free referrals for PTC with traffic exchange programs

This post contains short introduction to manual traffic Exchange programs and discuses how effective is this free method used get referrals for PTC web sites.

What is manual traffic exchange programs?
Concept of traffic exchange is very simple – you visit other people websites to get your website visited by others. This process is organized by traffic exchange websites where you have to register and submit your website. Usually joining traffic Exchange programs is free, but paid membership upgrades are available.

You can submit on or couple of websites (you can submit referral links too). How many websites can you submit depends on traffic exchange program you are using and your membership type.
The number of times your website will be browsed by other traffic Exchange members depends on how many times have you visited other websites and Exchange ratio. If Exchange ratio is 1:1 that means your website will be browsed as much times as you have browsed other websites. Usually ratio for standard members are from 5:4 to even 1:1 in best traffic exchange programs. Of course you can buy traffic exchange credits too as well as receive money instead of credits for surfing websites (There are lot of variations depending on traffic exchange program you are using).

Traffic is usually counted in Exchange credits 1 credit = 1 visit to your website. Depending on traffic Exchange program there are lot of options available you can set up in your account to organize your traffic. For example; geographical targeting, amount of visits per day etc.
All traffic exchange programs provide affiliate programs too, that means you can receive traffic exchange credits when your referral surfs websites. Plus, some traffic exchanges will even pay you money (around 0,10$ per referral) for referring others.


Things you should remember about traffic exchange programs

• Don`t expect too much. Just because thousand people will visit your website doesn't mean you will made a single sale or get a single sign up. Most likely 50% of them will not even read the title of your website, because your website will be only one of hundred other websites surfed that day.

• Quality of traffic you will get from traffic Exchange programs is low quality. Low quality mean that no matter how good your product or service is only few visitors from thousand will actually sign up but there are great chance that no one will. Everything depends on how good you are at choosing what and how to promote with traffic Exchange programs (do you know what other traffic exchangers are interested in?).

• If you will not have at least few active referral traffic exchange is just a waste of time for you. Because you will not be able to surf enough websites by your own to get enough exposures four your websites to get any results from that.

• If You use traffic exchange programs (as well as PTC) to get traffic for your website or blog you are NOT allowed to place there any ads delivered by AdSense, Bidvertise and other PPC advertising services. Read more about AdSense and traffic exchange.
  

How to get referrals for PTC web sites with traffic Exchange programs?
So, the question is: Can you get referrals for your PTC web sites using traffic exchange programs? And the answer is YES. Maybe it`s not the best method, but anyway it works.

Because about 90% of websites promoted in traffic exchanges are PTC web sites, different MLM programs and other traffic exchange programs. So, people who are exchanging traffic with you most likely already knows what PTC is and there are good chance that they will be interested in PTC web site you are promoting.

It is useless to promote well known PTC sites like Neobux or Clixsense, because most likely if there are people who is interested in earning money with PTC they already have accounts there.

Get the best results by promoting new PTC web sites. That is my only advice I can give you about traffic exchange programs. So, if you are looking for a ways to get some free referrals it`s good if you have few thousands of traffic Exchange credits when a new and promising PTC site launches.

There are literally hundreds of traffic Exchange programs, but I would recommend you to start by signing up to these two: EasyHits4U and TarfficSwarm and others (leave a comment with link if you know a good traffic exchange program).

If You havn`t noticed there are PTC websites like Clicksia, Cash-Harvest, Incentria and many others where you can Exchange traffic too.

TuiBux – sold and currently under maintenance

Few days ago notification about closing website for maintenance purposes appeared on TuiBux website. There were mentioned that website will not be working for up to 12 hours, but as we can see almost two days have passed.

In few forums information appeared that TuiBux (and TuiCach as well) is for sale. TuiBux was listed in Flippa (website marketplace) on 23 August and currently has been sold in auction for 5 500$.

Currently there are few of other Bux websites for sale: UltimateClix, Jaysu and Hits4Bux

[ update 31.08.2009. ] TuiBux is back.

Bux (PTC) sites and ponzi schemes - where is the difference?

In this post I want to explain what is Bux sites (form of PTC site) and what is ponzi schemes and what`s the difference between Bux site and ponzi scheme masked as Bux site.

What is ponzi scheme?
First of all let`s identify what is ponzi schame? Here is definition:

A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to separate investors from their own money or money paid by subsequent investors, rather than from any actual profit earned. The Ponzi scheme usually offers returns that other investments cannot guarantee in order to entice new investors, in the form of short-term returns that are either abnormally high or unusually consistent.

