Paid Survey Success

One important aspect of making money online is knowing how to avoid getting scammed when you first launch yourself into the wonderful online money making world. Trust me there are a lot of sites out there trying to take your money and they often have creative ways of appealing to you. This is the first in a series of articles exploring a variety of online scams. Make sure you subscribe to Paid Survey Success so you won’t miss the rest of the articles.

What is a really easy way to get people to send you money? Appeal to their greed of course.

Make up some story about how wonderful you are at investing in something and tell them you can easily double their money and you’ll have lots of people salivating and lining up to send you their money.

Does it have to be true? Of course not, you just have to get people to believe that it’s true. And what easier way to do that than to bypass their logic and get them to think with their greed.

Promise them whatever they want to hear. Tell them they can get rich without working at all, without doing anything but sending you money and waiting for the profits to roll in. Make them believe that they can make money even when they are sleeping.

Do people really do that? You bet they do if all they want is to take your money. And people all over the world fall for it every day.

What is a HYIP?

HYIP stands for High Yield Investment Program. They are the sites out there that promise you a 1% daily return on your money or some such nonsense. Most of them claim that they are brilliant with stocks or futures or foreign currencies and all you need to do is send your money to them and they will pay you back at the rate of 1% a day or double your money in 3 months or something along those lines.

HYIP’s are not investments and while they may be high yield for some people for a short time eventually they become zero yield when your money disappears.

There is no way to know how much money is taken from people every day through these types of programs, but judging by the number of them and how quickly they spring up and go away I wouldn’t be surprised no matter how high the number is.

The reason they spring up so quickly is that you can actually purchase programs that run a HYIP on your website. Or you can simply buy a website that’s already been set up as a HYIP and is ready to start taking money. Programmers can put these together from templates very quickly.

Once the website is up and running it is so simple to put any kind of information on there you wish. If you’re planning on stealing people’s money do you care if it’s the truth? Of course you don’t, you’re just like any other con man and you’re gonna tell your victim whatever you need to so you can part them from their money.

So you tell the world that you are one of the top stock brokers or commodity brokers or FOREX traders and you have a “NEW” system that will put money in their pockets even while they sleep. Will people believe you? Yep, some will because now you have the attention of their greed.

Of course you want it to look like your program is already successful because that will make your lies even more believable. So, when you set up the website you also put counters on there with large numbers to show how many people are already making money with you. Yes it’s another lie, but what do you care you’re getting rich.

Now you have even more people buying into the program, but you can make it look even better. What if you had testimonials from ‘real’ people who made money with your program. Easy! Set up a forum and pay some people to put a few dozen posts in there about how wonderful your HYIP is and how rich they’re becoming. The costs for the forum posts is minimal compared to the amount of money that will soon be flowing your way.

Now with everything in place you start advertising your new HYIP. In the beginning everything is going to look great to your “investors” because you’ll pay out to everyone on time. And you’ll set up an affiliate program as well for others to promote your great HYIP. And you’ll pay them on time as well. If you do this then you’ll be able to get hundreds of new “investors” in just a short period of time.

Your “investors” will be ecstatic as they receive their payments and as greed takes over they will “re-invest”, send every penny right back to you to make as much money as possible. Eventually the owners of the HYIP will have several hundred thousand dollars and that’s when they pull the plug and POOF!…they disappear.

There are thousands of documented cases of HYIP fraud. Some people have even lost their life’s savings this way, please don’t be one of those people.

How To Avoid The Scam

If you’ve come across a HYIP and you think you want to invest please STOP! Check out this site where they have over 3300 scam HYIP’s listed.

Among those who track these things it is estimated that 99-100% of all HYIP’s are scams. I think the 1% difference are just those that haven’t been discovered to be scams yet.

Is there anyway that you can tell the difference between a real HYIP and a fake one? No, there is no way to tell the difference. It is impossible.

Always remember with any “business offer” you find on the internet that money CANNOT be created from nothing. The money needs to come from somewhere and usually that somewhere is from other unsuspecting people like yourself.

