Is your dream to be able to earn money at home online? Make a full time income by working at home? Quit a dead end job and retire early? My dream was YES to all of those!
But I had no experience, and after losing money to a scam program years ago, I certainly didn’t know who to trust. Every time I wanted to pursue my dream, I just had more questions than answers!
What business model should I use? Do I need a website? How do I set up a website? How do I get traffic? Do I sell products? How do I promote products? Do I have to use social media? How do I actually get paid?
Well, I’m here to tell you that starting as a complete newbie, I did it! The answer was to find a simple business model that was easy to understand and get the right training.
I was able to start earning money at home online, retired early, and have 6 websites so far. Keep reading, and I’ll show you how anyone can become successful online if you’re willing to put in the time and effort!
Best Business Model For Beginners
There are several ways to start an online business, but the business model that is the best, in my opinion, is Affiliate Marketing. What is affiliate marketing? Here’s the definition from the Cambridge Business English Dictionary:
Affiliate marketing is really a lot more simple than people think! I use my websites to promote the products and services of online retailers. If the visitors I refer to those retailers buy something, I get a commission!
I don’t do any selling, I don’t have to worry about product inventory or shipping, I don’t have to deal with customer service or anything that the retailer deals with. I just communicate with my readers about things that I like and products or services that are useful, and then provide a link where they can purchase them!
The commissions I earn average anywhere from 3-5% all the way up to 75%! Even if my referrals don’t buy the item I was promoting, I still get a commission from anything they purchase on the retailer’s website. Most retailers will even pay you a commission if the referral doesn’t buy right away, but comes back at a later time and purchases something–sweet deal!
Sounding pretty good so far? Let’s see the benefits of starting an affiliate marketing business!
Benefits Of Choosing Affiliate Marketing
Here’s why it’s so good for anyone with little to no experience:
~ Low Cost Startup–You don’t need an upfront outlay of cash–if you have a laptop and an internet connection, you can start an affiliate marketing business! You don’t need to buy inventory to sell products, you don’t need to buy expensive equipment, and you don’t need to rent any office space. All you need is to be online with a laptop or computer.
~ Choose Your Own Niche–The topic of your business can be anything you want it to be! No matter what your interest or passion is, you’ll be able to find affiliate programs to join to start making money. Choosing a niche that you love will also make it more enjoyable when you’re new to online marketing and trying to learn everything you need to do.
~ No Selling–Worried that you don’t know how to sell to people? No problem! Remember, with affiliate marketing you aren’t going to be doing any selling–you’re going to be communicating and promoting. On your site, you’ll be discussing interesting topics related to your niche, educating your readers, answering common questions people ask, reviewing products, and helping your readers with solutions to problems they may have.
While you’re writing those posts, you will give recommendations about things you use and services you like, compare different items, show products that help solve problems or make tasks easier, etc.
Within these recommendations, you just provide a link to a retailer that you’ve signed up with. When your readers click on the links and purchase something, you make money!
~ Work From Anywhere–As long as you have your laptop or mobile device and internet access, you can run your online business. You don’t have to be stuck at home or in an office, you can literally take your business with you wherever you go!
~ Work Anytime–You don’t have to have any set hours to work on your affiliate marketing business. It doesn’t matter whether you have just a couple hours in the evenings, 2 or 3 days a week, or an hour every morning before you go to work. You can work on your business any time it’s convenient for you!
~ Passive Income–You don’t need to monitor your business all day because your website is up and running and generating sales 24/7 365 days a year. So while you will need to spend time and effort adding quality content to your website, those posts can earn income for you indefinitely!
==>==> Get my FREE Proven 5 Step Plan To Start Making Money With Affiliate Marketing <==<==
Where Does A Beginner Learn How To Do It?
Many of you are thinking, “It doesn’t matter how great an affiliate marketing business would be, I don’t know how to do it!” That’s exactly what I was thinking when I started looking at online marketing.
Not only was I worried about my lack of experience, I had already lost money on a scam program and was more than hesitant to take a chance on something else. But then I found the legitimate platform that changed everything for me by teaching me all I needed to know!
That program is Wealthy Affiliate, and it’s a 100% legit platform that is designed to help you become successful by providing step-by-step instructions to start and run your business. The best part is that it’s totally FREE to try out their system with their starter membership, and you can stay on this membership indefinitely!