From: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ponzi_scheme

As we can see the mine indication for ponzi schemes is that they don’t have a real source of income. They are paying their investors with their own and other investors money. That means ponzi schemes = scam.
They have to recruit new investors who invest money all the time to keep their business running. That’s why they use aggressive advertising campaigns. A good example of ponzi schemes is HYIP (High Yield Investment Program) who claims to triple your money within 24 hours. I strongly recommend you to stay away from them.
By the way they were named that because of famous cheater Carlos Ponzi.

What is a Bux site?
A Bux site is basically the same as PTC site – members are paid for clicking and viewing advertisements. The difference is that Bux sites usually pays around 0,01$ per click while classic PTC sites only around 0,001 – 0,05$ per click.

It follows that Bux sites is way more expensive for advertisers to promote their products, and there are very small number of advertisers who are ready to use Bux sites to promote their products (and why should they when they can get even ten times?).

So, Bux site can’t exists only as middleman between advertisers and visitor (members), because they wouldn’t be able to provide enough sponsored advertisements for their members to motivate them stay active. That’s why majority of sponsored advertisements served for clicking is their own.
So, the mine difference between classic PTC site and Bux site is that Bux site is middleman between visitors and advertisers and advertiser itself too. Can such form of PTC be productive and tenacious?

Let’s take a look at whole process from other side. To earn money as Affiliate you need to have a source of traffic and you have to be able to convert it into sales and/or signups (that can be don by choosing the appropriate product for the traffic you have). Probably you have heard a lot about importance of having a list of sales prospects (potential costumers) to be successful in affiliate marketing. And that’s right; especially when a new product comes out it is important that you have ability to inform thousands of potential buyers.

If you are owner of Bux site, that’s exactly what you have - a list of sales prospects. The difference is that you are paying your potential costumers for viewing your products.
Of course part of the Bux sites earnings still comes from their members (membership upgrades, referral sales etc.), but they have outer source of income and that’s the mine reason why they are not ponzi schemes.

So, how stable the Bux site will be depends on how good marketer the owner is, and how big capital reserve he haw (will after one unfortunate affiliate campaign he will bankrupt or not?).

So, my answer is Yes, Bux sites are not scam until they are paying and they even can become even extremely successful too (there are one great example for that – NeoBux. It’s online now for couple of years and paid out more than 10 millions of dollars already).


What is ponzi scheme masked as Bux site?
So, the ponzi scheme masked as Bux site looks exactly as regular Bux site, but it don`t have any outer income source. Money that’s paid out to it’s members comes only from membership upgrade, referral sales etc. It’s mathematically impossible to keep running business that way for long, because no one will invest if payouts will decrease and it’s impossible to increase payments if no one is investing. The line between Bux site and Ponzi scheme is extremely thin.

A lot of Bux sites become a ponzi schems after their owners fails to succeed in affiliate marketing and they have to find a way to get their members to invest more and at the same time how to pay out less, and these ways are usually fraudulent. (one of the best known examples is Bux.to. They sold fake referrals)

Conclusion and Advice
There is no way you can tell whether it’s a Bux site or ponzi scheme masked as Bux site, so all you can do is be careful. Most likely if you will join a Bux site that is ponzi site You will be able to still receive few payments before it stops paying or disappears.

My strategy is simple. Don’t invest too much or don`t in vest at all in new Bux sites and when you earn something invest it in highly trusted PTC sites.

BpBux - Under Construction

BpBux is under construction right now, but they will be back soon. That's what they say and meanwhile there is no reason to question that.


If honestly, I agree that they needed some changes. For example, their layout and design wasn't too good, because of that awful sliding information section and little bit confusing navigation too.

There is no detailed information given about what will happen with rented referrals and so on and that`s a bit confusing, but we will find out that soon. However, it`s mentioned that payments made to BpBux is non-refundable and any discussions about that can lead to account suspension.

Links and Resources

This is the place where I have collected links to different resources I used to build this blog as well as links to communities I`m member of and other interesting websites and blogs.


Resources and tools I used to create this blog:

• Blogger - free blog publishing tool from Google

• Simrandeep Singh - author of blogger template I`m using for this blog

• Zoho - online web applications geared towards increasing your productivity and offering easy collaboration

Communities I`m member of:

• Earn Money Space - community (forum) where you can make money online free, safely and easily.

• BlogCatalog - premiere social blog directory on the internet. Search, Browse, Rate and Review thousands of blog sites.

