A 2-Tier affiliate program is quite literally a referral. If you have ever used or come across websites that claim to pay you whenever you read an email, you will have seen these programs in action. When you sign up for these accounts, you will have levels of referrals. When someone signs up under your link, they are your referral. When they make money, you will be given a percentage of what they have made.

Many of these surf the internet and get paid to read email programs do not work and you will make little to no money from them. The more successful users of these programs will make money by finding ways to get people to sign up under their links. When they have hundreds of referrals, which is when they will really begin to make the money. These referrals are in effect, doing the job for them.

Unlike these small paying programs however, an affiliate program generally pays more and you will be doing your own work to make money from them. When you have someone signup with your affiliate referral link, you are then getting paid twice from the same affiliate, if your referral begins to make money.

2-Tier affiliate programs work by having someone signup under you. If you have one hundred referrals, you will be lucky if five of them begin to make money. Chances are that out of the hundred, you may only receive one or two people who will take the affiliate program seriously. When these people begin to make money from their own affiliate links, you will usually receive a piece of their commission. You are not taking money away from them; you are just getting a bonus from the affiliate company that you have signed up with.

You don’t have to use a 2-tier affiliate program unless you would like to. Even if the affiliate site has a plan in place for their affiliates, you can simply use the program as though it were a single paying website. Some affiliates will try to achieve signups by creating a separate section on their websites called webmasters. When a website owner clicks the link, it will usually have information about affiliate programs that they are using. This is a great way to achieve a signup as you are showing them programs that work for you. If they have a similar website they may try your affiliate.

You should read the rules and know the payment plan that is in place. Some affiliate programs will pay you a one time fee when someone signs up under you, but most will only pay when your referral has made money. Even then you have to be careful because an affiliate program may only pay you, when the affiliate referral reaches a certain payout. For example, if an affiliate cashes out at fifty dollars and quits the program, you may not get a commission if the affiliate program only pays you when they reach a hundred dollars.

You should try to use the 2-Tier programs if they are available, but you do not have to. Think of it as getting an extra paycheck from one affiliate program. If done correctly, it can be less work than actually applying affiliate marketing and it can be worth it in the end, if you receive sign ups who take it seriously and try to make money.