Fortunately it is possible to make money on the Internet, and it is also possible to get rich; you just need to realize it will take a long time to happen and it will take a lot of effort to get it there. In order to start down a path towards financial freedom, start looking for systems that make you money without you having to put further effort into them (beyond effort of their first creation). Royalties are a good example of this. A writer pens a novel, sells it to a publisher, then continues to receive royalties from sales of the work for as long as the work is available. The novel requires no more effort from the writer beyond the effort to make it, but becomes a valuable source of income thereafter.

A job on the other hand requires constant effort. As soon as you make your weekly pay, you have to go back and do it all over again to make next week's pay. Your job will always require your attention. Any kind of paid work suffers from the same problem.

The goal is simple, to free yourself from the work>money cycle. The methods of achieving this are many and varied, and depend largely on what you're good at and passionate about. For example, photographers can sell their photographs on stock photography websites. Musicians can sell their compositions on stock music websites. Those who are good with computers can create a vast array of content for the multimedia thirsty 21^st century. Programmers can create games or programs. The product doesn't matter, so long as you own the rights to it. The idea is simple, if you own content you can license that content to third parties who will sell it on your behalf (for this purpose digital content is favourable to physical products since an unlimited number of copies can be sold).

The next step is to set up a system that takes care of sales automatically, so that you never need attend to it. You might have to do this yourself, or hire someone to do it for you. Fortunately in a lot of cases, there are third parties who sell what you're offering, and are always on the look out for contributors. Such companies will take care of the website, advertising, administration, and paying you, leaving you to worry only about supplying them content and spending (or saving) your royalties.

Such websites include dreamstime.com and istockphoto.com for photography; revostock.com for stock movies and music; constant-content.com and triond.com for writers (not to mention the endless possibilities open to fiction writers). 3d02.com and 3dexport.com are where the tech savvy can sell 3D digital objects. For those who yearn for a serious challenge garagegames.com is worth checking out with a platform allowing amateurs to create their own computer games (and casual games are very popular these days).

So to put it simply, you're looking to switch from being an employee to a content owner. Of course, none of this will help you get rich overnight. Getting a loan and starting a business would surely be faster, but that I'm afraid is outside the scope of this article.

Be prepared to make very little. If the kind of residual income mentioned in this article was easy to come by, then lets face it, no one would be working. A simplified rule is; the more content you have, then the more income you can get out of it all. Through dedication and hard work having content will pay off in the long term, but first aim for realistic targets.

1. Your first target is to make two dollars per day. “Two dollars per day!!” you surely exclaim. Yes – don't give up your day job quite yet – but aim for that. Once you reach it consider yourself fortunate because half the world's population – 3 billion people – live on less than two dollars per day. If you're making that from residual income then you're doing well. If you're able to set up a system that makes two dollars a day then there's no reason why you can't reach ten dollars a day, or twenty dollars a day (and so on). Now you can see where this is going...
2. Second target: pick a bill (rent, electricity, phone) and aim to get your residual income to the stage where it covers your bill. Once that's covered, move onto the next bill. Repeat until all your bills are covered.
3. Third target: savings. Start saving some of your residual income, so that interest can add value to it. The savings will also play an important role later in smoothing out the ups and downs of the residual income.
4. Fourth target: diversify. Once you have a residual income, the last stage is to diversify. Only by having a number of separate sources do you ensure against disaster. Any one source of income could dry up at any time. Diversification is key. Once you reach this stage, then you should also have plenty spare money to reinvest back into making more money.

By working through this list, someday you'll likely find that you have the financial freedom to pursue your own projects and your own agenda. By freeing yourself of the work>money cycle you are leaving yourself open to a vast array of possibilities that would otherwise have passed you by (because you were busy making someone else rich). It's not a get rich quick scheme, but it has its merits. Not all of us are in the right place at the right time, to spot a niche, to invent a winning product, or invest in the next hot stock... but we can all invest time to create content, in whatever shape or form it takes, and subsequently enjoy the benefits that residual income brings.

The question is, how much traffic do you need? The answer depends on the kind of website or online presence you have. People with personal pages and blogs for non commercial purposes may be contented with their friends and family visiting their site. But for online marketers and business bloggers, they rely on a huge amount of traffic in order to get visitors, leads, prospects, customers, and revenue from their websites.

Regardless of your reasons for generating traffic, here are some success secrets on how you can turn your site into a well visited, winning site.