Any time a website promises to pay you more than you pay in without any effort on your part you should immediately RUN from that site. Never send money to a stranger who promises amazing returns on your money with no effort on your part.

Think about it, if this person is such a wizard at creating money from the stock market or FOREX or commodities or whatever why would they need your $10 or $20? They wouldn’t! Would you trust someone who came up to you on the street and told you they were a money making genius and if you gave them a $20 bill right now they would double it for you in the next 3 days? Would you give them the $20? Then why do you expect people on the internet to be different? They’re not, in fact the cloak of anonymity makes them even more dangerous.

If the most brilliant investors of our time such as Warren Buffet and Peter Lynch can’t double their money every month what makes you think that a complete stranger from the internet can do it for you?

Popularity: 23% [?]

You already know that I believe paid surveys are the easiest and most risk free way for you to start making money online today, right now. I also believe in diversification which is why I’ve begun writing about other money making techniques that work well. Hopefully these tips will help you make even more money or if you’re not making money now you can start to profit from the internet.

If you’re one of the millions who’ve jumped far enough into the online world to start your own website or blog I’m sure you’ve at least heard something about search engine optimization (SEO). Basically SEO is all the things you do for your site to make it get noticed by the search engines. A lot of experts will tell you that SEO is quite difficult, but I don’t necessarily believe them. I’m definitely no expert when it come to SEO, yet I’ve gotten pages to the top 10 results on Google.

If you’re just beginning in SEO then you certainly don’t want to have to digest something like Aaron Wall’s SEO Book Training Program which is huge and costs $100 per month. What you need at this point is something easy that delivers results. And if it’s free that’s even better.

Josh Spaulding of EZ-Online Money is here to help you out. He’s created a free downloadable report on SEO called The Easy SEO Report that is so simple my 12 year old son gets it. The report is short (just 15 pages) and covers the basics of SEO that will deliver the results you’re looking for. It’s great to know the difference between PageRank, TrustRank, and link equity, but it’s not necessary when you’re starting out. All you need are the basics and Josh has delivered them in an easy to read format.

It’s a free report and takes just 10 minutes to read so why not take a look at it? I wish I had found something like this when I was starting out it would have saved me months of trial and error.

Download the Easy SEO Report Here

Popularity: 13% [?]

I’ve been exploring ways to make money online outside of paid surveys and todays post is a tried and true money maker.  If you haven’t heard yet about Squidoo you should go and check it out because there are lots of people that have been making good money by authoring Squidoo lenses.  You probably won’t get rich, but it is another way to make some cash from the internet and it’s a good way to diversify your online income.  And if you’re just getting started making money online Squidoo is a great way to build confidence, get motivated and start learning about internet marketing.

One of the major reasons people give up on trying to make money online is they don’t have the patience required to market and establish a new blog.  As a consequence they lose their confidence, motivation and faith in their ability to make money online.

How Will Squidoo Help You Get Started With Internet Marketing?

Squidoo is a free platform that allows you to author what they call ‘lenses’.  These lenses are really just web pages and they have one big advantage over starting your own website.  The advantage is that Squidoo is already highly regarded by search engines which means it is much easier to get your lenses indexed.  This means you should start seeing traffic to your new lenses quickly which will be a big confidence booster and motivator.  There’s nothing like that first sale or seeing people view your site to boost your morale and motivation.

What makes Squidoo a good way for anyone to start making money online?

1. Once you create an account and get used to working with Squidoo you can create a lens in as little as 10-15 minutes.  Try doing that with a blog or website.

2. Squidoo will allow you to rank well in Google almost right away because the site has high authority and trust.  Getting your own site in the top 10 results in Google can be very difficult and requires hours or marketing work, but with Squidoo all that work has been done for you already.  By doing a little bit of keyword research you can get a highly rank lens page pretty quickly and easily.

