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Signup for SwagBucks to Make Money Online

WARNING

The following is an unveiled attempt to get you to sign up for Swagbucks with my referral link.  Other than being a user, I am not connected with Swagbucks in any way.  I have received no compensation for this post.  But, if you sign up for Swagbucks using my “Refer Friends” link, I will earn referral Swagbucks.  Just like you could for referring your friends.  
You know, once you sign up.  
With my affiliate link.  
Get it?

What is SwagBucks?

Swagbucks is a program where you earn points, or Swag Bucks (SB), for doing things online that you would normally do. 

When you have enough Swag Bucks, you can exchange them for rewards. 

According to Swagbucks, they’ve given away over $45 million in rewards to date!

What Can You Get With Swag Bucks?

You can redeem your Swag Bucks for a gift card from a pretty decent selection of companies.  Starbucks, Home Depot, Cineplex, Walmart and Babies ‘R Us are only some of the companies offered. 

You can even get PayPal gift cards.  That’s pretty close to cash! 

Personally I opt for the Amazon gift cards because they’re a good deal and I shop at Amazon already.  You need 500SB for most $5 gift cards, but you only need 450SB for a $5 Amazon gift card. 

Once you’ve got enough Swag Bucks, you just put in a request and you’ll get your online gift card code in about a week.  Easy!

How Much Have I Made with Swagbucks?

I don’t expect to get rich with Swagbucks.  I think of Swag Bucks more as spare change I can make by goofing off on the Internet when I need to give my brain time to relax. 

I’ve used Swagbucks off and on for over three years now.  Usually, I start using Swagbucks in the fall to earn some Amazon money for Christmas shopping.

In total, I’ve earned 17 $5 Amazon gift cards (that’s $85 people) and have I enough points to get another gift card.  When I’m paying attention, I can easily get one or two $5 Amazon gift cards a month.  

In other words, I make more from using Swagbucks than I do from my blog.  But for a lot less effort!  I was a little more attentive to Swagbucks today while I was writing this post and I earned 60 Swag Bucks.

Is SwagBucks a Scam?

When I first heard about SwagBucks I was tempted by the idea, but concerned that I would be giving away all my information and that I’d never actually get something back. 

I was so happy when I got that first $5 Amazon gift card and it actually worked at Amazon! 

All those years I’d been that I’d been searching online I’d got nothing.  Now I was getting free stuff that I actually wanted!

How Does SwagBucks Make Money?

It’s not much of a surprise to learn that Swagbucks makes most of its money from advertisers.  Pretty run of the mill.  I figured that’s probably happening with my regular search engine, so I might as well get paid for it! 

Before I signed up I read through all the disclaimers to make sure I was comfortable with all the details.  Which is something I think we should always do!

Is SwagBucks a Pyramid Scheme?

Swagbucks makes its money off advertisers, not from users.

You can earn SwagBucks from new users you refer to SwagBucks, so I guess you could draw a pretty short pyramid…  But only one layer… 

It’s a free program.  Users don’t need to pay anything to signup.  So, there’s nothing at stake if Swagbucks goes belly up.

Personally, it doesn’t seem like a scam to me.   But hey, I’m biased from all the swag they’ve thrown my way.

Earn Up To 190 Swag Bucks A Day Without Doing Anything Special

There are certain meat and potato things you can do every day to earn Swag Bucks.  They’re not worth much individually, but they do start to add up.  Some of the tasks are fun.  Some you just try to get through as quickly as possible.  If you did these all every day, you’d make over $50 each month.

