Clickworker--A Review

Data:
Home page:  http://www.clickworker.com/en/

Rate of Pay:  varies with task
Payment Details: Paid monthly on the 7th via PayPal

What is Clickworker?

Clickworker is another online task work site.  You are paid by the task, not by the hour, different tasks have different rates of pay which will be noted on the job description.  Tasks include: surveys, fact checking, finding addresses, website evaluations similar to the tasks on Leapforce, writing content for webpages and editing/reviewing content that other workers wrote.  Compared to what Leapforce workers can earn, the pay here is low.  Clickworker claims that the average clickworker makes around $9/hr.  That is lower than Leapforce and I’m not convinced that you can make that much, there are far more low paying jobs available than high-paying ones.  Granted, I haven’t completed all the possible assessments yet so I may not be seeing every type of job that is available, but I am qualified for writing/editing, the big website evaluation project.  

How Do You Get Started?

Just go on the website, click on "For Clickworkers" at the top of the page and register.  They will ask just basic information; no resume or references are required.  Once are registered, sign in as a Clickworker and begin by taking some assessments. You must take a few assessments before you will be given any jobs.  First you will do a language assessment on any languages you speak; native speakers will have no trouble passing this.  Once you pass the language assessment you can qualify for Author and Editor jobs.  Other assessments will appear under your Assessments tab, which you can take if you are interested.  Once you have passed the assessments, jobs that you qualify for will start to appear on your task page.  To start working, just click on a job, read the instructions and start working. 

Before you are paid, your work will be evaluated and anything that was done wrong will be rejected; in some cases you will be allowed to correct your mistakes or deficiencies and resubmit the job.  

My Review:

I have not been working on this site for very long, mostly because I can make A LOT more on Leapforce, but I’ve recently worked on a set of tasks called UHRS, these tasks are similar to those you would find on Leapforce.   The interface for these tasks has a very annoying count-down clock in the upper left on these tasks, so you know you are being timed even though you are being paid by the task and not by time spent on it.  I have not been given credit for all of the tasks I’ve completed and I suspect that I am not being paid on the tasks where I went into “Over-time”.  Clickworker does not allow anywhere near the amount of time that Leapforce does on similar tasks, this may be Clickworker’s way to reject payment for work but still get the task completed.  The more I work on Clickworker tasks the less I like it.

A minor annoyance, but since this is a review I’ll mention it; although they are picky about your punctuation, spelling and word usage in the tasks you complete for them, Clickworker appears not so concerned about the same issues in the task instructions on their own site (I’ve found several usage and spelling mistakes).

Because of the low pay and the things that annoy me about the site I would only use Clickworker as a back-up source of income when low on work from other sources, or when you want something you can do for very short periods while doing other things.

Next Topic:  My thoughts about managing your time while working a “regular” job and doing extra work from home.  Also I’ll be starting to work on “Mturk” another task work site and review it in the coming weeks.

Leapforce Update

I have worked for Leapforce for 2 years now (see my previous Leapforce post), making an average of $300-400/month.  It’s a good job for me, but I’m not sure it is right for everyone.  It is very detailed work, and it is work, just because you are evaluating web sites does not mean you are being paid to “surf the internet”.  To be successful at this job you will need good analytical skills and the ability to understand and follow detailed directions.

When you are being evaluated for the job and while you are working for Leapforce you will have 100-200 pages of detailed guidelines you must learn and use to evaluate the websites you visit.  You can not make your own judgments about the websites, you must use their guidelines even if you do not agree with them. You will be evaluated on your work, both how many tasks you complete and how well you follow the guidelines.  This can be frustrating; some tasks do not seem to allow enough time to do a thorough evaluation.  Sometimes Leapforce will make adjustments to the allotted time for tasks, sometimes they don’t.

I don’t know how they evaluate the quality of your work.  My quality ratings have gone back and forth from good to bad and everywhere in between.  I don’t think that the quality of my work has really changed that drastically so my suspicion is that different people do the evaluations, or it may depend on which individual tasks they choose to evaluate you on, they can’t evaluate every task you do so they pick several at random (I think).  Fortunately they now provide very detailed feedback on each task they evaluated so you can understand your errors and (hopefully) not make the same ones again.  They do keep renewing my contract so it seems that they will keep you on as long as you aren’t getting consistently bad ratings, and they are much more lenient about poor ratings during your first six months.

One thing that is essential if you do this job is a good anti-virus program that is frequently updated.  You will at some point click on a malicious site and you have to rely on your antivirus program to stop anything from infecting your computer.  Norton has worked will for me for the last 2 years.  Also, be aware that you will occasionally end up on a porn site even if you tell Leapforce that you do not want to evaluate porn.  You can release a task with a porn site if you really don’t want to deal with it.

There are several types of tasks that you will be given to do.  I can’t go into the details about the tasks because of the confidentiality agreement I signed.  Some tasks are enjoyable to work on, some are tedious and some seem totally pointless.  You never know what type of tasks will be in your task list until you log in and start working.  Another bit of frustration comes when there is little or no work for you to do.  This happens most often in the summer, so you may not be able to make as much money in the summer as other times of the year.

In conclusion, working for Leapforce is much like any other job, frustrating and tedious at times, interesting an enjoyable at other times. The good points about working for Leapforce are that your work hours are flexible and you can do it from home and it pays better than other online work I have investigated.  The job still pays $13.50/hr.  You can work at any time of day and for as long as you want, providing there are tasks for you to do.

Use this link to apply:   https://www.leapforceathome.com/qrp/public/jobs/list?uref=f16e8eb5ab8dea5fccd319d7d970c6e7

I am currently investigating 2 other sites that offer pay for doing online tasks, some of it is similar to work on Leapforce, except these sites pay by the task rather than by the hour as Leapforce does.
See my  advice for taking the Leapforce Qualification Exam.

