Bruce Brown's The Complete Guide to Affiliate Marketing on the Web is a crash course for those who want to learn how to successfully host an affiliate program on their Web sites or join an affiliate network. This book provides an in-depth look at all of the basics of affiliate marketing, including managing, promoting, and growing programs; helping affiliates who are technically challenged, managing cookies, developing multi-tier marketing, and writing a marketing plan. It's clear the author has a firm grasp of where affiliate marketing is today and where it's likely to be headed over the next few years.
I was worried that this subject would be too technical and, therefore, hard to learn. Fortunately, the author provides simple, step-by-step, easy-to-follow instructions for novices who are learning how to become affiliates. He also describes how to maximize search engine optimization, how to become a power affiliate, affiliate mistakes, and effective ways that to deal with click fraud and scumware (commission stealing applications).
The book is chock full of useful resources regarding website development techniques that will enhance affiliate marketing programs, the best software to use (and it's often free), and ways to select the most reputable affiliate programs. Also, the last part of the book features case studies and interviews with several experts in the field--I learned a lot from reading what they had to say. Though the book is big (nearly 400 pages), I found reading The Complete Guide to Affiliate Marketing on the Web to be profitable and worthwhile, and I would highly encourage anyone who is interested in a good introduction to the subject to read this book.