1. Know Your Audience

   And I mean, know them very much! If you don't know your audience, you will not be able to decide on what particular promotional approach to use. For example, your website is about weight loss, then you should research on the popular topics that appeal to weight loss enthusiasts. Then, make that information available on your site! This will ensure that future visitors of your site will enjoy your content and come back for more.

2. Know The Movement Of Your Target Crowd

   You should discover where your target crowd frequently goes. What sites do they regularly visit? For example, your website is about network marketing and your target crowd consists of people who are interested in earning extra money. Then you should discover the top forums, blogs, social networking sites, chatrooms that these people visit! Create a user buzz in your category of interest by contributing articles, participating in discussions, and exchanging links in those key sites.

3. Know The Popular Keywords in Your Field Of Interest

   This might take some time to discover, but it will do you good for the long term traffic. Take a look at sites and forums with a similar topic to your site. Which articles and posts get more views than the others? What words and phrases do they have in common? As you gain more knowledge and expertise in your particular niche (or topic) online, you will be aware of the popular keywords that generate user interest and attract the search engines faster. For example, in the personal development niche, one of the most popular keywords are "success secrets". So if you have a site that's related to self-help or personal development, make sure you include those words in your keyword list. Then use that phrase repeatedly in the content of your website. This will attract more web users, and yes, search engines. More traffic.

4. Use MySpace and Social Networking Sites To Your Advantage

   This step is really easy. Sign up to Myspace for free. Create an attractive profile, then post your website links and some of your sample articles there. Then, invite more Myspace friends. As you go along building your friends list, people also see your website link too! That could also generate more traffic! There are many ways you can generate a horde of traffic through social networking sites, and I will discuss that in future articles.

Writers who are consistently producing fresh and new content to be published on the web are usually the ones who make the best money and who are the most well known on the Internet. Writing new content should be a given if you really want to be taken seriously as a writer of any kind.

Most successful writers and bloggers have at least one very important thing in common, and that is, that they have chosen the type of writer that they are. These writers have created a reputation for their work and themselves by writing about one or possibly two topics on a regular basis. This works so well, because their audience starts to recognize these authors as experts in their chosen topics.

When writing an article per day becomes normal daily routine, then quickly enough you realize that you have built a pretty sizable article archive that could continue to generate an attractive combined income each month. Of course, whether a writer will continue to make residual earning from their writings depends on the type of publisher that they have chosen to write for and the “terms” that the publisher is willing to payout and for how long.

Internet writers and bloggers who publishes at least one article per day will eventually build a loyal readership and make more residual income from past published articles that are stored within the author's article archives. New articles or blogs will typically make more money on average in a short period of time, because new content will normally attract larger audiences who has been swept up in the moment and desiring to read more of what they are interested in learning about at the time.

The longer that the articles or blogs that the writer has written is published on the Internet, then the more it is considered old news and the less appeal effect the writings will be in the future. The older the articles and blogs become, then the less money the articles and blogs will be able to generate in the future. On the bright side, the entire archive of new and old published articles can potentially generate a decent residual income on their own, even if the writer should take some time off from their writing.

Writers have the ability to write themselves a pay raise, just simply by publishing a few new articles per week. So, if you are disappointed after learning that you are making less than what you want to make, then just write something interestingly new to share with your loyal audience. It is really, just that simple to do.

The Internet is a very big place where the normal world ends and the weird wonderful world of bizarre begins. These ten websites are no exception, but the exception and you'll soon be on your way to discover all of the wacky, wonderful subjects and topics that some people have thought would be awesome to dedicate an entire website to their bizarre sense of taste.

1.

Are you spending too many afternoons locked up in a room while flipping through a Victoria Secret catalog and spending some quality time with yourself? If the answer is yes, and you need some help, then look no further than this website. Complete with articles, and other information developed to help break the addiction and give hands around the world a much-needed day off.

2.

According to the website, T.W.I.N.K.I.E.S. stands for Test With Inorganic Noxious Kakes In Extreme Situation. In 1995, Rice University designed and performed a series of tests to test the properties of the sponge desert snack known as the “Twinkie”. An entire website dedicated the Twinkie is pretty darn weird, but in this case interesting, too.

3.

This website is dedicated to condiments (not condoms, don't let the first entry on this list confuse you), but if you want to learn about mayonnaise your out of luck. Learn about some of the most popular condiments available to dress up any of your favorite sandwiches or fries.

4.

Just accept the fact that some fads just won't die. This website glorifies the obsession with the world's most horrible hairstyle faux pa. Everything that you never wanted to know about mullets can be found on this website.

