September 2007 Archives
This is a really cool offer I found on QuickRewards.net -- Log in, click on Signups, then (down on the page a little) Super Shopping Deals. Go to page 2, then #3 Vista Print T-Shirt.
VistaPrint has a selection of customizable T-shirts FREE...you just pay shipping ($4.41 for the cheapest shipping method). You have to choose a white color tee with no printing on the back. But still, there are some really neat designs. These would make neat gifts, or if you have a website, it's a really cheap way to advertise your site while you're out and about.
PLUS, QuickRewards gives you $5 cash back for your purchase! So you'll end up 49c ahead!
If you're not a member of QuickRewards, please join here!
This offer's only good for new VistaPrint customers (read: clear cookies and use a new email address). :)
LuckySearch.com Review -- Update, Jan '10: please see this post for some of my concerns about this program and why I will no longer refer members to LuckySearch (SuperPoints.com)
Who is Eligible:
U.S. residents -- one area of the site says age 13 or older, but another says age 18. Limit one account per person (they will check).
How It Works:
Make up to 25 searches per day through the website for a chance to instantly win points. Points can then be cashed in for prizes. Minimum to cash out is 500 points (for a $5 Amazon GC). Other prizes include movie tickets, iPods, gift cards from a variety of merchants, strollers, even cars! Save up those points! :) Serious note: each search must be unique -- please make legitimate searches.
And, if you refer someone and they win, you get some points -- 50 if you directly referred them, or less if it was a referral of someone you referred (five levels deep).
How Often Do People Win?
Winners are chosen at random. Every day there will be 50 winners of 100 points, and 10 winners of 500 points.
How Do I Join?
Just click here to join!
Like LuckySearch? You may also like these similar programs: BigDevil, Blingo, MSN Live Search Club, and Winzy!
BigDevil.com Review
Please click here to join!
Who is Eligible:
Currently U.S. residents only, but they hope to have it open to Canada and UK by the end of September.
How It Works:
Make searches through the website for sweepstakes entries plus chances at instant-win prizes. Instant win prizes include $5 Amazon GCs and $25 Dining Gift Cards. You may also instantly win additional sweepstakes entries (plus to the ones you get just for doing a search). August's sweepstakes had five prizes: a $500 cash card, an Xbox 360, a 1GB iPod Shuffle, and two $25 Dining Gift Cards.
You will earn one point (one sweepstakes entry) for every search you make, up to 20 a day. Confirm your email address and they'll let you earn 30 points a day. (They'll increase your points per search to two and/or increase your maximum number of daily searches If you make BigDevil your home page or download their toolbar.) Earn 200 points by referring a friend. As mentioned above, you can win points instantly while searching. Also, you can wager points in an arcade. Note: program terms say that you are not allowed to continually search the same word, so do please make legitimate searches.
And, if you refer someone and they win, you win, too!
How Often Do People Win?
The site chooses random times to offer prizes -- if you're the person searching at that time or the first person after that time, you'll win a prize. It looks like someone wins about once an hour (less frequently at night). Tip: if you see it's been about an hour since the last winner, that's a good time to get your searches in! They give out a daily minimum of 10 $5 Amazon GCs, 10 $25 Dining GCs, and one prize worth $50 (not sure what format it's in, GC or cash), a monthly minimum of one $100, one $250, and one $500 prize, and quarterly at least one $1,000 and one $5,000 prize will be awarded to a lucky instant winner.
How Do I Join?
Just click here to join! And be sure to check your inbox for the confirmation email!
Like BigDevil? You may also like these similar programs: Blingo, MSN Live Search Club, and Winzy!
As I've posted about before, AdLibCorner is THE source for rewards program trivia answers -- and now, it's better than ever! Ginger revised the newsletter to have a lighter background, a nice index that helps you jump down to different areas of the newsletter, and a more newsletter-ish layout. Check it out, and while you're there, be sure to sign up for her AdLibCorner Tidbits newsletter for daily freebies, samples, steals, and deals!
