SwagMelt Lite

GOOD MORNING, SWAGGERNAUTS!

Happy Saturday mornin' to ya!

First things First! If you haven't already signed up for a Swag Bucks account, there's no time like the present! Just go to the swidget on the right there, press the Sign Up button on the bottom right. Fill out a short form, confirm your email, and get 30 swagbucks to get you rolling! Then come back here and start with my second blog post, "Beginner Tips for Swagsurfing!", for tips on how to get started!

Did you do your Daily Four? Remember, 4 swagbucks a day adds up to money in the bank! 4/day x 30 days = 120 super easy swagbucks a month!  One minute a day gets you a $5 AGC every 4 months!

Toolbar use, Daily Poll vote, NOSO Click Through, Survey Visit!

*** CALLING  ALL  SWAGGERNAUTS  TO  THE  VOTING  BOOTH! ***

Announcing the launch of SwagMelt's newest blog project - The SwagBooth!

The SwagBooth is your one stop ballot box for swaggernaut contests and giveaways. Instead of looking down an ever-shifting list of discussion board threads, at SwagBooth you have ONE list with easy instructions and ONE place to post letting everyone know you voted, and who for. Winners will be listed at SwagBooth, and on the Swagbooth discussion thread on facebook. Check out your Swag Ballot, and send me details for all of your contests to be entered on the ballot today!


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Today I want to talk about my Favorite special offer, Ever! This offer was literally a Win, Win, WIN! situation!  Of course, most of you probably know I'm talking about Netflix. I've raved about it enough!

I did the Netflix free trial offer from the Offerwall / Payment wall section up top on the special offers page. I can't tell if they still have it there or not, since I have completed it, but when I did it, I got 885 Swag Bucks! That's just 15 shy of two $5 Amazon cards. I got the free month of the "one out at a time" plus unlimited instant viewing plan.

That was enough to get me hooked. I was kind of bummed to think I might have to let it go. Finances are tight and Netflix, no matter How much joy and entertainment it brought into the house, is simply not on the paycheck budget! Then I discovered an awesome bonus fact. You can pay for Netflix with PayPal! Which means you can pay for Netflix with Swag Bucks!  HUZZAH!!!!! (Disclaimer: You have to sign up for the free trial with a credit card, or use something like the reloadable Visa gift card I bought at 7-11. Anytime before your free trial is up, you go into My Account and change your payment method to PayPal.)

 

As you know, a $5 Amazon card is only 450 Swagbucks, and a PayPal is more expensive at 700 Swagbucks for a $5 card. It might seem like a bad investment if you look purely at the numbers.

1,350 Swagbucks for $15 Amazon or 1,400 Swagbucks for $10 PayPal

Well the value of Netflix truelly goes beyond the difference in swag cost for me. I don't have cable, don't have an antenna, haven't much to do for entertainment. The kids are SO tired of the same old movies. Now, we have kids tv, sitcoms, drama, reality tv, all at our fingertips with instant play. Movies Galore! Once a week I get a DVD in the mail for myself, and the kids get to pick a DVD for Friday nights. The DVDs we pick for mail delivery are always something that is not available to watch instantly. It's like waiting for a treat while getting our snacks throughout the week!

They have Great customer service. A little over a week ago I couldn't get into the Netflix website. Two days letter I got an email from them apologizing for any service interruptions I may have had, and a link to a credit on next months bill.

  

Then today I got an email from them with a quick 3 choice survey question. They are always tracking the playback experience of their streaming video. Occasionally they will pull a title temporarily to tweak it for better quality, based on customer feedback. It usually doesn't take long, so far it's always been there again by the next day.

Also, as for cost vs. value, if you go back a few blog posts you can see am estimate of what you can earn both by doing the bare minimum of swagwork, and by doing special offers. In there I calculate an estimate of about 4,500 swagbucks a month from searching, SBTV, codes, and free / free trial special offers. That isn't an over the top estimate- it's about what I made this month taking a good week and a half off from doing Any special offers. Doing a much smaller amount of offer attempts the rest of the month too.

That's plenty of Swagbucks to go around. Enough to get your five $5 AGCs  and your two $5 PayPal payments (2,250 + 1,400 = 3,650)  with swagbucks to spare!

To me, that's too sweet a deal to pass up! But to get the maximum payout for this offer, be sure to check all the offer walls to find the best payout! It would be a real bummer to make, say, 405 swagbucks, then see it elsewhere for 700 or 800!

Now some of you may be thinking I get some sort of kickback for posting all this glowing review stuff. I don't! Again, it's just good old fashioned "I love this so much I had to share it with you!" kinda blogging. 

That's it for todays post Swaggernauts. It's not very tip filled, but with all the kids piling on top of me it's taken me over 2 hours to get it done *laugh* so any tips or questions or thoughts may be tacked on later.


Thanks for visiting, and please, remember to surf over to the SwagBooth, and place your votes!

As Always, HAPPY SWAGSURFING!

MSBD, Giant Cookies, & a Swag Warning!

GOOD MEGA SWAGBUCKS DAY SWAGFRIENDS!

I'm excited today! It's Friday, so I will have all my kids here tonight YAY! YAYAY! It's Friday, so yits Mega Swagbucks Day, Right On! And today I am just gonna chat with you *chuckle*. I wasn't able to be on the Swagbucks Facebook page much yesterday but I checked in and checked the General Info for Newbies thread several times. I didn't see any new questions really! That's ok, I got something I wanna show ya anyway :)

First things First! If you haven't already signed up for a Swag Bucks account, there's no time like the present! Just go to the swidget on the right there, press the Sign Up button on the bottom right. Fill out a short form, confirm your email, and get 30 swagbucks to get you rolling! Then come back here and start with my second blog post, "Beginner Tips for Swagsurfing!", for tips on how to get started!

