“The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing. ”
― Walt Disney Company
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Imagine sitting down at your computer for 5 minutes a day and getting paid an extra $100 a month for it. Now, imagine what you could do with an extra $100 a month. Interested?
Now, will you do something else for me?
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Online surveys with Swagbucks was one of the first ways that I started making money online.
Back before I started a blog, even before I was let go from my job, I was using Swagbucks to offset expenses every month, splurge occasionally, and even buy food when money was getting a bit tight.
I even used Swagbucks to buy my father a fathers day present when I didn’t have the spare cash lying around.
Swagbucks is definitely legit: they’ve been around eight years and have dished out more than $122 million ($137 millions as of July 2016) to their customers.
To date, I’ve earned more than $5,000 from Swagbucks – and who couldn’t use an easy extra $5,000??
So… What is Swagbucks?
Before I share my personal experience with Swagbucks, let’s talk about what it is.
Swagbucks is an online rewards program where you can earn virtual currency called “Swag Bucks” – and you can turn these “Swag Bucks” into real gift cards (I usually turn mine into Amazon gift cards).
Ways to earn Swag Bucks include: watching promotional videos, participating in polls and surveys, buying products (cash back), and playing games.
The easiest way is through using their search engine. Whenever you’re signed in, and use their search engine you win Swag Bucks.
Quick tip: set Swagbucks as your default search engine on your web browser so that you don’t even have to think about it.
My daily Swagbucks Routine:
- Answer the “Daily Poll Question” (1 Swag Buck).
- Make a couple of searches using their search engine (between 6-50 Swag Bucks).
When I hit 500 Swag Bucks, I cash out for a $5 Amazon Gift Card. It normally takes about a week to get the gift card sent to my email.
How do I make my big money?
Two words: cash back. What is cash back? Cash back is a way of shopping online and getting rewards back when you make a purchase.
How is this legal? Swagbucks gets money from stores for advertising stores on their site. They take the commission they get from the stores and split it with you (in Swag Bucks).
Example: Let’s say you bought a new laptop from Walmart.com for $500. Walmart pays Swagbucks 8% of that sale ($40), Swagbucks takes this money and gives you half (4% or 2,000 Swagbucks).
How many stores are eligible for cash back? There are over 1,000 different online retailers. Quick side note: Amazon is on the list, but hardly anything there is eligible for cash back, so don’t even bother.
How do you activate the cash back? The first option is to go swagbucks.com and search for the store you want to shop at. Once you find the store, look to see how many Swag Bucks you’ll get per dollar spent. Then click the “Shop Now” link and you’re officially done. After the purchase is made, it will take between 3-7 days for the Swag Bucks to show up in your account.
Things I Don’t Love About Swagbucks:
- It’s frustrating that you don’t get Swag Bucks on every search you do. They normally give you Swag Bucks at three different times per day while you’re searching.
- I made Swagbucks my default search engine, but their search engine isn’t as good as Google because they use Bing’s search results. I would rather have slightly worse results in order to accumulate more Swag Bucks, so using their engine is still a no-brainer in my mind.
- This should be obvious, but you’re not going to become a millionaire using Swagbucks. But it’s definitely realistic to think you could earn $100 in gift cards, every month, by using Swagbucks for just a few minutes a day and using it for your normal shopping. Who wouldn’t want a free forty bucks every month?
- See all those surveys? See all those videos? They’re garbage! Please don’t waste your time. The key to remember is that one Swag Buck is only worth one penny. Most of these surveys are going to take a long time to complete, and when you’re done you’re going to be spammed with loads of emails in your inbox. 100 SwagBucks might sound like a good deal, but is 10 minutes of your time worth $1? I don’t think so.
Here are some of my recent gift card redemptions:
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