That's exactly what traffic exchanges are; you agree to look at the websites of others, and they look at yours. Traffic Exchanges are clean and "family friendly". Almost all traffic exchanges have a free membership option. All of them have inexpensive upgrades.

Here's the deal, with free memberships you exchange your time looking at websites, buy the upgrade, and you get more visits in less time. Like the offline world, it's time or money. Many exchanges offer excellent bonuses and services for paid upgrades and are worth the upgrade 98% of the time. All traffic exchanges will pay you for referrals who upgrade, making TE's an very affordable advertising source.

Do traffic exchanges really work?

Yep. You have to know a little bit of how to use them, and pick exchanges that deliver quality traffic. I suggest that you use exchanges of 30,000 or more members. I have a personal preference for "TE's" with a clean, well designed interface. Good customer service is important. For many new online marketers, traffic exchanges are the first place they start, so if you have something that is targeted to "newbies" traffic exchanges are an ideal place for that.

Maximize your traffic exchange advertising:

1) You are marketing to other marketers. Make your landing page appeal to people like yourself who work from home.

2) Always advertise a capture or signup page. Offer something free or very low cost. Make sure your page loads fast. Rememeber, people will see your page for only 10-15 seconds. Cluttered pages with all of your affiliate links will get you nothing.

3) Make sure your capture page is tied to a quality autoresponder.

4) Start out with one or two traffic exchanges (TEs). Add more as you understand them.

5) If you are really working these strategies, you will create quite a list of affiliate links and passwords. I use the same username for everything. I also keep a document or Excel spreadsheet so they are all in one place.

6) Use tabbed browsing to build up your credits. I spend about 30 minutes each day surfing. I do this during conference calls, while watching TV, listening to audio trainings, etc. You will not see significant responses from your traffic exchange advertising unless you do thousands of credits.

7) Traffic Exchanges are an excellent source of marketing ideas. Some just list your site. Others like Traffic Swarm and Instant Buzz help you develop your ad writing skills. Instant Buzz will actually track your conversion rates. This gives you an excellent way to test your pay-per-click (PPC) writing skills!

8) Use some of your traffic exchange credits to advertise your other Traffic exchange or list building links.

9) Many TEs are also downline builders. That means that not only do you get increased credits for referrals, you will now have a opt-in list that you can promote your primary business too.

10) Autosurf exchanges are a waste of time. Don't bother.

11) Traffic exchanges with longer timers (20 seconds or more) give you more exposure.

Online marketers seem to have a love-hate relationship with traffic exchanges. New traffic exchanges come online everyday. Maximize your traffic exchange and you can develop a highly targeted opt-in list quickly and inexpensively.