5.

6.

This website is extremely weird even bordering dangerously close to stupid. Truthfully, I have found it terribly difficult to describe. To make things even worst this website allows its visitors to submit their own “Oo” to the list. This website is totally useless, incredibly difficult to explain and worthy of its place on this list.

7.

This website is the perfect place to find stupid gifts, gags and goodies that are as bizarre as this website is. Imagine the expression on your love ones face when they receive a Tattoo Sleeve, a Hillary Nutcracker or an electronic yodeling pickle as a gift from you. Just remember to remove the receipt, because payback is hell and there are plenty of odd, stupid and bizarre gift ideas to choose from and worst yet you might receive one of them as some kind of bizarre gift-giving payback.

8.

Finally a website that I can get behind even though it is bizarre. The Darwin Awards are awarded individuals who improve the world by accidentally removing themselves from it. Within the pages of the Darwin Awards are hilarious stories and events that chronicle the enterprising the demises of people doing some really bizarre things. Warning: Some people may realize that they can do two things at once; laugh and pee at the same time.

9.

Who farted? Rule number one should be, whosoever farts in a crowded elevator should have to endure fart jokes for the rest of the ride. Being the butt of jokes should make one think twice before cutting the cheese after the elevator door closes. Seriously, this is a bizarre website that outlines proper elevator etiquette especially when not riding alone.

10.

Have you ever wondered? I know I sure have. This website is the prefect ending to this article, because, well…Click if you dare. Believe me, it is a liberating feeling to have closure, finally.

This article was inspired after following the bartering (swapping) skills of a man named Kyle MacDonald and his website “One Red Paperclip". Kyle, Swapped his self from one trade to another, until he had himself his very own house. Amazingly, he managed to swap himself to a house in only fourteen trades.

Now, I am not suggesting that anyone can do what Kyle MacDonald did, but if you never try, then you will never know. Even if your idea isn't so grand as swapping until you achieve something big, it is cheaper than buying new or bidding in an auction. You can still swap your old things for the things that you want and only be responsible for paying the cost of shipping the things you have agreed to swap with another member(s).

This list isn't a Top 10 list, but if it were, then I would suspect that this list would look pretty much the same as I have it right now. So, enjoy!

Books, CDs, DVDs Swaps

Bookmooch

Exchange used books with other BookMooch members and “Get” the book(s) that you want in return. There is no cost to participate in the BookMooch community. Only pay for the actual shipping of the books that you agree to swap.

Paper Back Swap

Swap paperback Books, CDs and DVDs with other members of Paperback Swap. Membership is currently free. Like with any swapping community, members are responsible for paying the actual shipping cost for the products that they have agreed to swap.

Swap Simple

SwapSimple makes swapping books, DVDs and video games really easy and simple. List the books, DVDs and video games simply by entering the UPC code that is printed on the DVDs or video games or enter the ISBN number that is printed on the back cover of the books into the swap listing tools and SwapSimple will take care of the rest. Swap with members who are included in your swap network free and only pay $1.00 or $2.00 per swap, if you are swapping with members outside of your swap network. Swaps are backed with a 100% Money Back Guarantee. Membership is free and required.

Sequential Swap

Dust off your old and new comic books, trade paperbacks and graphic novels and use Sequential Swap to swap what you have to get the comics that you want with other members. Membership is free and required.

Fashion and Cosmetics

Swap Style

Swapstyle.com describes itself as “an online fashion swap party where you can swap, sell and buy fashion, accessories, cosmetics, shoes and lots more with people from all around the world at any time, day or night”. This is a fantastic idea in my opinion, because it can save its members a lot of money on the name brand fashions and cosmetics that are normally purchased at retailers at high markups. Members can also participate in forums and discuss the latest fashion trends, sales and/or whatever comes to your mind at the time. Members are only responsible for paying the actual shipping costs associated with the items that they have traded or sold and the other members are responsible for paying for the actual shipping of the things that they agreed to swap with you. Membership is free and required.

Make Upalley

Ladies here is your chance to swap cosmetics that you own, but don't use for cosmetics that other members have and you want. We're talking about name brand cosmetics - the expensive stuff. Members are only responsible for covering the shipping costs for the cosmetics that they have agreed to swap. Members can read products reviews or write a review on the products that you have used. Participate in forums and meet other members, so that you can get to know the people that you might want to make a swap with later. Membership is free and required.

