Neobux Paid Me

I finally reached the $2.00 minimum payout on Neobux and cashed out. They paid me almost instantly. By the time I opened a new tab and logged into Paypal, my payment was already there:



It's $1.98 because Neobux apparently takes fees out when they pay you. They inform you of this when you go to cash out, though.

I would like to stress that this was done WITHOUT a premium account, without renting referrals, and with no actual referrals (nobody clicked my referral link, nobody loves me... *sniff*).

You'll also see a payment from Ciao - my final payment, actually. Took them about a month, in comparison.

I also recently requested a prize from Points2Shop. It was a pretty cheap price - a CD from a band I happen to like, used, for about 3 bucks plus maybe another dollar or two for shipping. It didn't come up in the Points2Shop searches, I had to manually enter the product ID, but I wasn't told it had to be specially requested or anything, so hopefully the request will go through normally. If so, it should arrive in a few days.

I've been plinking away at Swagbucks, as usual. Swagbucks and Neobux are favorites of mine, by now. I like ReviewStream but I've been having difficulty thinking up new reviews (that they'll accept at full price, anyway). Same with Associated Content. Those two definitely take more time and energy, although they pay a lot better.

Regarding Surveyspot, I have not yet qualified for a single paying survey. Regarding Opinion Outpost, many of the surveys they offer seem to be surveys I can also take through Dollar Surveys. I'd rather get the 1 buck (transferred to my Paypal within a week) than "points" I have to save up, so it's not hard to guess why I tend to go with Dollar Surveys. That, and they don't ask for tons and tons of personal information about myself.

Swagbucks Now Offers Paypal

So I just noticed through the Twitter feed that Swagbucks now offers a $5 Paypal to the address you signed up for Swagbucks with. Since I've redeemed gift cards from them in the past, I know that they definitely come through on their prizes. So this is good news for those of you who are only interested in cash. A $5 gift certificate from Amazon still costs slightly more than half of the 80 Swagbucks that a $5 Paypal apparently costs - but sometimes, you just need cash.

Waiting...

The points I've been waiting for on MyPoints are still pending.

Nothing at all in my Paypal account from DollarSurveys - but I did get tons and tons of spam! I'll be taking my surveys through Points2Shop unless/until I see something from DollarSurveys actually arrive in my Paypal account, since they both run off of the same survey services (and the number of surveys you can take per day through those is limited) and I would like to benefit the most (or at all) from any surveys I take.

The gift card I requested a few days ago from Swagbucks is still pending - I haven't gotten my gift card number yet. They've always delivered in the past, so I'm not really worried about this, and I'm back up to 11 SwagBucks already again - almost 1/4 of the way to my next gift card.

Regarding ReviewStream - I made a formal payment request from them today. I won't state the amount I requested, since I don't want to jynx myself. I wasn't quite sure how to make the formal request - they didn't offer any suggestions or guidelines, so I just emailed them and asked for the money to be sent to my Paypal account. Yeah, I've been busy writing a lot of reviews - I've been sweating bullets lately, since I've had no way to pay my student loan or phone bill.

Still nothing worthwhile from SurveySpot, besides them expecting me to take surveys for free. Is the chance to not get paid for surveys why I signed up for SurveySpot? I think not. I think I can do that pretty much anywhere else on the Internet.

Progress, Monday June 22.

Associated Content accepted another article. It's currently processing, and I hope it posts later today.

I redeemed my third Swagbucks prize, another $5.00 Amazon gift card.

MyPoints - I finally have enough points for the $10.00 Bath & Body Works gift card, however, some of those points are still "pending" and I can't order it until they officially post.

Sendearnings - up to $16.93 (cashout is $30.00)

ReviewStream - Writing several reviews a day and up to $18.80 (cashout is $50.00). A dozen more are still pending. You can find links to posted reviews here.

Neobux - up to 50 whole cents!

Points2Shop - 764 points. Not really a 'minimum' cashout, but it's the equiv. of about $7.64 on Amazon. Got my sights set on a $25.00 pair of 'pirate' boots. It's gonna be a while. Some offers I completed last week are still 'pending' but others post almost immediately - I'm hoping this doesn't turn into another GamingLagoon situation.

Survey Spot - As of yet, I have not qualified for any paying reviews.

MyLot- have been signing in and posting every few days, I'm up to $2.54 (that only took, what, 6 months?).

Gaminglagoon - What's that? My pending offers are still pending? Surely, you jest.

I have found a few other places to join but won't be discussing them until I have an idea of how they may pan out.

A relative also emailed me a list of paid survey websites. The list is incredibly long! I don't think I could ever evaluate all of these, although I'm sure some will clearly be garbage the moment I look at them. I plan on leafing through it over the course of this week, however.