Ok, now that the business part of the deal is posted, let's move on to the fun :P (Did someone slip some cheese into my cheerioes this morning? hehe)

I know I already talked about the Amazon.com $100,000 Universal Wishlist Giveaway. But last night I found something I wanna show ya, to illustrate just how easy it is, and to explain why I personally LOVE their wishlist toolbar. (And no, I don't get Squat from Amazon for posting this, I just believe very much in the old school concept of Word of Mouth. When I like something, everyone knows it!)

Last night I was browsing the Swaggers Who Love Freebies group on facebook. There was a post there by Carol Santora about Fancy Fortune Cookies giving away free gourmet cookie samples. Their facebook page needed to hit 10,000 fans by anytime today. (They made it! With room to spare!) Well I was like, OH MY GOSH a giant chocolate covered fortune cookie sounds SO DANG GOOD! So I went browsing their stock, found one I liked, (Pumpkin Pie flavored cookie dipped in chocolate SCRUMPTIOUS!) and sat there drooling at it. Then I remembered my Universal Wishlist button on the toolbar! I decided to test it out on a site I Knew wasn't associated with Amazon in any way. Plus, I really want this dang cookie .*tummy grumbles in agreement* And What Do You Know?

So Easy! I'm already entered for this week but now I have that mammoth cookie there to torture me any time I look at my Wishlist! LOL :D

Remember to put something on your Wishlist from any site outside of Amazon.com once a week from now until December 19th!

I also wanted to talk about the new "Bonus Opportunities" attached to the swagsearch. My last three searches have produced something that looks like This -

(NOTE: also see what I searched? Yesterday I won an 11, 7, and an 11 searching for things I need to do. I'm tellin you, it's the way to go. So much less stressful and I *always* win 3 times a day that way!)


Ok, so what is this? Is it really a bonus?  Well, Kind of! It's a special offer. You click it, and it redirects the page to one of several special offers. This one was for the Drivers Seat game.

Unfortunately I had already completed this one (Almost made it until I had to back up to correct, and ran over a pedestrian, OH NO!) so this was the screen I got.

AH well! Too bad! However I got another one this morning for 6 that involved visiting the Windows 7 facebook page and liking it for 6. Sold myself down the river for 6 swagbucks LOL. (Windows is Not my favorite OS, I am stuck with it because I have kids too young to get Linux!)

I think this is a pretty neat feature! However I wish it opened in another tab or window, instead of redirecting your search page. With Swagbucks touchy search rules, I hate having to go back to the search, I don't want to get penalized or anything. However I don't think that's a problem, I may just be paranoid :P

Speaking of the back button and opening new pages (loosely anyway) - I just wanna put a word of warning out there to you Swaggernauts. The 27 swagbucks offer from Geneio is very tempting- I swagsearched to find out what the heck it was, and it sounded really cool!  However- DON'T DO IT! 

It did something FUNKY with my browser, and whenever I would close out a pop-up or new window that had opened from another tab/window (ie clicking a link), it would not only close out the pop up, but would attempt to close my entire browser. If I hit cancel, whatever tab was the originating point would switch to a "New Tab", then try to load the Geneio page, fail at that, and open.. get this.. a zoombucks search results page???!!!!???

I do NOT like this mess. Ok, uninstall it right? Did that.. still having this issue. Every time I load my browser it tries to go to the Geneio home page, then hits a ZB results page. So I changed my default homepage back to Swagbucks. Took care of the load up problem, but I am *STILL* having issues with pop ups / new windows trying to close the entire browser, and being redirected to the dang ZB search page in the long run.

I can't figure out how to fix this short of a system restore. The only reason I haven't done that yet is because I went through a solid hour of computer maintenance after I'd installed Geneio but before I noticed it had a problem. And my lazy butt doesn't want to have to do all that maintenance again *laugh* but it looks like that's gonna be my only option.

UPDATE!

I took my own advice, and reported this offer to the Contact us link on their homepage. Here is the reply- proof that the Swagbucks team does want to keep the offer walls safe. We just have to give them the data to investigate with :)

Thanks for letting us know about this offer. I have passed this along to our Special Offer team for review. If you have any further questions, let me know. Have a great day!

NOW! For the Question Of The Day!

Two days ago I broke down how many swagbucks you can possibly make doing the bare minimum of searching and SBTV.  I'm curious what kind of daily average you guys get with your swagbucks. Mine actually varies anywhere from 60 - 200 a day, depending on the kinds of offers I bother with. How about you? Please, post in the comments section and let me know! And answer yesterdays question too!


Enter The Swagbooth!

Surf over to SwagMelt's new blog addition, The SwagBooth! If you have a picture or project in a competition and need votes, PM me on facebook or write to JennySweets on Swagbucks with the link, when it ends, and the giveaway details if you are having one. I hope to make it much easier for everyone to vote, and comment, which I *think* will encourage more voting!

That's all folks!

Much Love to you Swagfriends! I hope you have a Super Mega Swagbucks day! I hope you have a WONDERFUL weekend! I'll see you back here tomorrow, same Swag Time, same Swag Channel!


HAPPY SWAGSURFING!