Swap Anything

U Swap It

Members of the Swapit.com community can swap anything that they desire with other members and for the things that they want. Swapit.com members are not limited, just to swapping books, CDs and DVDs, but can swap electronics, sporting goods or anything that they want to swap with other members. Members are responsible for paying for the shipping of the items that they have agreed to swap with other members. Members can also join into the Swapit forums to get to know other members better. Membership is free and required.

Swap Thing

Here is another fine swapping community that allows its members to swap, buy or sell things in a new and different way. Members can swap, buy or sell services, skills or things that they have for services, skills or things that other members have and you want. At the time that this article was written, there were 3,452,775 things available for swap or for sale at SwapThing and that is a lot of things to browse through. Membership is free and required.

Toys

Toy Swap

This is the perfect website for anyone who has old or new toys that are no longer wanted or played with and that can be swapped for old or new toys that other Toy Swap members have available for swap with you. Membership is free and required.

Cooking and Baking

Bake Space

If you are a person who loves baking fresh cookies, cakes and pies, then Bake Space is the perfect place to be, because its members swap cooking and baking recipes and share ideas. Membership is free and required.

Swap A Skill

Swap a Skill

Do you have a skill that you want to swap in exchange for a skill that someone else has available to swap? This is a great website for individuals who process a skill (artistic, musical, engineer, plumber, electrician, or just about any type of skill that you can think of can probably be found here at Swap-A-Skill at times. Basic membership is free, but there are some costs associated with membership upgrades, if you so choose to upgrade your membership. Be sure to read the membership agreement, before signing up.

Swap Term Papers

Swap Termpapers have 10,000 termpapers intheir database and members can swap a quality termpaper that they have written for a termpaper that Swap Termpapers have in their database (termpaper that you need). The termpaper exchange is free as long as the member has a quality termpaper to trade-in, otherwise members can purchase a termpaper from Swap Termpapers at the going rate. “Swap Termpapers has termpapers, essays, book reports, book reviews and thesis papers written the way that you need them”, according to Swap Termpapers.

For Webmasters: Swap Links

Monster Link Swap

Drive more traffic to your website by establishing quality link partners online.MonsterLinkSwap.com members save time and money, because MonsterLinkSwap.com has an established database of other webmasters wanting to exchange links with you, now. Basic membership is free, but limited. Upgrades are available, but upgrades do require payment.

Fun Swaps

Sketch Swap

No Membership Required. Just simply draw something and once your masterpiece is finished, then submit your drawing, so you can receive a drawing that someone else has drawn. Personally, I think this is a neat little website even though there is not much to it. Sometime simple is better.

File Swap

FileSwap enables visitors to swap computer files, photos, music, wallpapers, audio files, animated icons, videos or even PDF and text files, quick and simple. Use the browse button to retrieve the file or files that you want to swap and hit the Swap button to continue. After the file you have selected has been entered into the system, then you will receive a random file that someone else has submitted. Yes, it is kind of like playing the lottery, but your chances of winning something interesting is far better than the lottery.

Conclusion

This was a fun article to write. I hope that I have been able to introduce you to a whole new world, where the things that you want today can be swapped for, while you have fun and save money.

If you know of any other websites that you believe are better than these in this article or you just believe should have been included, then leave a link to them with your comment. I do check weblinks and I will remove any weblink that leads to adult websites or any illegal website.

Ok, on the Internet these days there are literary loads of sites which promise an avalanche of cash but rarely pay.

First thing you absolutely must know and remember is this: Never, never, never, pay upfront anything to do any job; if someone asks for your money it's probably a scam.

Keep in mind the sites I will introduce do pay, they accept all international members and you will not have to pay to join, you will not be paid in only points (unless convertible to cash). Another thing you must remember is that no-one gives anything for free; any site that claims they will pay you large amounts of money for doing essentially nothing it's because they want to steal your time, they don't have any intention of paying you whatsoever.

There are various ways of earning on the Internet, and I've dealt with a lot of them.

The lowest paying ones are PTC (Paid To Click) sites. These sites pay you around 0.2 to 1 cent for very ad you click. In order to get the money you have to wait on average of 30 seconds. Some of these sites include Gainpay.com , Gainmail.com , apairof.com and fastcashemails.com (which pay in cash and points, but the points are converted to cash every month).

I do NOT recommend signing up to these sites, they are a huge waste of time and usually weeks pass by before you can cash out (when minimum cash out is set at $1).

