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Curious on how to make money with online surveys? It can be done, but when I tried the first time, I failed completely.

You don’t have to repeat my mistakes! Don’t miss these five tips to succeed with answering online surveys!


When I was on maternity leave the second time, I tried something I had read about but never tried – I signed up to make money with online surveys. The reason I did was, I was curious about if you really could make money this way.

Being an enthusiastic person, I jumped in and got started. And failed. Miserably. I probably made all mistakes possible when trying to make money from answering online surveys.

The Mistakes I Made When Trying to Make Money With Online Surveys

Here are the mistakes I made:

  • The first few times I entered a few surveys, I answered and answered and answered – only to find out at the end that the surveys I answered were NOT to get cash. It was not even to get stuff – but to enter a competition to get stuff. Stuff I didn’t even want. Duh!
  • A few weeks after my first venture into online surveys, my email inbox practically crashed from spam. This was due to my second mistake. I used my ordinary email for online surveys. And especially since I didn’t research legit survey companies, I had obviously stumbled upon a few bad ones that had sold my email address to some shady email spam company. I still suffer from this, several years later.
  • The email spam emphasizes my third mistake. I didn’t research legit online survey sites enough. Or honestly at all. I just Googled online surveys and got going. I had fun while answering the surveys – at least until I got mad when realizing that I wouldn’t earn a cent and my email had been hijacked. But, honestly, it was my own fault.
  • And this leads to my final mistake. I got so mad and disappointed that I just stopped answering surveys. (And went back to Candy Crush, but don’t tell anyone… :-) ) I think this was probably my most stupid mistake – to just give up instead of learning from my lessons and starting over. (Until MUCH later)

I still think that answering surveys can be a fun thing to do – and if you use the right companies for it, you can make a bit of money too. It is perfect procrastination while breastfeeding or just relaxing – definitely more productive than playing Candy Crush or browsing Instagram for hours. :-)

Do you want to try it out?

5 Tips To Succeed With Making Money Answering Online Surveys

Here are my tips to be more successful than I was:

  • Use only legitimate survey companies. There really are some shady ones out there! How to know? Do your research! Check reviews, scam reports, forums. Never sign up if they require money from you or they promise to make you rich.

Here are few survey sites you can sign up for (For FREE) that are definitely legitimate:

  • Swagbucks – Swagbucks is an awesome website for both saving and earning some money. You can shop through Swagbucks and get cashback. But you can also earn money by answering surveys, playing games, watching videos, and more.
  • American Consumer Opinion This is a great site for earning cash from surveys. Despite the name, it is open for anyone in the world.
  • QuickRewards Another legit survey company that pays cash.
  • Opinion Router. Sign up to earn CASH from surveys. All countries allowed!
  • Unique Rewards This is not just for surveys. You can receive cashback by Paypal or check by surveys, shopping online, watching ads, reading emails, and more. It is available for US, UK, and Canadian residents.
  • PanelPlace They allow participants from all over the world and pay cash.

How to get started

  • Don’t be too worried about signing up with a number of different sites. This advice may sound as if it is contradicting to only use legitimate sites. But really, there are some really good companies out there, and since signing up should cost you nothing, you have nothing to lose by signing up to as many (legitimate) sites as possible. That way, you will increase your chances of actually being able to pick and choose among different surveys to complete.
  • If you want cash – make sure that’s what you get! Read what the payments are, how you can get paid, what the payment thresholds are and decide for yourself if it is worth your time. But remember that getting gift certificates or discounts can also help pay your bills if they are relevant to your life!
  • Use an easily accessible but special email account for the purpose. This is without a doubt what I would do if starting over. Create a Gmail account and use it! This way IF they spam you, your regular email account will not suffer and also Gmail has quite efficient spam handling. Check the email often!
  • Answer surveys even if they don’t pay you big bucks. Some survey companies will not send the high-paying surveys until you have already answered a few. They might want to test and see if the quality of your answers is high enough first. So even if you should not answer for nothing (or for entering a competition, as I unknowingly did), don’t be too picky either!

These are my tips! Not too difficult, huh? Just remember to use legitimate sites, check what and how they pay and use a designated email for your surveys and you can’t go wrong!

If you do try to make money with online surveys, please share how things go by leaving a comment below!

Leave a Reply

This Post Has 4 Comments

  1. Kathy Grittmann

    Another fun and good one is ysense. It gives daily bonuses and paid links to click on. Plus lots of video offers and surveys and tasks. With Swagbucks, I bring in a decent amount every month as a stay at home mom. https://www.ysense.com/

    1. Paula @easybabylife

      Oh cool, thanks! I hadn’t heard of them clicksense before. And then you mention Swagbucks too. They’re good. Can you share approximately what time you spend and what money you make with these?

  2. Lisa Savage

    How long before you started seeing money from surveys?

    1. Paula @easybabylife

      Hi, well once I answered through sites that actually paid in cash, it didn’t take long. :-)