I have a few websites that are completed (or very near completion), but not yet widely publicized. The ideas behind them are pretty strong - one of them is a very solid business model that has done extremely well in the past, but for various reasons that competitor closed up shop, giving me a great niche opportunity.

Hopefully this question isn't Googletarding (I checked the FAQ), but I'd like to know how 2p2ers here got their start in marketing their sites or ideas around the Interwebs. I know all the basic standard stuff - promoting it through blogs, message boards, writing blog posts and adding content, submitting my site to various search engines and legitimate directories, but any further insight is certainly welcome. Perhaps some ideas on how to setup an affiliate network? Backend software? I'm fairly proficient (or at least, I can find people who are) when it comes to website tools implementation, so reading material is certainly welcome.

Thanks!

EDIT: The idea of the website centers around Internet gambling/services.

If you are selling a digital product/service, or even a monthly membership site, you can use ********* to do all your affiliate stuff. They'll handle payment processing and paying your affiliates for you and stuff.

For advertising, you can hire people to answer related questions on Yahoo Answers with a link back to your site for about .20-.30 per answer. I notice each of my answers gets about 1 visit per day in a diet niche. There is also software that scrapes Yahoo Answers for content, so when someone scrapes your answer, you'll get a backlink on their site as well, which helps in SERPs.

Huh, cool idea about Yahoo answers. Thanks.