Websites/blogs about Paid To Click:

• EZmuney.net - Blog about PTC, containing PTC news, reviews and usseful tips.

• Scam-PTC-sites -,up to date list of SCAM PTC sites.

• Stella12 - blog about earning money online with PTC and not only.
  

Other websites/blogs:

• Ekstrex - Blog about games providing full versions of softwares and games.

PTC sites hosted by BuxHost – are they all scam and waste of your time ?

Here is a short summary about BuxHost and PTC sites (bux sites). I hope it will help you to decide whether join these sites or not.

For those who don’t know already BuxHost is company who provides service that allows anybody to become an owner of PTC site. For only 25$/month BuxHost will provide you with script, hosting and domain name. They will set up everything and you will have your own PTC site ready within an hour (how will you earn and will you be able to pay your members - that’s your problem, of course).


I’m sure a lot of people have asked themselves this question: Can I trust PTC sites hosted by BuxHost or are they just a waste of my time?
To answer this question I did some search for more information about Buxhost and here is what I found:

PTC sites hosted by BuxHost - the pros and cons
A website named PTC notes have publicized a list of arguments on why BuxHost PTC sites should be treated as trustful and reliable one’s (they also have a hedge list of BuxHost sites and ‘news and updates’ section where you can find latest information about what’s happening with these PTC sites). So, let’s take a look at their arguments:

I completely agree with arguments like:

• Information about BuxHost hosted sites owners isn’t hidden, that means you can actually find them.

• There are no excuses like: suspended hosting, bandwidth exceed etc. as BuxHost takes care about technical side.

• Owner can’t sell fake referrals and site stats (number of visitors, money payd out etc.) are real, because they haven’t got such option available.

( above is my summary; from:
http://www.ptcnotes.com/promote/buxhost)

What we can infer from these arguments is that BuxHost services are absolutely unsuitable for cheating purposes. So, we can say for sure that people who have decided to run their own BuxHost PTC site have all the best intentions.


Who are the owners/administrators of these sites…
So, looks like the big question is: Do they (BuxHost PTC site owners) have what it takes to successfully run a PTC site?
Here I would like to quote from PTCnotes one of their arguments:

The admin is serious, has the money for rent $25 / month, not just 15 years old kids playing free scripts

from: http://www.ptcnotes.com/promote/buxhost

There is no way I can agree with that. Plus, if you take a look at the “New and Updates” section on PTCnotes website, you can see how serious these administrators actually are. The greatest part of all news is about these PTC sites changing theirs TOS and click rates (and they are doing that quite often, and that’s too often).

There might be different reasons why they change click rates so often:

• I have this feeling about few of BuxHost hosted PTC sites that their administrators are just experimenting with their sites (and their members) in hope that one day they will find the lucky combination that will allow them to finally earn something. There is no way we can talk about any kind of stability here.

• There are few one’s who increase their rates, as I understand, to get more people to sign up and get more upgrades. When they have reached their aim, they decrease the rates again.

• There are few BuxHost hosted PTC sites that are simply owned by morons (read more: Platine-Bux or the Worst PTC Site Ever)

Of course there are few BuxHost hosted PTC sites that pays their members. The problem – there is no way you can tell witch are the one’s, because they all looks the same.

Violation of copyrights and legal process against BuxHost
That far was about owners, administrators of BuxHost hosted PTC sites. But there is one big problem with BuxHost itself. BuxHost have violated copyrights of PTCpay (BuxHost`s NextGeN script is suspiciously similar to PTCpay`s GeN3 script) and they have been sued. Here is information published on PTCpay forum:

PTCPay will be filing a law suit against the owner of buxhost.com for copyright violation and infringing international copyright laws. The owner of this site is using the GeN3 script and selling it as his own. We will take steps to also notify the local authorities about this incident, as well as the federal copyright agency in the Netherlands. The host will also receive a court order demanding them to shut down all his website services.

We will be suing for trademark and financial damage, as well as trademark violation, and violation of the contract which comes with the usage of the script.

From now on, local government agencies will be notified of all unlicensed GeN3 users. We will actively seek to add the names of the owners of these illegal websites to an official database of known scammers in both the US, Europe, and Asia by contacting the copyright protection agencies. Piracy is a serious offense and can result not only in large fines, up to $100,000 in the United States, but also can ruin the reputation of the violators.

from: http://ptcpay.com/forum/announcements/3368-ptcpay-lawsuit-against-buxhost.html#post14905

BuxHost have declared that their NextGeN script has nothing to do with GeN3 and there are still discussions going on about that. BuxHost are still online and a new PTC site comes into existence every day. So, I can’t tell you for sure whether to join or not BuxHost hosted PTC sites.

