So first of all I would like to state my credentials. I am the creator, founder and content manger of Nothinginlife.com and of TalentBank.com, and ApplyMarketing.com two of which run on the offer free stuff business plan. During the day, I act as the Associate Producer of the Computing and Technology Cannel for an Internet product comparison site in Manhattan. In addition I have helped various smaller sites with promotion. In keeping with my beliefs, I created Nothinginlife.com and Talentbank.com for free. Obviously I spent $70 to register the domain names, but the ideas, all the graphics, the content, the tools and the promotion has all been done free of charge.

So the first thing I would like to explain is most frequently asked question “Why is this stuff free?” Well as the old saying goes Nothing in life is free. To explain this question I will have to divide freebies up into three categories: “Totally Free”, “Free With Shipping” and “Free After Rebate”.

Totally Free Stuff
These offers are obviously the best and trusted form of free stuff. This is what every freeloader looks for when they search the net, the opportunity to obtain goods and services absolutely free of charge. I have noticed that as sites become larger they offer less and less of these true freebies and they sell out to pushing below average freebies that pay the site every time an item is requested. The best freebies on the net are those that offer no compensation to the site. When I first created nothinginlife.com all the free offers I posted were those free links that generated revenue, then I went into my site as an unbiased user and surfed my own site only to find that many times I had to compromise totally free for free with shipping and there was really nothing as a user I would want to sign up for. So what I decided to do was to sacrifice revenue for content, so I posted some really good freebies that were placed with the only purpose of making my users happy. Eventually as my site grows, I am less reliant on the free stuff that pays me and more reliant on advertising and I was able to offer more and more good totally free stuff. But as I said previously Nothing in life is free. Each time someone is offering you something for absolutely no return, they are asking for compensation in form of information or advertising. These companies are offering a free item in exchange for valuable demographic and psychographic information that they could use to gather information on your behavior and interests and eventually use this information to more effectively influence your buying decision. So in return for a free T-Shirt you are providing the company with information about yourself or even agreeing to sign up for a newsletter that serves as a vehicle to promote their goods. You also may agree to view ads or even click on ads to obtain free merchandise. Unfortunately these totally free offers are also the most difficult to obtain and take the longest to arrive. The totally free services that the net offers are almost always paid for by advertising. The way alladvantage is able to pay you to surf is by selling advertising and giving you a small percentage of what they make in advertising revenue. Please read my section on Why freebies never even reach you. If you would like to read another opinion Click Here

Free With Shipping
These offers are a completely different beast than totally free offers, because there is actually money involved. The truth behind Free With Shipping (FWS) is that companies have deals with the manufactures of these products to sell them at a promotional price or even free. Some of the cost may be compensated in the cost of shipping. Sometimes these offers are gateway offers to try and temp you to buy more expensive items. In most cases, these freebies are of much better quality and the probability that you will receive these freebies are much higher because the stock is usually rotated, replenished and tracked.

Free After Rebate
The way Free After Rebate works is when you are offered an item that cost $20 and promised a rebate for the full amount after the point of purchase. These freebies are also good in quality, and once again because money is involved, more likely to show up at your door. The only problem with this type of promotion is that the rebates often take many months to redeem after the purchase is made. Also there is the drop out rate of all those people who either forget to submit the rebate or are just too inconvenienced to bother filling out the form.

So now that you understand a little about how freebies work and the different types of freebies, I will move on to the next frequently asked question. “Why don’t I receive all the freebies I sign up for?” Well there are many answers to this question. Once again it depends on the type of freebie, its not likely that you’ll get stiffed on a free after rebate offer, but a totally free offer that just required your email, may never arrive. The most common answer is that the company who offered these freebies didn’t anticipate the response of the freebie and simply ran out. Oh yea and they forgot to tell you that they ran out or they never updated their page. To avoid this I recommend reading the article on Pitfalls of offering freebies Click Here. If you have a freebie offer that you never received I’d like you to E-Mail Us. I’m still waiting for the free envelopes from Postage4free.com I sent away for over 6 months ago. 

Most of all be wary of offers you receive in emails that you never subscribed to.

Here is an artilce from a visitor about the cost of free.