MicroWorkers Review | Is It a Scam?

“Learn more about Microworkers by reading this full review.”

Is Microworkers a Scam?

Microworkers is a pretty interesting option when it comes to work from home opportunities.  The basic principle behind Microworkers is this: an “employer” posts a task and then workers can decide to accept the task.  If the task is completed in an acceptable manner the “employer” then pays the “worker.”

The interesting thing about the “employer” is that it is not really an employer in the traditional sense.  Anybody can post a job for workers.  In fact, if you have a simple task that you would like completed, you can post it with Microworkers! For now, let’s focus on the worker side of the business and how to make money using Microworkers.

The nice thing about Microworkers is that the tasks that are available to complete are usually extremely short, so there is lots of potential to make money very quickly.  For example, there may be a task that only takes a few minutes to complete, and while the pay may only be $1 that is still a great value relative to the amount of time that you spent on the task.  Many employers use the site to outsource tasks that are beneficial to their online business, so there are always a wide variety of tasks that are available on the site. (You might also want to check out my post with over 75 gig economy type jobs that offer lots of flexibility.)

With an option this intriguing it is worthwhile to look at both sides of the employer-worker relationship that Microworkers offers.  By fully understanding both sides you will be able to benefit from what both aspects of the service have to offer.  Let's look at the benefits of being a “worker” first.

The Scoop on Microworkers “Workers”

Quite often individuals just want to make a few bucks when they are looking over online work from home opportunities.  If you are looking to make some of the hours you spend online a bit more lucrative than becoming a Microworkers “worker” is a good option.

What Kind of Jobs Do Workers Do on Microworkers?

A micro job is considered a task that can be completed in less than ten minutes.  To get a better idea of what a micro job is, let's look at a few examples of jobs that are actually posted on the website.  Most of the jobs that are available will pay between $.10 and $2.20, and the website has a nice feature that provides an estimated time of completion for the micro job.

Here are a couple of the tasks that are posted on the site and the estimated time and pay rate for the tasks…

College Information Requests

Fill out a short form. Estimated time is only 3 minutes and the job pays $2.20. After you submit the form, copy the URL so that you have proof that the task was actually completed.  It is a good idea to keep in mind that most of the forms that you will be submitting will lead to receiving more email.

You may want to use a secondary email account when filling out forms in order to cut down on the amount of spam an unwanted email that you receive in your primary email account.  If you were to do the math as far as what you are making an hour for filling out the form it would about $44/hour. The downside is that you can only fill out the form once.

DISH Network Quote Requests

This form takes just about one minute to fill out and the pay for filling out the form is $1.55.  On closer inspection, the form did not require any sensitive personal information like credit card numbers or social security numbers, so it is relatively safe and again it does not require very much of your time.

When you first log on to the site you will be given a list of available micro jobs.  On this particular day, there were 198 available micro jobs listed on the site.  In order to get a better idea of what the micro-jobs would equate to in terms of an hourly salary, let's do a little number crunching…

How Much Money Can You Make on Microworkers?

All of the tasks that were listed for $.50 or more would take approximately 5 hours to complete and would earn you about $54 or roughly $11 an hour.  If you decided to move up and only complete tasks that paid over $1 that would take you down to a little over 3 hours, but then you would be earning approximately $13 an hour.  The higher the amount per project the more you earn on an hourly basis and the shorter the amount of time you actually spend working.

As you pick tasks to complete on Microworkers, it is a good idea to be selective.  If you want to get the most from the time that you spend working on tasks it is better to pick higher paying tasks that require a few more minutes.

Some who have used the site have felt that there were not actually a lot of jobs posted on the site considering how little you earn per task, but it is important to keep in mind that Microworkers is still a relatively new site and there are a number of new jobs being posted every day.  It is a good idea to check the site every day to see what new opportunities have been posted.

How Do I Get Paid?

Getting paid depends on whether your employer rates your job as being satisfactorily completed or not.  After you have set up your account and completed a few jobs you can check to see the status of completed jobs to see if they have been completed satisfactorily based on the desires of the employer.  This is important to keep in mind! If the employer does not feel that you have completed the work correctly, you will not be paid. It is important to make sure that you understand the instruction before taking on a micro job to avoid this kind of scenario.

Microworkers sends payments through several different methods including Paypal, Check, and Moneybookers.  Keep in mind that after you request a payout it usually takes up to 30 business days for the payment to process.

Should You Be a Worker?

If you decide to join Microworkers as a worker, you can definitely make some extra cash. However, when you look at it realistically, this is not the kind of work-at-home opportunity that is going to allow you to pay your bills every month.

To make the most of it, choose your tasks carefully. The more selective you are with your jobs, the better pay you make.  Sometimes we all go through rough patches and we need to find ways to make any extra money that we can.  Keep your options open, and keep in mind that you get a $1 bonus for just signing up for Microworkers. Every little bit counts when you’re in a bind.

Those that are looking for more ways to make money at home, will want to see the 40 legit ways I have listed to make money from home. But those looking for more serious work need to read all about work at home jobs that offer benefits and a list of entry-level work at home jobs.

The Scoop on Microworkers “Employers”

If you need to start outsourcing some of the work from your home business but find that hiring a virtual personal assistant is a little much for your budget, you can use Microworkers to break up the tasks and get them accomplished on a budget.  The main reason that employers use Microworkers is to promote and market online businesses.

Anyone who has tried to start an online business knows that it is hard to get traction at first.  You have to resort to a number of creative methods to get the word out about your business.  Social networks are a common way for businesses to get things rolling, but unless you have experience with how to use these networks to your advantage you may run into a few problems.  Social networks are all about fans and followers and Microworkers presents an excellent opportunity to build up fans and followers for the products and services that you offer.

Whether you offer to have workers “tweet” about your website, do a short review on their blog or website, or write about your site in a way to give it a boost in the search engine rankings all of these methods can be invaluable in helping your business to gain the word of mouth necessary to really take off.

With a little imagination, you can come up with several great micro jobs that can help boost the business for your website.  Even if you are not sold on joining Microworkers on the worker end, if you have your own website that you are trying to promote, or even if you are just thinking of starting one, there are a number of ways to use Microworkers to help promote and market your website.

The Bottom Line on Microworkers

At the end of the day, this is a good opportunity to add to your arsenal. It only takes a few minutes to sign up for Microworkers, either as a worker or employer and before you know it you can be enjoying all of the benefits that this creative outsourcing site has to offer. Get started here.

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