Tax time is coming, well, it’s always coming, but if you’re stressing out about your taxes, it’s probably coming pretty soon — so what is the affiliate marketer to do about his or her taxes?

Basically, it all comes down to the $600 mark, if you make any less than $600 you can just put your affiliate earnings on your income tax form. But if you make any more than that, you’ll need a few other forms.

First, you need to find the correct forms. First of all, you need the W-9 form which provides all the tax information about you and your advertising network. You’ll also need a 1099-MISC form; which details all the commissions received from the network.

Networks must legally send a 1099-MISC form to their affiliates. The 1099-MISC must also be included with your income tax statement, the IRS will come looking for it otherwise.

The one big difference between affiliate income and normal income, is that tax is not withheld from affiliate income, therefore there is a much better chance of having to pay a good chunk of your income when it comes to tax time.

Many professional affiliate marketers suggest opening a separate account to put in 10-15 percent of your income to pay taxes when the time comes.

The biggest rule of thumb when it comes to taxes is, of course, Keep A Record!

It sounds easy, but keeping track of how much you spend on your home or small affiliate business, the better your tax time will be. If you know exactly how much you spent on the business, you’ll have an easier time deducting it from your income. But since your taxes aren’t taken out automatically, it becomes even more important to keep a record or you could miss out on a lot of pre-tax business deductions.

If it’s your first go around doing taxes in the affiliate marketing industry, you should probably seek out a tax preparation professional. They can show you exactly what you need to be doing and do most of the work for you.