The beauty of a joint venture is that no matter how much or how little traffic you are currently receiving at your site, this marketing technique can explode your traffic and profits.

There are five things you need to do to create a successful joint venture.

1. Set goals. Do you know what you want to achieve with your joint venture?

Because this technique is so effective, be prepared to be rejected. You should also be prepared to "lose your shirt" upfront if you are going to get potential partners to accept your offer.

Jimmy D. Brown of Profits' Vault, http://www.profitsvault.com, recommends you aim for three goals:

a. Build your list b. Secure lifetime customers c. Recruit new affiliates and partners

Although you will lose on front end, you'll gain on backend because you'll have a target market in place ready to buy.

2. Make a list of contacts. How many publishers you decide to contact is up to you. I would recommend you make a list of at least 10 because some of your contacts will completely ignore your offer.

If you don't make contact with first 10, make a list of 10 more, but don't quit.

Use targeted key words in search engines to find sites that complement yours and study them carefully before you contact publishers.

What to look for in potential partners:

a. Sites that complement yours. If you're selling computer hardware, look for sites that sell computer software, computer books, etc.

b. Sites that have a mailing list. You want your potential partners to contact their customers/readers with your offer.

Look for ezine publishers with large lists. Small lists are good if readers are loyal.

3. Create an irresistable offer. This is where you will lose BIG.

Things have changed. Today, with billions of pages, and many of once free search engines going to fee models, your chances of being found in search engines is pretty slim unless you can devote yourself full-time to search engine submission.

Factor into this fact that search engines won't accept affiliate pages, and your chances of being found are non-existent.

If being a search engine guru just doesn't appeal to you, then pay-per-click search engines may be just thing.

To get started with pay-per-click search engines requires some preparation. Once you get everything set up though, this is a very easy promotion method for you to maintain.

You will need to create a text document or spreadsheet of your information so that when you are ready to begin your submissions, you can cut and paste your entries, saving you time.

The first thing that you want to do before you sign up with any of pay-per-clicks is to create a good description and list of key words you want to purchase.

It is very important that you select right key words or you are wasting your time.

There are, however, some very good tools that you can use to help you select your key words. Here are an excellent site for helping you select your key words: Overture Search Engine Suggestion Tool - http://inventory.overture.com/d/searchinventory/suggestion

Once you have selected your key words, write your description of your product or service. I would recommend that you go to one of pay-per-clicks, or several, and use some of key words you have selected to help you find sites you will be competing against.