Money Tree 4 Moms

In my previous post, I discussed affiliate marketing, and how it has been a steady money-making strategy for me. Today, if you are interested, I’d like to introduce you to a way to get started as an affiliate marketer.

Let me start by saying there are simply hundreds of programs available that claim to offer the secrets to riches and wealth through affiliate marketing. Many of them do offer valuable, workable techniques that you can use to generate some level of income online. However, if you are completely new to this way of making money, the vast majority of these schemes will leave you confused and unhappy, wondering where your time and money went.

Newbie Campus is absolutely the best program I’ve ever seen for someone who is a beginner in the area of affiliate marketing. Unlike many other affiliate training programs, Newbie Campus doesn’t pretend to be a “get-rich-quick” scheme. Instead, it offers realistic expectations and proven techniques for how to go about earning an income online. It’s curriculum includes over 30 training videos that provide step-by-step instructions that walk you through exactly how to get up and running quickly. Furthermore, Shauna Barton, the creator of the course, offers to personally provide support to help you along your way to success.

When I got started in affiliate marketing, I spent weeks researching how it worked and the best methods to use to make an income on a limited budget. Honestly, if Newbie Campus had been available to me, it would have literally saved me several months of wasted effort and put me on a much faster track to making a substantial contribution to my family’s income.

Now, I will admit, when you first check out the Newbie Campus web site, it’s pretty over the top… a really long page of copy, lots of big red headlines… but once you get past that and into the actual program, there is an abundance of valuable, practical information that will give you an excellent understanding of the affiliate marketing process and put you on your way to earning a very respectable online income. She’s so sure that you will be able to put her plan into action that she offers an 8 week money-back guarantee.

So if you are a new to the idea and process of affiliate marketing, I highly recommend Newbie Campus. Give it a try, and be sure to let me know how it works for you!

One of the ways  I am able to most successfully make money from home is through a process known as “affiliate marketing.” Affiliate marketing is a sales/advertising strategy in which a vendor rewards an affiliate for each customer brought about by the affiliate’s marketing efforts. Let me try to provide a more concrete example…

If I am an affiliate for Amazon.com, I can earn a commission by sending a customer to the Amazon web site to make a purchase. How would I do that? Let’s say I recently bought a blu-ray player for my family. Prior to buying it, I did a LOT of research, trying to find a model with the features I wanted, for a price I was willing to pay. Consequently, I now am something of a blu-ray expert. So, I write an article for one of the online article sites (EzineArticles.com, SearchWarp.com, GoArticles.com, to name just a few), sharing my newfound knowledge, and add a few affiliate links to the Amazon web site for the blu-ray models I liked best. The affiliate links contain a code that will let Amazon.com know that the customer was sent to their site by me. Then, when the customer makes a purchase from Amazon, I am rewarded with a commission — a percentage of the sale.

That’s a pretty simplistic explanation, as there are many ways to increase the amount of traffic that will use your affiliate links and therefore increase your sales, but at a high level, that’s what affiliate marketing is all about. It can be a very profitable way to make money online, from home, on your own schedule. Many, many affiliate marketers make yearly incomes over six figures, and I’ve met some of them personally. As for me, with my family obligations, I can’t devote the time it would take to make that kind of money, but I do enjoy a steady income from the affiliate marketing work I’ve done.

So, I’m creating a new category on MoneyTree4Moms to talk about affiliate marketing, how it’s contributed to my success, and my recommendations for ways to get started if you are interested in finding out more about this method of earning money from home. I’ll admit that it’s not for everyone, but if you are willing to spend a bit of time learning about it and experimenting a bit, you may find that it’s a very fun and lucrative way to earn an income.

Another way that I make money is by taking Mystery Shopping assignments. Mystery shopping obviously must be done during business hours, and therefore can’t be fit into my schedule whenever I have a bit of free time like paid online surveys can. Because of this, I don’t use it as often as I do paid surveys, but it has still proven to be a very profitable choice for our family.

Mystery shopping is a unique type of market research. Mystery shoppers are given an assignment to visit a store, mall, or shopping center, dine at a restaurant, or watch a movie. They then complete a questionnaire based on their experience as a customer. Mystery shoppers earn money while visiting their favorite stores, eating at great restaurants, going to their local theater, or even playing a round of golf!

Similar to paid online surveys, there are membership web sites you can join that will help you find and successfully complete your mystery shopping assignments. Again, if you would like the best opportunity to choose shopping assignments that best fit your preferences, it is beneficial to join more than one site, as this will give you access to the greatest variety of job openings.

Here are some of the mystery shopping membership sites that have worked well for me:

• Get Paid to Shop, Eat Out, or Watch Movies
  This is my favorite site to use to find mystery shopping assignments, and as a plus they also maintain a listing of paid survey opportunities! Resources are also available to help you learn more about mystery shopping and tips and techniques you can use to be more successful. All in all, this is a great company to work with!
• Want to Shop for a Living?
  This is another super site to use for finding mystery shopping jobs. They provide access to over 200 companies that are looking for secret shoppers, and their opportunities are updated on a daily basis. Several bonuses are also offered for signing up here, but I personally didn’t find them as useful as the ones offered at some of the other sites. However, this is still one of my favorite sites, and I can always find jobs in my area and that fit my timeframe.
• Get Paid to Shop and Eat!
  This is one of the first sites to provide access to mystery shopper information and because of their many years of experience it remains among the best out there. One of the bonuses they offer for joining is a report that will tell you how you can earn extra money by attaching advertising decals to your car. This was a money-making opportunity that I had never heard of before, and I now earn about $200 each month by doing this!
• Access to Hundreds of Paid Survey and Mystery Shopping Opportunities
  This is another site that offers access to both mystery shopping and paid survey opportunities. One of the things that is unique about this one is that they offer an online forum where you can exchange thoughts and get helpful hints from other members. This is a great resource, especially for someone who is just getting started mystery shopping!