3. Unlike other free web authoring sites Squidoo allows you to promote affiliate products.  You can put your own affiliate links into your lens and start making money from day 1 with Squidoo.  Some popular affiliate networks include Clickbank and Commission Junction.  Just find a product and build your lens around it.

4. Since the lenses are so quick and easy to set up Squidoo is a great place to experiment with different offers, layouts and ads to see what will convert for you.  You can use Squidoo to identify profitable niches before taking the time to build an entire website around them.

5. Along the lines of yesterdays post Squidoo is a good way to diversify your online income.  It gives you one more way to get some additional cash each month.

You can get started with Squidoo here

Popularity: 15% [?]

You may have heard that diversification in the stock market is a good thing to reduce risk.  Well, the same thing applies to your online business.  The more ways you have set-up to make money the safer you’ll be.  That’s why I’ve started sharing additional ideas outside of paid surveys with you.  I want you to be able to make money in a variety of ways.  This not only makes your income safer, but it’s a lot more interesting too!

Yesterday I introduced you to the idea of freelance writing to make some extra money online.  I want to drill down on this idea a little bit today by focusing on just one of the websites I highlighted for you yesterday.  I’m going to give you some tips for using Associated Content to add to your online income fairly easily.

Associated Content is a website that pays their authors in two ways.  First, they will pay you an ongoing commission of $1.50 per 1000 views for every article you submit to them.  This is forever so the more you submit the more this passive income stream will grow.  I don’t know about you, but I love to keep getting paid forever for work I only have to do once.

The second way they pay is through direct payments to the article authors.  That’s right, they will pay you for your articles!  There is just one condition your article needs to meet; it must be original content written by you.  That’s it.  In my experience you can get paid anywhere from $3.53 to $7.50 per article.  Keep in mind I have only been writing for them for less than a month so these numbers could be higher or lower.

In the past two weeks I have had 4 articles accepted for a total of $19.43.  Not bad considering the articles were fairly short (400-500 words) and took me just a bit over an hour to write.  I am also getting commissions based on page views now and after 10 days the total there is a whopping $0.58!  I know not much at all, but keep in mind it is only 4 articles over 10 days.  Imagine 400 articles over the course of a year

There are several things I think you can do to maximize the amount of money you make with Associated content.

• Make your articles specific and focused, not general.  For example, it’s better to write about fancy blue widgets rather than just widgets.
• Write articles in batches.  Since you’re doing the research now it is easier to write 3-4 articles at a time while everything is fresh in your mind.
• When you submit articles you will be asked for optional information like images and reference links.  Include these and it seems like you’ll get paid more.
• If you haven’t already start participating in social sites like Digg and StumbleUpon.  Good articles submitted to these sites can get you thousands of page views.

Again, this is not something you can use to quit your day job, but it is one more thing you can do to make some extra money quickly and easily online.  Combined with other strategies like paid surveys and you’ll start to see your monthly earnings increasing.

Popularity: 12% [?]

You already know paid surveys are a good way to make some money on the internet, but it isn’t the only way to make money online.  There are dozens of other ways besides paid surveys that you can use to make some extra cash.  Since it’s always a good idea to diversify your sources of income I want to introduce you to some of them.

One way that I use to make money online is freelance writing.  Did you know that there are hundreds of companies and websites that are always looking for people to do their writing for them?  The pay isn’t always great, but once you start to get established you can earn a substantial amout of money every month.  If you don’t believe me just take a look at what Chris Bibey has done with his writing skills at ChrisBlogging.com

You don’t have to be a Pulitzer prize winning writer either to make money this way.  All you need is an enjoyment of the writing process and the desire to make money doing it.  Website content is easy to write and the pay can range anywhere from $5 for a 500 word article to $50 or more for a 500 word article.

The key here is repeat work and not underpricing yourself.  Many freelance writers started out taking very low paying writing jobs that turned into repeat business for them at a much higher rate.  If you can deliver quality writing consistently you’ll find that your customers will keep coming back for more.  This gives you a steady stream of income and also allows you to command a higher price for your work in the future.

