affiliate doubt

I have not yet hosted with dreamhost. i am still an affiliate. When I login to dh, i see this message at the left below the menu.

This account is currently pending approval.

If you've already made payment, please fax this form to us and you'll be approved within one business day... thanks!

I am in doubt whether i will get my earning if there is a sale through my site. why do i need to pay becoz i have not yet hosted with dh yet. pls clarify. thanks.

You can check with support, but I doubt you have to pay anything. I'd guess that it's just there because you don't have a hosting account--maybe it's just a generic message that doesn't make sense to those that aren't signing up for hosting.

Why are you trying to make money referring people to a company whose service you don't use yourself?

ok i contacted the support. i have another doubt. if i opt for 10 % affiliate scheme. how much do i earn. since i have not got a single sale through my referral, i would like to get a sale. So which one is better 97 $ afilaite scheme or the 10 % scheme ?

i have opted for 97$ scheme as of now and i offer 50 doler as discount. but i didnt get any sale. any suggestion for improvement would be appreciated. thanks.

My dreambook account used to display that message if I logged into the panel. All it's telling you is that if you want to host, you need to pay. It doesn't mean you have to pay to use the free services.

Just because you want to make money doesn't mean people will sign up for hosting through you. You know you have to do the work, right? It's not like you open an account, then DH starts dumping money in it--you have to actually refer customers that sign up and don't cancel within 97 days.

It's also gonna be hard for you to get rich on referral links and $50 promo codes when there are tons of people giving out $97 promo codes.

If you don't have a ton of relevant traffic, you might might not get many/any sign-ups.

It's also easier to refer people when you know about what you're referring. If you tell someone, "I recommend Dreamhost," and they ask, "Why?" what will you say? If someone thinks you're recommending them just so you can make money, they'll probably go out of their way to make sure you don't get credit for it.

Also, if you spam your code in any way, you can lose your account and any referral money in it.