One of the most common questions I’ve gotten from people trying to make money online is whether you can really make money by doing online surveys. For me, the answer to this has been unequivocally “Yes!” However, in order to get the best results, a little research is required.

Paid online surveys are actually one of the most reliable ways I’ve found to make money online, and it fits perfectly into my lifestyle. If I have a whole morning available while my kids are in school, I will complete a longer, more time-consuming survey (that will also pay quite well). If I only have a few minutes before I need to start dinner, I can choose a shorter survey, and still earn $5-$10 in twenty minutes or less.

In the past 2-3 years, the number of online survey sites has simply exploded, to the point where you need to be very cautious about where you sign up. Some sites are free to join, and some charge a membership fee. I’ve tried virtually all of them and, truthfully, I’ve found that the old adage about “getting what you pay for” is very true when it comes to these online survey sites.

You see, the sites you join are not actually the ones conducting the surveys. These membership sites provide information about different surveys and market research opportunities that are available for you to participate in. They provide a service to you by organizing the details on hundreds of companies that will reward you for sharing your thoughts and opinions. In my experience, the sites that charge a fee to join are much better organized, their information is more accurate, and they offer better opportunities than the free sites. And I would much rather spend my precious time actually filling out surveys and earning money than I would tracking down all the online research opportunities myself, or worse yet, wasting time with inaccurate information and broken links on the free sites.

So if online surveys sound like an opportunity you’d like to pursue, how do you know where to begin? Below I’ve listed my favorite paid survey sites. You may wish to start slow and try out one of two of them, but I’ve found it advantageous to sign up with a handful of different sites. They all have certain listings that are unique just to them, and investing in the one-time membership fee at each site has given me the most flexibility to choose the surveys that work best for me.

• Work from Home by Typing Online
  These folks do all the work for you. Rather than getting scammed, the site administrator researches a large number of companies and then compiles a large list that is available to all members. Simply join as many as possible, complete their surveys, and watch the checks roll in. I highly recommend this company… I believe they are the best, most reputable survey company online!
• Unlimited Access to Hundreds of Paid Survey Companies!
  Much like the previous company, these people research the companies they work with. Their database is continually updated in order to give its members the most current information available in order to maximize your profits. This is another awesome company to work with.
• Make Money Taking Online Surveys
  This is another organization that thoroughly researches the companies they work with and only works with reliable, reputable firms. They also pride themselves in protecting your privacy, and will only work with companies that will keep your personal information (name, address, phone number, and e-mail address, etc.) strictly confidential. Another business that I highly recommend!

And now, for those of you who really don’t want to pay anything to get started, I have two recommendations for you.

• American Consumer Opinion Surveys
  This is a very reputable company. They do not keep an online database of opportunities — instead you provide demographic information when you register, and every now and then they will send you a “screener” survey (a short questionnaire) to see if you qualify to participate in the full survey. Rewards are always paid via check, and they range in value from $4 to $50, depending on the length of time it takes to complete the survey. Since they offer you a chance to participate so infrequently, you will not make much money doing this. However, I’ve found them very pleasant to work with, and they have no minimum payment amount, so they mail you a check very quickly for each survey you complete.
• CashCrate
  I have mixed feelings about this one, and I don’t use it very often. However, I know some people have been very successful making money through CashCrate, so I’ve included it here. I found that the payment for most surveys is very minimal — generally fifty cents to a dollar — and you need to get a little “tricky” to actually get credited for the surveys you complete. For example, they recommend techniques like using several different e-mail addresses and clearing your cookies after every survey, but even following all their hints, I still found that I was only successfully paid for about 20% of the surveys I completed. But give it a try if you are interested… as they say, your mileage may vary!

Welcome to Money Tree 4 Moms, the site dedicated to helping Moms find creative and unique ways to make money.

I’m Tammi, and I won’t bore you here with all the details about me. If you’re interested, you can visit the About page to get the lowdown on all that. What I do want to say is “Come on in… have a seat… make yourself at home!”

So, you’re a Mom looking for ways to make some extra money. (Or maybe you’re not a Mom, and you snuck in here anyway. That’s OK, it happens… we won’t kick you out!) You’ve absolutely come to the right place!

What makes me qualified to give you advice on how to bring in some extra money? Like many other moms, I’ve struggled with balancing the need to bring in a second income with the need to be available for my family. While trying to figure it out, I’ve tried LOTS of things: corporate career, part-time jobs, child care, MLM, and my own consulting business, to name a few. Along the way I’ve come to know a LOT about ways to earn money… the good, the bad, and the “it’s so ugly we can’t even talk about it.” None of it ever let me find that perfect job/family balance… until I learned how to fit a variety of small money-making tasks into my available time. I identified things I could do on my schedule and for the length of time I had available that would help earn an income for me and my family. And I can’t wait to help you accomplish this as well!

So, kick your shoes off and stay awhile. I’ve got lots to share!