What Is Ebates and Why You Should Begin Using It

In the passed few weeks I have discovered an amazing, FREE website called Ebates. This website allows its users to receive cash back for shopping at a variety of stores. These merchants pay Ebates to refer customers to their stores and in turn you receive a chunk of cash back that you spent at that store. It's an incredibly easy way to make money online!

It's completely free to sign-up and when you sign up you are eligible for a $10 gift card at one of their sponsored stores. Some of the stores that you can receive cash back with are:

Nordstrom: 6% Cash Back

Under Armour: 8% Cash Back

Groupon: 6% Cash Back

American Eagle: 4% Cash Back

Kohl's: 6% Cash Back

Gap: 7% Cash Back

And literally hundreds of other stores! 

With Christmas fast approaching, Ebates is the perfect website to use for those of you looking to save some extra money. Show your parents... I guarantee that they will thank you for doing so. 

Heres How the Process Works....

Ebates as seen on CBS

So there you have it. Ebates is 100% legit and millions of people use it to save money while they shop online. Learn more about it here.

5 Tips to Use YouTube to Drive Traffic to Your Website

YouTube has established itself as one of the most popular websites in the world since its introduction in 2005. Ranking in at number 3 according to the Alexa Top 500 Global Sites, YouTube receives millions of unique visitors every single day. People watch a staggering 2 billion videos each day and according to YouTube, 24 hours of video is uploaded to the video website every minute. These statistics are absolutely incredible and YouTube has limitless potential in terms of generating traffic to your website or blog.

YouTube is no longer used by kids who are solely looking to watch a funny cat video or various sports highlights. It now serves as a great resource filled with thousands of hours of informational videos. YouTube not only functions as an amazing way to generate ad revenue from people directly watching your videos, but also as a great way to generate traffic to your blog or website. Here are 5 helpful hints to use when you are looking to use YouTube to drive traffic to your blog or website.

1.) Create a High Quality Video

Possibly the most important step in using YouTube to drive traffic to your blog is to create a great video. You don’t need a high budget to create a great video, rather a plan of action, knowledge on your topic and some sort of video editing software. Examples of different kinds or effective videos are DIY (do it yourself) or top 10 list videos. These will encourage people to not only click on your video, but also watch the video in its entirety. Nothing is worse than having someone click on your video only to exit out after 10 seconds due to boredom.

2.) Link in the Video Description

This one seems pretty obvious, but I see people forget to add their URL in their video description more often than not. If you make a popular video, why miss out on potential targeted traffic by forgetting to add a silly thing like your website’s URL? Make sure you add it to the beginning of the video description as it will be the first thing that stands out to the viewer. Also make sure you include some information on your video and be descriptive. You want to make sure you do this, because the more YouTube knows about your video, the more confidently it can rank it for a specific keyword.

3.) Get Traffic to Your Video

If you spend hours in creating an informational video only to receive no traffic to it, you’ll be pretty disappointed in your efforts. Unless you already have a solid subscriber base, you will need to promote your video in order to get some traffic to it. Just like search engine optimization for a website, you can use the same methods to promote your video. This includes adding good tags and keywords to your video description, posting it to social sites like Facebook/Twitter/Google+/etc, or sending your new video out to a mailing list. You can also post your video, granted it is helpful, to online communities like LinkedIn or Ouora. Getting targeted traffic from online communities will also help your video and ultimately your website rank better on search engines.  If you can generate solid traffic to your well-made video and then tell viewers to click on your link to your website, more often than not they will.  This leads us to our next tip.

4.) Tell Them to Click Your Link!

What’s the point of creating a video, putting your link in the description and then not taking the time to tell the viewers that you want them to view your website? Put emphasis on the fact that there is a link to your website in the description and you want them to click on it. If you can create a high-quality, informational video that people want to watch, chances are that your website contains a ton more material that the viewer may be looking for. You can also encourage your viewers to like and subscribe to your video and channel so they will be informed when you come out with additional videos in the future.

5.) Put Your Website URL in Your Actual Video

When using simple video editing software, you should always put your websites URL into the actual video if your main goal is to generate traffic. You should remember that often times videos are shared and embedded onto different websites. This means that your link is being shared and viewed all over the internet and not just on YouTube. Maybe add it as a watermark in the corner of the video, so as not to obstruct the viewers view, but so that they know that it is there. This will also help prevent others from stealing your video and taking credit for it.