Here’s a short list of 5 freelance writing sites to get you started.  Remember, you don’t need to quit your job in the first month, but you can build a solid business through freelance writing.

Associated Content – This is where I started and while the pay isn’t great it is a start.  They will pay you anywhere from $3.53 (the lowest I made) to $10 (the highest I’ve heard) for your original articles.  Plus, you get an additional $1.50 for every 1000 page views your articles receive.  So, you not only get paid upfront, but you make continuing residual income.

Helium – Helium is another site that pays you a revenue share for the articles you publish there.  One nice feature of Helium is the Writers Marketplace where companies post their needs and they pay from $16 to $200 per article.  Go take a look, maybe there’s something already posted that you’re an expert on.  This is a great way to break into writing full time.

Review Stream – This site pays for reviews of darn near everything.  Anywhere from $0.40 to $2.00 per review.  You won’t get rich, but you can make a nice bit of extra money pretty easily.

I Freelance – This is a huge freelancing auction, not just for writers, but for all types of freelancers.  You bid on a project and if you win you get paid.  IFreelance is a good place to get started simply because of the sheer number of offers there.  Two downsides are you have to pay a monthly fee to bid, currently starting at $3.91 a month and when you start there you’ll have to bid low to win jobs.  Once you have a track record and a portfolio you can raise your bids and win more profitable jobs.

Online Writing Jobs  – Some higher paying jobs here, but mostly lower paying jobs.  Another good place to get your feet wet and find some longer term customers willing to pay you what you’re worth after you’ve proven yourself.

There are more sites like this around, but I don’t want to overwhelm you right now.  These will get you started and if you do a search on “freelance writing” you’ll turn up plenty of additional research and reading material.  The best advice I can give you now is just get out there and do it!

Popularity: 11% [?]

Everyone wants the highest paying surveys, because these are the real money makers among paid surveys.  So what’s the deal with these high paying surveys, the ones that are claimed to pay $75-$150?  You rarely hear of anyone who actually takes these highest paid surveys so do they really exist?  Or are the high paid surveys simply a creation of the paid survey companies made to get more people to register with them?

The truth is that these surveys do exist, but they aren’t offered all the time or to just everyone that signs up to take paid surveys.  I have taken several surveys that paid over $50 and even one that paid me $225!  The key to getting these surveys is to make the market research companies know that you’re important and that you’re reliable.

Many people turn down the surveys for $1 or $2, but these are the surveys that create a track record for you with the survey company.  When they need survey takers for the highest paying surveys who do you think they turn to?  Don’t miss out on the big paying surveys later by declining these smaller surveys now.

If you think you are going to sit down today and start taking paid surveys and make thousands of dollars a month your first few months you’re wrong.  More realistically you can make several hundred dollars in the first month doing paid surveys and will be able to slowly increase that as the survey companies begin to send you the higher paying surveys.

The people that have made a full time job from survey taking haven’t done so overnight.  They have taken the time to build a good reputation with the survey companies and they are known to be reliable.  They will take surveys regardless of the size of the reward and that is why they get the highest paying surveys now.

Once you find the highest paying surveys the next trick is to actually get accepted to take them.  If you’ve been taking surveys for any amount of time I am sure that you, like me, have missed out on some high paying surveys simply because you were too late to the game.  If you’re only checking your email once a day or less then you will very likely miss these high paying surveys because once the invitations go out they are snapped up pretty quickly.  Keep an eye on your email if you want to take the highest paying surveys.

Another reason people miss out on the highest paying surveys is that they limit themselves to just a few survey companies.  When they don’t get that $75 survey after a few weeks they give up.  Well, that won’t work if you want high paying surveys.  You’ve got to register with as many survey companies as possible, at least several dozen and a couple hundred is better.

Once you’ve registered make sure you’re checking emails several times a day and for the first month or two respond to every survey possible.  Once you’ve established yourself as reliable to the survey companies they will reward you with the highest paying surveys out there.  I can tell you it’s quite a rush when you get that first $75 survey!

