How to Earn Dividends

• 1). Research companies in order to find out which firms are currently paying dividends. Not all companies pay dividends. You can use Yahoo! Finance, Google Finance or any other financial source that will display if a company currently has a dividend yield. If a company is preparing to pay out dividends, it will have a declaration date when the board of directors sets the dividend and announces the ex-dividend date.
  
  
• 2). Purchase shares of stock in a company using your brokerage account prior to its ex-dividend date. In order to qualify for the dividend payment, you must be on the list of shareholders during the record date. Because pending transactions take a few days to settle, the ex-dividend date, which is two to four days before the record date, is the cutoff date to receive the dividends.
  
  
• 3). Hold the shares of stock until after the record date. Afterward, you can sell off the shares and you will still receive the dividends on the payment date.