Make a few extra bucks...

For frugal people like us...every penny counts! Through the frugal blogging community I have found a few great ways to make a few bucks (or gift cards) online - and a few things I think are total ripoffs/wastes of time. Here is the scoop:


Swagbucks - I love, Love, LOVE Swagbucks! Basically you randomly earn bucks for doing searches online. You can use those bucks in the Swag Store to purchase merchandise and gift cards. It is 45 Swagbucks for a $5.00 gift card to Amazon.com. Since I signed up in October last year, I have redeemed $55.00 in Amazon.com gift cards! This hasn't just been for doing my own searches, though, the BEST thing about Swagbucks is their referral program. You provide your link to friends, family, fellow bloggers, etc. When they sign up you earn Swagbucks for their searches...up to their first 100 Swagbucks. This is a very powerful tool. I would love it if you would sign up for Swagbucks using my link HERE. Then get your own link and start telling your friends - then start racking up some Swagbucks! You will LOVE it. Check out some of the things I have purchased with my Swagbucks and more of my experiences here.


YouData - I have been really impressed with YouData. This is a service that pays you to view ads. You earn between $.05-$.15 for each ad you view. The best part of this program is that you are paid every Friday directly to your PayPal account! There is no threshold for a payout! I signed up January 22nd and have earned $11.33. This is real cash!I have just been letting it build in my PayPal account. YouData also has a referral program, for each person that you get to sign up, you get $.01 for each ad they view up to 100 ads - or $1.00. Depending on how many people you sign up...this could add up fast. Again, please use my link HERE to sign up then get your own and tell all of your friends and start collecting some money!


A note about surveys...

I don't do the surveys, mainly because I haven't really found a great site that pays a decent amount. I don't feel like it is worth 15 minutes to make $.50-1.00 especially if you have to build up $20.00 or $25.00 to get a payout. If anyone is aware of some great survey sites, please pass them along!


And now for the ripoffs...

Have you heard of Inbox Dollars or Send Earnings? These are sites that pay $.02 when you read e-mails. The problem? You have to earn $30.00 before you can get a payout. This means you have to read 1500 e-mails to get a payout. You get about 2-5 e-mails per day, so let's say an average of 3. This means it will take about 500 days to get your payout - or almost 1.5 years! Yikes. To make matters worse...there is a $3.00 processing fee (or 150 $.02 e-mails) to get your cash - so you end up with $27.00 for reading e-mails every day for a year and a half. This is not worth it to me. At all.

So tell me. What have your experiences been with making money and gift cards online? Any great sites or other ripoffs? Please leave a comment!