Let’s have a little fun today and play a game! I’m going to give you a list of things and you tell me what they all have in common. Ready? Here we go:
- MySpace -> Facebook
- DVD -> Blue Ray
- Gas Cars -> Hybrid Cars
- 3G -> 4G
- Live TV -> DVR
- Flip Cell Phones -> Smartphones
OK, the quiz is over. Do you have the answer? Hopefully this wasn’t too difficult for you. The answer is the list to the left of the arrow are things that are outdated. To the right of the arrow are the products of the future. They all have a profound effect on how we go about our daily lives. I have one more to add to the list:
- SwagBucks -> Ibotta
I know what you are thinking, “What the heck is Ibotta”? The answer is the wave of the future. I had the opportunity to get a sneak peak at Ibotta before it is released to the world. {Editor Note: Ibotta has officially launched!! Click here for the app!} All I can say is WOW! Before I tell you all about the amazingness of Ibotta, some of you may be unaware of SwagBucks.
A quick overview of SwagBucks is it is a free website that you sign up for and get earn “swag bucks” for doing things online. You then redeem these “swag bucks” for merchandise. The problem with Swag Bucks is that 1 point isn’t equal to $1. One point is worth a fraction of $1.
Up until now, Swag Bucks has been the leader in this market. Until now. Ibotta, which will release to the world later this month is the future. Ibotta is a free app for your iPhone or iPad (Android is coming soon) that allows you to earn cold hard cash on products you use. What makes Ibotta unique is that is personalized for you. As you use it more and more, the app “learns” you and tailors to you the product offerings. In other words, you won’t get a bunch of products that you don’t have an interest in using.
You may be thinking, “Yeah, but there probably aren’t any products that I use offered.” I would bet you that you would be wrong. They already have partnerships with many of the top 20 global food and consumer brand companies. And based on what I saw, I believe it.
Let me tell you a little more how it works:
- Once you have the app, simply start it up and find products that you are going to be buying when you go shopping. You can either look at all of the products together, or sort by category.
- When you find a product, you have a few ways on earning money: learn a quick fact about the product, watch a short video, or answer a question about the product, among other things.
- Then, go shopping. Currently, the app has partnerships with Target, Walmart and Walgreen’s, and they are in the process of adding many more stores.
- When you get home, use the app to take a picture of your receipt. Within 24 hours, you have cash in your account.
- From there, transfer the money to your Paypal account or make a donation to your local school.
Ibotta sports the highest payout per product in the industry. They are able to do this by cutting out the middleman. If you are worried about your personal info, you need not worry. Ibotta only collects your email address to make sure you are a real person. They will also ask for your gender, date of birth and zip code. These are needed to personalize the product offerings to you. That’s it. And they never sell this info to anyone or other business.
By now you are probably trying to pick your tongue off of the floor! There are other things about the app that I love that are really cool. For instance, let’s say you are looking for a product in the store and you aren’t sure if what you see is the same thing that is on the app. No problem, as you can take a picture of the product and the app will tell you if it’s a match!
You can also create a shopping list and email to someone else if they are doing the shopping. This way, I can create the shopping list, email it to my girlfriend, and she can pick up the items while I watch the game. When she comes home, I take a pic of the receipt and get cash in my account! How great is that?! (Note to the men reading this: I am not encouraging or recommending this strategy. I cannot be held responsible for any fights if you do use this technique with your significant other.)
Finally, you can still use manufacturers coupons and the like with this app. There is no need to change any of your shopping habits.
As I said before, Ibotta launches later this month. You can use this link to go to the website and provide your email address to get on the waiting list for when the app launches. You may be wondering why you need to get on the list as opposed to just going to their website. The reason is because by clicking on the link above, you are guaranteed to be one of the first start using the app. If you simply go to the website on your own, you have no guarantee of getting to download the app when it becomes available. (I know this sounds crazy, but there is some serious hype surrounding the launch of the app, so it’s best to use the link so you know you will guaranteed a spot.)
{Editor’s note: I downloaded the app this morning and scrolled through the offers. I found three things I needed to buy on the app. I paid $6.29 for the items. Through Ibotta I earned $1.75. That means I just saved 28% on what I bought. It took me a cool two minutes to take the survey and learn facts about the products. I highly suggest you try it out.}
Download the free Ibotta here and start getting cash for shopping!
Per my terms of disclosure, I am not getting paid anything from Ibotta for writing this post. I wrote this post because that’s how impressed I was with this app. If you click on the links and earn cash back from Ibotta (meaning they deposit money into your Paypal account), I get a referral fee. You can get a referral fee as well by getting your friends to sign up as well.
{ 4 comments… read them below or add one }
Swag bucks is a glorified affiliate program masked as a rewards site. This is different how again?
Ibotta is different in that you get money for buying the products you already buy. There is not earning “points” that you have to redeem. You earn cash (and a decent amount) that you can transfer to Paypal. Put another way, when I used Swag Bucks, it was a lot of work for me to do to get the “swag bucks”. With Ibotta, I only have to review the app to see if there are things on my shopping list on the app that I can get cash for.
I haven’t tried this app yet, but I do like the idea of earning cash rather than points. Cash has less fine print, it’s value is straightforward, and it can never be taken away once its deposited in your account. Points, on the other hand, are more confusing with regard to valuation, they carry more fine print, and they’re subject to expiration.
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I agree….there is too much work involved with trying to figure out the value of points and whether a deal really is a deal.