Refunds, Referrals, & Offer Issues. Your Questions Answered!

Good Morning Swaggernauts!!!

It's Thursday! That means the weekend is almost here- and that's when I get Really busy! *chuckle* I do miss the days when I worked a Monday - Friday job. Or even when I worked Friday through Tuesday- at least I had two set days off a week!

Parents never get a day off, especially if one is staying at home to care for the kids. Weekends may be relaxing for some families, but around here it's 10 times as active, noisy, chaotic, and exhausting. Yet I still look forward to Fridays. My stepkids come over for the weekend and things don't settle down again until bedtime Sunday night!

It's hard for me to swagsurf on the weekends, hard to post a blog that makes any sense *wink*, and Forget me sitting down to a nice episode of Heroes! And Yet! I Love the weekends!

So in that spirit I say, Come On Friday! For those of you working the 40 hr + work weeks, or in school, keep your eyes on the prize! It's almost here!

I feel a change coming in the blog. I can't run forever on pure tips. It's time I started sharing myself with you too. At least, myself as it pertains to how I, as a stay at home mom with no income, "work the system". I think it's time to make it a bit more personal. I hope when I go that route, you will stay with me. Join me! Let's make it a conversation, not a monologue!  

For example: Right now my 22 month old son is in his room watching a Sesame Street dvd I bought with Swagbucks funded Amazon.com gift cards. Sesame Street: 25th Birthday - A Musical Celebration!  It's his first time seeing it, so it's Really got his attention! (and now mommy can blog! lol!) I am just full to the top with joy right now, because he's in there singing along with the songs, dancing his funky white-boy baby dance, happy as a lark! Every time I put in a new dvd I bought via swagbucks and he starts shakin his money maker, I am even More motivated to earn the swag! 

What kind of things do you buy with your swagbucks? What kind of swag gives you those "Life is Good" moments? Comment on my blog and let's start that dialogue!

Today's tips post is another mishmash of questions I've been seeing on the Swagbucks Facebook page. I need you guys to feed me your questions! I've posted a lot of tips, but sometimes folks don't want to have to go back and dig through- and I admit, my blogs are surprisingly long! So keep asking, here, on the facebook page, in the General Info for Newbies thread. I will keep answering!


First things First! If you haven't already signed up for a Swag Bucks account, there's no time like the present! Just go to the swidget on the right there, press the Sign Up button on the bottom right. Fill out a short form, confirm your email, and get 30 swagbucks to get you rolling! Then come back here and start with my second blog post, "Beginner Tips for Swagsurfing!", for tips on how to get started!

Now, on to the "useful" part *wink*

1: Swagbucks refunded a card I ordered. I got the email, the item is on the Refunded tab of my "Order Status" page, but I don't see the swagbucks in my account. HELP!  Don't fret! While refunds Usually show up right away, they can sometimes take up to 24 hours to post into your ledger. I would wait at least that long, and if the swagbucks don't show up after 30 hours or so, go to the Contact Us link on the homepage. Choose "Prize Information" from the drop down list and fill out the extra boxes that pop up. Explain that the order was refunded but you haven't gotten your swagbucks yet. Then, sorry I know this is an annoying word but, Wait patiently for word back from them. They are usually pretty quick but over the weekends it can take longer. They usually get back to you within 24 hours but give it a couple of days if not. They WILL fix it! They have Never let me down with prize problems.

2: I have a referral who won 20 swagbucks yesterday, but I didn't get them. What's up with that? This can have many answers, so I will cover all the possibilities. First I would ask you, are you sure they successfully signed up as your referral? How did you find out they won? Did you see their swagtotal in your referral list? Or did you see their swagtotal in your friends list on swagbucks? If it is a friend or family member, and they told you they won from searching, check and make sure they are in your referral list. (If something went south and it did not register them under you, I am so sorry to say there is nothing that can be done about it. Swagbucks won't retroactively make someone your referral due to problems with scam artists in the past.) If you are sure they are listed under you as a referral, and you saw their swagtotal in your referral list, then just be patient. Sometimes it can take as much as 48 hours for their wins to post to your ledger. Usually it's right away but there are "hiccups" now and then. If you saw their swagtotal in your swagbucks friends list, they may not have gotten those swagbucks from searching. It may have been the daily four, or special offers, surveys, etc. If they are definately your referral, and it was definately from searching, and it's been several days, write to swagbucks at the Contact Us link on the home page. Select General, and ask them to investigate why you are not getting your referral bucks.

3: I did a special offer that didn't credit. I did an inquiry with the offer company but they denied my swagbucks even though I did everything right and submitted all the proof they asked for. What the heck? I'm so mad! What do I do about it? Go to the Contact Us us link on the homepage, and choose Special Offers from the dropdown menu. Give them all the information such as which offer company it is, the offer name, and in the body of the message explain the situation. Tell them what steps you have taken, how long it took the company to reply, what proof they asked for and what you submitted. Then give them time to investigate. Right now there are a lot of swaggernauts frustrated by the offer companies. The Swag Guy hears us! (He'd have to be Blind not to see all the talk about it on the Swagbucks Facebook page LOL.) They need us to contact them with very specific details so they can A: Help you get your swagbucks and B: track whatever the heck is wrong with these companies and try to communicate with them to correct it. Swagbucks won't work if people leave because the special offers don't credit properly and people feel cheated. They know this, and are working to resolve it. Besides, The Swag Guy and Gal love us! Believe it!