There you have it. Make sure you apply all 5 ideas from above when using YouTube to generate traffic to your blog. As a teen it can seen overwhelming when trying to get traffic to your blog, yet these simple, yet effective tips can work wonders for you and your website and help you produce more traffic then you have ever received before creating YouTube videos.

Easy Way for Teens to Make $100 a Day With No Experience

Are you a teen or college student in need of some extra spending money? If you're like me than that answer is a for sure yes. I am constantly looking for ways to make some extra money online through internet marketing. I've done paid surveys, Adsense, blogging, stocks, you name it I've done it. While those methods all work great and have been extremely successful for me, I now have a perfectly free method that you can use to start making money RIGHT NOW. You will be an affiliate for Ebay without actually selling anything yourself. Lets get started:

1.) Go to www.ebaypartnernetwork.com and register for a free account.

2.) Do a quick search for online classified ad websites. Obviously Craigslist is the best, however there are some others out there that will yield you some cash.

3.) Pick a high demand item on Ebay and list it on Craigslist or a similar classified website. Now when people message you regarding the item, direct them to the Ebay listing saying that you "Decided to list the item on Ebay."

4.) People will then go to your Ebay listing and most likely buy the item you are promoting. You will not only get paid for the items that you sell, but also for the people that sign up for Ebay through you.

You should easily be able to make $10 a day with this method, and with a little bit of work, $100 a day is not out of the question. Don't be afraid to try and sell some larger items like Cars or motorcycles as those will bring you a pretty large commission.

Good luck and let me know how this works out for you!

Teens Make Money with Google Adsense

As most of you teens and college students begin your online money making adventures, you will most likely come across a program called Google Adsense countless times. Google Adsense is one of the most popular ways to make money online but what exactly is it? Here are some quick useful facts about Adsense:

• It is a large share of income for Google. In Q2 2012, Google reportedly made $3.13 billion, or roughly 27% of their total revenue.
• Publishers receive 68% of the total revenue and Google 32%.
• It is 100% free to be a publisher of google ads.
• It is by far the most reliable form of advertising on the internet today.

So how much money can you actually make with Adsense? On this blog, www.teenswithmoney.com, I average about 500 unique visits a day, which equates to $150-$200 a month! It really is quite easy and is a great way to make some extra money on the side, especially as a poor college student in need of cash.

While you will not get incredibly rich with Adsense, it is definitely possible to make $1000 a month with it. While I make nearly $200 a month with just this one blog, if I were to scale up and create a few more I could definitely make a lot more money. As a teen or college student looking to make some money online, it is entirely possible to make a cheap website/blog based on anything you desire, build backlinks and perform some search engine optimization. Here is a proof of payment for adsense:

College Students and Teens Make Extra Money Online For the Summer

As the school years come to an end, most teens and college students are faced with finding a job that pays minimum wage or slightly above. That task alone can prove to be very difficult as companies are hiring less and less adolescents and hiring more adults to fill the same roles. If and once you find a job theres a good chance that it will be for under $8 an hour minus taxes. So you'll be wasting away your summer working 30-40 hour weeks, making less than $200 a week. While I absolutely agree that work experience is extremely important in growing and maturing as a person, I don't agree that kids should be busting their asses and making pocket change in the process. Fortunately for you, there are numerous legitimate ways to supplement your summer income by partaking in online endeavors. Here are some ways that you can spend your summer downtime and make some sweet cash in the process.

1.) Online Survey Sites
By far the best way to make money online without having to spend any of your own is with paid online survey sites. They allow you to fill out easy surveys, watch videos, play games, etc. all while making some easy money in the process. If you go back and read some of my older posts you will learn how to truly maximize your profits on these websites by taking advantage of referral programs. For the past few years I have been making between $500-$1000 a month on these websites and my income only continues to go up. Some of the best websites are Cashcrate, SwagBucks, and SquishyCash. Check out some of my older posts to get you started:

Blogging is the Key to Getting Referrals
How to Get Backlinks
Article Marketing Works

2.) Invest!
If you're in college now is the time to really start doing some research on potential investments. Bonds, mutual funds, stocks or index funds all offer a great opportunity to further grow your income. The sooner you start, the more experience you will gain and the better off your future self will be. A great article to check out is "How to invest $20, $100, and $1000 (and more)" over at the Motley Fool, give it a read if your interested! I also recommend you check out one of my older posts,  "Turn $500 into $5000 with Penny Stocks." Educate yourself. People don't make money in this life by being dumb. The more you learn, the better off you will be. It's never too early. I'm able to invest the money I earn from survey sites, and earn thousands each year off investing.

