Make Money Online With High-Paying Surveys, Auto-Surfing, and Data Entry, Using Very Little Money

With the advent of the internet, a new world of hope and opportunities has been made available to everyone. The problem is, this same world has been laden with many scams and con- artists as well, taking advantage of people looking to make a good income online. While there are almost an unlimited amount of ways to make money online, I will just focus on the three methods that have personally made me a fortune and hope that someday it will do the same for you.

Method One: Paid Surveys Online This first method has been made quite popular in recent years due to its ease and speed of making money. You get paid on a one-time basis by various companies to take a survey of your opinions about either an idea, product, movie, or any consumer item you can think of. These companies pay money for real people to evaluate their products because they need legitimate, real-world opinions about how good or bad their products are, or if there are any flaws associated with them. It is done all the time and it is very cost-effective for these companies to do these surveys, rather than go ahead with mass production and simply put the product out on the mass market, untested, where it may or may not be successful.

There are always new products being put out by successful companies so that they can stay competitive in today's fast-paced world, thus ensuring that there will always be a steady flow of surveys that will pay anyone to evaluate their products. This is how anyone can make a decent living if they wish to pursue this type of occupation full-time.

Paid surveys are subjected to frauds and scam artists because some unscrupulous individuals actually trick you into taking their surveys that claim they pay you, but never do. The real objective of these scammers is to collect your personal information, bombard it with spam and unsolicited advertisements, and maybe even sell your personal information to other third-parties.

The most common method of scamming people is to get someone to join their paid survey program, fill in their personal information, and then take a few surveys. This is what legitimate paid survey programs do. However, when you take the scam-surveys, they ask you questions, you answer them, and then are redirected to another website that asks for more personal information, and sometimes money from you. A legitimate paid survey would never or almost never ask you for money from you or more personal information other than the information you already gave them when you first agreed to take their surveys.

Most surveys pay from $5 dollars USD to $75 dollars USD, sometimes more or less. They can take anywhere from a few minutes to almost an hour to complete, depending on how much the company is paying you. The higher the dollar amount, the longer the survey will take to complete, generally.

I personally can complete the $75 dollar surveys in about 50 minutes, so that can give you an idea of how much you can make if you did this full-time. The $5 dollar surveys takes me about 3 minutes to finish.

Method Two: Data Entry Online This method involves filling in a few blank advertising text-boxes for various marketing companies. You get paid a commission if the company is able to sell their products through the ad you just typed in for them. This is far more lucrative than doing paid surveys, but does require a little startup capital of say, $25 dollars in addition to the memebership fee to join these companies.

Legitimate companies will tell you what to input into the text-boxes and do all the marketing for you. These companies actually find it cheaper to pay someone on a commission basis to do some of the grunt work for them, while they can concentrate on marketing and creating sales-ads (which is what these companies tell you to input into the ad text-boxes).

The scam companies want you to do all the work, come up with the marketing, pay for everything, including marketing costs, and then when the sales are made, they do not pay you your commission.

Method Three: Auto-Surfing This is my new favorite form of making money online. It involves joining a website that will require you to "auto-surf" webpages for you to get paid. Auto-surfing is simply letting your web-browsesr visit websites submitted by advertisers for about 10-30 seconds each. When your browser visits the minimum amount of websites (usually 50), you are rewarded with money based on how much cash you paid into the auto-surfing website (this is called your membership/upgrade level). Note that I said your web-browser, not you, doing the work. That means you just log in, click the auto-surf link, and then let the computer do all the work for you. Making money does not get easier than this.

Legitimate auto-surf programs will pay you on time. They spell out all the rules and agreements in their Frequently Asked Questions links. They also pay somewhere around 1% to 3% of your memebership level, each day. Any number higher than that is very likely a ponzi scheme. These auto-surf programs also are backed by businesses or foreign currency exchange, which is why they can afford to pay out such high returns. They also place a small cap on how high your membership level can go, which is how these programs stay in business and not make them go bankrupt. Some programs also have membership expirations, which means the amount of money you put into the programs disappears after a fixed time (usually 1 year). You are also usually limited to one or two accounts, in addition to the membership level cap.

It is entirely possible to earn several thousand dollars a month doing legitimate auto-surf programs, but that usually costs around $20,000 dollars initially. The upside is, you can start auto-surfing with as little as $6 or $10 dollars, and work your way up from there, and still earn that 1%-3% per day on that.