4: Why is my swagtotal flashing red? That means you just won swagbucks! You may not have gotten a pop up for whatever reason. This happens from search wins, SBTV wins, and the daily four. Its red, but it's a good kinda red!

5: I got a pop up saying I won, but my swag total didn't change. Did I lose my points? For some reason this has been happening a lot lately. Don't worry! Just refresh the swagtotal. If that doesn't work, go to View Account from the homepage (or My Swagbucks from the swagtotal dropdown menu) and look at your ledger. If it still hasn't shown up, try logging out and back into Swagbucks. If all else fails, and after a period of time the win still doesn't show up in your ledger, write them at the Contact Us link.

OK! That's it for today! Boy this was a hard one to post, because I am rather off the charts A.D.D. and my brain started cracking last night *chuckle*. I hope it came out ok! Hope it's still useful! Hope to see you back here for more tomorrow! :D

As Always, HAPPY SWAGSURFING!!

Your Questions Answered!

Good Morning Swaggernauts!

Today I am going to answer a couple of questions I see on the Swagbucks Facebook wall & discussions pages.

First things First! If you haven't already signed up for a Swag Bucks account, there's no time like the present! Just go to the swidget on the right there, press the Sign Up button on the bottom right. Fill out a short form, confirm your email, and get 30 swagbucks to get you rolling! Then come back here and start with my second blog post, "Beginner Tips for Swagsurfing!", for tips on how to get started! 


1: My question is, how much time would you estimate you spend acquiring swagbucks? Maybe you could give an idea of how much time it takes to earn 450 points or other levels of points.  (Thanks Christina for a great question!) Well, let's look at this from a "worst case scenario" sorta view first. How long would it take you to get to the $5 Amazon gift card level if you did nothing but search & watch Swagbucks TV? For this answer I am going to look at my ledger, and see how much I earned yesterday, leaving out the three swagcodes and the 100 sb survey. I got my average of  three search wins, and three Swagbucks TV wins. I got decent wins all day, two 10s and an 8, but you can't count on that so let's be conservative and say I got an 8, 9, 10. That's 27 swagbucks. I know SBTV wins are supposed to be between 1-5, but I have never gotten anything below a 5. Three SBTV wins at 5 a pop, thats 15 more bringing the total to 42. Then there is the daily four (toolbar, NOSO, polls, survey visit) for 4 swagbucks. So, 46 swagbucks through the minimum of effort. At that rate it would take a mere 10 days to earn a free $5 Amazon.com gift card! 

Now, let's look at what I *Actually* earned yesterday!  It was a slow day for me, researching for my blog (web hosting for future ideas, lookin for a good WYSIWYG editor, etc!) so I didn't do Any special offers, other than the 1 video I watched on the gWallet slider. I did however get a survey- Don't count on those every day. I only get a couple a month. That survey was for 100 swagbucks. I got three codes for 6, 6, and 7. (119 sb) Three wins for 10, 10, and 8. (147 sb) one video for 3 (150 sb) and my Daily Four which brings the total for yesterday to 154 swagbucks.  I don't usually get surveys, but I do however usually do special offers. Even with the current trend of offer company difficulties, I would say 150 swagbucks a day is pretty average. That's 4500 swagbucks a month. Sounds about right to me! If you look at my current swagbucks total on the swidget to the top right, That amount reflects what I have earned since I bought a ton of prizes at the beginning of October. My account was just about at ZERO after ordering five $5 AGC and three $5 PayPal deposits. So I have earned almost 3900 swagbucks this month. Entered a couple of swagstakes too so, 3900 is fairly accurate, and there's still 4 days left in the month, when I usually make a final push for swagbucks! Keep in mind, I have really backed off of special offers this month due to frustration with the offer companies, and I still managed to net 3900 swagbucks! If I had been at my usual pace, I'd probably have enough right now for a $50 Amazon card (not that I would buy it, gotta keep funding PayPal too, for Netflix and hopefully Web hosting!)

2: Ok, but what about the time involved part of that question Jen? If I won the minimum of 3 wins a day and 3 SBTV wins, how much time would I spend in a day trying to do that?  Well that's not an easy question to answer, because wins are so random. I have personally fallen into a Fairly predictable pattern but even I get shaken up sometimes, not winning til late at night. But let me relate an average for me. I usually have my search wins spread out pretty evenly through the day. I don't try to search all day. I get up and search "Swagbucks Facebook" and a couple other things I need to do. This morning I won on Blogger, coming here to post. I will put SBTV on while I cook breakfast and do dishes. Usually get one win. I will come back and search something every couple of hours, just one or two searches. Takes very little time. As for SBTV, I will watch no more than 5 in a sitting- if I haven't won by then, I'm wasting too much time. Usually I win within 4 videos. So I would guesstimate I spend less than 20 minutes total a day doing searches, and a bit more watching videos. 2-3mins per video, I watch 20 videos a day tops but often less. And I usually half watch those videos while I am physically busy doing other things anyway. WARNING: Watching SBTV while Cooking or Doing Dishes can be dangerous to your health or your dinners flavor! I have broken a dish, burned myself on an epic pancake flip fail, and tripped over toys while carrying the computer between rooms LOL. Spreading it out has been the key for me. It's helped me to chill out for one thing :P and made my wins much more regular and predictable. What does it all boil down to? If I was Only searching and watching SBTV, then I would spend less than an hour a day getting that 46 swagbucks figure we got in the first question.

