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Winning a referral contest in traffic exchange programs is another way for anyone can earn extra gas money online and you can earn even more if your referrals decides to upgrade their account.

Below are some of the tactics I used when I participated in Savvyclicks.com's referral contest back in November 2006. I came in second place, earning me a whopping $40 bucks.

1. Email your opt-in list, newsletter subscribers or downline members. Since this is your warm market, the folks that you are promoting to should be able to trust you enough to join under you. Don't be shy to tell them that you need their help. Since online gurus do this from time to time, why can't you.

2. You can buy ads space on targeted blogs or newsletter ads in a targeted niche ezine, and one of the most popular newsletter in the traffic exchange industry is none other than Hit Exchange News.com.

3. If newsletter ads doesn't float your boat, then you might consider advertising in ad co-ops such SavvyClicks.com's ad co-op or PageSwirl.com's ad co-op program. By combining several traffic co-ops, you can expect several thousands of hits a month spread out in over 30 traffic exchange programs.

4. There are traffic exchange programs that have discounts or special sale on traffic credits or visitors to your websites. Take full advantage of them especially if they have a 2 for 1 sale where they will double your credits.

5. Check all the traffic exchange programs that you belong to, you could have extra credits sitting there you might not be aware of. If you do, get rid of them, use them to help you win that referral contest. Convert some of the credits into banner ads or text ads.

6. Okay, so you checked all TE accounts and they have all dried up, so start surfing. When you surf traffic exchange for credits, make sure you use a tabbed browser so you can maximize your effort. Start surfing all the big exchanges such as TS25 or Startexchange as they have hundreds of people surfing daily. You need to consistently surf 5-6 different exchanges daily for the duration of the contest.

7. If you are on a tight budget, you can always go to Getpaidtoread email programs such as Adpaid.com or Stormofcash.com or Donkeymails.com. Use a variety of ad campaigns including banner ads, paid to click, paid to read. By spending around $5-$10 bucks, you can get alot of advertising and signups for your money. Always abide by the contest rules so make sure you read it thoroughly.

8. There are safelist programs such as adtactics where you can buy a solo ads, although it's not cheap but you can reach alot of their active members.. You can also upgrade at Webcentresurf.com or Helphits.com and you can send your ads to all the active members every single month.

Last but not least, you have to track your ad campaign otherwise you have no way of knowing where are your referrals are coming from. If you know where they are coming from and they are active, you can put more emphasis on that area. There are plenty of free and paid services to choose from with both have their own advantages and disadvantages.

There you have it.

There are other ways you can promote that I haven't mentioned such as posting in forums, blogs, adboards, classified ads and social networking sites which are all time consuming, not always effective either. You should be using them near the end of the contest to help you push over the top.

You certainly don't have to use all of the tactics that I have mentioned above to win a referral contest. When I came in second at Savvyclicks.com's referral contest, I only used a few of them. You have to judge where you stand in the contest, if you are tied near the end, use more strategies by sending a second email to your opt-in list to remind them but if you are ahead by a mile and you think you can win it without more effort, then stop.

There are referral contest where it only last for about 2 weeks so you have to know which ads you can implement quickly as some ad campaign may take days to process. There are marketers out there that accumulate credits for months in over a dozen hit exchange or more just for this purpose, to win a referral contest. Sure it can pay off in the end but, for me it's the challenge, the competitions and accomplishment in the end that you've done your very best.

In conclusion, winning a referral contest is not easy and can be very competitive but with a meticolous planning, some clever strategies and a little bit of patience you could end up in the winning circle.

Good luck.