How to get FREE gifts to give for Christmas, Holidays and Birthdays

In these tough financial times, all of us are looking for ways to save money and cut costs wherever possible. The holiday season and birthdays can surely be a budget buster when you have many people to buy gifts for. The good news is that there are many easy programs that you can join to help offset the cost of gift giving by making many of your gifts FREE! If you start now, within a year, you will surely accumulate enough rewards to earn free gifts, gift cards, etc.

All of these programs are legitimate, free and easy. You will be amazed at the amount of gifts and gift cards you will be able to get through these programs in a year's time. You can use the gift cards to give as the gift or use them to purchase gifts to give for Christmas, birthdays, Mother's Day, Father's Day, etc. A simple way to offset the cost of gift giving by receiving great gifts with minimal effort and the best part is, nobody has to know that you didn't spend a dime on their gift!

This is just a few of the many rewards programs that I use to give you an idea of what is out there for you to take advantage of. There are many sites that require you to take surveys to earn rewards such as Amazon gift certificates, etc. The more you explore these different programs, the more you will find.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Internet access
• A little bit of time

1. The first program that I belong to that has great rewards is MyPoints.com. MyPoints is a program where you will receive emails from them and all you need to do is click on the link in the emails. The link will take you to the sponsored website and you will receive 5 points each time you click on the link in the email, whether or not you actually browse the website that you're taken to. Points accumulate even faster when you take the surveys that they send to you and when you do your online shopping by going through the MyPoints website, as a lot of online stores are linked to them. You will receive points for each dollar you spend on the website that is linked to MyPoints. It is NOT necessary to purchase anything to accumulate points. Even when I don't make purchases, I earn a lot of points through just clicking on the links in the emails and generally earn enough to get about two $25 gift cards per year. There's a huge selection of retail and restaurant gift cards to choose from.

2. The next great program is MyCokeRewards.com. For anyone that drinks Coke products, this program is great. All you need to do is set up an account and enter the Coke rewards numbers that are on specially packaged Coke products. The points accumulate quickly and you can "buy" items with the points. There are usually really great gifts, gift cards, etc. that you can get for your points. If you purchase Coke products and have just a few minutes of time to enter the codes, it's nice to get something back from a company that you support with your purchase of their products.

3. Check with your cable provider for a rewards program. Our cable company is Charter and they have a program called Live It With Charter at LiveItWithCharter.com. All you need to do is sign up for the program, which is free to all of Charter's customers. Depending on the services that you get from them (phone, cable, internet), you will receive points each month based on the amount of your cable bill. Once the points accumulate, you can "buy" items from Charter on their redemption days. I have received several different items from this program, such as a coupon for a free turkey at Thanksgiving time, a backpack, a remote controlled Mercedes Benz for my son and a ToysRUs gift card. A great free program that gives back to you for purchasing your services from them.

4. Check with your bank and/or credit union for rewards programs. Many of them will have a rewards program where you can accumulate points for using a credit or debit card with them. Once you've accumulated enough points, you can trade them in for great gifts from a catalog.

Tips & Warnings

• There are SO many wonderful, easy programs out there that offer free rewards and it just takes a little bit of time to sign up and start accumulating reward points. Taking advantage of these programs is a huge step in cutting costs for Christmas, birthdays and other gift-giving Holidays. The best part is that it is FREE. You just need to know about it, sign up and start reaping the rewards!
• Be cautious of sites that seem to good to be true. Do your research. Check for user reviews of sites to find out if they are legitimate. You should NEVER have to give a credit card number or pay for legitimate rewards programs. Most programs just want a bit of your time in order for you to gain points and rewards. Good luck and have fun!!