Secret #1. You don't have to buy anything. You don't have to pay someone to design and build your website, you can do it yourself. The trend now is for real and honest websites, not flashy expensive ones. Blogs are incredibly popular. You'd be better off righting a daily blog about your business or idea than paying $10,000.00 to have someone make it. Most web hosting services have free website building tools. Yahoo has a really good one.

Secret #2

You don't have to pay anyone to get traffic to your site. You don't have to pay for advertising, search engine optimization, or search engine submission. You do have to create as many link exchanges as you can, send out press releases, and promote your site in any way you can.

SECRET #3 Your website can't be your only job. Do not quit your job to create a web-based business. A website business is much cheaper and less risky than opening a restaurant or a real estate agency. It costs a few hundred dollars a year to run if you do all the work yourself.

SECRET #4 You have to have patience. You will not make money overnight. You need to have a website on a general subject. "Entertainment" or "Jobs" are great subjects. The parasites of mealworms are not. Some search engines take a year or more to get into the top search pages.

SECRET #5 Google is the best. Yahoo, Ebay and Amazon all have great affiliate programs, but no one compares to Google. Google's software, payout and reach are second to none. If a program seems rinky-dink it is.

SECRET #6 You have to love what you do. It's been two years in the making, hundreds of hours of research, and hundreds of hours of creating web pages and promotion. I'm making money, but my hourly wage right now is probably about $1 per hour. And it's worth every penny.