What do McDonalds, Quiznos, and Harley Davidson have in common? These companies all sell franchises to their business. That means a portion of the owner's revenue goes back to the parent company for each sale that's made. They're affiliated with the parent company. The affiliate marketing model is a similar concept.

So what exactly is affiliate marketing anyway? Simply stated it’s pay for performance marketing. You sell someone’s product and they give you a cut of the action. Your portion can be a set percentage, such as twenty-five percent, or a standard dollar amount. It’s like a referral program. Have you ever referred business to a colleague and gotten something (money or a gift) in return? Same concept.

There are thousands of affiliate programs available offering a variety of products and services – from those offered by independent small business owners like me to huge affiliate program networks like Commission Junction, LinkShare, ClickBank and PayDotCom. You can promote just about anything you can think of from insurance to pet supplies to banks, to wireless service / products and more – the options are pretty much limitless.

The best place to start when deciding what to offer is with your existing business. Think about what would add value to your business and browse the affiliate networks to find available products or services or head on over to a search engine and search for affiliate plus your topic. Let’s say you are in the car business and want to find affiliate programs that complement your products and services. You could do a search affiliate+cars to find potential programs. Go ahead and try it now.

Bingo! That search shows you that cars.com has an affiliate program. It’s important to note that there are also sponsored links for other affiliate networks that may contain programs you could join.

But what if you don’t have an existing business? Where do you start with affiliate marketing? Start with what you know or what you are interested in. This is very important. If you choose to set up your affiliate business on a topic that doesn't interest you, you will quickly lose interest and have less success. It’s just plain common sense that we spend more time on those things that interest us.

Start by brainstorming a list of your current hobbies and interests. Once you have a list, you can take a look at it and narrow it down to those areas that interest you the most. Then you can take that list and do a keyword search to see if there are other people out there who are interested too. Once you've found your hot market, seek out those programs on the affiliate networks and get started.

Denise O'Berry is a small business expert who helps small business owners take action to grow their business. Visit http://www.whatspossible.com to get your free copy of her Success Strategies Guide: 10 Keys to Success for Small Business Owners.