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Make money surfing the web…… why not?

January 4, 2012 by Karl

In this article you will learn how to make money while surfing the internet like you do every day. Make enough to pay for Christmas at the end of the year!

This is not a scam! I have been doing this for over a year, and it really works!

Several of these “search & win” sites exist. The most noteworthy are Swagbucks and Zoombucks. If you want to get your feet wet in this, open up a Swagbucks account and see how quickly you can earn some money.

Here’s the way it works in general:

Open up an account, do your normal website searching through either of these sites, and watch how quickly you can start winning “bucks”. Now typically it doesn’t add up to a whole lot, about 30 cents a day in real dollars, but 30 cents ads up, and before you know it, you can cash in your “bucks” for Amazon Gift Cards (or some of the other “prizes” they want to sell you).

Both Swagbucks and Zoombucks have the same basic exchange rate where one “buck” equals about 1 penny (more or less). With Swagbucks, you need to have 450 “swagbucks” to cash in for a $5 Amazon Gift Card. It typically takes about a week for the gift card to show up in your account. Then you take it to Amazon, and use it to purchase what ever you want. There is no limit to the number of gift cards you can use in one Amazon purchase, so you can build them up and use them to buy the family a nice gift at the end of the year. I know a few people who have used nothing but Amazon Gift Cards to fund their Christmas.

With Zoombucks you need to get 1000 “zoombucks” in order to receive a $10 Amazon Gift Card. With a new account you actually need to reach 2000 zoombucks before you can cash in any points, so it can take a while. Zoombucks also take longer to build. If you are only collecting zoombucks through searching, you will typically only make about 4 to 5 zoombucks a day. That’s a lot of days to add up to anything.

Both sites also have other ways to make money, usually through signing up for things, watching their version of TV, or answering surveys. I don’t bother wasting my time with these. If you think about how much you make answering a 30 minute survey (usually about 50 cents) that’s about $1 per hour. Not worth any rational person’s time, but some people become addicted to “winning” these bucks.

Both sites also allow you to make money by promoting their sites. I will make a few “bucks” if you sign up through one of the links I have provided. You can too, if you get others to sign up through you.

Both sites also offer toolbars for your web browser, with a nice simple search window, but they are not necessary if you don’t like having things cluttering up the top of your browser.

Here’s my routine. Every morning, I spend about 5 minutes winning a few swagbucks and zoombucks. Then throughout the day my wife and daughter do some quick searches to win some bucks on their computers (tied into the same account). Then I usually try again at night. That’s it. It builds up.

Here’s a few hints. With swagbucks, you usually don’t win more than once every two hours or so. So I do a few quick searches until I win, and then stop for a while. With zoombucks you will only win once a day or so. If you don’t win on the first search of the day don’t waste any more time.

That’s all there is to it! Happy searching (and winning)!

Category Household | Tags: frugal,make money,money,save,search and win,surfing the internet,swagbucks,zoombucks | 3 Comments
Ditch the FAX line!

January 2, 2012 by Karl

Learn how to ditch your fax machine while keeping your fax service, and save money monthly without having the cost of the machine or the local phone company. Learn one more trick in how to be a frugal and thrifty minded small business owner.

We run two businesses from our home. It is imperative that we have a dedicated fax line and a good reliable machine. This is why we have had a dedicated fax line coming into our house for the past 10 years.

Over the past 20 years, there have been two options with fax machines. One is to have a physical machine that sits on a horizontal surface in your office, and the other is to use the modem of your computer as a fax machine. Each has its reliability issues and associated expenses.

With a physical machine, there are costs associated with keeping it operational. Though it is always available to receive a fax, it uses paper and ink or toner to print a page, and that costs money – especially for all those junk faxes that are received.

Using a computer as a fax machine has it’s issues also. The computer always needs to be on, and if it goes into sleep mode, it may not always wake up in time to answer, or not wake up at all. Also, faxing out can be a headache if the fax program you have only accepts a single type of document format, which involves time-consuming conversions.

We just recently realized that our dedicated fax line was costing us over $20 a month in fees and taxes from our local phone company, for something that we use once or twice a week. Then there is the cost of the equipment, maintenance, and ink or toner on top of that.

There is another option! There are fax services out there that allow you to keep your existing fax number (it may take a few weeks for the number to be ported over to them). Most of them offer a 30 day free trial. There are initial costs to have your existing fax number ported from your local phone company to them, but then the monthly costs to have a fax machine will be more than cut in half.

The way these fax services work, you are given an email address in which you can send your outgoing faxes (usually as an attachment in one of several different formats). You email your fax to your service, the fax is sent out, and you receive an email receipt that it was successfully faxed. Incoming faxes are received from that phone number, and emailed to what ever email address you choose.

When shopping for a fax service, be sure to find one that has reliable service. There are some that do not have very good track records. Also make sure they can set you up with the number of accounts that you may need. For example, if you have 5 employees that need to send faxes, you should be able to set them each up with a separate email to send faxes out, or you could have a single email that everyone on staff uses. Check these details before signing up with anyone. I would also check out their service for a month or so before porting your fax line over, to make sure they are providing the quality of service you need.

We have decided to go with a local company that provides fax services rather than going with one of the big international services. I like to keep the business local, and I also like having the personal relationship with someone who can take care of things if there is a problem.

We have switched fairly recently, so I will give an update on how it is working. We should be saving about $15-$20 per month taking all the factors into consideration. This is an annual savings of $180-$240. Every bit helps in this economy!

Category Office | Tags: fax,frugal,machine,money,save | No Comments