IntroductionWhat is the most successful home based business ? Answer affiliate marketing. The reason is simple, the most successful businesses are ones which minimize overheads and maximize profit. Affiliate marketing meets both criteria and the following article is intended to show you how you can start or build a successful home based businesses.Quick Guide To Affiliate MarketingIn today’s world everyone is looking for ways of generating extra money. Most home based business opportunities require a considerable amount of time commitment and finance. One exception is affiliate marketing where you can start small, with zero capital and gradually scale up. Most on-line home based business opportunities will leave you high and dry as soon as you sign. Remember where we started, we were talking about profitability and overheads. All the best affiliate programs are free to sign up.Essentially an affiliate program is an opportunity for you to make money promoting a third party merchant’s products. For this, the merchant will pay you a commission on every sale that you send their way. As these commissions can range anything from 10% to 75% you can see that this is an incredibly profitable home based business model since your home based business does not have to buy any stock. All you have to do is send willing buyers to your merchant and cash in. The trick is in avoiding the scams. Good opportunities are out there. Avoid the “… you’ll make LOTS of money, FAST, with little or no WORK…” That’s, unfortunately, a great fantasy, but the most successful home based businesses simply do not come about that way.Starting Up An Affiliate Marketing BusinessThere is just one simple step to starting an affiliate marketing business. And it is simply this. Start with affiliate programs that promote something that you are passionate about. Most people try to start with a project that offers most returns. By sticking to something you are passionate about, your passion and enthusiasm will come across to your clients and your work at business will be well onto the road of becoming a great success.Having a mentor will definitely help your on-line business to be successful. The great news is that you can get mentors for free by simply joining an on-line forum. Simply enter the name of your on-line affiliate program and add the word forum in Google. For example Clickbank, a popular affiliate program, you would search on “Clickbank forum” and you will get a list of forums full of mentors for your on-line business as a Clickbank affiliate. Most people who want to start their work at home business don’t have a ton of money lying around, and so once again affiliate programs come up trumps, remember they are free to join and pay handsomely.The most common mistake is to start a home based business without clear objectives on what the home based business intends to achieve and how it will do that. In addition, most people are shockingly unaware of any skills they may have to brush up on. Fortunately it’s getting easier and easier to build web-sites, blogs and other internet presentations without having an understanding of programming or technicalities of creating web sites. if you can use a computer, regardless of level of expertise, you can create a successful online home based business.Benefits Of A Home Based BusinessOne of the major benefits of a work at home business is that you can work when you want. In addition, if you have a family you can arrange your work around the activities of your family. Successful affiliate marketing home based businesses provide regular income. The great thing about affiliate marketing as a home based business is that if you have a regular job you do not have to give it up. You can start small and gradually scale up until your home based business is a success and you can then leave your full or part-time job.Facts About Home based BusinessesJust remember, as the number of work at home based businesses increases, you must be able to compete with other businesses. This is the only way to be successful. Work-at-home businesses are enjoying huge popularity across the globe. In fact, there are over 200000 newly started home based businesses each month. Operating a home based business usually requires a greater commitment of time, energy and money than most jobs. It also requires a great deal of sacrifice. However, there are a lot of tools available that simplify many tasks and make it easier to build a truly successful affiliate marketing home based business.SummaryAffiliate marketing provides all the ingredients for a successful home based business, no stock to keep or buy, high paying commissions and working the hours that suit.