Hartfelt Promotions started primarily promoting affiliate programs. That was back in the 1990s when the internet was fairly new.
Back then there was a vast amount of free web tools and free web hosting sites.
Most of that is all gone now and I no longer make the bulk of my money from affiliate programs, but from my own websites.
The biggest lesson I learned was that you need your own products or services to sell if you want longevity.
I've made thousands of dollars on affiliate programs, but those programs ran in a cycle of about two years. The first year, if you are in early enough, you made a lot of money, then, when the program got saturated with thousands of marketers, it spelled the beginning of the end.
If you were really good, you could make hundreds of thousands of dollars with affiliate programs. I was NEVER that good. There were a lot of reasons why, but lets just say my passion lay in other things.
The problem with selling on the internet some major company does not sell discounted over the internet. And then add China into the mix. There is almost no way to have a decent profit margin for a small time operator. If you do not sell in volume, you will not make a lot of money,
The solution is very simple. Sell your own unique brand of product or service. If you find your niche market, you will do very well.
I no longer promote other businesses. I have enough of my own websites and customers.
However, it is not very hard to create your own web presence today. There are a plenty of resources out there that allow even a novice to do this. You really only need to do one thing. Mine the internet for the information you need. There are also many companies that can provide services that you can use. Investigate them thoroughly before you spend any money. Take your time and learn. All it takes is common sense and a lot of reading.