Get Paid to Read Email

While there are big companies like MyPoints and EmailCash that essentially operate as multi-store shopping rewards programs, there are also a lot of small one-person sites that pay their members to read email ads (PTRs). The most important thing to remember about these sites is that they're not big companies, they're a guy named Dave or work-from-home Mom named Stacy. A lot of them have no experience running a business, know little or nothing about marketing and advertising, and add 2 + 2 and get 5. And they're operating in a seriously overcrowded market with razon-thin margins, so most of them end up going broke really fast.

But there are a few who have managed to be successful, or at least managed to keep going. A lot of their success is based on the fact that they've managed to make enough advertising sales to keep their members interested. Usually, that means search engine advertisers. For members, that means instead of seeing ads for interesting products and services, they get ads for search engines. Not big search engines like Google or Yahoo! Search, but little search engines who's owners get paid every time somebody makes a search.

So if you join any PTRs, be prepared to visit a lot of search engine pages.

Over the last few years, I've joined hundreds of PTRs. To be honest, most of them aren't worth the time it takes to sign up. But I've found a few that are ok. They're run by hardworking, professional people and if you do what you're asked to do -- read the email, click a link and visit the advertisers website until a timer expires -- you'll be paid.

If you want to give it a try, I suggest you start with these:

• Avant-Cash
• BeezyClickin
• Disco-Dollars -- No longer recommended this PTR (30 June, 2005).
• HaulingCash
• HeavenlyEmail

Actually, I no longer recommend ANY of these programs. I'll try to put together a new list of recommended programs (they change over time) and link to it from here. -- 28/09/2006

How much can you earn? Not as much as you could flipping burgers. Maybe $10-20 a month. Not enough to pay the mortgage, but its a start. You can earn more by getting referrals -- people who join the program using your special affiliate link.

To give you an idea of potential referral earnings, let's say you get 100 people to join a program. If that program pays you 15% referral earnings, then instead of earning $1 a month at that program, you could make $16 ($1 + ($1 x 15% x 100).

When I'm looking at a PTR and trying to decide whether I want to join or not, I don't worry too much about referral earnings. It's a nice bonus, but to me, if a program isn't worth joining for what you can earn without referrals, then it's not worth joining at all.