3: I know there is a code, and I'm on the Swagbucks Facebook page looking for TSG's post about it. How can I find it through all the dang "Thanks, TSG" spam?? Ugh!   The answer to this comes from swaggernaut Hope Stuart in the General Info for Newbies thread. Major Kudos on this one Hope! When you are on the wall, swimming in spam, look at the "Write Something" box. Under the "Share" button you should see the word "Filters". If you click that, you will see three options - "Swagbucks + Others"  "Just Swagbucks" and "Just Others".  If you click on the "Just Swagbucks" option, all the spam will disappear and all you will see are posts from TSG. That makes it a ton easier to find his code posts, or anything important he may be saying. Then you can switch it back whenever you are ready to see the other posts again.. maybe after all the "Thanks, TSG!!!" posts have died down :P

OK that's gotta be all for this mornings post. My son is about to eat his socks he's so bored- time to go to the park!

Please post questions for me here, on my discussion thread at the FBSB forum, in swagmail (JennySweets), or friend & PM me on facebook! Your questions feed the blog, and I guarantee if you are asking it, someone else is asking it somewhere too!

And as always, HAPPY SWAGSURFING!

WIN $100,000 From Amazon! Plus More Donut Holes!

GOOD MONDAY MORNING SWAGGERNAUTS!

What do you want to do this morning, roll over and bury yourself in the covers, eat a pan of lasagna, or sing with the birds? I wish I was the later type.. I'm definately more a Garfield personality on Mondays :P

First things First! If you haven't already signed up for a Swag Bucks account, there's no time like the present! Just go to the swidget on the right there, press the Sign Up button on the bottom right. Fill out a short form, confirm your email, and get 30 swagbucks to get you rolling! Then come back here and start with my second blog post, "Beginner Tips for Swagsurfing!", for tips on how to get started.

I just remembered a Super contest Amazon.com is having. You can enter once a week between now and December 19th. All you have to do is put an item on your wishlist from any site other than Amazon, and you are entered to win $100,000.

There are a couple of ways to do this. The easiest, the one I use, is to install Amazons wishlist toolbar. (Since you can hide toolbars that you aren't actively using, I only pop it up when I need it!)

This is easiest because no matter WHERE you are on the net, you can click Add To Wish List, a pop up will open, and you can add it to your Amazon Universal Wish List. Otherwise, without the toolbar, you can only add items from sites that have Amazon.com wishlist buttons on their item pages. 

You can find a link to the Universal Wish List Button here. I liked this feature even before the contest.. it makes shopping around Amazon much faster being able to just click that button and POW the item I want is on my wishlist without having to surf away. (Of course there is always the wishlist box on the right side of the screen whenever you are shopping Amazon too. I just prefer my Universal Wish List toolbar lol!)

This morning I went to Overstock.com and browsed childrens DVDs. Found one I liked, clicked my Add To Wish List button, confirmed that I wanted to add the item to my wish list. At the bottom of the pop up is a yellow button to go enter on Amazon. You click that, it takes you to the Amazon contest rules page, and you click Enter the Sweepstakes.  Super Easy to enter to win! Go back every Monday to enter for the week.

While we are on the topic of giveaways, I want to mention a site that I have just FALLEN IN LOVE with. It's run by swaggernauts like us, who do work every day hunting down free item giveaways and contests, then are wonderful enough to share it with the rest of us. It's a facebook group called Swaggers Who Love Freebies. I go there once or twice a day. Every post is a link to free stuff, or contests, and it's AMAZING what these folks find! In the two weeks since I've been a member, I have signed up for all sorts of goodies. Just last week I received a package with a Nice thermal lunch box for my husband (his was Falling Apart!), a calendar, several pens, one of which is the expensive fat grippy kind I need for my carpal tunnel. A Space camp dvd and poster for my son, a free album download from amazon (that will also be sending some Silly Bands for my stepdaughter, bands with bells no less!), and a code for a free 8x10 collage from Walgreens Photo. (It turned out NICE!)

I want to thank Carol Santora, Katie Smith, and all the regular swaggers on that site who post free stuff Every Day! I can't tell you how EXCITED free stuff gets me, with basically NO budget for anything other than the bills. A lot of folks are using the freebies they get for stocking stuffers.

I just noticed that today they have a post for a free DVD giveaway! HOW IRONIC AND NEAT! It's the very same DVD I found on Overstock that I added to my universal wishlist this morning to be entered into the $100,000 giveaway! That's a $20 item, for free. HOW COOL IS THAT?

Ok, enough of the contest and giveaways. Lets have some donut holes!

I'm referring to the gaps in information from my previous posts. Let's go through a few questions and answers, and remember, if you have a question I haven't addressed yet, PLEASE comment, friend me on SwagBucks (JennySweets) and write me there, or friend me on facebook and PM me. I'm here to help! :D

1: Can Amazon.com cards be used to buy ANYTHING on Amazon? For the most part, yes. However I have discovered that some of the vendors that sell through Amazon do not accept Amazon gift card credits as payment. I personally haven't had a problem with this yet, but it has been mentioned on the Swagbucks Facebook page.  Some will accept them for the item, but not for shipping. So far everything I've ordered through Amazon, or through a vendor listed on Amazon, has been no problem. Some vendors (like the one that sold me the mp3 adapter cable you see on the right sidebar) even had free shipping! So for the most part, the gift cards are good for anything. But not 100% of the time.

2: What does it mean when people post things like "11 for facebook" on the Swagbucks Facebook page?  When people get a win, sometimes they post what they searched for. Other swaggernauts may decide to try their luck with the same search. Sometimes they win too. Sometimes, they win More than the original poster. It's not a guarentee of a win but it works for me about 1/4 of the time.

