This weekend I stumbled across a recently new website that may be the holy grail of homesteading—-the ability to safely earn some money from the homestead. I’m not sure if this will violate any of Chuck’s policies but I feel it is very pertinent to homesteading and so I’m posting it here. I won’t be long-winded, but let me tell you what I’ve learned.
First, my name is Steve Nelson and I’m a Contributing Member of this forum. I’ve been a member of this forum since its old Countryside days. I moderate the Link Library Forum down at the bottom of Homesteading Today. I have a B.S. degree in computer science and used to work as a software engineer and later as an IT Consultant. I’m also a retired Air Force enlisted man. My wife and I are both permanently disabled--she has MG and I recently had a battle with a spinal cord tumor in my neck. We live on a few acres in western Illinois. I dabble on eBay as member ID sanelson1 and my feedback rating is currently 297 and is a 100% positive. I just wanted to establish who I am.
What I stumbled upon is BigCrumbs.com which I believe is the first honest-to-goodness, legitimate way that I have found to make a few extra dollars from a home computer. Believe me I have looked at every home income opportunity hawked on the Internet and rejected them all for the scams that they are. BigCrumbs.com appears to be the one refreshing oasis in a desert of scams.
I'm posting this in an attempt to get the word out to all of us homesteaders first about this new company with a novel idea that was formed last year in Atlanta, Georgia. A small group of software engineers, who know the ins and outs of Internet eCommerce, started:
BigCrumbs.com
2451 Cumberland Pkwy
Suite 3422
Atlanta, GA 30339
for two reasons:
First, to empower consumers with the ability to maximize their hard-earned dollars by providing the biggest overall cash back rewards of any website or "rewards" credit card.
Second, to provide an extremely easy and fun income opportunity, that also features NO startup costs. Yes, you read correctly, it's FREE! Honest to God it actually is free! BigCrumbs.com is not some sort of Ponzi or pyramid scheme. No one at BigCrumbs.com will ever ask you for any money!
Having worked as a software engineer myself, I've known for years about how online retailers pay a referral commission to affiliate websites that provide links to the retailer. I know you've seen these websites that are littered with logos and links that provide a click-through to other retail sites. They're known as affiliate sites. There's a reason those links are there--to make money and lots of it! Even Homesteading Today has them at the top of the forum. They help defray the cost of running this forum.
If you click on one of those retailer links, the affiliate site will earn a few pennies even if you don't buy anything from the retailer. But if you do make a purchase, then the affiliate site will also earn a small referral commission for directing that golden traffic (a buying customer as opposed to those "just looking") to the retailer.
Previously, the only way to get in on this cash cow was to own and operate a large website that has lots of traffic and then try and redirect some of that traffic from your website to the online retailers. As usual, like so many other ways to make money, the "little guy" was left out in the cold.
Now enter BigCrumbs.com. Basically, BigCrumbs.com provides the opportunity and the means for "little guy" John Q. Public to gain a seat at the table. BigCrumbs.com is the affiliate website and John Q. Public is the traffic. The difference from all the others is BigCrumbs.com keeps track of individual John Q. Public’s traffic, then rewards John Q. Public with a piece of the pie. Yes, you heard right! Not only that, but will also reward Mr. Public for all his referral’s purchases down through 5 generations of referred members.
Why would BigCrumbs.com voluntarily have a business model that gives away some of the pie? REPEAT TRAFFIC FROM AN INCREASING ARMY OF LOYAL MEMBERS IS WHY!!! That's something that the millions of other sites who depend on the random clicks that come from being at the top of Google and other search engines don't have. By the way, that's one of the ways Google.com makes some of their billions of dollars. You search for an item on Google, click on the link to the online retailer (Google makes a penny or two from that click), then if you make a purchase on the retailer’s website Google makes a nice percentage as a referral commission. It’s that easy.
BigCrumbs.com has already signed 136 merchants as of this weekend. They range from A1Wireless.com to Zones.com and include sites like eBay, 1-800Flowers, BestBuy, BooksAMillion, Buy.com, CircuitCity, Dell, Drugstore.com, GospelDirect.com, iTunes.com, Kohls, LaneBryant, Lerners, OfficeDepot, OfficeMax, OldNavy, Overstock.com, PetsMart, Plow & Hearth, Sears, SharperImage, SmartBargains, Target, TigerDirect, and ToysRUs to name a few.
I only discovered and signed up with BigCrumbs.com a few days ago and I make no claims of untold riches coming to you or me for that matter. I'm as new to it as can be so I have no empirical evidence to prove all this, but it all just makes good sense to me. Please understand I am a skeptic and I’m proud to say that I’ve never been taken in by any get rich quick schemes. But, since BigCrumbs.com never asks for money and it takes nothing more than basic contact information to sign up, I thought I'd give it a shot and you also. Lord only knows how many other websites already have our contact info!
If you want to know more, click on my BigCrumbs.com referral link and check it out:
BigCrumbs.com
Sincerely,
Steve Nelson
[Update 2/5/07 10am]
A couple things I didn't include because the post was already too long was the two types of member accounts. Neither cost you anything and you can never change account types once you join. I felt it necessary to add the following because of some replies about MLM.
First is the CrumbSaver account which looks to be for someone who spends a lot of their own money online and doesn't want to get involved in referrals (MLM). The CrumbSaver gets a larger percentage commission back from their own spending.
The other is the CrumbEarner account for all the rest of us who spend some money online, but need the power of numbers to get a better return. The CrumbEarner gets a smaller commission, but also gets it from their own spending plus 5 generations of referrals.
Some folks are commenting on this being MLM, but since no one sells anything to anybody it passes muster with Georgia state law.
Finally, if you're worried about my referral link, then don't use it. Just go to BigCrumbs.com and join without being referred. I just felt that some homesteaders out there could benefit from this.
Hope this helps.
-- Steve