Scam auto-surf programs usually offer ridiculously high returns each day, with an impossible membership expiry duration. For example, an auto-surf that pays 7% daily and upgrades never expire, is very likely a ponzi scheme. However, an auto-surf that pays 12% daily with an expiry of 12 days, is not since if you really look closely at the numbers, the returns per month is relatively low, but high enough to keep everyone happy.

Another sign of auto-surf scams is that they simply do not pay but continually ask for more money despite the company's "problems." It is best to go with auto-surfs that pay on time and have had relatively good reviews by people on the internet.

Most autosurfs pay you weekly, bi-weekly, or monthly. Any duration longer than that is asking for trouble.

Sarah Lauren is a self-made rich woman who runs her own business reviews and scam-watch website at www.richlemongal.com in addition to explaining her own personal experiences with various money-making online programs. She has spent several thousand dollars of her own money researching what are the legitimate programs and which are not (and losing thousands as well). She also explains

Paid Surveys - All You Ever Need To Know!

Ok another ridiculous attempt to make money on the internet right?

Wrong! This is great way to make some instant cash easily. Let me tell you a little about 'Paid Surveys'.

What are they exactly?

They are simply this - 'Paid Surveys conducted by major companies in order to better understand what their market actually wants, which intern will save them money on future productions.'

Due to the high risk involved in producing new products, these companies are willing to pay members of the public money to participate in their surveys. The amount of money you could aquire from participating is anywhere from $25 to $150.

Now this may not seem like alot, but what if you were asked to complete 10 paid surveys at $50 each? You would make $500. Not too bad for answering a couple of questions.

How do I sign up for Paid surveys?

The best way is to sign up with an 'Paid Survey Provider'. Market Research Companies(MRC's) who conduct the surveys, pay money for the data provided(you and me). The Paid Survey Providers then take their cut after and we take ours of course. Simple as that.

How do I know which Paid Survey Provider would be best for me?

The best Paid Survey Provider to be apart of, would be one that has the most clients, which would give you more opportunities to participate in more paid surveys. Another thing you must find out, is whether or not they mostly offer cash rewards, as many paid survey sites do not and instead offer you the chance to go in the draw for a prize.
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So if you want to make some money through paid surveys, always keep this in mind.

Do you have any tips that can help me make the most of this opportunity?

Make sure you check your Paid Survey Provider often because they are updated all the time and you never know when a new company may become registered with them. It's best to register early with a new company as the old saying goes, 'first in best dressed'. In other words, the earlier you register, the better the chance you will have of being invited to participate in their surveys.

Another tip is to register with companies that offer cash rewards as we talked about above. Lots of companies will give out non-cash prizes as well as allowing you the chance to go in a draw for a cash reward. Make sure you register with companies that offer you money first.

Register all of your family members for as many companies as possible. This gives you a better chance to be offered more surveys, which would mean that you can make more money in the long run.

Make sure you stay patient. There are databases that are free to sign up with, but they give you a small chance of gaining invitations to surveys. That's why I suggest signing up for a membership with a Paid Survey Provider. You will gain access to more companies providing surveys which will help you prosper more in the long run.

So is it worth it?

Of course it is! It may not make you filthy rich, but it is a fun and easy way to make a few extra bucks. I find the surveys to be enjoyable to participate in aswell as the rewards being quite a welcome bonus. It's great when I recieve a check for $50 that I can't even remember what for!

Josh Stanton - www.infotrate.com

Josh Stanton is the Owner of infotrate.com which provides free information all about Paid Surveys. Visit his site to find out what the Top Ten Paid Surveys are. You can also view infotrate.com's free list of Paid Survey articles - infotrate.com/articles

 

Designing Effective Surveys

Turtle" Parzek

Eileen Parzek for SOHO It Goes!, March 2003

As the web becomes more and more a part of both our personal and business lives, business people and marketing professionals have turned towards web surveys to do research, plan projects, get feedback and develop new products and services. The emergence of excellent web survey applications, complete with wizards to make creation fast and simple, templates to ensure attractive designs, and full suites of reports and statistical analysis, make this method of interacting with your customers very attractive and extremely cost effective. However, as with all computer applications, the old adage "garbage in, garbage out" applies to surveys as well - if you do not know how to design an effective survey, the results will leave much to be desired.

