8 Ways Not To Become Rich

Tip #122 - Eight Ways Not To Become Rich. Besides having a “real” job, there are little ways that you can make money on the side. These little ways include filling out surveys, doing Internet searches, testing products, and looking at advertisements. These little things will NOT make you rich. But they are fun ways to earn some extra side money or gift certificates for things you can use. Let’s explore some of these options.

Looking at Advertisements: There are a few sites where you can earn money looking at advertistements.

YouData – This is one of my favorite sites. You can see that I have an advertisement for them on my sidebar. This site is great because it doesn’t involve much time - only looking at advertisements. And they don’t come into your inbox. You login and they send your way ads that are targeted to you. For each ad that you look at you get about 15 cents. And every Friday, they deposit money into your PayPal account! I love that – no waiting around months to receive your money. I receive about 50 cents to 1 dollar every Friday into my account – not bad for a couple minutes of time. (Full disclosure – if you sign up for this site, I will get referral compensation of about 15 cents. ;-) ) Note: that at sign-up they will need to send a text message to your phone to confirm that you are real. It is a one-time deal and you won't receive any other texts from them.

Surveys: There are dozens of survey sites. I like the ones that pay money or points towards gift cards. Some just earn you entry into a sweepstakes. I have not tried all of them out there, but of the ones I have tried, my favorite are below.

Global Opinions Panal / Synovate – this company has become my favorite one to do surveys for. The surveys come to my inbox on a regular basis – usually about one survey every few days. I don’t qualify for all of them, but for several. Each survey is worth points and after a certain number of points, you can cash it in for a check. I even get a few points for surveys that I don’t qualify for! In addition to the surveys, I have also tested a few products for them – regular household items – that they mailed to me, and then I answered a survey about what I tested. I have received a couple of checks from them in the mail and got to keep all that I tested.

Kidzeyes – this is a great survey program for children ages 6-12! My daughter sees me doing surveys sometimes so she was excited that she would be able to do them as well. Signing up is a bit funky – I had to call and leave a message for them to confirm my sign up. But all is good with this firm. The surveys we receive are few and far between but they have paid us well for them. We have received a couple of $10 checks from them in the past few months. There is a sister program called Teenseyes for teenagers, which I have not tried.

CashCrate – this survey site is time consuming, I will admit. They have a lot of things going on on their site which appear to lead to many emails going into your inbox. I don’t do any of those things. The only thing I do are the Research Surveys. You can do up to two per day and they pay 80 cents per survey. What I like about this site is that I can do up to two per day – much more frequent than what other survey sites send me. However, many of those surveys are pretty long and are not worth my time for 80 cents. Having said that, I often get sucked in and just finish them up. Once your balance reaches $20, you wait until the middle of the next month and then they send you a check. I received a $20 check after about a month when I initially did these and then I slowly started to not qualify for many surveys and my completion rate has slowed down. I am close to reaching my second $20. What is frustrating about this site is that I often answer many questions to find out that I don’t qualify and I don’t get anything for that. But I like this one because there are surveys almost always available (Full disclosure – if you sign up for this site, I will get referral compensation of about 15 cents. ;-) )

Survey Savvy – This one is a good survey site as well. I don’t receive emails from them frequently but occasionally. Each survey pays a different amount depending on its length and other factors. (Full disclosure – if you sign up for this site, I will get referral compensation of about 15 cents. ;-) )

Pinecone Research – this survey company pays $3 per survey, which is a fairly high dollar amount comparatively. The downside is that the surveys are few and far between. They send them to your inbox – on average maybe once every couple of months. Of course, if you fit the profile they need, you may get surveys more often. Pay can be sent via check or directly deposited into your PayPal account. The problem is with this company is that you need to sign up through a banner ad of theirs; you cannot do it directly from their website. So you have to find one to sign up for them. I signed up through someone’s blog, so it may be worth it to do a search to see if they have sign-ups available.

Testing Products: If you like trying out new products there are a few sites that allow you to do this by sending you things in return for your opinion or spreading the word. I mentioned that I've tried out products and given my opinion on them for Synovate. Below is another company that has you test products.

BzzAgent – This company allows you to test products and share your opinions about them with others. They will send you offers to participate in a campaign – for example, a new apple juice has come out. They might send you coupons for free apple juice and discount coupons to share with friends. You try the juice and are supposed to “Bzz” family and friends about it – telling them about the new juice and why you liked it or not and then give them coupons for them to try it. After this, you write a “report” of a few sentences explaining who you “buzzed” and what you said. Over the couple years I have been with them I have tried about three or four products – some were new and others had been around for a while. I have turned down products that I didn’t want to try.

Internet Searches: There is at least one compnay out there that gives you credit for doing Internet searches with them. There may be more, but I am not aware of them.

Swagbucks: Most people have heard of Google to search for something on the Internet. But there are other search engines out there. Once such search engine is Swagbucks. And this one pays you to do searches. Search for whatever you want just like you do through Google but do it through Swagbucks instead and you accumulate points. Points can be used for gift cards or other items. I’ve been accumulating points and cashing them in for Amazon gift cards. After a few months’ of use, I three $5 Amazon gift cards and am working toward another $5 one. There are other ways to accumulate points on their site, but using their search engine is the biggest way. They use Google as part of their search engine so you should be able to find what you want using Swagbucks. (Full disclosure – if you sign up for this site, I will get referral compensation of about 15 cents. ;-) )

In Real Life – All of the items listed above are time consumers and if you figured out an hourly rate doing these things, you would not be impressed. But if you have time to kill or enjoy doing surveys, it is a fun, easy way to make a few bucks on the side without much effort. I have been participating in most of these for just 6 months with the exception of Pinecone Research and BzzAgent, which I have been part of for more than a year. And in the 6-month time period, I have probably accumulated about $100, got free products to test, and earned $15 in gift cards.

I usually do the surveys first thing in the morning when I go on the computer, taking a few minutes each day. And then as I receive them in my inbox, I fill them out as I have time. The products I have tried have been for things I would normally use or buy saving me money in the process. Plus it’s a lot of fun to try to be the tester of new products!

As I said in the title, these things won’t get you rich, they won’t even get you comfortable, but if you have extra time and enjoy these types of things, it’s a fun way to earn a little bit of pocket money.