There was a link on Ebates' Blog to a YouTube video promoting Ebates. The little girl in the video is sooooo cute! Go watch the video, then come back and join with my link if you're not already an Ebates member. I'd be so happy I'd coo like the Ebates Baby! :)
Extrabux Review
Please click here to join.
Date Launched: June 2006
Reward Per Dollar Spent: Varies
Minimum to Cash Out: $10
Cash Out For: Rebate check or PayPal
Earn For: Shopping, signups, referrals
Limit One Account Per: U.S. resident 18 years+ with valid email address
Notes:
1. Extrabux is free to join. Rebate rates appear to be very competitive with other cashback portals; they vary by merchant but are as high as 31%.
2. Extrabux's website includes a large list of coupons that can be combined with cashback rebates.
3. As with other programs, earnings remain in a pending status until the return period for the merchant has expired (from 10 to 90 days). You can opt to have your earnings sent (by check or PayPal) whenever your balance exceeds a particular amount, or every x number of months that you specify, or you can choose to donate your earnings to one of about a dozen charities.
Related Articles: 2007 Shopping Rebates Comparison Chart, Interview with Extrabux
Upromise has a Bonus College Savings promotion going on through the end of September. They've temporarily increased their rebate rates by 1% to 8% depending on the merchant. Their rates were pretty competitive before, so this is a great deal. For instance, Upromise usually gives 2% cashback for purchases at Sears, which is tied for the best rate you can get through any rewards program. But now, until 9/30, they're paying 5%. If you're making a big purchase, the extra 3% can add up.
What a lot of people don't know about Upromise is, if you don't have someone's college expenses to save for, you can withdraw your earnings in the form of a check. They cut checks once a quarter and there is no minimum required to cash out by check.
Read my Upromise Review or Join Upromise now!
Got a nice email from Tyler at FusionCash.net with a couple of updates on his program. The biggest change is that, where members used to have 90 days after completing an offer to cash out your earnings, they're extending this now to 180 days. They feel this is ample time to reach the minimum to cash out of $25 (with at least $15 being from offers you completed yourself, as opposed to referral earnings).
FusionCash is also allowing members, at cashout, to donate an amount between $5 and $15 to one of five selected non-profit organizations. FusionCash will then MATCH your gift! You'll receive a tax-deductible receipt from JustGive.org confirming your donation.
FusionCash.net was launched in 6/05 and I've been paid by them nine times for a total of $627.20. They pay members to complete offers such as surveys, free trials, and signing up for services like auction sites or online movie rentals. Click to read my full review of FusionCash or go ahead and join FusionCash now!
Best Buy's RewardZone rewards program has always required that the gift certificates that you earn from the program be redeemed in-store...until now!
According to an email sent to Best Buy affiliates yesterday, Best Buy will allow members to redeem their rewards online as well, starting on September 30th. With online delivery of rewards, and now online redemption of rewards, RewardZone is easier to use than ever!
Click to read my full review of Best Buy RewardZone, or please support CompareRewards by shopping through the banner below.
You may notice that CompareRewards looks a little...different today. That's because the blog software that I use to publish the site was in dire need of an upgrade, and after hours of hard work and testing, the new site went live last night.
If you think it looks different on your end, you should see how different it is on mine!
The cosmetic look of the site is under development, and there seems to be a problem at the moment with "captchas" (required for posting a comment) not displaying. These are issues I'm still working on.
What you'll find different: a search function that actually reliably works, a tag cloud that lets you see at a glance which rewards programs get the most mentions here on CompareRewards, and links on each entry for you to submit content to Digg.com if you think it's something that would be especially useful to folks who don't routinely visit the site. Also, some dead programs were removed from the list of reviews and a few were added that somehow didn't make it in when I initially reviewed them.
What's coming up: more rewards program reviews, updates of existing reviews, and a revision of my annual shopping rebate comparison analysis. Tagging of posts has to be done manually and I'm doing it retroactively, so you'll see the Tag Cloud change as I continue work on that. And I will be working to add more color to the menu and to the site in general.
