Hi Chris,
It's partly about finding the right programs but also about taking the right action.
Follow Cedric's advice in the 2nd post plus read the rest of this thread for starters.
http://www.webproworld.com/viewtopic.php?t=17938
To find good programs that pay one of the best ways is to go to Abestweb and join programs that fit the niche you are interested - with merchants that have forums there. Most are honest and pay well.
Pick an area that you know about or are passionate about. It will help you stay motivated until the money comes in.
Learning
SEO and driving traffic is the key so you will need to get really good at that. Also keep in mind that just putting some banners on a site won't do much for you. Datafeeds is the way to go to generate more income. That takes some tech expertise and a program like WebMerge.
If you don't know anything about datafeeds I wrote a beginners primer, let me know if you would like the link to it.
If you don't want to learn datafeeds but want to get a ton of product pages up without programming CHECK THIS OUT!
http://www.afftools.com/psc/directory.html
Most of the merchants on this page are good and the tool will save you TONS of time and help you build sites quick and easy. It will still take lots of work on the traffic building side to make any income though.