, niche sites are the way to go when it comes to affiliate marketing. I joined an affiliate network that gives some good information on how to set up an affiliate marketing business, and they have products in a few popular niches to promote. It was free to join and they even gave me 10 or 15$ (I can't remember) just for joining. And if I get posting in the forum more, they'll add another 10 or 15 bucks. I'm also reading a free affiliate marketing book that gives some very good effective strategies for niche marketing and how to do your research for whatever affiliate product you are promoting. In fact, they suggest you offer products from more than one vendor and that you don't put all of your eggs in one affiliate basket. Naturally, they have their own affiliate programme on offer, and they also have a complete suite of tools that you can you can use to set up and automate your affiliate business, but this is a little beyond my budget at the moment, so I'll just use the information and apply it to the free programme I mentioned before to generate enough money to buy the tools I'll need to automate as I build more niche sites. I don't think I will really need automation with just one site anyway. I hope we can both find our niches and enjoy great success from it. xoxo Cyne

People are buying information products, services such as hosting, domain name registration, how to programs, telecommunications items like ipods, blackberries, cellphones, computers, printers, internet services, health information, and something that I had not considered until one of the Affiliate Marketers that I follow Rosalind Gardner pointed it out in her blog, looking for work in the Internet Marketing field. Apparently lots of the successful Internet Marketers delegate their chores to others and are looking for people to hire in areas like design, ghost writing, accounting and/or bookkeeping, technologists who can keep their systems up and running smoothly during their product or service launches, and like that. As to how to tell if anyone professing to be an Internet Guru, I do the following. If I like something they have developed or something they write and I see a couple of good ideas put forth or I like their style, I start following them on their social networking sites. Usually after a couple of months you will find that they spend most of their time online. They have weekly newsletters, they write regularly to blogs that are one their sites, and they don't just pitch their product or service or promote some other marketer's stuff either. They tell people that they are going to be away for a week, a month or what ever traveling or holidaying and they post pictures, videos and what ever about what they did while gone. They regularly attend seminars as visitors or as speakers who are asked to speak and paid for it as well. And finally, I regularly lerk about their sites reading their comments and replies to others comments and sometimes commenting on their sites. I read their answers to see if they usually appear to have put some thought into them or are just blathering. You can usually tell if they are earning the kind of money that they are claiming to earn or just full of hot air. You can usually tell who is coming up by working hard and who is just there for the fast buck after you have spent a small fortune on programs that appear to be offering something worth all the money or not but it takes a while to learn how to tell if you are likely being scammed or not. I've bought a few programs that were great until half way through it and then I found that the marketer either hurried through it just to get it on the market or just was out of the buck. Either way I got scammed big time! Lately there have been more marketers who are really delivering on their promises and they are really telling newbies all the details about how to start, the tools you need and how much it is going to cost you. The worst that I have seen recently is this Government Grants thing that claims that it is free money from the government but neglects to tell you that they are going to charge you $56.00 plus per month for providing you with the information on how to apply for government grants. Go to your community services branch for the same information that is provided for free! If it isn't let your government know that you are being charged for the information which the government provides to them for free and pays them using your tax dollars to do so.