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Using Google Play Rewards to Pay for Your Mobile Apps

Elizabeth Henges — Mon, 25 Sep 2017 18:02:25 +0000

Have you heard of Google Play Rewards? I can’t blame you if you haven’t–it’s not the most advertised app around. However, the app can help you earn Google Play credit, which you can then in turn use to buy new apps, upgrade free apps to premium/pro version, and pay for in-app purchases. It’s quite easy to use, too! Today you’re going to learn everything you need to know about the Google Play Rewards app (which is free, by the way), including recommendations to spend your new found funds on. Of course, please be aware that this is only an Android thing.

With that, let’s get started! First and foremost, you’ll definitely want to go ahead and download the Google Play Rewards app:

Google Play Rewards

What does the Google Play Rewards app do?

What Google Play Rewards does is give you surveys, and completing the surveys will give you up to $1 in Google Play credit (usually it’s around ten cents, though). This varies a bit from popular survey sites like SwagBucks, though. First off, you immediately get the credit added to your account (unless there’s a connection error, but then you’ll get the credit in a couple hours), so you don’t have to worry about waiting to redeem points or anything like that. Secondly, surveys and everything else are all handled in-app, so you don’t have to worry about having survey redirect and dead links, or being disqualified for a survey last minute like I’ve had happen all too often with Swagbucks. Finally, surveys only take a minute at the absolute most to fill out, so you don’t need to set any time aside to get work done. All and all it’s a much better version of Swagbucks, though of course unlike the latter you can’t really make a ton of money off it (though really, are those stories even true) and you’re only getting Google Play credit.

How do I make sure I keep getting surveys?

Google Play surveys are mainly personalized for you and the things that you do with your phone on your Google account. There will be occasional surveys that get more basic data about you that doesn’t offer any credit (things that most surveys will ask you such as age, pay grade, etc) and these will also help with your other surveys and what kinds you’ll get. In order to get the most out of the app, keep some things in mind:

Keep your location data on. This is the single most important thing you can do if you want to keep the surveys coming in. Most of Google Play Reward’s surveys are about asking if you’ve been to certain places and to rate your experience if you have–if you don’t have location services on, then you won’t be getting those surveys. It’s understandable if you don’t want location on at all times, as there’s plenty of reasons to not want that, but know that this app isn’t going to do much for you then.

Don’t lie on the surveys you get. Building off the above, Google Play will send surveys asking you if you’ve been to a location and none of the locations match up with anywhere you’ve been to (or even anywhere in your city). It can be tempting to fill out a survey to get a reward anyway, but there are plenty of reports out there that lying on the location surveys in turn seems to get you less surveys and lower credit rewards. After all, they do you where you’ve been. Besides, even clicking ‘none of the above’ gets you a credit reward, so there’s no real incentive to say anything other than the truth.

Watch YouTube videos on the same Google account your phone is tied to. The second most often surveys I get from the rewards app are surveys that pop up from time to time about the YouTube videos I watch. I actually don’t watch YouTube all that often, so it might pop up more often for more avid users. The YouTube surveys basically ask if you liked the video you watched, if the recommendations you’re presented are things you might click on, etc, and usually go for a bit more than the location surveys.

Don’t forget to answer the surveys that you have. Once you get a survey, you should get a notification and you have 24 hours to respond to it. You also get another notification when it’s about to expire as a reminder. It’s not a stretch of the logic to assume that if you let surveys expire Google Play will probably send less to you, so don’t let them expire if you’re able.

What should I use my credit on?

I’ve used Google Play Rewards for almost exactly two years now, and have made almost $81 dollars in credit. While not a gigantic amount, it’s more than enough to have some fun on the Play Store. I used a lot of my credit to either buy apps when they were on sale, or upgrade some free apps to an ad-free version of it. If you need some good Android apps to try out, here’s a couple recommendations below:

Nova Launcher Prime – $4.99

The normal version of Nova Launcher is free, but Prime really ups the home screen customization options. If you want a customizable home screen that you can make perfectly to your wishes, you can’t beat this!

Pocket Casts – $3.99

If you listen to podcasts, you need Pocket Casts. Pocket Casts is basically the number one podcast listening app, and for good reason–when I’ve listened to podcasts in the past, I found Pocket Casts had the options I needed to play the episodes the way I wanted to, and was far less buggy than the free options.

Goat Simulator – $4.99

What’s the fun if you don’t splurge on something silly every once and a while? Goat Simulator is just that, a silly little game starring a goat. Give it a whirl!

What do you recommend to buy from the Google Play Store? Let us know in the comments!