Popularity: 33% [?]

Make Money With XSV Cash

Here’s a new GPT program for you. XSV Cash has just launched in June 2007 and they look to be one of the best GPT programs out there. No, they don’t have the most offers yet, Cash Crate still wins those honors in my opinion, but they have something better – payment through PayPal!

That’s right, XSV Cash will pay you through PayPal and they have a scant $7 minimum payout which means you can join and hit the minimum payout in just 10-15 minutes. Since I’m impatient this is just the kind of thing that I LOVE!

XSV Cash is also open to members worldwide 14 years and older, although the bulk of their offers are still U.S. based. However, if you are outside the U.S. you can still make good money with their killer referral program. XSV Cash will pay you 5 levels on your referrals!

1st level 20%
2nd level 10%
3rd level 5%
4th level 3%
5th level 1%

In addition to the level bonuses you also make a $1 bonus when your referrals complete their first offer. As you can imagine this adds up pretty darn quick.

Overall, XSV Cash looks like a serious contender for one of the top GPT programs out there. With a larger list of opportunities and more international support they could soon overtake the top dogs.

Popularity: 16% [?]

While paid surveys are a good way for many people to make money online, they are especially well suited to students. Considering that many students live on a shoestring budget any extra money they can get is appreciated. And with paid surveys a student can make several hundred dollars a month to supplement their budgets. Paid surveys for students are definitely a good way to make extra cash.

There are several things that make paid surveys a perfect money maker for students.

• Students spend a good part of their time online already
• Paid survey sites place a premium on users between the ages of 13-25
• Most students can benefit from the extra money earned with paid surveys

People between the ages of 13-25 spend more time online than any other age group. Some surveys put the figure as high as 8 hours a day. That may be a bit high, but even if the number of hours is half as much there is no denying that students are online a lot. Between IM’ing friends, doing research for school, participating in web 2.0 spaces like Facebook and MySpace and taking exams or completing assignments online today’s students are truly connected. So, why not take some of that time on paid surveys for students and use it to supplement income.

It takes such a small amount of time taking surveys to make a decent income that it would be quite easy for a student to fit in several surveys a day. Take one while chatting with your friends. Or maybe use them as a break from calculus or that essay on current morals in business. Since each survey usually takes just 10-15 minutes I think you can see how easy it would be to fit in quite a few each day.

And it is very likely that since market researchers need younger people so badly they will be paying a premium for their survey responses. How about $10 for a 10 minute survey? It’s easily possible because market researchers can’t get enough young people for their surveys. This demographic is the most highly sought out of any because of their disposable income and online habits. Why not take advantage of that while you can?

Finally, I have yet to meet the student who couldn’t use some extra cash. Being on a limited budget while attending school makes it difficult to find the money you need sometimes for clothes, video games, parties or most everything. You can make your life a little easier by adding hundreds of dollars to your monthly budget with paid surveys.

And wouldn’t it be nice to know that anytime you need a little extra you can log on and take some surveys to get paid. No need to be at the mercy of a part time job where you are locked into the schedule THEY want. You can take surveys online at anytime of the day or night, whenever YOU’RE free.

Popularity: 13% [?]

Make Money With Paid Survey Jobs

How much will I get paid for taking online surveys?

That is completely up to you. You can do as many or as few paid survey jobs as you like. It depends on how motivated you are and how many paid survey sites you register with. Individual surveys can pay up to $40, but most will pay less. If you get chosen for a focus group they will pay between $100-150 generally for 1 hour.

——————————————————————————–

How soon can I start to make money online?

If you follow my advice and register for all the paid survey sites on the first page of the database today you should receive your first paid survey jobs within 24 hours and certainly within the first week.

——————————————————————————–

Who pays me for taking the online surveys?

You will receive payment from the market research company that is hosting the survey. This can be in the form of a check mailed directly to you, a deposit to your account with that company or a deposit to your PayPal account.