Comments? Suggestions? Please send me an email. I love hearing from you, and though I'm sure I can't make everybody happy, I'll darned well try. :)
If you have an account at BondRewards.com, be sure to check your email today for a special offer only available to current members: click through the email to BondRewards and all shopping orders today only will qualify for double rebates!
Not a member of BondRewards? They're the rewards program with the highest overall rebate rates in last year's shopping rebate comparison analysis. See my full BondRewards Review, or go ahead and Join BondRewards now!
If you participated in "Smack Daddy's Quest," a referral contest on Jellyfish.com, and you accumulated 50 Quest Points or more (by 2pm central yesterday), you can turn your GURU points into cash! Guru points will remain in your account, but they will pay you 50 cents for each guru point (not Quest Point). All you have to do is request the points-to-cash conversion (there's a link on the site to click to do this) no later than 2pm central time tomorrow!
As soon as you click that link, the cash will appear in your account (click My Info, Cashback Purchases) under Available for Payment. I scored a SWEET $39.50! This was a really nice way for Jellyfish to thank the people who took part in their referral contest... but I'm not surprised, "Fair" is Smack Daddy's middle name! :)
Not a member of Jellyfish yet? Great shopping rates, fun games, superior customer service... Join Jellyfish here!
Update, 9/18: They seem to have ended the promo a day early -- no lock icons to be found!
The locations of today's (Monday, September 17th) MyPoints combination lock icons, to click to play the instant-win game for points and sweepstakes entries, are: Once again, MyHome (the first page you get to when you log in), Shop, and (different today): Insurance Center (then look down the page on the right). Please leave a comment if you win -- I haven't yet -- but there are some big prizes to be had so let's keep trying!
Go to MyPoints here if you're already a member, or join MyPoints here.
A couple of years ago, I retired from the newsletter business. ;) I had been sending out a daily email with the trivia answers for those rewards programs that offer daily trivia questions for points or cash. I stuck in some program news when I came across it, some bargains and coupon codes, and a little personal chatter. I was really trying to do too much.
So I retired and my good friend Ginger graciously took the reins, first providing the answers on her own YahooGroup and now on her wonderfully informative website, AdLibCorner.com. (Please visit there when you're finished up here, and be sure to bookmark it and check every day for the latest trivia answers!) Meanwhile, I branched out into doing TipBlog, updated as often as I get a chance -- though not often enough lately -- with deals, coupons, and freebies...as well as maintaining CompareRewards, of course!
So, whatever happened to the old trivia newsletter?
It just sat dormant. Until now.
Bump-bump-BAH! (dramatic music...best I can do in text, sorry)
Announcing the CompareRewards Insider -- the website's companion newsletter! Subscribers will receive a weekly newsletter with a synopsis of the big news of the week. If it's been posted on CR, there will be a link to the full story as well as some exclusive content. I may post mini-reviews of new sites, I'll answer user questions, and I may even slip in a little gossip here and there. :)
The next edition will be sent out a week from today, so if you're interested, please send an email to comparerewards@yahoo.com with "subscribe" in the subject line if you would like to receive this newsletter! Note: if you previously received my trivia newsletter, you are already subcribed!
Thank you all for your continued support!
This actually happened in early June, but it wasn't a site I frequented, so... better late than never.
SearchChips, a site that gave members sweepstakes entries and instant-win prizes for performing searches, had been up since 2005. They say the site will be offline until sometime in 2008, when it will relaunch in a different format, incorporating member suggestions and with a "new vision."
Good news: old members will be invited to beta-test the new site, and they insinuate in their FAQ that chips will carry over to the new site. Bad news: all referrals will be lost. :(
I'll let you know if I hear from them again. In the meantime, you can still enjoy earning for doing searches on BigDevil, Blingo, MSN Live Search, and Winzy (the latter two have been previously reviewed here; the former two have reviews in progress now).
