...mount oftime, energy, effort and money.My answer: Ride the coattails of the huge websites who've doneall the trailblazing you'll ever need to kick-start your onlinebusiness.According to Alexa.com, the following websites rank among theTop 10 sites on the Internet out of the billions and billions ofwebsites available today.As I list them, pay attention to how they can help any"bootstrapping" business, no matter what size.1. Yahoo.com - This perennial search giant not only helps...

... youresearch online, but can help get traffic to your site. Mostnotably their advertising subsidiary, Overture.com, can attractvisitors to your site starting as low as a dime per click.2. MSN.com - Microsoft's portal site can lead you to free emailaccounts (Hotmail.com) and free instant messaging(Messenger.MSN.com) to make online communication free and easy.3. Google.com - Currently the Web's most popular search engineand all-around media powerhouse, Google can help you, amongother things, buy clicks starting at about a dime(AdWords.Google.com) and expose your full-length, full- motionvideos to the world free of charge (Video.Google.com).4. eBay.com - The Web's #1 online auction site, eBay.com getsmillions of visitors daily, all of whom want to spend money onsomething. You can spend less than a dollar to put up some used,damaged, or older merchandise from your business to gainexposure to new customers and create a new revenue stream.5. Passport.net - Passport.net is related to MSN.com and shouldget grouped with #2.6. Amazon.com - The Web's largest bookseller is also one of thelargest online retailers of consumer goods. You can grow yourbusiness by targeting Amazon's millions of visitors with yourown books, CDs, DVDs and more for surprisingly little cost.Also, the Amazon Marketplace makes it easy for you to sell newand used merchandise directly through Amazon.7. MySpace.com - Allows you to create a website that's partblog, part chat room and part networking space. MySpace.comprovides a fast way to post and share information withassociates online.8. Microsoft.com - Besides providing the vast majority of PCoperating systems in the world, Microsoft.com also boasts one ofthe largest available clipart and photo collections on the Web.You can quickly find and use these professional images in Websites, brochures and more.9. Google.co.uk - The popularity of Google's United Kingdom sitedemonstrates that if you sell anything online, figure out a wayto sell it to people in England too! You can automaticallyadvertise on this site through Google's AdWords program (see #3).10. AOL.com - America Online's portal site enables you to get anemail box with 2 GB of storage along with their classic AIM (AOLInstant Messenger) to facilitate all your online communications.