  1. Install the SwagButton – 1 SB per Day
    In the past, I’d stop using Swagbucks because I’d forget to go to the website.  Now that I’ve installed the SwagButton in my browser, I’m getting little notifications that help me earn more Swag Bucks.  Plus, I can do many of the other tasks from the button instead of going to the website.  Basically it reminds me that Swagbucks is a thing, so I’ve been using it more lately
  2. Answer the Daily Poll – 1 SB per Day
    Each day there is a new, rather random, poll.  Just log on and pick your answer and you get a Swag Buck.
  3. Click Through the No Obligation Special Offers (NOSO) – 2 SB per Day
    For this task, you click through a series of ads.  Then now you usually wait for a video to load with an ad and your code to get your points.  I use the arrow on the right, it doesn’t move around, so I can click through mindlessly now. 
  4. Find Swag Codes – About 3 SB at least twice a day, so 6SB per Day
    Swag Codes are hidden on the Swagbucks website or social media pages. When a code is live, you just need to find it and enter it in a box, then you get points.  Honestly, before I had the SwagButton to let me know where to look, I never really found any.  Now when I get a notification, I’m on it.  If I feel like it.  There are usually 2 or 3 SwagCodes each day worth about 3SB each.
  5. Play Games – 2 SB per 2 games up to 10 SB per day there are some games that are genuinely entertaining (well at least for me).  But, if I’m just trying to fill time and earn some SwagBucks, I stick to SwagJump.  It’s the fastest game.  It doesn’t matter how well you do, you just need to play twice to get 2 SB.
  6. Search with Swagbucks – Earn more than 20SB per Day
    Now that Firefox doesn’t have Google as the default in the search bar, it was easy for me to make Swagbucks my default search.  I just search the web like I normally would and every once in awhile I get Swag Bucks.  Usually, I get about 8 SB for searching.  But I usually only get search points once, maybe twice a day.  I do find that my results aren’t as great as Google, so sometimes I need to search twice.  Getting paid to search is pretty great though, so I think it’s a fair compromise.
  7. Swagbucks TV – 3 SB per 10 videos up to 150SB per Day
    I’ve never made 150SB watching movies because that would be a pretty big commitment for me.  I find watching the videos through the SwagButton or in a new window is much more convenient than just using your browser.  So I am watching more videos now.  You only really have to watch the ad that comes before a video and maybe a small part of the video itself before the meter registers your view. 

    If you’re American you can use your mobile device to watch videos too.  On mobile, you can get 2SB for every 5 videos up to 36SB.  I’ve heard that the mobile app runs continuously too so you don’t need to click through to start each video.  It’s a pretty sweet deal.  Not for us Canucks though.

More Ways To Earn

Get Paid To Shop
Before I bought anything online at Christmas, I checked to see if I could earn Swagbucks on my purchase.  Many stores will give you 1-5 SB per dollar spent when you go to the site from Swagbucks itself. 

Sign Up for Free Trials and Special Offers
I once tried Netflix for a free trial month.  I didn’t really like it, so we didn’t keep it.  But I signed up for the trial through SwagBucks and got $10 worth of points!  There are lots of special offers like this, so if you like to buy online, this could be great for you.

Watching Special Videos Sent to your SwagBucks Inbox.
So watching ten videos is a bit of a pain to earn 3 SB.  But watching only one to make 2SB is a lot easier.  I didn’t have any videos when I checked today, but they were pretty common before Christmas.

Ways I Don’t Make Money with Swagbucks

Surveys
I’ve tried the surveys before and won’t bother again.  Sometimes I’ve stuck with a survey for half an hour before being disqualified.  Generally, I don’t qualify for the surveys because I’m not planning big purchases and don’t use many products in my house.  If this is like you, skip the survey hassle.

Tasks
I did actually do these in the past and made a decent amount of SwagBucks.  But now the tasks are through a third party and I don’t want to sign up with another company.  Plus, the tasks felt more like work than goofing off.  So I felt more like I was being underpaid than I was picking up change off the street.

Encrave
I hear that this is an easy way to pick up a few SB.  Just watch a movie or something.  I’m Canadian, so I’ve never been given the chance.

Are Bing Rewards the Same as SwagBucks?

In Canada, Bing Rewards aren’t a thing, so again I’m not an expert here.  I’ve heard that you can earn SwagBucks for signing up for Bing rewards though, so it might make sense to start with SwagBucks

How Can I Signup?

Ready to get paid to surf the Internet? 

You can signup for SwagBucks with my referral code: http://www.swagbucks.com/refer/addsup

When you use my referral code you get 150 SB just for signing up!  That’s 1/3 of the way to a $5 Amazon gift card!

Conclusion

You won’t get rich with SwagBucks.  But if you’ve got some time to goof off, or if you NEED to set aside time to goof off, making some change by fooling around on the Internet is a pretty sweet bargain. 

Each year for Christmas I’ve got a little stash of Amazon gift cards that I can use to get some sweet gifts.

I’ve recommended Swagbucks to my friends in the past and now I’m recommending it to you!

What About You?

Do you use Swagbucks or another service like it?
How do you convince yourself it’s fun to make only pennies?

What’s been your lowest paying offline job?



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