3.) Sell Your Stuff!
Chances are you've got a lot of old crap laying around in your room. From video games to sports cards, there is always someone out there that will pay money for your things. Recently, I was able to sell some of my old Lacoste Polos that I had grown out of for over $240 on Ebay. They had just been sitting in my closet, unworn for years and I was able to turn those shirts into some cash for my back pocket!

There you have it. Start making some extra money online today as a teen or college student. Best of luck!

Cheers

Make Money Online By Growing Your Social Media

Being a blogger and attempting to make money online as a teen can be a tricky subject. Add attempting to get a steady flow of loyal readers on top of that and you've got yourself an even harder obstacle to tackle. If you're looking for an extremely effective way to add readers on top of your search engine optimization efforts, social media is the way to go. In the beginning of the 21st century, social media has seen an incredible boom. To think that Facebook was launched less than 10 years ago and already has close to 1.5 billion users is mind boggling.  What better way to capture readers than to use those stats to your advantage. Here are 5 tips to keep in mind when using social media to boost your blog:

1.) Give people reasons to follow you
If you feel like your in a rut give your followers something fresh, something new. Nothing is worse than drawing in readers with interesting status updates, then completely dropping the ball and forgetting to post for a month...and by that time all your new followers are probably gone. So stay on top of your social media, don't forget to post and when you do, give your followers reasons to follow you.

2.) Start Conversations
Encourage your readers to leave comments and actually respond to them! You don't want your readers to think your account is simply a robot, but instead a real person with real emotions that has actual conversations with readers. By doing this you will build steady relationships with your readers and they will be more likely to share your posts via Facebook, Tumblr, Twitter, etc.

3.) Don't be afraid to try new platforms
When I first started my social media efforts I stuck to the two biggest ones, Facebook and Twitter. Now believe me, I had incredible success using those two than before I did. However, once I began using other platforms such as Tumblr, Google Plus and Pinterest I found that I was receiving more traffic than ever. Keep in mind though that you should never sway away from Facebook and Twitter as those are by far the most popular, but by using others as a supplement to those two is the idea I'm trying to get at. Just be open to new programs that often come out!

4.) Stay on top of current trends
Adding on to the last tip, make sure that you consistently put in an avid effort to stay on top of the latest trends in social media. You don't want to find your marketing plan come to an end at Facebook and Twitter while another new platform is expanding at an astounding rate and you are left picking your nose. Instead, be open to new ideas and be creative with your efforts, however, ensure that you always have your blogs reader's best interest in mind and aren't just trying to flood your website with the wrong type of visitors.

5.) Understand your target audience
By understanding your target audience, your status updates will reach more people in a more effective method. For example, this blog is catered towards teens and college students trying to make money online. Do you think a good post would be about how to raise and care for your child? I think you know the answer. How about a post on the latest methods to monetize your blog? Perfect! Make posts that your followers will want to read or else you will just find yourself losing readers faster than you can say "oh no."

Benefits of Making a Blog as a Teen or College Student

Have you ever considered writing and a blog to make some extra income online? Chances are you have, however chances are that you also quit after a few months. The current blog you are reading How Teens and College Students Make Money Online was created about 4 years ago. In that time I have written very few articles, however this blog still ranks fairly high for the search terms "teens make money online" or "college students make money online." Due to that, I am still making money off it, with little work each month.

I also own a few other blogs on the topics of Stock market trading as well as a Detroit Red Wings blog. I put a little bit more effort into those blogs and am making even more money off them each month. Long story short, if you are considering making a blog to make some extra money and can write about a simple topic, do it. When I first made this blog 4 years ago, I was in high school and had no idea that it would still be around in 4 years, let alone still making me money. I am now in college and do not have nearly enough time to be constantly updating it, however when I do my earnings increase. While I am not getting rich off of it, it's a fantastic way to earn some extra money each month.

At first, creating a blog is a lot of work. You have to find the right niche, do keyword research, get backlinks, etc. However, after the beginning stages are over you will find yourself doing less and less work, while earning more and more money off of services such as Adsense (which is what I use) due to increased traffic. So if you are on the fence about whether or not to create a blog and already have an interesting niche that people would want to learn more about, then go for it! I can guarantee that your future self will be kicking you if you decide not to do it. This is corny, but....you wont succeed unless you try. Good luck and make some money online!