Three websites for earning free gift cards
December 28th, 2008 | by mbhunter |I love receiving gift cards. Whether it’s something utilitarian like a WalMart gift card or something a little more yuppie like a Starbucks card, they’re handy.
I’ve been test-driving a few gift card sites for a while, and these three either look promising or have delivered already, and you don’t have to spend a dime through the sites if you don’t want to. You can earn the gift cards faster if you do, but you don’t have to. Here they are:
(Update 8/4/2009: Scour used to be here but they’re moving toward a drawing-entry-based model. You can win, but you can’t earn for much longer, so only two websites until I find another one. Sorry!)
Swagbucks. Swagbucks is a new site I’ve started to test-drive. It works more or less on the same principle as Scour. You earn Swag Bucks for searching the web, shopping at merchant partners, and so forth, but the Swag Bucks come into your life at random times. You might search a few times and earn nothing, and then the next search you earn 10 Swag Bucks (like I just did). (One thing I have found is that I win my first time each day after only a couple of searches. That may change, but that’s how it’s working for me now.) You can also benefit from your friends winning too: if you refer them to Swagbucks and they win, you win too! Right now I’ve almost got enough points for a $5 Starbucks card, and that’s searching maybe three times a day for a few weeks, nothing major. You can redeem your points for other things besides gft cards: Netflix memberships, iPhones, even a drum kit with double bass drums! Searching this site is easy too: there’s a Firefox search plugin, as well as toolbars for IE and Safari. Swagbucks looks pretty slick. I’ll report back when they deliver my gift card.
MyPoints. I love MyPoints. They’ve been very good to me. I’ve talked about them before but the main ways to earn points are (1) reading e-mails, (2) completing surveys, and (3) purchasing at online merchants through their site. (These opportunities come in the e-mails.) The nice thing, though, as I mentioned before, is that you can just read the e-mails and earn points! They also have opportunities to earn points for shopping on eBay, which lets you hunt for bargains and get something back in addition. I’ve gotten several gift cards from them. They deliver them quickly. I highly recommend that you join MyPoints.
So, there you go. I use all three of these sites frequently, and it’s not really doing anything outside of what I’d normally be doing while working on the computer: reading some quick e-mails and searching the web. I just do these things and get free gift cards. Cool, huh?
(This is the first time I’ve talked about Swagbucks but I’ve talked on MyPoints before.)
3 Responses to “Three websites for earning free gift cards”
By Dima on Jan 2, 2009 | Reply
Seems like a lot of wasted time to get a $5 Starbucks gift card for some burned coffee… Either way, all of these rely on you trying to sell them to your friends and family which I find pretty disgusting. What is even more disgusting, is that you do not reveal that the links you provided for all three are your referral links. This is my first and the last time visiting your website. kthxbye
By mbhunter on Jan 3, 2009 | Reply
Dima: I know I’m feeding a troll here, but I need to clear this up, even if you’re not around to read it.
Yes, they’re referral links. I do get a (very small) benefit if you sign up through a link to websites that I use myself and that I genuinely recommend. If you find that disgusting, I’m sorry.
Secondly, sure, referring people helps speed things along, but it’s not a necessity by any means. Using the services as they’re intended to be used is enough to get rewards. You don’t have to pedal them to your friends and family. But if you like them and use them and see the benefit from them, why wouldn’t you?
By Kyla on Jan 21, 2009 | Reply
Wow you’re a miserable ass!! What are you on this website for if you can’t handle a referral link? I’ve been a member of MyPoints for years and have NO referrals & I have received numerous gift cards. So no, they do not rely on you “selling them to family and friends” What’s disgusting is that your life must be so miserable, you have nothing better to do with your time than be disgusted by a referral link? If that’s your biggest problem-LUCKY YOU. If it’s not, figure out what is and go bark at that issue.