3:  Ok, but why is Everyone posting their search wins right now? That's all I see! If you go to the Swagbucks Facebook page and its post after post after post of search wins, that means "the gates have opened". You can win randomly all day, any time of day. However, there are several moments throughout the day where the "Swag Gates" are opened, and it's Very likely you will get a win. When that happens, a flood of search win posts will appear on the forum wall. Good time to go search!

4: I went to the Swagbucks Facebook page and all I see are miles and miles of Thanks, TSG!  What the heck is a TSG, and why are people saying Thanks? TSG is short for The Swag Guy, or The Swag Gal. People are saying thank you because there is an active code somewhere, and they come to post gratitude that they found it and got their swagbucks. (Sometimes I wish we could just do one thanks thread, but hey, at least its a great way to tell when there's a code!) If you see that and can't find the code yourself, you can ask for some clues. It's against the rules to post codes anywhere, so don't even bother asking "What's the code?"  but there's no rules against giving hints!

5: People are posting that there is a code in the toolbar. Where? I see nothing! In the middle of your swagbucks toolbar is "From TSG [0]"  (or another number, will address that in the next question.) If folks are saying check the toolbar, and you see a 0 there, fret not my friend! Just click From TSG, then click the blue word Messages. That will take you to the latest post from TSG with a clue where to find the code, or the code itself.

6: My From TSG button just went from [0] to [15], and they are all old, expired codes. What the heck? I don't know why this happens, but sometimes all the messages that have been released by TSG to the toolbar will pop up at once. It's a glitch of some sort. If you want to know if there is a real, new message, just click the blue Messages to see the latest post.

7: Can I use discount codes when doing special offers, or Shop & Earn? Generally, no. The whole point of the special offers, and Shop & Earn, is for the company offering the swagbucks to make money. They pay SwagBucks (or the special offers company) for the purchases, or click throughs, or what have you. So if you are buying through them, but use a discount code, they are paying out without getting the profit in return. Just makes sense. However, sometimes you can use codes for free shipping with the special offers. The best way to know before hand if that is going to work is to ask on the Swagbucks Facebook page. Ask if anyone has tried it, and if so, they will give you an answer. If you try in the morning and no one knows, try again in the afternoon or evening. There are swaggernauts who lurk all day, but there is also a distinct Morning, Afternoon, and Evening crowd that changes out, each with different bits of information for you.

OK! That's it for this mornings post. My son is getting super antsy, he is starting to view the laptop as his enemy :P Time to go play!

Again, Please, for serious *chuckle* , ask me questions! Lots of questions! I need to know what you want to know, so I can make this blog Useful! And remember to vote in the polls on the right sidebar!

AS ALWAYS-  HAPPY SWAGSURFING!

Referrals and Donut Holes!

First things First! If you haven't already signed up for a Swag Bucks account, there's no time like the present! Just go to the swidget on the right there, press the Sign Up button on the bottom right. Fill out a short form, confirm your email, and get 30 swagbucks to get you rolling! Then come back here and start with my second blog post, "Beginner Tips for Swagsurfing!", for tips on how to get started.

Ok that may sound like a silly title, and it is :P Donut Holes?!  Actually, I am referring to holes in the information from my previous blogs. I went through the Gerneral Info For Newbies thread on the discussions tab of the Swagbucks Facebook page. I was looking at the questions people have asked, and noticed, I have some holes in my info! It's breakfast time, there's a lovely picture of doughnuts on the forum, and Voila! We have donut holes :P

I'm gonna start with Referrals though. Last night when I asked in the forum what people would like to see information on next, that was the most common response. How to get referrals, and what happens when you Do get a referral.

I am no expert on getting referrals. You'd think I was with this blog, (and now that I haven written all I know, it appears I know more than i give myself credit for! :D ) but people are slow to believe in SwagBucks sometimes. It DOES sound too good to be true. But the best advice I can give, the only thing that has really worked for me so far, and has gotten me 5 referrals (plus 3 more folks who tried to sign up under me but it didn't "take") is simply, word of mouth!

I have my swagbucks account linked with facebook connect. On the swagbucks homepage top toolbar, next to your swagtotal, is a blue button that says f Connect. If you click that, it opens a page asking you for permissions, and asking you to set what things you would like swagbucks to share automatically. I have everything set to share. That way, whenever I get a win, it posts to my profile. Whenever I win with swagbucks tv, same thing. Whenever I get a swag code, it posts too! If you look at my profile on facebook all you see (for the most part) is a streaming river of wins, codes, and a the beginning of every month, prize redemptions.

After a while, this Does get some folks curious. :D

Now I also post 2-4 times a day in my status message about the blog, maybe a small blurb on how much I've won in the past day or two, or how much $value of prizes I have ordered so far. Maybe a list of loot I've bought on Amazon with those gift cards! This gets people curious too- it must, because I am finally seeing some traffic on this blogs stats page *giggle*

The biggest questions is- How do I get people to Successfully sign up UNDER ME? Like I mentioned before, I have had three people try to sign up under my swagname and somehow, the referral link doesn't take, and they end up as no ones referral. Honestly, it doesn't do anything special for Them to be signed up under anyone - I would help ANYONE who asks questions. It sure would help ME though! (Plus I feel like my referrals are my special swag family lol).

