SolveYourProblem
Article Series: Freebies
How To Get Stuff For Free
Are
Freebies For Real?
If you tell someone that something is free,
they immediately start looking for the catch. After all, the
words of wisdom “there is no such thing as a free lunch” have
usually been proven true for people time and again throughout
life, and so a healthy cynicism towards free stuff usually
springs up with good reason. If you are one of these skeptical
types, however, you may be missing out on some really great
stuff. The truth is that you CAN get free things that
are really and truly free, and yes, actually worth having. You just have
to know where to look.
OK, here is where the caveat comes in. The definition of “free”
often depends on the definition of “cost.” As any economist
can tell you, cost really doesn’t only come down to how much
money you have to hand over to get something. There are additional
costs, like inconvenience and time spent doing something. And
true, some freebies have these “non monetary” kinds of costs
associated with them. You have to balance all of the costs
with the value of the free stuff you are getting and decide
if it is worth it to you. The two biggest costs associated
with freebies? Time and convenience are at the top of the list.
Time
is a big factor in many free offers. Companies want a
bit of your time in exchange for their free products. Indeed,
some companies literally want hours of your time. Have you
ever taken advantage of one of those “free weekend vacation”
offers in which you received free accommodation in a beach
house or condo for a weekend in exchange for suffering through
a long presentation and intense sales pitch? For some people,
they can handle the presentation and have no qualms about refusing
to buy anything and the free vacation more than makes up for
it. Other people would rather pay any price to avoid having
to listen to one of these spiels. So, while these weekends
are freebies, for some people, they cost too much.
More
often, a company wants your time in a less obvious way –
they want you to spend time filling out forms. These forms
may simply be your name, address and email address, or they
may be very lengthy, quizzing you about buying habits and the
like. The reason the companies want you to fill out these forms
is often for market research, and they are more than happy
to
give you a freebie in exchange for this. Many people find the
time spent filling out these forms will worth it to get a great
free product.
Convenience
is the other cost involved with many freebies. Time and convenience go hand in hand in some cases – after
all, it may not be especially convenient to fill out form after
form simply because it is time consuming, but convenience takes
another hit from freebies in the form of spam email. Often,
signing up for a freebie can land you on a spam email list,
and for some people, getting tons of spam is so inconvenient
that they would rather pay full price.
The truth about all of these costs of freebies is that the
freebie is in the eye of the beholder. You have to decide what
you are willing to put up with in order to get a free product.
Once you know the limits to your freebie costs, than you can
cash in on some really great products that don’t cost you a
dime. When you spend five minutes filling out a form and get
rewarded with a free DVD player that you have been wanting,
you will realize that there are free things out there to be
had.
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SolveYourProblem.com : 2009
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