Earning money online

I'm no expert at this, but I do make a few bucks here and there by doing things online. Here are some of the ways I do it (all of these are Canadian-friendly!)

Get paid for your opinion - do surveys for money

Survey Savvy*. Paid surveys, usually a couple bucks for 10-15 minutes of your time. It's not even minimum wage, but if you're a good multi-tasker, you can watch a tv program and make a few dollars at the same time. Surveys are emailed to you, and payment is by cheque request.

Pinecone Research. This one is pretty exclusive - they only open it up to new members once in a while, so if you see an invitation (usually a banner ad: "The web sites that our banner ads may appear on are constantly changing during the course of the campaign.'), jump on it! I love Pinecone Research. It's $5 per survey (paid into your PayPal account or via cheque), and occasionally send out products as additional survey material (as in, you do an initial $5 survey, they may send you a product to try, and then you get another $5 for a follow up survey). I've received random things to test out and that's always pretty fun. I've been a member for over 10 years.

Survey Lion. Very similar to Survey Savvy, only a bit more frequent survey invitationss emailed to you. Amounts between $1 and $10 (rare) per survey. Payment is by cheque. They do have a referral program that is currently disabled - aw! But I can still recommend the site.

Product Promotion

BzzAgent. Honestly, I haven't been invited to a BzzCampaign in ages - but a few years ago I was in campaigns regularly and it was fabulous. I'm not sure if they got too big or I got too lax in keeping up with their surveys and such.  If you want to leave me your email address, I can send you an email to join - or just head to the site and sign up. They send out products and you are meant to "bzz" about them - sharing your experience via pretty much any method you can. I have received some really great products such as a high-end electric toothbrush, an epilator, teeth whitening kits and so on. There's no payment per se, other than the products you may be invited to try and promote.

Sponsored Tweets*. If you have a Twitter account and you don't mind posting the occasional ad, you can earn a few bucks with this one. You can set the amount you can charge per tweet (they will recommend an amount, but you can set it to whatever you like). You will receive opportunities and you can pick and choose what you would like to promote, or not. You also write the tweets (based on recommended information they provide). I find it a slow earner (over about two years I earned $56), but that will vary for everyone. Payment is via PayPal.

Swagbucks*. This one's relatively new (compared to the others I've mentioned - it's a few years old), and I know I've mentioned it here on my blog before. They used to be more fabulous, but it is still easy to earn and redeem. The reason I say "used to be" is that I could previously redeem for Starbucks cards which they would mail to me. Now they will only apply money to an existing, American Starbucks card. Last time I was in the States, I couldn't find a Starbucks that sold gift cards (?!) so I don't have an American one. I'm just hanging on to my Swagbucks until I finally get one. Anyway, that was my favourite redemption, but there are loads of other things you can redeem for including online coupons, PayPal cash and gift certificates as well as products they'll ship to you.  The good thing is that Swagbucks are easy to earn and seem to add up fast. I think the easiest way is using their search engine for random rewards, but you can also find codes, do surveys, polls, and more.

Do you have favourite sites for earning money online? Have you tried any of these ones? Or is it something you have never, or wouldn't consider?

* indicates a referral link. I'd be honoured (and grateful too!) if you decide to sign up using my link.