Using Google Play Rewards to Pay for Your Mobile Apps

7 Super Bowl Apps to Download Before the Big Game

Kyle Schurman — Mon, 23 Jan 2017 23:25:21 +0000

Kyle Schurman

The Super Bowl is the most watched television event every year, drawing both fanatical NFL followers and those who only watch the football for something to do between commercials. If you’ve been invited to a Super Bowl party with people who are more interested in the football than the ads, you may want to spend a bit of time prepping so you don’t stick out as the Super Bowl novice.

Our collection of the seven best Super Bowl apps are free to use, and they’ll give you all of the information you need to know about the Patriots, the Falcons, Super Bowl history, and Lady Gaga. With your impressive knowledge from these Super Bowl apps, you might even be picked to host the Super Bowl LII party next February!

Fox Sports Go

True Super Bowl fans will be watching the big game on a huge HDTV. But even bigger fans will have a second option available, just in case. After all, you may have to get a second helping of hot wings from the kitchen at some point during the game, and you don’t want to miss one play … or one commercial.

You can use the Fox Sports Go app to stream Super Bowl LI on your smartphone. This app is free for both iOS and Android users. Those viewing the game on the app will not need to enter proof that they have a pay TV service, which is great for cord cutters. Viewers using the app will receive both national advertisements as well as local ads during breaks in the game.

Live Odds

Impress your friends by knowing all of the Las Vegas odds on the Super Bowl, including all of the crazy bets. After all, those are the most fun. Everyone knows the Patriots are a field goal favorite, but not everyone knows you can wager on the color of Gatorade that will soak the winning coach.

The Live Odds app from SportsInsights will give you real-time information on each possible wager the sports books in Las Vegas are offering. You also can see trending information on how the public is wagering on the game, making it sound as if you spent several hours watching the Super Bowl prep shows to garner the latest information.

Live Odds is free to download, but you can make in-app purchases for more detailed content and historical information.

Super Bowl LI Houston

The official on-site Super Bowl LI app is available from the NFL. This free app is designed for people attending the game to learn about all of the different functions and events going on around the game. The app also contains a QR code for gaining admission to events.

Even if you aren’t attending the game, you can impress those at your Super Bowl party by knowing about all of the different experiences available, such as meeting famous NFL players. Maybe you can even recreate a similar experience at your party: Signing a few autographs while wearing your Joe Montana jersey isn’t illegal, is it?

Super Bowl NFL Emojis

Want to show all of your friends how big of a Patriots or Falcons fan you are? The official NFL Emoji app provides a series of emoji-like stickers you can insert at the top of your text messages. You can select from any of the 32 NFL teams to see their stickers.

So whether you’ve been a Patriots or Falcons fan forever — or for just a week or two — you can make it appear as though you’ve been with the team all along with this app! And when your team is winning at halftime, sending 51 consecutive texts with your team’s sticker at the top to your buddy who’s a fan of the other team is not in bad form at all.

Official Team Apps

If you want to do a deep-dive into information about the Patriots and Falcons before the game, download the official team apps for both of them. These Super Bowl apps allow you to go back and see highlights from the season and read game recaps.

You’ll have access to the player and team statistics. There’s live talk show broadcasts leading up to the game, as well as live press conference feeds. (And to answer your question, yes, there’s a photo gallery of the team cheerleaders inside the app.)

If you need some new gear — say an NFC Champion Falcons sweatshirt — you can order gear through the teams’ e-commerce stores in the free app.

At Ben’s Bargains, we’ve collected some coupons for the NFL Store that can help you save some money on Patriots and Falcons gear.

Super Bowl Trivia

If the game’s a blowout, the hot wings sauce barely has the kick of ketchup, and the commercials are a bore, perhaps you can still save your Super Bowl party with the Super Bowl Trivia app. With 50 Super Bowl games already in the books, developer Evel Bunny Studios has plenty of material to create dozens of trivia questions in its free app.

It’s in a multiple choice format, so even those who aren’t fanatical about the NFL or about the Super Bowl will have a chance. The app is free for Android users.

If you’re on the iOS format, consider the Super Bowl Quiz app. The quiz questions are sorted by category in this app, which is a nice feature.

Halftime Show

If you don’t know much about Lady Gaga, but you want to sound hip during the halftime show, you need to do your homework. The Gaga Daily app is free, and it will give you the latest news on Lady Gaga. With her appearance on the Super Bowl halftime show coming up, the app is loaded with current information. (As of this time, this app is only available for Android devices. An Apple iOS version is under development.)

If you’d rather just be able to familiarize yourself with Gaga’s songs before the halftime show, consider the Lada Gaga Songs & Lyrics Android app. It’s a pretty simple app, and with the lyrics available, you can sing along during the halftime show.

For iPhone users, the My Artist Alerts for Lady Gaga is the best free app, containing news, related tweets, and song lyrics.

You’ll be a Monster before you know it with these apps!

7 Super Bowl Apps to Download Before the Big Game