Indeed, longer that I do business on Internet more I find that there are numerous free resources out there that can be amazingly helpful. I thought therefore that I'd put together a list of my ten favourite free business-building resources and exactly what they can do for you.

Ready?

1) Link Checkers

Visitors to websites hate "dead links" - links that don't got anywhere.

And because visitors hate it, so do search engines. They'll penalise you for dead links.

Therefore, by just making sure all your links work properly you'll look more professional, get better rankings in search engines and build better rapport with your visitors.

> http://validator.w3.org/checklink

2) Alexa

Alexa ranks websites by traffic. The smaller number of their ranking, more traffic they get.

You can use it to keep a running tab of whether your traffic is increasing or decreasing - and compare it to your competitors.

Another useful feature is to check out potential link partners. Someone emails you and asks for a reciprocal link. But if you're getting more visitors each day than they'll get all year then it's not a fair deal - you'll send them tons of traffic and get virtually nothing back in exchange.

> http://www.alexa.com

3) Google Toolbar

The Google toolbar has two particurly useful features.

Firstly by installing it on your browser, whenever you visit a website it'll tell you their Google PageRank. PageRank is Google's measure of how "important" a site is. A PR of 1-2 is typical for new sites. 5 is reasonable and 7+ is very impressive indeed.

By only linking to high PR sites (5+) Google will see you in a better light.

Secondly, is that Google Toolbar effortlessly lets you check "backwards links".

That way, you simply surf over to each of your main competitors, and use this feature to see which websites are linking to them. Then assess each website based on their PR and Alexa ranking to quickly come up with a powerful list of potential link partners. Easy!

> http:/ oolbar.google.com/

4) BetterWhois

You've got a list of potential link partners with high quality sites. Next visit each one to check for quality of site and that it's theme is closely related to yours.

Then find some way to contact them.

But what if you can't find one anywhere?

As an Internet user, have you received a letter, fax or e-mail asking you to help a Nigerian {or any other citizen who you previously don't know} with a bank transaction - and offering you a chance to share millions of dollars?

This is a typical Nigerian Scam which has been around for decades, but now it seems to have reached epidemic proportions with use of Internet.

While some people recognize that this scheme, also known as -419 Advanced Fee Scam,- sounds too good to be true, unfortunately thousands of other people, daily, keep being victimized by this fraud.

It is not really their fault because daily these scammers keep coming up with newer twists and variations to scams to defraud even most scam conscious individuals.

Many people engaged in doing business on Internet are increasingly becoming victims of this notorious scam despite all warnings about scams in general.

********************How The Scam Works******************** In Nigerian scam, scam artists entice their victims into believing they have been singled out from masses to share in multi-million dollar windfall profits.

Typically, a company or individual receives an unsolicited letter, fax or email from a Nigerian claiming to be a senior civil servant.

In email, Nigerian informs recipient that he is seeking a reputable foreign company or individual into whose account he can deposit funds ranging from $10 to $60 million, which Nigerian government supposedly overpaid on a procurement contract.

In return, recipient gets to keep a share of millions.

There are dozens of different variations of this email originating from several countries, all involving a plea for help and a promise to share riches.

But NOTE this clearly-

It doesn’t matter what story is...

It doesn't matter what country is mentioned...

It doesn't matter how true it looks....

So far as you don't know person before and he or she is offering you such an 'opportunity of a lifetime' of gaining millions of dollars within a short time for doing absolutely nothing...

Forget it...

... every single one is just a scam!

Laws passed in Nigeria outlaw notorious Nigerian advanced-fee fraud letters. Victims of these scams have also included Nigerians... to show that not all Nigerians are involved in scams.

In short, these scams started in Nigeria and has led to thousands of Nigerians losing their entire fortunes to these scammers. Many have been known to commit suicide for losing all they own.

Yes, even Nigerians themselves are victims!

The scams are perpertuated by just a few bad eggs from among millions of honest Nigerians worldwide.

Such honest Nigerians have suffered in 2 ways from their few bad eggs in their midst.

One- by losing millions to scammers themselves, Two- by being blacklisted by other people worldwide.

It is therefore important not to look at 'Nigerians' as problem, but to look at 'scammers' as problem.