I have a lense on Squidoo, predictably called Shiny Little Pennies.

Up To Speed

Sites I Have Hit Payout On, And Have Paid Me:

Associated Content - Another article awaiting review.

Swagbucks - Roughly 10 points away from another gift card.

Sites I Am Close To Payout On, But Have Not Yet Gotten Payment:

MyPoints - I have nearly accumulated enough points to request my first gift card. That only took a few months, eh?


Sites I Am Not Close To Payout On, But Are Good Prospects:

I have not personally cashed out on any of these sites yet, and therefore cannot vouch for them in good faith. You are still welcome to join them if you want, but I won't give them my endorsement yet (so to speak).

Survey Spot - Still haven't qualified for any paid surveys.

NeoBux - Surprisingly, one of the best "get paid to click ads" websites I have encountered. I started out with only 4 ads to click per day, at 1 cent each, but am now up to 6 ads, and one of them counts for a cent and a half (which hardly makes sense, but ok).

SendEarnings - Yep, it's still slow as slow gets. I don't waste much effort on SendEarnings, lately. In any case, NeoBux is looking much more promising.

Points2Shop - The daily surveys are the only real way I get points. Honestly, I don't feel like giving away all of my personal information or signing up for stupid "free trials". That's about 50 points (50 cents' equivalent, I guess) per day, when I qualify at all. So it's going to take me a while. Assuming I only qualify half the time, that's roughly 150 points a week. But I guess it's not bad if you're saving up points for something special.

ReviewStream - I'm not a big fan of ReviewStream for regular reviews, they'll gyp you out of the full review rate and give you the Bulk Rate whenever possible. Nonetheless, I get the sense that it's fairly legit. I have recently submitted several ReviewStream reviews for the full rate, and one has gotten approved so far. You can find links to them here.

Scour - 183 points so far. I don't focus on Scour, but run my searches in it when I remember to.

Sites I Have Looked At But Haven't Really Touched:

Textbroker


Sites I Have Doubts About:

GamingLagoon - My Completed Offers are still pending. Big surprise.

Hits4Pay - Yep, they still want my SSN. A reader recently commented in defense of Hits4Pay's request for a Social Security number. I already understood that this was for tax purposes, but I'm not comfortable giving my SSN out to every Tom, Dick, and Harry. I've been poking around PTC sites for a while and honestly, since I am not an aggressive recruiter, it is highly unlikely that I will be making more than $600.00 from them.

Hits4Pay's BBB report can be found here. It's an A-, actually not a bad report. However, it is ultimately up to individuals whether or not they wish to divulge such information.

Just Joined Two More Sites

...shall we see how they pan out?

I joined EasyHits4U in order to try to get some traffic. Not that many people know about this blog. I think it's a shame since I really do try to be genuinely helpful, and I try to update regularly. If you arrived here via EasyHits4U, please spend a moment to read this blog. Even if you think ppc/paid survey/review for money/get free stuff search engines are a load of crap, I hope that my enthusiasm and wit will make this blog worth reading.
For those interested in EasyHits4U, you can't have Adsense ads up. It's against the program policies! That's why I have taken my ads down for now, until I get a decent flow of traffic. You can actually make money directly off of EasyHits4U, but honestly, it's not going to be a lot even if you sit there and click madly all day long. I like to keep it running in the background and click when I remember to. While some of the sites are just Internet crappy crap, I have actually found some neat sites and fellow bloggers through it.

I have joined Points2Shop. I don't yet know how it will pan out. Unfortunately, it is one of those "COMPLETE FREE OFFERS" sites, which I loathe. Yes, you can play games for points, but the games are limited and you have to spend points in order to compete - no guarantee that you will win more points. Still, it has daily surveys, and you get a point just for logging in every day. That's 365 free points per year (which comes out to about $3.65, so don't get too excited).
The interesting thing about this one is that there's no dinking around with gift cards. You buy things directly from Amazon with your points, and they seem to have a 1 point: 1 US dollar ratio.

And, of course, the well-known Neobux. I've held off on joining because I've heard good and bad things about it. You only get 1 cent per ad you click. On the other hand, clicking ads isn't much work, is it? It's one of those things you can just do for 2 minutes a day. You get about 4 ads. That's, uh, $1.00 a month. Minimum payout - I'm not sure, I think it's 2 bucks. I'll check later. I guess Neobux is another one of those "get referrals to make anything worthwhile" websites.

But I'd have to say that one of the websites with the best payoff-to-effort ratio is still Swagbucks. That's why I have some advice for you:

Ciao and Swagbucks Cashouts

Currently up to my eyeballs in Message box spam in Ciao. Also angry - discovered some members who had copied my reviews. I reported them - unfortunately, one of the continually frustrating things about Ciao is that they do nothing about the plagiarists.