==>==> Check out the Starter Membership now–no credit card required <==<==
If you decide that affiliate marketing is for you and you want to own your own website with their advanced features, you can sign up for Wealthy Affiliate’s premium membership. It’s just $49 per month to get advanced training and multiple websites!
I’ll go over the basic features of Wealthy Affiliate next so you can see what they have to offer. If you’d like complete details, you can read my full review here.
~ Secure Website Hosting–To have an affiliate marketing business, you need a website. But you don’t want just any website, you want a secure, powerful WordPress site! Wealthy Affiliate’s free starter program gives you 2 WordPress sites on their SiteRubix platform–complete with SSL encryption for a totally secure experience for your visitors.
With the premium membership, you can host up to 50 websites with Wealthy Affiliate, 25 domains that you own and 25 free domains–all at no extra charge. Each of these websites is another income stream you can add to your business!
To see all the details of this world-class hosting service, you can read my blog post Who Has The Best Website Hosting Services For Your Online Business?
~ Complete Affiliate Marketing Training–You will get step-by-step training that covers how to create your website (which takes about 3 minutes!), how to write terrific content, how to drive traffic to your site, how to sign up for affiliate programs and monetize your site, how to use social media, and so much more!
The Online Entrepreneur Certification course is organized into 5 sections of 10 lessons each. These lessons consist of both written and video tutorials and daily tasks, which make them easy to understand and accomplish. You get the entire Getting Started set of lessons in the starter program!
~ Community Forum–I can’t say enough about WA’s very active community! This is a feature that sets Wealthy Affiliate apart from every other legitimate program out there. You have access to literally hundreds of experienced marketers at any one time, and they are all willing to help and answer questions.
~ Weekly Live Training–Every week there is a 1-hour live training class by Jay, the WA Live Training Coach. These classes cover a different topic each week, and they are recorded so you can see any of them whenever you want to. **This feature is available in the premium membership.
~ 1-on1 Coaching and Live Chat–Sometimes you need an answer right away, and you can get it in Live Chat! There is also 1-on-1 coaching available to you, which is something I haven’t found anywhere else. 
These 2 features are available for 7 days for starter members with unlimited access for premium members. However, I will personally coach anyone who is referred by me any time, regardless of which membership you have!
Keeping Expectations REAL
If you’re going to become successful with affiliate marketing, I’m going to tell you something that a lot of people won’t–you need to have realistic expectations! I don’t care how many people out there swear their program will make you thousands of dollars fast, it just isn’t going to be true!
If your goal is to make long-term, consistent, substantial money online, you will have to put in the time and effort–there’s no shortcuts. But if you need to make money now, you should look for a job and then start your online business as a side hustle in your spare time.
You can get a realistic timeline at How Long Does It Take To Start Making Money With Affiliate Marketing?
I’ve reviewed a lot of make money online programs, and it’s really disheartening to see just how many get-rich-quick schemes there are out there. They promise you that all you need to make hundreds and thousands of dollars a day is their latest and greatest program, and you barely have to work!
Don’t fall for these schemes because the only ones making money are the people selling it to you. I know how easy it is because I’ve fallen for one. You can learn how to avoid scams by knowing what to look for at Make Money Online Fast–Beware Of The Scams!
So be sure to go into an online business with the right expectations. If not, you’ll get discouraged and won’t enjoy the process.
It can be extremely hard to keep your motivation going and stick with it. Unfortunately, a lot of people wind up quitting right at the time their website is likely to take off–don’t let that be you!
How Much Can You Make? $100,000+!
Check out the latest update from a Wealthy Affiliate member who was able to make 6 figures in 2018! See it by clicking on the image below:
Want more motivation? Check these out below!
10 Internet Business Success Stories
Making Money By Affiliate Marketing–Earn $100,000+ A Year!
Any Beginner Can Learn How To Earn Money At Home Online
There are a lot of ways to start an online business to make money. But if you’re a beginner, the best way to start out is with affiliate marketing. The benefits are great, it’s the easiest business model, it’s extremely low cost, and with the training and hosting you can get with Wealthy Affiliate, it’s the best chance of success!