Introductions, first

Whether on the first page of the survey, or in the cover letter inviting people to respond, it is important that you introduce the theme and purpose of the survey. This establishes in advance what types of questions you will be asking and puts the audience in the right frame of mind for answering the survey. Additionally, it helps to tell them why they were chosen, to establish understanding and trust, and assure that their input will be confidential, and personal information will not be shared.

Organize Yourself

It is important that the questions you ask fit within the theme and purpose set down in the introduction. Create an outline, when you are first planning your survey, and then subgroup the questions into logical categories.

First think about what information you want to know, and develop your questions from that. Experiment with different groupings, until each question flows from the previous, in logical order.

Give careful thought to how much you need each question - the fewer the better, because people generally do not have the time or inclination to answer long questionnaires.

Respect your Respondents

Be careful not to use jargon and buzzwords, but also avoid being too simplistic by knowing your survey audience and finding the appropriate balance. Remember that the respondent is taking time out of busy day to help you. Tell them in the introduction approximately how long it might take to complete, and let them know, as they go, how far along they are.

Carefully Craft Questions

When surveys are delivered by phone, trained surveyors usually conduct them and the respondent can get clarification without being led towards a particular answer. With self-administered surveys on the web, every question must be completely clear and understandable. Keep each question as short as possible, without losing meaning, and avoid jargon unless you are sure your audience understands it.

Be careful to ask only one thing at a time. If you have to ask additional questions on the same topic, do it as separate questions to avoid getting muddled responses. Be aware of inserting your own biases and intentions into the question, and try to keep questions neutral so that a "right answer" is not evident. The idea is to get truthful answers which go straight to the heart of the subject, and the simplest variations in a question can make this happen, or not.

Know Your Type

We are all familiar with the most common types of survey question formats - text, check boxes, yes/no, range responses - but there is a real science to knowing which type to use with which question to get the best results. For example:

* When using multiple choice answers to jog the respondent's memory, will it create bias towards the available choices? Is that okay?

* It might seem easiest to use a Yes/No or True/False question, but be sure that these two answers are the only ones that a respondent might possibly want to use or they will be forced to choose, diluting the truth of their answer.

*When using ranges, for example "strongly agree" to "strongly disagree," how many choices are necessary? Five is typical - but is it possible that many users will be "lazy" and chose the middle, and neutral, position?

*Before giving using text fields, known also as "free form" fields, consider how you will summarize these responses.

As you develop the survey, think about the different types and picture the results that will come from using each type. With your audience in mind, determine which type would provide the most effective results for what you need to find out. You can further refine these decisions when you test the survey, as explained later.

Protect Against Non-Response

It is unavoidable that a percentage of those surveyed are non-responders. The best way to minimize this element in the survey results is to keep the survey short and to the point, follow a clear outline with stated goals, and accurately target who the survey recipients need to be.

Believe it or not, research states that a 10-15% response rate on any survey is considered a success.

Dangle a Carrot

Even with every precaution taken, creating surveys is never an exact science because there is little control over the human element. For whatever reason, you will often scratch your head wondering why people looked at the survey and dropped out, or just never even looked. A carefully executed survey can minimize this - and incentives can take it a step further. Do you have something you can give away, to encourage folks to take your survey? Providing a free item or bit of information, providing a free copy of the results, or some other lure can go a long way towards gathering results.

Fly a Pilot

When you, yourself, develop a survey, it is easy to overlook the elements that might stop your respondents from completing the survey and wording that might not be clear. Always be sure to test the survey on a few people prior to sending it out to your entire audience. This will also allow you to review the results and see if the questions asked and the way they were answered will result in effective results.

Cut it Off

Be sure to tell your respondents when the survey will be closed. Typically, most respondents will respond within 5 days of receipt and so unless you know for sure that a significant portion of your audience needs longer, a week is a fair amount of time. Do not send out the survey on Fridays or over weekends - we all know what we do with mail received on those days! Try Tuesday morning for optimal response, and expect to see approximately 50% of your responses in the first 24 hours.

It may seem like you need a dual degree in cognitive psychology and statistics to develop an effective survey. This not being true for most of us, these guidelines will provide a foundation to improve both the survey and the results of your efforts. There is no better way to find out what your customers want than to ask them, and if they are already online, web surveys are an ideal way to do it.

Eileen Parzek, better known on the web as "Turtle", is the owner of SOHO It Goes! supporting entrepreneurs and small business through design, communications and technology.