So how to get people to actually be signed up under you? Well, you have Virtuals, which are cute swag pics you can order through the Swagstore. These go directly into your "Virtuals" on swagbucks, and you can find them by going to the swagbucks homepage, clicking your swagtotal for the drop down menu, and clicking Virtuals. This will take you to a page that shows you all the virtuals you have bought.Each one has a blue Post To Facebook button. This doesn't allow you to write anything of your own, it posts a prewritten blurb to your facebook profile with the pic to grab folks attention. This post is SUPPOSED to have your referral link embedded in it- so the theory goes that anyone clicking on that link and signing up will end up signed up under you.

These are fun, and cute, but if you are like me with your fconnect set up, it might be a little bit of overkill. I only use them occasionally.

So far the best method I have found to get folks actually signed up under my account, is to direct them to my personal swidget. The one to the right there, at the top. Every time someone clicks Sign Up from there, it is linked to my referral name.

To get the swidget, go to the swagbucks homepage, and click on the PROMOTE tab in the top toolbar. Then choose Widget. This will take you to the Swidget Grab page. Press the Get Widget button, choose the button that corresponds to Where you want to post your swidget, and copy the code. If you choose the Facebook option, it opens a little blurb to post to your Facebook wall. Anyone clicking on that link will be taken to your Swidget, and if they sign up through your swidget, they will be your referral.

So, what happens when you get a referral? Why do people want them so badly?

Every time a person signs up under you, and starts searching & winning, you win too! Every time they get a win from searching (and searching only,) you get matching swagbucks. There is a cap of 1000 which stinks, but that IS two $5 amazon cards with 100 swagbucks to spare, so I definately can't complain!

The biggest problem I have found is getting my referrals to be active once they sign up. Of the 5 that I currently have, only one was very active. In less than 2 months they had hit the 1000 swagbucks cap. Keep in mind, this is from searching only! Who knows how many swagbucks they actually made in that time from codes, special offers, etc. ! 

If you are going to try to promote your referral link, definately mention somewhere in the blurb for people to write you in facebook, or to friend you on swagbucks (include your swagname so they know who you are!) so you can talk with them. You want to try to inspire them! Get them searching right away. (When I first started I had no help, no person I signed up under, and I didn't do squat for about 2 weeks *chuckle*. Once I started rollin, so did the swagbucks!)

That's pretty much it! If you have other ideas I haven't mentioned, Please comment here! If you have a link you want me to share, such as your own blog or swagbucks fan page, comment and I will post it on the sidebar to the right there.

Now on to the donut holes (are you hungry yet? lol)

Just a couple of quickies today, and tomorrows post will be much more thorough. I noticed a lot of folks asking questions about prize redemptions that I neglected to cover in my earlier blogs. Lets go through a couple of them, then I have to go clean the house and get the boy down for a nap.

1: What is the difference between amazon ecards and e certificates?  The ecards are for American swaggernauts, and the e certificates (amazon.ca) are for our Canadian friends. (there are also amazon.UK cards for our British friends, but they are more expensive- Bad on you swagbucks! I guess it has to do with the difference in dollar values..)  If you accidentally order the wrong one, you can contact swagbucks via the Contact Us link at the bottom of the homepage and ask them to refund the purchase. Or, if you realise your mistake before you verify your order, just don't verify it! After 48 hours it gets refunded back into your account. (Usually, just keep an eye on it.)

2: How do I verify my order?  Ones you have pressed "Snag This", verified your shipping information and pressed SUBMIT, an email will be sent to the account you have linked to your swagbucks account. Just go to your email, open the letter and press "Confirm".

3: How do I see what orders are open, what has shipped, what is pending verification? From the swagbucks homepage, use that ever-so-handy drop down menu (click your swagtotal up top on the bar) and choose Order Status. This will open up a page with tons of information. There are tabs to click through, to sort your findings. Verified is for orders that you have,obviously, verified, but have not shipped yet. Shipped shows you which prizes have been sent, Pending shows which ones you still need to verify.

4: How do I use my amazon cards, and where do I find them once they have shipped to me? Again, go to the Order Status link. On the left sidebar you will see "My Gift Cards". Press that, enter your password, and a list of all the cards you have available, and all the cards you have used will appear. The ones you have not used yet appear first, with a code. Open a new tab and log into amazon.com. At the top is a link, GIFT CARDS. Click that, and on the left sidebar is a spot for "Apply to account". Have that page open and ready then tab back to "My Gift Cards". Highlight and COPY the code, tab back to amazon, Paste it into the box and hit Apply. The amount will be added to your amazon account, and the code can no longer be used. To keep straight which codes you have used is easy- tab back over to My Gift Cards and click "Mark As Used". This will move the card into the other list, and prevent any confusion on your part. (There is no penalty for trying to apply a code more than once, if you have forgotten you used it.) Once you have entered your code and applied the amount to your amazon balance, it Never Expires! You can save it up as long as you like, get something awesome!

5: How long does it take to ship my card / prize?  Each prize has an estimate listed for how long it takes. The amazon cards state 10-14 days. For me it averages about 12. PayPal states something like 10-18 days, it averages 18-20 for me. Each prize is different, so just take note what the item description says when you are ordering.