There are also PTS sites which pay you to use their search engines, zotspot.com (where I never managed to earn a dime) and slashmysearch.com . The latter site pays really little but it does pay. It also offers a free email service where you also get paid (as long as you are reading/writing).

A second free way of making money is by joining getafreelancer.com . Here you post your capabilities (design, legal, translation, C++, advertising etc.) and you bid on projects (the bid is how much you want to be paid). Then the job poster will decide who get the job usually basing his decision on the persons experience, cost, how long it takes to do the job. The average bids go anywhere from $10 to $5000+ depending on how long and complex the job is.

A third way, for designers/photographers is to post their images/pictures on the internet to try to sell them. There are two very competent sites which do that, bigstockphoto.com and dreamstime.com . Here you upload your photos, you decide how much you want for them. There are different prices for different actions; for example full rights over a good photo can be sold at around $200. You can also decide to sell them for one time use, limited use or whatever you want.

Agloco.com is a site that pays you to surf the internet. Basically what you do is you download a toolbar which monitors when you are online, as long as you are online you will get paid for a certain amount of time. There is also another site, a scam site known as surfjunky.com , which pays you about 50 cents per hour, unfortunately though that money will never be wired to you.

A good way to make money, if you have a specific, active blog is to use reviewme.com and/or payperpost.com . These two sites work on the same principle, they basically put you into contact with people who will pay you to review certain products. The price ranges on these vary drastically from $5 to $100's.

If you have your own blog/website you can also sign up to a free Google adSense program. You just submit your site/blog, if they approve it they will give you a code to insert in your site/blog which will activate their ads. Now whenever someone clicks those ads you will earn money; Don't click your own ads or else you will be banned.

There are two more sites where you can get paid to review, but you get paid very little: ciao.com (Make sure to sign up for the right country or else they won't pay you) and dooyoo.com (same as ciao). These two run on the same circuit, so the reviews you published in ciao can also be posted here through cut/paste; assuming of course that you are the author.

Yet another great way to make money, if you got the luck to get the gig and the skill, is to sign up to two free sites, thevoice123.com and voices.com. These two sites offer you the possibility to do voice-over jobs, these are probably the easier jobs you can get (assuming you get accepted by the job offerer) and they pay quite a sum of money, usually around 100 - 500 for short clips.

This is a very fun way to make money, keep in mind you do need the right hardware and the right software for the job. You also need some minor audio editing skills, like being able to fuse tow audio tracks, add music to an audio track with no music, etc.

One new free survey site as just opened up, awsurveys.com ; it accepts international members and you can earn 26 dollars in just a few minutes. You are given two links for each survey, you view the site and express your points of view on it (about three sentences for every link). Now there are two drawbacks; They are quite new and only have $26 worth of surveys and the minimum payout is $75. the second drawback is the fact that if you choose to be paid through paypal they will keep a $25 commission charge while if you get paid through check then you get it all; however i assume that the check will most likely only be available in the U.S.A.

On the other hand you can join various paid forums. Here you get paid to post, the most famous of these kind is mylot.com , here the minimum payout is decided by you (between $10, $20, $50, $100). There is also paidforum.net but there is a rumor going around that they don't pay. Their min cash out is $50. there are two more and both which somewhat pay a decent amount but it still takes forever to earn. One thing to remember is to not consider these to be jobs, you have fun while posting but you will never earn enough money to be able to live of of it.

Lastly you can always try to post your ad on kijiji.com ; here you can post your CV and request a job or you can respond to a job offer. This is probably the simplest way to get your skills known to the global community.

On a different note, beware of ACN; ACN claims to be the new form of telecommunication, you can work for them by recruiting customers. You have to convince people to change from their phone provider to ACN; you will then earn anywhere between 1 to 10% from each of their phone bills.

Now anyone who has ever tried to get referrals for certain programs will know exactly how hard it is to convince people to sign up to certain things, and keep in mind refferal programs are free; how hard would it be to convince someone to change to another phone provider? This isn't even the worst part. To be able to work for them you have to pay a one time fee of 399 Euro; now if someone is looking for a job do you really think they would be willing to spend 399 euro to be able to work without the certainty of being able to get it all back?

If they contact you be very careful to make sure that they really are who they say they are (there are a lot of scam artists out there), and please take into consideration that regardless of the fact that there are people who say that they did earn with ACN there are even more who ended up not earning a thing.

The best advice I can give is don't join any job which obligates you to pay to work; don't listen to their empty promises, if they really made that much money they wouldn't need you.