The concept of affiliate marketing is a natural outgrowth of the online marketing that sprang up in the early years of widespread Internet use. At first, online marketing was more of a business to business approach, since companies were the first to jump on the Internet bandwagon. Putting up a web site and sending emails out to solicit business was a cost-effective way to gather new business clients. As Internet use began to spread into the home, a number of companies began to see that working with owners of personal web sites would be a great way to promote goods and services with very little in the way of investment in marketing resources. The trick was to make the idea enticing to individuals, so they would be interested in allowing companies to advertise through their web sites. Out of this need to come up with a strategy that would appeal to a large body of people, the basics of affiliate