A couple of visitors have sent me emails about earning money taking Surveys on the Web. Even one affiliate was smart enough to email me. These pitches are everywhere: Twitter streams, Facebook, emails, and even on Television. Since the economy is really bad, this entire industry seems to be promoting like hell. My first reaction is that they ALL SUCK!
I’ve examined a few with more research left. What I have found is that the initial pitch is very very enticing BUT once you drill down to the real details of exactly how you get your money, many of you will find that it’s not worth the significant effort and in some cases you are opening the door for SPAM and charges on your CC.
A perfect example is this site, which says:
In case you can’t read the Click here for Details copy, this is what it says:
SUMMARY OF PROGRAM REQUIREMENTS. To receive the reward you must: 1) be a U.S. resident at least 18 years of age or older; 2) register with valid information; 3) complete the following reward offers: 2 Silver offers, 2 Gold offers, and 4 Platinum offers (Available reward offers will vary. Some reward offers require a purchase. Credit card offers may require you to activate the card by making a purchase, transferring a balance or taking a cash advance. Click on the following links to go directly to the reward offer pages: Silver offers, Gold offers, Platinum offers); and 4) follow the redemption instructions. All program requirements must be completed within 60 days of the date of registration. Please read the Terms & Conditions for complete program details. Your information will be shared with our marketing partners. Please read the Privacy Policy for more details.
My thoughts and advice:
(1) If you drill down to those links and carefully read the copy above you will see that a lot of work is involved plus your purchases in some cases. READ ALL THE FINE PRINT BEFORE you sign up. Is it worth your time? Does any risk reward make sense? I’m not running a baby-sitting service on this site :) You will need to decide if it’s worth the REAL effort. I explained this to a number of visitors who sent me emails and all of them said no thanks.
(2) The companies who run these affiliate programs for the survey sites are doing a LOUSY job of policing their affiliates. Period. Some of the copy that these affiliates use includes:
”Make lots of cash with our survey”
” Earn $xxx when you Submit survey answers”
”Work from home and make tons of cash with our surveys”
The links in these pitches are usually cloaked and or redirected by the affiliate and rarely if ever from the survey site. These affiliate pitches are clearly slimy and fail to disclose the real facts. Does the mother ship really care? Is the mother ship turning a blind eye until the regulators clamp down? You decide.
(3) I’m NOT inferring that the disclosures and terms on the site is somehow non compliant. Rather, these sites make money because they KNOW with absolute certainty that some of YOU will not read the fine print.
(4) PLEASE read all the fine print BEFORE you decide weather to sign up or not. PLEASE 