One of my favorite writers at SmarterTravel.com is a guy named Tim Winship, who co-authored a book called Mileage Pro -- The Insider's Guide to Frequent Flier Programs (buy it through my Amazon link here
On Tuesday, Mr. Winship's article was called, "The Truth About Deceptive Airline Practices." In it, he makes some excellent points about airlines can exaggerate their on-time stats by simply pulling onto the tarmac and waiting endlessly there, and how they make their fare specials look more special than they really are by hiding extra fees and roundtrip requirements in the fine print. But what I wanted to comment on here, which I think is applicable to *all* rewards programs and not just frequent flier programs, is the exaggeration of their membership numbers.
"...Most industry outsiders would be scandalized to discover that in reporting the membership of its [AAdvantage] program, American includes every account ever established since the program's inception. Included among those 56 million members are duplicate accounts; accounts of people who signed up but never earned or redeemed a mile; and accounts of those who enrolled at some point during the program's 26-year history but have since died." This, Winship says, is not unique to American, but is an "industry standard."
Is this rather questionable accounting practice unique to airline frequent flier mile programs? I would seriously doubt it. My gut feeling is backed up by an analysis released by Colloquy.com in May that examined national membership in all types of loyalty programs and found that the average household belonged to 12 different programs, but was only active in about 5. "Fat membership roles may look good in a press release, but active loyalty program members are the only members who count,” said Kelly Hlavinka, senior director of Colloquy.
Usually, when I approach a newer or obviously lesser-known rewards program and request an estimate of their membership, their management politely refuses to answer. (Jellyfish co-founder Mark McGuire was the most recent to, very nicely, decline to share.) I don't begrudge these programs their desire to withhold this sensitive information. They're acknowledging that they don't yet have anything to brag about. At least, in not answering, they're being honest.
But what about those rewards programs that are willing to give out their membership numbers? Are they being honest, or are they using some version of the horrific accounting methods that American AAdvantage uses? Or perhaps are they just being cagey in their wording?
Upromise's Company Information page says, "Since the launch of Upromise in April 2001, more than six million families have enrolled in the Upromise program." Their 2006 annual report (see page 17) says, "Upromise's popular rewards service...has more than seven million members who have joined Upromise to save for college..." That sounds like a lot of members, but knowing what we know now about how AAdvantage counts their members, I have to immediately ask, "Yeah, but how many of them are active members?"
Part of the problem may lie in defining "active." Is a member active if they confirmed their account by clicking an email link and then did nothing else? What if they bought something through the rewards program once, four years ago, and nothing since? What if they log into the site frequently but never shop there? There IS no across-the-board definition of an "active member," and unless a company is publicly traded, there is no requirement for a rewards program to release ANY membership information.
To show I'm not just picking on Upromise -- I'm not, I'm a member there (though whether I'm active or not is up for debate; the site says I haven't made a purchase there in 180 days), what other programs are releasing their membership data?
MyPoints' Media Kit says that advertisers can "gain access to our permission-based audience of 6 million online shoppers..." In April of '06, when United Online took MyPoints off United Airlines' hands, their press release about the acquisition said that while MyPoints had "a True Opt-in(r) database of approximately 4.5 million members," there were "approximately 1.4 million members with activity in their accounts." Maybe MyPoints got 1.5 million new members since April 2006 to bring their total to 6 million, but that would still mean that just 2.9 million, MAX, were active. It would seem misleading (though again, industry standard) for MyPoints' media kit to say their "audience" is 6 million but neglecting to mention that half of them were inactive.
Ebates' Advertising and Partnerships page says they have "over 7 million members." However, in a January 2006 article written by Ebates' founder and CEO Alessandro Isolani, "The Art of Woo," he said that the program had "more than seven million registered members and roughly one million active shoppers." Wow. Pretty big difference. Kudos to Isolani for publicly making the distinction, and voluntarily so (Ebates is privately held and does not have to release their data). Even so, his definition of "active" may be very different than another site's...so there can't really BE any fair comparison of sites by membership numbers.
Other sites reporting membership numbers include BondRewards (their site has a banner saying they signed up their one millionth member this year), Memolink ("As of March 2005, memolink.com has garnered over 10 million registered members"... Yeah, Memolink's bigger than Upromise! ...if you believe that), Borders Rewards ("nearly 20 million members"), and Greenpoints (10 million members in May 2006).