Best PTC (Paid To Click) Sites

It is not easy to compere PTC sites and decide which is the best one. Although majority of them are very similar to each other, when it comes to the best PTC sites they each has something unique that makes them stand out of the crowd, that is reason why they are the best one`s, I guess). So, here is my list:

Must Join PTC Sites:
There are three PTC sites: NeoBux, ClixSense and WordLinx witch I see as the best one`s, because they are online for several years now and have proved them as reliable, trustful and professional PTC sites with excellent earning potential. If you are new to earning with PTC or you haven`t joined them jet for some other reason, then these three PTC sites is simply must join for you:

ClixSense pays you to view advertisers ads for 30 seconds and pays usually 0,01 $ per ad, but 0,02 - 0,05$ ads are available quite often too. Plus, 10% referral earnings and chance to earn even more with ClicxSense affiliate program. With these and other great features and minimum payout of10$ and check as payment method it`s one of the kind PTC site.
Premium members (membership costs only 10$/year) gets up to 200 paid ads a day while standard members (free membership) gets around 10 ads available daily.
The number of sponsored ads available daily depends on your membership type and your country or region.

WordLinx is online for several years now and has proved it self as one of the most trustful PTC sites. Under the extremely simple design you will find a PTC site with great earning potential.
You are paid 0,05$ - 0,01$ for viewing ads for 30 seconds. The number of available ads per day varies, but you can increase it by upgrading membership to premium (only 10$/year).
WordLinx is very simple, even ascetic, PTC site - there is only one thing it can do for you, but it`s good at it - WordLinx earns you good money.

Neobux - the absolute leader among so called Bux sites. It has good earning potential, but what makes it different from other Bux sites is that it is stable (online for many years and payed out more than 10 millions $ already).
It has lot of great features like: referral renting option and recycling, highest security level and lot more.
Standard members: earns 0,01 - 0,015$ per click and 0,005 - 0,01$ per referral click and have 4+ ads/daily.
Golden members: 0,01 - 0,02$ per click and 0,01 - 0,02 per referral click and have 8+ ads/daily.
Number of available ads and amount paid for viewing them varies depending on your membership type and your geographical location. Earnings can be received instantly (PayPal and/or AlertPay) when payment minimum 2$ is reached.



Best PTC sites

Most important qualities for good PTC site is stability and reliability. So, as next one`s here are listed PTC sites that are very stable and trustful. It might take a bit longer to reach minimum payout for them (pays 0,001$ - 0,05$ per click), but they will be worth your time as well as money and time invested in them. These PTC sites should be your priority.


Clicksia & Incentria - two of the best PTC sites (very similar to each other). They offer not only Paid To Click, but traffic exchange and Get Paid To Signup too.
As a standard member you will get paid from 0,001$ to 0,005$ per click and around 15 ads are available daily. You can earn more by upgraing your membership, because premium members have more than 100 ads daily and they receive 100% referral earning.

Cash-Harvest, TheClickers and VelvetClix - these are PTC sites witch pays average of 0,001$ per click, but you will have 20, 30 or even more ads daily even if you are standard member.
Don`t get confussed of their little bit messy oldschool look They are one of the oldest PTC sites and very trusted too.


PPLinx & BuxP - not as old as previous one`s, but basically very much the same. Many ads worth around 0,001$ each.






Best Bux sites
There are lot of PTC sites witch pays 0,01$ per click and more, they are so called Bux sites. Althrough, they might seam to be better than the one`s listed abow, they are NOT. That`s, because there is great risk that they will turn into SCAM after while. 90% of Bux sites usualy stop paying and/or dissapear after two months.

Of course You should join some of them, because you can earn some money and get payout from them before that happans, but I would not reccomend you to invest much in them. Here are some of the best Bux sites:

PalmBux - the second best Bux site right after Neobux where you can earn some money. For now everything looks fine and there is no reason to be suspecious about it.

BpBux, SvBux & BuxWiz - these are other three Bux sites witch together with PalmBux & Neobux are the best ones that are around for now. So, if you are looking for some Bux sites to join and earn with these are the right one`s. But remember that they are still a Bux sites and they should be treated as that - carefully


Of course there are many of other good PTC sites I have not listed here, but my aim wasn`t to list here every single PTC site I have received payment from. I hope it was helpful and you found information you were looking for.
If something will change and I`m sure it will, I will update my list of best PTC sites.