——————————————————————————–

How many paid surveys can I take?

You can take as many surveys as you like. Once the number of companies you are registered with grows you will find that you have more than enough work to keep you busy. If you need to make more money take more surveys, if you want to relax a bit pick only the highest paying surveys sent to you. You’ll find that paid survey jobs are very flexible.

——————————————————————————–

Why do these companies pay me for filling out surveys and giving my opinion?

Companies need to know what their customers think and the information is extremely valuable to them. In the past they held focus panels onsite, but this was very expensive and time consuming. It also limited them in the number of people’s opinions as well as the diversity of the responses. The market research companies are continuing doing what they have always done, but they are making the research more relevant through the use of the internet’s reach.

——————————————————————————–

What if I don’t live in the U.S. Can I still make money online taking paid surveys?

Yes you can. Most companies these days have operations all over the world and they need the opinions of their customers all over the world. Some programs are only available to users in specific countries outside the U.S. The most popular paid survey jobs are listed in the sidebar to the right.

——————————————————————————–

Do I have to pay taxes on the money I make taking online surveys?

If you are a U.S. citizen the companies will issue you a 1099 form at the end of the year if your earnings are over $600. If your earnings are less than $600 with each company it is your responsibility to report these earnings to the IRS. Your paid survey jobs income is considered regular income for tax purposes. If you have any doubts at all please talk to a tax professional. I am not a tax professional and the information in this FAQ is not to be considered tax advice.

If you are a citizen of a country other than the U.S. please check with your governments tax authority to determine your tax responsibility.

——————————————————————————–

Do I need a PayPal account to get paid for taking surveys?

Many of the paid survey sites will pay you with a check, but some require a PayPal account to send your payments. All you need for a PayPal account is a valid email address and signing up is easy. You can visit PayPal here.

Popularity: 10% [?]

I’m sure you’ve already heard that the paid survey can be a great way to make money online, especially if you’re just getting started. If you’ve done your research you already know that there are loads of sites out there offering paid surveys and information about paid surveys. And I’m sure you’ve also found conflicting stories about whether or not it’s a good thing to try to make money by taking surveys online. This article is aimed at making you more familiar with the paid survey and helping you to avoid some common troubles that people have when they get started taking surveys online.

First and most important, some sites will want you to pay them to get access to their database of survey companies or to get “special” access to surveys. You should never pay for this type of service. All of the legit survey sites are free to register at and any market research company out there always offers their paid surveys for free. Furthermore, you can get all of the information you need about getting paid for doing surveys for free by searching.

Another thing that people fail to do when beginning to take surveys for money is that they don’t register for enough paid survey companies. They think that they will sign up with two or three survey sites and the money will come pouring in. The truth is that you need to sign up with dozens to hundreds of companies if you want to make the big money taking surveys online. The reason is that each paid survey site may only send 2-4 surveys a month (larger companies will send 2-4 a week). If you’ve only signed up with a few survey sites you won’t get nearly enough surveys each day to make good money. But if you diversify and register with every site you can you are making sure to flood your inbox with new survey offers.

Finally, you should keep in mind that you won’t make money overnight through paid surveys. It takes time to build a list of survey companies for yourself and it takes time for each of those companies to come to trust you and start to send out the highest paying surveys. Give yourself 2-3 months after you’ve begun to gauge your progress. By that time you should have signed up with many paid survey companies and have a good reputation with most of them. You will have met the minimum payout requirements for most if not all and should now be receiving regular checks. It is this time, after three months that paid surveys really start to get fun for you.

It doesn’t matter how many sites or which survey sites you choose to join, these three tips are a great resource for anyone who wants to get paid for filling out surveys. Remember the three keys; never pay for survey information, register at as many paid survey sites as possible and have patience when you are beginning to take surveys for cash. Keep these things in mind and you’ll be ahead of 95% of the people who start taking paid surveys online.

Popularity: 6% [?]