Now, $2,000 in a month is probably not the norm for most participants. My first check was around the $100, but it shows you what is possible if you learn how to capitalize on this opportunity. Even if you earn as little as $25 in a month, it would more than likely cover some or all of the costs for your web site.

Have you ever wondered how do websites make money ? Answer is simple. Websites turn to a host of money making activities like affiliate programs. Website is the ultimate money making machine, it earns even when you are sleeping. So instead of earning few $s from 10 different websites, it is wise to have your own website and only effort you have to put is to make your website popular, in return you can earn hundreds of dollar every month.

Anyone who has a website, or can build a website, has a great basis for making money online. Any web site can get advertisers even if it is relatively unknown. Most of the websites, now a days earn extra income from this great opportunity called Pay-Per-Click Contextual Advertising.

The big BOSS of Contextual Advertising is Google Adsense !

Thanks to Google’s Adsense network contextual advertising, with the short text based links that appear next to a website’s content, is a very hot item on the internet now.

The pay-per-click contextual advertising has grown into a $ 3 billion business. With the entry of biggies like MSN and Yahoo in the Contextual Advertising world this is expected to become 15 billion annual business by 2010. Well, no one seems to loose this opportunity of money making online. So, why you ?

All need is a website on any topic. Google Adsense will serve ads on your website and if any of your visitor clicks on them, you make money, SIMPLE ! If you have a website which is running all you have to do is to insert "Google Contextual Ads" on all the web pages of the site at appropriate places and website will start earning money instantly !

Read all about Contextual Advertising !

Another way, by which web sites earn money are Affiliate Programs. So, what are Affiliate Programs - Affiliate programs allow you to make money from your website by displaying advertisements on your pages and receiving commissions per click through or product sold. Affiliate programs are another way of making your web site profitable.

Affiliate Network is an intermediary from where you can choose affiliate program from a wide range. The process to join a Affiliate program/network is very simple. Just visit their site and fill their application form. You will get instant consent in some programs while in others manual checking of your application is done. On approval, you will get a piece of HTML code, to be cut and pasted on your website..

Read all about Affiliate Programs !

Quick tips on making the most from your affiliate programs.

1. Choose 2 or 3 affiliate programs. As the saying goes, don't put all your eggs in the one basket. If one affiliate program stops, you still have the other 2 to back you up until you find another.

2. Always chose affiliate programs that suit the content of your website. It makes no sense to advertise cars to your visitors for example, if they have come to your website looking for arts and crafts.

3. Try to deep link the programs you are promoting. That is, make a page showing the product and then link from that direct to the shopping cart of the merchant. It has been proved that the deep linking or white label method creates more sales than banner advertising.

Don't give up if your affiliate program isn't working from the start. Keep adding content to your website that will attract visitors. The bigger your site is, the more visitors you will attract, which means the more opportunity to make money from affiliate programs.

Now, let's talk of money expenditure. You need to spend money to:

A good and affordable company is economicalhost.com. You can buy domain name for Rs. 450/- and 250 MB web space for Rs 1200/- .

Theme of your website - Prefer a theme for your website on which content is easily available from offline sources like, magazine, newspaper, books etc. This has many advantages,firstly you can find large volume of content for your website, remember larger website perform batter as they keep visitor on your web site for longer time, secondly, you don't have to waste much time searching for content to update your site.

Importance of Content - Want to know what makes one website a stand-out when others fail ? In a word, it's content. Visitors to your website want to find a clean, readable design that has the right fonts and colors and quick downloads--but then they want the design to "get out of the way." Web users are voracious consumers of information. In fact, today's web surfers are looking at more web pages in a single session than ever, but are spending less time per page. So for your site to deliver customer satisfaction and build sales, effective content is of paramount importance.

Content should be fresh, informative and unique. This will make visitor to stay and come again. Update your web site with fresh content regularly, so that every time visitor come to your web site to find new information. This will increase the credibility of your web site.

Must for a website:

Optimizing your Web site to Earn Money:

If you have a website which is running all you have to do is to insert "Google Contextual Ads" on all the web pages of the site at appropriate places and website will start earning money instantly !

If you have poorly running website. Hey ! you need to work on it :

If you don't have a website, no problem just make one, these days making website is a fun with the availability of HTML editors like Dreamweaver.

Now , if you are planning to design your website in order to make money. I would advice you to read following sections, so that when your website is up on net, it is fully optimized for various search engines, because most of the traffic you site is going to get from these search engines, and best of it, for no extra cost.

Start from here along with designing your website -

The secret to making money online is to make a very solid informative web site on a subject that you enjoy. The bigger your site is, the more visitors you will attract, which means the more opportunity to earn money from affiliate programs.

Yes, you can make a decent living as an affiliate, you may even generate substantial income very quickly - but the reality is that in the start-up stages it can be very hard work. I hope your strategies and my articles will assist you in achieving your online goals !