6: How do PayPal prizes work?  PayPal is different than the other gift cards. You do not get a code to apply. Swagbucks deposits it directly into your PayPal account. It is VITALLY IMPORTANT that your swagbucks email, and your PayPal email, are the same, or else you will NOT get your money! When the prize ships, swagbucks sends you an email. Then, when it clears into your PayPal account, PayPal sends you an email. If you have one that says shipped by swagbucks, but doesn't show up in your PayPal, write to swagbucks via the Contact Us link and let them know. They will investigate and if there is some error, they will refund your PayPal purchase so you can order it again. This happened to me this month, and it took them about 24 hours to get the swagbucks refunded to me.

Ok, that's it for now, though there are a ton more donut holes for me to find and fill in for you. Check back tomorrow for another post, and as always,


HAPPY SWAGSURFING!

Swago, Swagstakes, and Partner Codes!

Good Sunday Morning to ya, Swaggernauts!

Todays post is going to cover three topics. Swago, (Swagbucks Bingo), Sweepstakes, and Partner codes. As it's Sunday and as I'm feeling like the horse that got run over by the cart, I'm gonna "cheat" just a little bit. But first, gotta do my pitch, because if you aren't Swagsurfin yet, you are missing out! (Just ask my mailman who has seen the number of packages to my house go from zero to at least one a week!)

To sign up with Swag Bucks go to the top of the blog page, and check out the black & white box on the right sidebar. That's the Swidget! Click the bottom right Sign Up button. Fill out a short form, confirm your email, and get a quick 30 swagbucks to get ya rollin!)


To explain Swago, (here comes the mini-cheat!) I'm going to give you a link here to the swagbucks blog from February 26, 2010. It explains Swago in very easy terms, and though I don't mean to be lazy, will help me finish the rest of the post quicker so I can get to church on time! :D

So here ya go, check out Swago here!

Swagstakes are a fun game of chance, for some really great prizes. They range anywhere from 25, 50, 100, 250, 500 swagbucks giveaways  to things like iPods and iPads and WII systems. Here is a link to the Swagstakes page, so you can see the kinds of prizes, and entry costs, I'm talking about. 

There are two different types of entries. Limited entries, with only a certain number of entries before they give away the prize. Timed entries, where you have a certain amount of time to snag your entries. The limited entries are a set price per entry, but with the timed swagstakes, the more swagbucks you spend, the better deal on entries you get. For instance, the 50 swagbucks giveaway starts at 2 swagbucks for a single entry. But when you spend 5 you get 3 entries. 8 gets you 5, 10 gets you 8, etc etc. The more valuable the item, the higher the starting entry cost. Just like any contest, the chances of winning depend on the number of people that enter, but people DO win! I see them post their winnings on the Swagbucks Facebook page :) If you look at my picture 2 blog posts back, you will see that as of that day I have had something like 77 sweepstakes entries. Mostly I just try now and then for the swagbucks :P  but the majority of those entries come from Partner Sites, bought with partner swagbucks earned by, you guessed it, partner codes!

Swagbucks has Oodles and Oodles of partners that have swagbucks powered search engines and toolbars of their own. Anything from NFL teams to rock bands. My favorite is Roddenberry Search, cause let's face it, I'm a major Trek fan (I don't know, am I a Trekkie, or a Trekker? If you know the difference then you as big a fan as me, maybe more!)

These partner sites each have their own webpage, and their own toolbar. Most swaggernauts have 2 or 3 different browsers, and install tons of partner toolbars on whichever  browser they don't use. Fan favorites seems to be to load up your Internet Explorer with the toolbars, and using Firefox, Chrome , or Sarafi for your main web activity.

These partner sites regularly have codes of their own, and you can find them by keeping an eye on the partner toolbars. They work like regular swagbucks with one MAJOR difference. You can only spend partner bucks AT THAT PARTNERS SITE. This may seem like having to do double work, it is kind of a bummer they don't count towards your "real" swagtotal, but here's my personal trick for making the most out of them.

Whenever I get a partner code, I go straight into that partners site and look at All Prizes. I quickly dump any partner bucks into their sweepstakes. Hence my high total of sweepstakes entries!

There's another downside to these partner bucks. Even though they can't be spent in the swagstore, they show up in your main swag total. It can get confusing. (Another reason I dump my partner bucks into sweepstakes as soon as I can, so I don't get an inflated idea of how many swagbucks I actually have.)

To determine how many REAL swagbucks you have, versus Partner bucks, just view your account summary. This can be found either from the home page, by clicking the words View Account above the right hand box with all of your swag brag information (Swagtotal, Referrals, Prizes redeemed, Sweepstakes entries.) Or anywhere on the swagbucks site, you can click the drop down menu next to your swagtotals (top, right side of the bar) and choose My Swagbucks. Either of these will open a page with 2 tabs- Summary, and Ledger. In the summary page you will see a list of every partner site you have or have ever had swagbucks with, as well as a REAL swagtotal. You can click on the name of any of the partner sites to go there and dump and straggler swagbucks you have into sweepstakes.

While I'm mentioning the Summary and Ledger pages, let me tell you, the Ledger is your friend! It shows every swagbuck you earn and where it came from, be it the daily four, or searches, codes (and what the code was), or from special offers, (and which offer company.) You will need to check this a lot if you do special offers, to verify when you have been credited if you aren't sure, or if an inquiry gets a response like "We credited your account x amount" and you want to verify they did.

Ok, I really have to run, time to hop in the shower! I hope today's blog gave you some more ideas on what to do with your swagbucks! I may post again later in the day but for now, expect the normal format, 1 a day *chuckle*.

Much love to you, my swagfriends! I hope you have a peaceful rest of the weekend, and tomorrow morning finds you bright eyed, and bushy tailed, ready to take on the work week!