2.) Know the search engines which give the best results. Yahoo is the most popular search engine, however, I get the best results from Excite and Infoseek. This doesn't mean that I don't use the other ones. It's just that I seem to have a larger success rate when I use those two.

3.) Keep track of all data that you find on your surnames. You never know if the tiniest piece of info will fit the puzzle later!

4.) Communicate! Stay in touch with other researchers of your surnames. E-mail is a Godsend.

5.) Learn how to use GEDCOM files. GEDCOM's are text files that are created by genealogy software that contain all the data in your database. These files can be imported and exported by virtually every popular genealogy software database. I set up a new folder on my hard drive for each GEDCOM that I import.