Nearly all the programs, tools and training in Internet Marketing are free to join. And typically they offer one or more UPGRADES that unlock additional features, add or increase earnings/commissions, or generate more referrals.
EARNINGS
$3.97
I spent a few days evaluating whether to upgrade in ClixSense. I asked Marie “Sassy” Perrelet. (Look her up — @mfpsassy on Twitter. She has been called “The Queen of Pay-To-Click.”) Sassy has built a business around promoting lots of PTC opportunities after testing them for a few weeks or months and then publicly reporting her earnings.
Sassy said my income would double in ClixSense if I upgraded. More ads, more 2¢ ads, and more income from referrals. An annual upgrade in ClixSense costs $17.
That uptick on Day 7 is my upgrade. As soon as I upgraded, I had an entire page of new ads to click on! More than I had ever seen before. I think ClixSense holds back some ads just to be able to provide a burst of extra income the moment anyone upgrades. It was a rewarding feeling.
Before the upgrade I was earning just 3.5¢ per day. After-upgrade daily earnings: 11.6¢ per day. With no referrals (I had only joined the week before) I could earn my first $8 payout in about three months because of that upgrade, versus nearly eight months without the upgrade. I’d get four payouts in my first year — $32 — and net $15 after subtracting the upgrade cost. Compared to $8 without the upgrade.
Clearly upgrading right away in ClixSense was a good decision.
What about the other three PTCs we’re now comparing with ClixSense? Not all upgrades are equal…
The main benefit from upgrades is the increased commissions from referrals. Because it costs a lot more to upgrade in the others, I’m holding off for now… but I have my eye on NeoBux. Why is the $90 “Golden” upgrade so golden? It’s because daily Fixed Ads earn 10 times as much. Upgraded members earn a penny for each Fixed Ad, while free members earn just 1/10 of a penny for each Fixed Ad.
Once I have some referrals in these programs, I’ll take another look at upgrading.
RENTING REFERRALS
I began promoting ClixSense almost as soon as I upgraded. I was already earning a lot of credits in traffic exchanges, so I used those credits to advertise ClixSense, using my referral link. Later on I began advertising in safelists too. And now and then I would tweet about it. Gradually I started getting some referrals.
NerdBux, NeoBux, and ProBux offer the advantage of being able to get referrals immediately — you can rent them. Costs are about the same. Rent a few or rent alot.
On Day 11 I spent $20 at NerdBux to rent 100 referrals. You can see what that did to my daily earnings. I quickly overtook and shot past what I was earning as an upgraded member at ClixSense. In my next blog post I’ll be analyzing my rental experience to show you whether it is a worthwhile expense or not.
CLICKING ADS ON MY PHONE
One more thing before I close this post. In the previous episode I mentioned that I was clicking ads on my phone. I have a smartphone, it’s an iPhone 4S, and for about half a year I did all my ClixSense ad clicking on my phone. I clicked most of the day’s ads on my phone before I even got out of bed in the morning. Then throughout the day, whenever I had a spare moment, I checked and clicked a few more.
That ended in December 2012 when ClixSense added some additional security to ensure that advertiser videos were actually viewable. You see, Apple has never permitted Adobe Flash on their iPhones (it really eats battery). Some of the ads I was clicking on contained videos, and I couldn’t see them on my iPhone. That was fine with me. :) But not so good for advertisers. You may still be able to use ClixSense on smartphones that use the Google Android OS. I wrote to ClixSense and asked them to reconsider, since mobile computing is only getting bigger, and more and more people every day are clicking for cash on their phones. For the moment, they aren’t buying my argument.
If you have an Android phone I’d be interested in knowing if you are able to use ClixSense on it. Please add a comment below.
Great evaluation Peter! Glad to hear the positive progress you are making. There is also a lot of value to 60 clicks on the Clixgrid every day. I earn about $1 extra a month on their grid. Also, by upgrading in Clxsense you are guaranteed 4 .01 ads per day which adds up to 14.60 a year, which nearly covers your $17 annual upgrade. Mishawaka out.
Yep, all good reasons to upgrade in ClixSense ASAP. I was happy I did right from the get go. Now I am looking at upgrading in NeoBux. The sky keeps getting brighter…
Do you think it is possible that people are stealing refferals.
Neobux and Nerdbux i lost some refferals, i been checking every day and use my balance money to extend and my neo point and without a warning I lost many of them, is there a way to prevent that, my auto pay was enabled
thank you
Hi Lise. No, I don’t think there is any stealing going on. Rented Referrals (RRs) expire after a month if you do not renew them. If you have autorenew enabled, they will be renewed if they click within the first 10 days; after that you will need to renew them manually or they expire. You can easily see which RRs are about to expire. In NerdBux, click at the top of the “Expired” column to see all your RRs that are about to expire. (In NeoBux, the column heading is “Next payment.”)
A couple sites recycle RRs automatically for free. The ones that I am aware of are: ProBux and Ojooo. There may be others that also recycle automatically.
I check my RRs list every day to see if any are due to expire, and if they’ve been clicking within the past several days then I will renew them. Otherwise I let them expire and rent new ones.
ONE TO WATCH OUT FOR: In ProBux, there is a COST associated with expiring RRs. Money is taken out of your main account when RRs expire, if you don’t have money in your purchase account. My main account actually went negative before I realized what was happening. So in ProBux, don’t rent more RRs than you are able to maintain.
ATTENTION: TimTech SOLD NerdBux on March 18, 2014.
Please read the blog post I wrote about the events leading up to the sale: “The Rise and Fall of NerdBux.”
Earnings dropped off quite a bit after the sale… but not to zero. I am still logging in every day and clicking all available ads, and earning money.
No, I don’t think NerdBux is dead yet, but TRUST — which is an important facet of business — has been significantly eroded.
Very good Peter.
So the four that you focused on are the four main PTC’s, it seems.
Good info,
thanks
Yes Sam, the four are: ClixSense, Ojooo, NeoBux, and ProBux. NerdBux is OUT because of it’s implosion earlier this year. In early Spring I replaced it with Ojooo. If you want to be cautious about upgrading at Ojooo or any of the others that’s fine. Take it at your own pace.
The NerdBux collapse left a lot of people out in the cold. Even though I had upgraded to Lifetime Membership there, my account was eventually deleted along with thousands of others, just a month or so after Johnson took over the site from TimTech.
UPDATE: My “Core 4” PTCs were updated last month. I am continuing to click and earn at Ojooo but am not recommending it at this time because they have become very slow to pay. I’ve replaced Ojooo in the Core 4 with ScarletClicks, a steady earner that pays promptly and has been around for several years.
With the collapse of ProBux, I’ve moved WordLinx into the #4 spot — it’s a British ten-year-old still going strong, but you will need to build up referrals in it in order to reach your first cashout.
Yes, i use android în nu phone and can view my care 4 ptc: clixsense, buxept, clixic and tm, no neobux sadly…
Thanks for that info, Visan. In the long run more PTCs will go mobile, because everything is going more mobile — that’s where the audience is. Glad to hear ClixSense is there.