Think about it, everywhere you turn, you have MLM opportunities staring at you in the face. It is everywhere you look, on the television, in your "real" mailbox, on the radio, in magazines, and now thanks to the internet, in your email boxes and 90% of the websites you visit. There it is, bold and fearless, the MLM opportunity. You have seen them, you know what they are, and they are the next best thing to Amway of course. They are any business that has a service or product to sell and they do so with what are called independent distributors.

These companies lure people in on that promises of making thousands of dollars a day or month just selling products. These independent distributors, in order to make real money need to recruit other distributors and so on down the line. Now here is the real kicker, you have to pay these companies YOUR money in order to become a distributor. That is right, no only do they make money off of each sale you make, they also make you pay them to sell their products. Do you see the problem with this?

Most business opportunities are going to cost you money, sure, if it is your own business, but for a company to require you to not only pay a fee to begin, in addition to buying the merchandise, well it is just basically silly to be nice about it. The only way for you to make money is to buy the product at a "discount" sell it for more, then turn around and bring in other sellers, to make money off of.

Now one great business opportunity is affiliate marketing. Affiliate marketing is a commission from a purchase made by those you refer to the business. Occasionally, you might get lucky to find an affiliate program that goes beyond that to include a client you have referred who then becomes an affiliate, but rarely any more than that. Does this sound similar to the MLM opportunities? Yes, it does, but there are some major key differences between the two.

In affiliate marketing, you are not required to pay any sort of fee to start up your business. In an MLM business, you are required to pay a start up fee in addition to purchasing products at wholesale. With affiliate marketing, everything you need to start is free and readily available for you, this includes any materials you need for training as well. With MLM, you are required to purchase any necessary licenses, products, or materials that might help you boost your business, this includes any conferences and such.

With affiliate marketing, your major focus is referring your clients and customers to the company you are promoting. You do not focus on building a major downline, as you do in MLM opportunities. Essentially affiliate marketing is the ideal business for any person looking to start and establish their own home based business with real earning potential, instead of real spending potential.

About the Author

Robert is a full-time Internet marketer, author and publisher and contributes to http://www.CashConfidentials.com on a regular basis. Robert provides new and unique ways to make money online - check it out!