Otherwise, I am pennies away from the $5 cashout on Ciao after just 2 days of renewed activity. That's not bad, really. I won't be cashing out at $5, however - it's not worth it, at this point. I'll wait until there's more in my account.

On Swagbucks, I just 'bought' another $5 Amazon gift card. My order has been verified, and I am currently waiting for the gift card number.

If you haven't joined these two sites yet, you're definitely missing out!

In the meantime, at MyPoints, I am about 150 points away from ordering my first gift card.

Legitimacy Verified - Associated Content and Swagbucks

I actually got my Associated Content payment deposited in my Paypal account several days ago, but a lot has happened since then in my personal life. I had to put a few things on hold for a while, and I have not been able to update this blog.

Here's the screenshot of the payment. It's only $3, but it's $3 more than I had, right?





As for Swagbucks, I got my first Amazon gift certificate code today. I actually redeemed the Swagbucks a few days ago, but it takes some time for them to post the code (my guess is that they request codes from Amazon either in batches every week, or else they request them on an individual basis, I don't know). You don't have to worry about missing it - they send you an email when the code is ready. When you go to My Account and check under My Gift Cards, there it is. I think it's clever - this way, you don't have to worry about your spam filter causing you to miss a gift card code that was emailed to you.

Here's a series of screenshots, from putting in my request for the gift card to actually entering it into my Amazon.com account. I have pixelated anything that might compromise the security of my account or otherwise cause problems (including the gift card code, my last name, and order numbers). Please do not email me asking for these things "as proof". I'm not going to send them to you, because I'm not stupid. Anyway:




And now the actual redemption of the gift code:





So there you go. I'm now $5.00 richer, which isn't a whole lot but it's free money so I can't really complain. You won't be rolling in dough but if you're a gamer looking for a way to support your monthly WoW habit, or you're trying to figure out how to buy birthday or Christmas gifts that you otherwise can't afford, just run a few searches a day (some in the morning, some at night) on Swagbucks.com. It's not that hard to win, and it's somewhat useful as well. I haven't downloaded the toolbar because I generally loathe toolbars, but I've heard that it's quite handy, so maybe I'll change my mind.

As for this $5.00, it's going to help pay for my brother's birthday present.

Swagbucks & The Search For Swag

A person I met on Ciao - he has a good rep, does good reviews - told me about Swagbucks. Now, I'd heard of it in the past - and may have even checked it out - but for whatever reason, I never signed up. It's a gift-card website (like MyPoints) that also offers prizes you can "buy" directly with your points. He said he'd gotten his gift card and it didn't take too long (unlike my months-long estimates about MyPoints) so I decided to sign up and try it out.

I started yesterday with 3 Swagbucks. As of today, I have 6. My goal is 45, to get a $5.00 Amazon gift card. I don't know what the hell I can buy with $5.00 (maybe pay for shipping for something) but that's not the point. The point is to find out if it's possible to get it, how long it takes, if it's possible to do it on your own rather than having to recruit a whole bunch of people, and if they actually "pay out".

They don't ask for a ton of personal information, which is a good start. Like MyPoints, you can accrue Swagbucks by shopping through their website. The interesting thing is that they seem to have a different list of websites to shop through, and it includes sites like Newegg.

Unlike MyPoints, they do not offer any sort of pay-per-click method of earning points. There are Polls, but they seem to be for amusement only, although you can earn points by submitting a poll question that they use. The main methods of earning points appear to be using their search engine (which will randomly award points), posting in their blog, shopping through their website, and referring friends. And while the gift card values may be lower, the number of points to buy them is also lower.

I run a ton of searches every day for various reasons, so that's no problem for me. They have a toolbar you can download, but I dislike and distrust most toolbars. I'm sure theirs is fine, but I won't be installing it after all of the trouble I've had removing crap like Yahoo! Toolbar from browsers in the past.

Doing the Math:
I seem to be averaging about 3 points per day (from searches) but I've only been a member for one day, after all. At this rate, it will take 13 more days to accrue the 45 points necessary for a $5.00 gift card.

It doesn't require a ton of effort - just regular everyday use running searches through their search engine (they have an algorithm to detect if you're running bogus searches and spamming searches, so doing that won't help you much).

Observations:
The blog is somewhat boring at the moment. The search engine isn't quite as good as Google, although they claim otherwise, and their Image search is annoying (it takes you to the webpage, not the image itself). On the other hand, it tends to spit up different results than Google, which can be useful in and of itself. I tend to run searches through different engines to see what each one picks up, so this isn't a problem for me.