How to Create a List of Best PTC Sites

You have to get some referrals to earn more with PTC and if you are like most of the people who earn money with PTC then you are a member of more than just one or two PTC sites. So most likely you are going to promote all of the PTC sites you are member of at once.

There are many free services you can use to create a list of PTC sites you are earning with. The two most popular are Blogger and Weebly


Creating a list of PTC sites you are earning with can be a good way to get some referrals. I have seen hundreds of lists of Best PTC sites, Trusted PTC etc., but majority of them are just not good or atleast not as good as they might be, because they don`t do what they were created for (make me want to join) and sometimes they are so messy that it`s even hard to understand what and why someone created something like that.

Some tips on how to make your list of PTC sites even better:

Choose a simple template/layout- If you are going to create a website that will contain only few pages, than you will not need a template with lot of images , JavaScript or Flash elements. I recommend you to choose the most simple template, layout, because it will have better load time and that`s important for SEO (Search Engine Optimization).

Don't overload your website with banners and ads - lot of people are making a huge mistake overloading the sidebar of website with advertisements, banners etc. I don`t recommend doing that, because:

• it distracts visitors from most important part of your website - your list of PTC sites;
• it is bad for SEO - lot of outgoing links and slower load time for your website;
• they are useless and most likely you are not going to earn much with them that way
  
• it dose not look good.
  

You should display some ads of course, but try to organize them.

Create "About Me" and "Contacts" pages - I think it`s absolutely necessary if you are going to get traffic from website/blog comments, because the main motivation for visitors who follows your links in website/blog comments is to get some information about the author of the comment. so don`t disappoint them. And if people are interested in who you are, they might be interested in contacting you too.
Another good reason for creating "About Me" and "Contacts" pages is that it gives others option to inform you, for example, if one of PTC sites You are promoting has turned into SCAM.
I`m not sure, but I think people might feel more comfortable to join PTC sites you are promoting, if they could see who`s promoting them.

Explain the list - I have seen only few lists with any comment about why PTC site are listed the way they are (is it because one PTC site has better design then other?... or better security?... ). If Your list is for experianced clickers, it`s absolutley OK, but for people who are new to PTC it might be confusing to chose withs one to join and why? at least it was for me when I started.

Analyze traffic - You should use Google Analytics, Statcounter or any other free tool to analyze your traffic (where your visitors is coming from, how much time they are spending on your website, and where and how they leave your website). It will give you some understanding of how to improve your list and make it even more effective.

These are some of qualities I think a good list of PTC sites should have to convert traffic into sign ups. Any ideas, experiance or comments?

Platine-Bux or the Worst PTC Site Ever

Now when there is BuxHost, everyone can become a owner of PTC/Bux site, because it takes only 25$ and 5 minutes to get and set up everything (hosting, script etc.). As a result a new Bux site upraises almost every day.

Platine-bux is one of them. with only a and might i say that it`s the worst PTC site I have ever seen. Here is promotional text for members from their home page:

Welcome to Platine-Bux.com

At Platine-Bux.com you will get paid by visiting our sponsor's ads.
We offer all features of today's PTC technology, including instant purchase processing and referral renting ($0.35 each).
Our payout minimum is at $5.00 (standard 10-15 days) or $2.00 (premium 72hrs max).

• Earn $0.0050 per click (Standard)
• Earn $0.0025 per referral click (Standard)

• Earn $0.01 per click (Premium)
• Earn $0.005 per click (Premium)

So, for Platine-Bux the question should be how much can you lose not how much can you earn.

You can rent a referral for 0,35$/month and you are paid for referral clicks 0,0025 $ as standard member or 0,005 $ as premium. There are 4 advertisements for standard members daily and 4+ for premium.

The earning potential is just funny. Looks like the owner and administrator of this PTC site have some serious problems with math, because here is how the earning potential looks like:

• As a standard member you can get maximum of 0,30 $/ month per referral if your referral clicks all ads every day without missing a single one. So, the best you can expect is to lose 0,05 $/month per referral (if you are super lucky).

• If you are premium member you theoretically can earn 0,25 per rented referral, but only in case your rented referrals clicks 100% of his/her ads. Most likely it will not happen and the best you can count on is getting back your investments.

• Of course you can get some direct referrals, but I wouldn't count on that, because I can`t imagine a way you could get someone to register with Paltine-Bux without putting a gun to his head.

Conclusion: Platine-Bux is not a SCAM, it`s just another great example of worst PTC site management.

[ update 17.08.2009.] - they have changed costs for referral renting from 0,35$ to 25$