The days of making a million overnight on the internet are long gone, but there is still money to be made in cyberspace. Last year, armed with only a basic knowledge of the technical details, a willingness to learn and mountains of patience, I set up a new website.

The plan was to create a gadgets and gizmos news and reviews site. In my first month, I attracted just 132 visitors. A year and half later, I’m getting 500,000 unique visitors a month. I’ve spent nothing promoting the site, and it now generates enough cash to cover my mortgage.

If you have similarly modest expectations, there’s no reason why you can’t do the same. Here’s how. First, buy a domain name, such as www.granscake-reviews.com. Domains cost anything from 2p, though a .com address (for commercial sites) will cost more. Domains remain valid for two years, at which point you must ante up another 2p. Another absolute necessity is a hosting company to look after the server on which your files will be kept. Expect to pay around £10-£20 a month.

Once you have a domain name and hosting, it’s time to start building pages. Web pages are built in a variety of computer languages, but the best one to start with is HTML (HyperText Markup Language). Web editor software packages such as Dreamweaver make it easier still, and if you’re on a small budget, older versions can be found on eBay at bargain prices.

Once you have a website, you can start planning to make money. The best way to start is through affiliate schemes, which work by implanting advertising banners on your site. Most affiliates work via “click through” — when a visitor clicks through to its site from yours, you get money. I use Google Adwords and amazon.co.uk. Google pays up every time someone clicks on a Google advert on your site, while amazon.co.uk gives you a percentage of any sales that it makes after people click through from your site. In both cases the amounts are small, but over a month the money can add up.

Beyond affiliates, you could try selling advertising directly to companies or take on an advertising agency to do it for you. The service is normally free, but they will take a cut of your ad revenue.

All these revenue streams do rely on you bringing in readers to earn money. The best ways to do this are to link with other websites, offer free copy, and post new content regularly. Offering your content free to other sites will draw people to yours. Also, the more your site is linked, the higher will be your ranking on Google, the web’s key search engine.

There’s one last ingredient for success: hard work. To get my website to its current state has taken a lot of late nights and poring over computer textbooks. I’m not giving up the day job just yet, but I hope that one day this will become a realistic option at least.

Stuart Miles runs the gadget-lovers’ website www.pocket-lint.co.uk

Links

www.cre8asiteforums.com
A good place to start learning how to use the HTML language.

www.nameroute.co.uk
Reliable domain name provider.

www.hostroute.com

Solid host.

www.google.com/adsense
To find out how to make money from Google.

www.amazon.co.uk
For details of Amazon’s referral scheme.

www.adviva.net
Internet ad agency.