Thus, a site that links well will have a higher chance of being re-visited in the future because the users will see it as a valuable resource and give it some percentage of the credit for the benefits they derived from jumping to the destination site. Affiliates programs make the backwards value of linking explicit and thus compensate sites for contributing to a more cross-linked Web. They make the Web richer and more useful since even small sites can link to additional services that they do not have the resources to provide themselves. And not only can I recommend the books, the user can buy them with a click. It is only necessary to pay for performance .
Nothing needs to be paid if there is no click-through.
Even better, the referral fee is typically based on the value derived from the visiting user, so nothing needs to be paid for a user who doesn't buy anything. After all, if the site doesn't send any traffic, there is no cost. And the computer keeps track of the referrals, so there is no need to manually negotiate complex deals or have other overhead that normally makes it expensive to have small partners. Every extra user interface element is one more thing for users to look at, so links should only be included when they in fact add value to the user. Also, there is a temptation to link to things that you cannot fully recommend simply because you get paid to do so.