1. Joining Affiliate Programs.

If you already have a website, then you should consider joining an affiliate network program. Depending on the theme and content of your website, you can get affiliate companies to advertise on your site. Different affiliate programs offer different schemes, such as pay per click and pay per lead schemes. Depending on the scheme you choose, affiliate programs can allow you to make money by just renting out your web page space to advertisers, or can give you a portion of the profit your advertisers make when a visitor from your site clicks on their advertisements.

Search engines, such as Google and Yahoo!, typically offer affiliate programs. Create links with other websites to increase traffic on your site; this can help you increase your earnings from these affiliate programs.

2. Selling Domain Names and Web Hosting

A domain name is a website's Internet address. For any website owner, most especially businesses, a good domain name that is easy to remember will increase traffic on their websites, and result in more profits. Selling domain names targets these businesses, and is thus a simple way to make money online.

You may also want to host web pages on your domain. Web hosting will require you to maintain your customer's website and keep them working. The downside to web hosting is that it requires technical expertise to be able to maintain the websites and your server.

Both renting out domain names and web hosting result in reliable income, since these services require regular payments from your clients.

3. Selling Your Products and Services Online

If you already have an existing business, you can choose to expand your market by selling your products and services online. This opens your business to a wider range of consumers, both local and international. You may also opt to start a new business online, and start advertising on your site.

If you do not know how to create a website, or do not have the time to do so, you should consider checking out certain sites that specialize in selling and auctioning different products. Sites such as E-bay allow you to make money by selling an extensive array of products, both old and new.

You can also get paid for your services, such as writing, blogging and transcribing. Sign up for different freelance jobs by searching for reputable websites and contacts.

4. Answering Surveys, Reading E-mails and Posting in Forums

Numerous websites are offering to pay online users and provide them with other incentives to answer surveys, read e-mails or post in forums. However, not all these sites are trustworthy; it would be useful to do a background check on these sites to ensure that they are legitimate. Stay away from websites and programs that require you to pay a certain fee before you can make money; most genuine paying sites will not ask you to pay anything. Also, do not believe sites that promise to pay obscene amounts of money; it's more likely that they won't.

5. Referring Friends

Certain websites also allow you to make money by referring friends to their website. Some of these networking schemes are genuine; however, majority of these sites are not.

If you want to make money online, know your business and select reputable websites. Most of all, be wary of scams.