Another Source Of Income - Paid Surveys $$$

First of all - here is a big bunch of flowers for my followers.    Thanks for your kind words.


I'm kinda embarrassed about my dark post yesterday, but it was cathartic - and it did help, as did all my lovely messages.    I slept well last night and today I feel better.


I bought myself a bag of kiwifruit - and I will try to eat one a day.  I'll probably just end up feeding them to my parrot, but at least I tried.  Right?


When I get down, I get really down - but then I bounce back like a rubber ball.


Today is a new day.  No more moaning for another month.




If you haven't already discovered the world of Paid Surveys, you should give it a go.   Here's a small glimpse into what appears in my In Box.


Yesterday, my sales were in the toilet, I hit my inbox to give it a clear out.


I received a new email from one of my many Paid Survey websites that I belong to.  It offered me this:

I nearly swallowed my tongue!  Get paid $50 to listen to 360 music tracks and give my snotty opinion on them?   Yes please!  I hit that Survey button as quick as I could, sure that I wouldn't qualify.   But I did.

So the rest of the afternoon, in the foul mood that I was in, I swapped between listing ebay items and listening to tracks.  In the end I found it quite relaxing, and very satisfying.


For each track, I had to select whether I:  a) had never heard of it,  b)  liked it   c)   Hated it.
If I chose a) - I had to choose whether I actually like the song or not.
If I chose b) - I had to choose whether I LOVED the song, or just LIKED it.
If I chose c) - I had to choose whether, I was just plain SICK of the song, or whether I HATED it so much, I would change the station.


This was a survey from a radio station obviously.  It was the easiest $50 I ever made.

The only downside - with this company I can only spend the money on :  Ticketek vouchers, online Magazine Subscriptions or Cinema vouchers.  Given I never go out, options 1 & 3 are out.    I now have $80 worth of Magazine Subscriptions sitting there waiting to go.   Hmmm, Mother's Day is coming up, I might use it for that.


I am signed up with lots of survey companies.  Most of these are Australian.


Opinions Paid
Cafestudy
globaltestmarket.com    (this is US based)
My View
Valued Opinions
What Do You Think
Your Opinion
My Survey
My Opinions
Pure Profile
Survey Village
Your Voice
Nine Rewards
Aussie Think


I have my In Box set so that any emails from these go straight into a folder entitled "Opinions".   I check that every day and go through the ones there.


This is my Opinions folder at the moment.  There's a few for me to go through.

Given I have already cleared out a few of these, I still have a lot to go through.  Because I belong to so many Paid Survey companies, I can get anything from 10 to 15 (even more) surveys sent to me a day.


All these companies are different.  Some offer points to be accumulated.  When you get enough you can redeem them for things.  Some offer cash incentives, also to be accumulated and redeemed.  Some give you an entry into a monthly prize draw.


The items that you can redeem points for are varied - usually gift vouchers at various stores.  Some will transfer cash into your bank account, others into your Paypal account.   Some will have options where you can donate your money to charity.  


Other companies pay you for reading emails - these are only small amounts (usually 10 to 30 cents) - but it all adds up in the end.


Here's a look at at one of the emails in my in box:

This is my newest company.  This one is nearly $5 for a 30 minute survey.  That's pretty good money.  The hint with these is not to just sit down and do them all in one go.  I have them open on a different screen and between ebay listing, I swap between them and do a few questions and then go back.  Otherwise I would get bored.


Especially if it's an a$$-rippingly boring survey on credit cards or mobile phones (my two most hated ones).


Surveys can be anything from 5 minutes to 30 minutes on average.  Some can go as long as 3 hours (taken over a few days).


If you want to find some paid survey companies to join, just google the words "paid surveys" and see what comes up in your relevant area/country.


My hints for joining are:


1.   NEVER pay money to a website to get the names of paid survey companies.  These are rip-offs.  You can get this information just by searching the net.


2.   If you have children you will get into a lot of surveys.   I don't, so I get kicked out of a lot of surveys for that.  :-(


3.   I list myself as a small business owner.    I get a lot of high-paid surveys because of this.  Even though I'm only a sole-proprietor company, my opinion is still wanted on many business decisions I make.


I currently get inundated with surveys.  I browse through them and choose the shorter ones and do them as soon as they arrive.  Anything with an interesting subject or a decent reward goes next.  All surveys have an expiry date which could be from 3 days to 2 weeks from the time you receive it.


RADIO STATIONS


Your radio stations want your opinion.  They will put you in prize draws or give you rewards to rate their music.   Just find the websites of your radio stations that see what they have on there.


This is one I joined last year.  Every week or so I get to "Rate the Hits" - they play me 20 of the new/popular songs and I have to rate them.   I wade through the current crappy music and give them a rating.   With only 20 songs, it only takes about 2 minutes.   I have to rate the songs on a meter that goes between  *This Song Makes Me Want to Vomit*  (just kidding) - to *I love this Song!*    Easy as pie.


This is the email I received yesterday from one of my stations, FOX FM:

This station has different prizes on offer each time.


In the past year, I have won:


~ 5 x DVD Pack
~ 2 x CDs
~ a $50 gift voucher for Coles-Myer
~ a $200 gift voucher to a shopping centre.  This is nearly an hour from where I live.  It's still in my purse, and I will get there sometime when I can afford the petrol.


In this email I've just received, the prize is some concert tickets.   If I won those puppies, I would fling them onto Ebay ASAP.


So once I've vented my spleen on such ultra-crappy music as "Puff Daddy Mo-Ho Featuring Miss Pooh-J Versus Bunghole Gang - and rated them as *this song makes me want to eat my own head*, I feel virtuous.