I guess the point I wanted to make here is that, personally, I'd rather be given a "We'd prefer not to answer" response when asked for a program's membership numbers, than to be given some number that is basically useless. You may think that exaggerating your program's participation will make you seem more attractive to potential advertisers or to potential members, but the fact is, long-lasting relationships are built on trust. Be honest with your program's data or just don't release it at all.
When I read the news release last week about Upromise's new offer to rebate members 1% on the purchase or reloading of McDonald's Arch Cards (that's the relatively-new McD's reloadable plastic GCs), I deleted it with no intention to bother posting about it here. I've seen others blogging about it like it's really something super-awesome and special, and I'm sorry, but I'm not on the bandwagon.
I guess what the hoopla is about, is that you get the 1% to your Upromise account when your Arch Card is reloaded, which doesn't have to be done at Upromise's website. Once you buy the card at a McDonald's restaurant, you go home, log onto Upromise, and register the card number. They'll give you 1% back on the original amount you put on the card plus any reloads (you have 30 days to register the card number after you buy the Arch Card, and the original buy and any reloads are retroactive). Once they have your card number, they use it to track any future reloads in order to credit your Upromise account the 1%.
First of all, we're talking earning ONE percent when you buy a gift card to McDonald's. So? Upromise already offers a 3% rebate on restaurant gift certificates through GiftCertificates.com! GiftCertificates.com doesn't sell McDonald's gift cards, but they do sell Sonic, Jack-in-the-Box, and Domino's Pizza, among others. (And, I might note, you could actually do better at Ebates, earning 4% on GiftCertificates.com purchases!) Or, you could register a credit or debit card at Upromise and eat out at one of the restaurants that participate in their Upromise Dining program -- you'd earn 8%, and (at least in my area) this includes Pizza Hut!
Second point I want to make: How much McDonald's food would you have to eat to make this really add up toward your child's education? Okay, I have a family of four, it runs us about $15 every time we eat at McDonald's, and we do that once a week. Let's just be generous and say we go twice a week. That's $30 a week, $120 a month, and at 1% using the Arch Card, I've earned...$1.20 that month toward my children's college education. If I con the kids into holding the cheese on the Happy Meals, I'd save that much in a month...plus I could just use my debit card and avoid the hassle of having to keep my Arch Card sufficiently loaded/reloaded!
And, I'm just thinking, eating McD's twice a week, my kids would probably die of heart disease from all the cholesterol before they even hit college age!
Now here's an idea: Don't go to McDonald's at all -- eat a sandwich at home or at the office and put THAT savings into your kids' college savings account!
Don't get me wrong -- I think Upromise is a good rewards program with an admirable intent. I just think this particular "innovative new program" doesn't live up to the hype.
Today's DMNews had a great article by Kimathi Marangu, executive VP of Business Development at Mall Networks, a company that personalizes shopping rewards portals. The article, entitled, "Not All Online Malls Are Created Equal," written to marketers who run or would like to run a shopping rewards program, discusses the keys to their success.
I don't want to rehash the article in full detail -- I posted a comment on it that hopefully they'll approve and you can read my reaction there -- but I felt it was good, pretty thorough advice: personalize the experience, offer a nice look and feel, have a variety of merchants available, promote the site to existing customers through special offers and emails, have flawless accounting in place, and update the site frequently. I disagree somewhat with the author's recommendation that using a pre-written platform customized for your site will maximize the program's potential (with no offense intended to Mr. Marangu, I think he may be a little biased in that he works for a program that does exactly that). This would definitely be the quickest and easiest way to start a rebate site, but there are many other successful programs that were designed from scratch (for instance, Ebates, then called Intellipost, began as a project at UC Berkeley's Haas School of Business).
Aside from that minor bone of contention, I think this article is very insightful and great reading for those currently running a rewards program as well as those considering one.
The price you see is the price you pay, tax and shipping included! Remember, tomorrow night they'll be reverse-auctioning a Toyota Prius!