Next topic:  An online task site that I’m trying out, called Clickworker. 

Focus Groups

Focus groups operate differently from surveys.  A focus group is almost always conducted in person; in some cases you can participate remotely via phone or skype.  Depending on your attitude a focus group can either be a tedious experience or lots of fun.  If you enjoy interacting with people and giving your opinion on just about anything you will probably enjoy the experience, but remember you are being asked your opinion on what is important to the company doing the research not what you are interested in.  The last focus group I participated in was about how my electric bill was formatted, not earth-shattering stuff, but I was paid $100 for my time.

If you are asked to participate you will be given the time and location where you are to report.  You will be told how long the session will take and the amount of money you will be compensated. The session will be held in a conference room with usually 10-20 people and a moderator.  Usually the session will be recorded and you may also be observed live via 2-way mirror or CCTV by executives of the company that paid for the study.  The moderator will ask questions and lead the discussion, you are only expected to answer the questions honestly, not come up with ideas to help the company with marketing or anything else.  The session should about the same amount of time they told you it would.  Generally you will be given cash when you leave.

How do you get invited to a focus group?  Sometimes a local company will ask a research company to pull together a group of existing customers for the study, so you may be asked to join just because you are already a customer.  You can also register with market research firms that conduct focus groups and they will call you if you fit a study they are conducting.  If you register with a research firm be aware that they don’t want to use the same people over and over so you will probably only be called once or twice a year at the most.  You can also find focus groups listed on findfocusgroups.com

If you live in a small town it will probably be difficult for you to participate in focus groups as they are usually held in person in a large city.  

Next Topic:  Update on Leapforce

Make Extra Money with Paid Surveys

Do you feel that your opinions are ignored?  Do you always wonder who those people are who are cited as participants in surveys? Believe it or not, businesses actually do want to know what you think about the type of products and services they provide, and best of all some of them will pay you for your opinions.  

Short surveys will pay a few dollars or perhaps just an entry in a drawing, but if you are invited to a Bulletin board or Blog survey it will generally pay in the neighborhood of $100.  The latest thing in consumer research is the bulletin board where participants enter their opinions about the topic in their own words in blog-style posts and can enter into discussions about the topic at hand.  The participant usually contributes to the bulletin board daily over a period from one week to several months and the pay is usually from about $100 to $300 depending on the length of time required.

Bulletin board surveys are sweet; the pay is great and they don’t require that much time, but you will have to check in to the site every day and contribute something.  Generally you are required to give your opinion on the topic threads started by a moderator, or you may be asked to respond to surveys.  The moderator may ask you to expand on or explain your posts, or the moderator may ask additional questions.  If you have time and are interested in the topic, you can enter into discussions with other participants.  One bulletin board I was on included areas where participants could start their own discussions about hobbies, pets, money saving ideas, and other topics of personal interest.

Online surveys can be tedious especially if they are long, repetitive, or poorly designed.  You may often wish you could complain to the survey designer when the questions are vague or don’t make sense.  For instance the last survey I completed was about in-store shopping as specific stores, but the survey started asking about shopping on the store’s website, I never said I shopped on the website and there was no option for “not applicable” so I had to guess.  But that’s a problem for the business that paid for the research, they aren’t going to get accurate data.  Even if it’s frustrating you can be well paid for completing the survey.  Usually you are told in advance what the incentive (pay) is and approximately how long the survey will take to complete.  Some surveys only pay off with entries into a drawing for money or prizes.  It is your choice whether you think it will be worth your time to complete the survey.

Sometimes a survey can be in the form of a phone or webcam interview as well.  Often you will also have a phone interview with someone from the research firm before being invited to join a bulletin board survey.  Research firms are trying to get the full range of potential customers represented when they do a study, they also don’t want the study to be weighted too heavily in one particular demographic, so you may not be invited to join the study because your demographic is already full.  Don’t be insulted if you are told you don’t fit the study, this will happen often if you apply for them a lot, it only means that your demographic group has already been filled for that study.

So how do you get in on all this lucrative fun? Begin by visiting http://findfocusgroups.com/  On this site you will find hundreds of available surveys, bulletin boards, and focus groups to participate in.  You can limit your search by the city you live in (if you live in a large city), your state, or by category (demographic or topic).  Most often the studies listed on this site will be given by reputable research firms--there are scams out there and you have to be careful.  The studies listed will have a little information about the topic of the survey and the amount of compensation.  Click on one that you are interested in and you will be taken to a pre-screening survey.  If you fit the demographic they are looking for you will go to the survey or there will be a message that you will be called for a phone interview if they are considering inviting you to join the study.

The pre-screening survey will ask for your contact information, age, annual income, and other demographic data.  If the survey asks for more sensitive data like ID numbers, account numbers DO  NOT enter that data, surveys can be used as phishing scams and a legitimate research firm will not ask for this type of information.

Often you will be invited by the research firm to register with them so they can send you announcements of upcoming surveys.  As long as you are comfortable answering the questions they ask (they will request even more demographic information and about your interests and shopping habits) go ahead and register so you will learn of more opportunities to take paid surveys. 

You will not be able to make enough money to live on this way, but you will be able to earn some extra mad money.  In four months I have earned $285 doing this, and its painless and often fun.

Next Topic:  Focus Groups

Its Alive!

I've been away for a while, working on Leapforce mostly, its turned out to be a good supplement to my regular income. But I have a new goal, I'm planning to retire (from my library job anyway) in 2 years. I'll still have to work though.  So I'm back to looking into more opportunities to make money working from home, and this blog will be revived.

Recently I've done some paid surveys and focus groups, found some "lost" money online, investigated mystery shopping, and I'm working on some other ideas.  I'll be posting about all of these in the coming days.