 I'm having a hand in trying to save the world from crap - sorry, rap music and possibly winning something - this is a good definition of a win/win situation.


The other side of survey companys, are ones where you get the chance to try new products and give your opinion on them.  Either you go to the survey company's office - or they post it to you at home.  You try the product and then after a certain amount of time, they send you a survey and you complete it.   You get the product for free, and sometimes you get sent a gift voucher, or get allocated points as well.


The last product test I did was in February, and I got sent a huge bar of bath-soap.  I did the survey, and then they sent me a $10 gift card as well.


I have also tested at home :  canned soup, panty liners, face moisturising cream, body moisturising lotion, tissues, Fish Oil capsules, herbal tea bags, fly spray and household cleaner.     There are others that I can't remember right now.


That's a pretty good service.    If you haven't done Paid Surveys before, I suggest you give them a try.  I find them very worthwhile.  Let me know if you do to.   Mention me as the person who referred you.  *wink*


Oh, this is the other bunch of flowers pictures I wanted to post.

Bwahhhhaaaa,  I wonder where they stuck the flowers???


Hope it made you smile.   :-)

In a Black Hole with a Black Dog ....

It's been over three weeks since my last blog.  Naughty me.


The past two weeks have been school holidays here, and also the Easter break.    My sales plummeted to the point where I didn't even need to go to the post office everyday, and on the days I did, I was posting no more than a $6.00 sales.  That is very bad.   No only my sales, but my life is disappearing into a black hole.


At the moment I have $15 in my bank account, and my amount of money waiting to go from Paypal to the bank account won't even cover the postage costs that I have put on my credit card.


I'm going backwards.


It's very scary.   It's very demotivating, and I feel deflated and useless.   The Black Dog is beginning to circle me again.

I know the sales can get lower during the school holidays, but this is the worst they have ever been.


For the past 3 weeks I've been eating packaged frozen meals, which are much cheaper than *real* food - and drowning my sorrows in chips and my *ahem* grape juice.     So now my weight and my digestive system have suffered.    I haven't done any exercise for over a year, I haven't eaten any fruit for ages, and any vegetables I buy shrivel in the fridge before I get around to cooking them.     I can't seem to get myself out of this rut.


I haven't been to an op shop for 3 weeks - I don't have the money to buy petrol or afford any new stock items.  I have spent the time going through my piles of stock at home and getting them listed - so seeing the piles go down and my flat looking a little cleaner is a good feeling, even if I'm getting no buzz from shopping and no sales.


I don't even have any sales from the past 3 weeks worth mentioning on this blog - or anything new that I've picked up or learned.  I am a big fat empty space.


I'm finding every tiny little setback is affecting me more than usual.  I've been worried about my Dad's health, and ferrying him & my Mum around to various medical appointments.  He's 84 in a couple of months, and is seeming to age suddenly now.   We were worried he was getting dementia.    (Personally,  I'm not surprised - living with my mother would drive anybody insane).    But after the tests a couple of days ago it turned out to be just a lack of Vitamin B12.   The doctors were very pleased with his *ahem* insides, and said he had the stomach and bowels of a man 20 years younger. 


Now we just have to worry about whether he needs a hip replacement or not.    Tests for that next week.  


I wish I was like my Dad.   He does not stress.   He lets everything wash over him like water over a duck's back.   I am a worrier.   At the first sign of things not going well, my stomach instantly produces enough acid to eat through steel and my bowels turn to water.   I am sure my insides are not in such a fine state as my 83 year old Dad's.


I just don't know how to relax, and *chill out*  Maybe I should start smoking pot.

A couple of weeks ago my friend Sue brought over a couple of pictures for me to sell.


These should go for nice prices at auction.


The first is called "Nymph" by J H Lynch

Here are the completed's.


The second is called " Woodland Goddess " by J H Lynch


Here are the completeds for this one.

They are retro and more than a little garish and tacky and quite large at over 1 metre in height.   But hey, they have titties on them.  :-)
I have put off listing them until the slump on ebay finishes.  Even this week after the school holidays have ended the sales have been appalling - I guess everybody's $$$ are still recovering from the holidays.


Sue now rings me every week asking "how things are going on ebay."   I told her I wouldn't put them up until after the holidays.    Now, because they will be Pickup Only, I want to list them so they finish around lunch on a Saturday.  I don't want them finishing on a weekday, because people will want to visit my house at night.  No way Jose!!   So I won't be listing them until this Saturday.


She rang 3 times in last few days and left messages.  One time I was out, one time I'd just sat down to eat my tea, and the 3rd time I was in the bath.   I didn't answer the phone.   It's beginning to stress me out.     I hate my home phone - I hate the sound of it ringing.   I don't like phones, and won't ring somebody unless I REALLY have to.   I guess it's just the way my brain is wired - or just the fact that I'm an anti-social old bag.


I need to get a life.  I haven't gone out in over 2 years.  I've lost interest in all the hobbies I used to have, except reading books.   I haven't seen a movie in 3 years.  But the sad part is, I don't want to go out amongst people.  I'm content on my own.  Yet still I feel empty and hollow and lonely.  I wake at 3am and start worrying over things I can't control : my aging parents, thoughts of me dying alone on the kitchen floor because nobody cares, thoughts of spending the rest of my life alone.


I'm a 64 year old invalid living in a 44 year old's body .  


My next book to read will be "How to not Sweat the Small Stuff", but I fear my inner cynic will just sneer at the words of wisdom.


With any luck by next week, I will be out of the doldrums, and not such a sad sack.  Until then, I had to check in and let you know I'm still alive, and barely kicking.


Until then the Black Dog is howling for a feed ......