General facts about Microworkers and Crowdtask

Crowdtask is a US-based platform which connects the „worker“ (people who carry out micro tasks) and the „employer“ (people who put the micro tasks on the platform). It seems there is another parallel platform called www.microworkers.com which has the same headquarter/company name (Weblabcenter Inc.) and the same web content as crowdtask.com. The person behind the platform is Nhatvi Nguyen who founded microworkers.com in 2010. In connection with this person the platform http://microtoilers.com/ was found. It is also a microjob platform but was closed in June 2015.

As the registration on crowdtasks.com is currently closed the evaluation was continued for the platform www.microworkers.com. This platform went into the Beta test phase in the middle of 2013 after it was redesigned completely.

The Microworkers process

1. New tasks are put in as campaigns. The campaign can also be created by a normal Worker member. For this, first the countries of the workers (Targeting), then the categories of the tasks are chosen. These are e.g.:
   • „Search, Click, and Engage“
   • Bookmark a page (digg, Delicious, Buzz,…)
   • Google (+1), Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Snapchat promotion
   • Yahoo Answers/Answebag/Quora/Wikians
   • Forums
   • Download
   • Install
   • Comment on Other Blogs
   • Write an honest review (Service, Product)
   • Write an Article
   • Mobile Applications (iPhone & Android)
   • Blog/Website Owners
   • Leads
   • Surveys
   • Testing
   • Other

   Further parameter like paying out, expenditure of time and number of persons have to be given.
   From the parameter it is calculated how much the purchaser has to pay for the campaign.

2. New tasks for the workers are shown on the web surface. The worker chooses by criteria, payment, and time expenditure and finds a detailed job description. For most tasks a proof is needed to show that the task is completed (e.g. code, text file upload, forum username etc.)
   The collected information on the completion of the task are made available for the purchaser. The purchaser can determine the deadline for the proof of the completion.
3. After the quality check of the completed task by the purchaser and after reaching at least 9 USD on the account the Worker can apply for paying out. The paying out is via PayPal or Moneybookers. The Worker can only apply for paying out when a PIN is given. This PIN is send to the Worker by post.
4. The data is transferred to the purchaser soon but the exact way could not be found out. Anyhow, the results or the tasks can be checked on the web interface. There is no separate report.

Microworkers website screenshots

Microworkers data usage range and spreading

Exact user numbers could not be found. As crowdtasks.com has only few information, we looked further into microworkers.com. Here the Facebook fans are ~ 29K and the Twitter follower are ~ 2K. On the startpage it says there are 700.000 MicroWorkers worldwide. The number of active Workers is not ascertainable.

Microworkers strength and weaknesses

Microworkers strength

• Own API for automation available and well documented
• Microworkers.com is responsive.

Microworkers weaknesses

• Programming error makes the parallel developed platform microtoilers.com visible without login (see http://microtoilers.com/jobs.php?sort=cost)
• PIN delivery via post is complicated and many users never got a PIN.
• No mobile App available.
• No commitment or level for Workers.

Personal evaluation of Microworkers

The platform Microworkers has a modern startpage. The rest of the websites behind it are not designed modern. Still, the platform is designed responsively.

The platform crowdtask.com seems quite modern. Unfortunately, the test could not be continued as the registration on the platform has been deactivated.

The platform Microworkers is constantly developed further. In the Microworker blog there are regular articles on new features and updates. There seems to be no email newsletter as I did not receive one.

The payment of the tasks is always under 1 USD. The highest payment is for forum posts. Generally, the payment is quite poor. Tasks are mostly posting in Social Media by influencers (high Klout Score, high number of Twitter follower/Facebook friends) or simple user registration.

After further investigation in Microworkers some negative feedback was found, some spoke of SCAM. Very often the Workers did not get the necessary PIN for the paying out.

 

 

Have you already tried Crowdtask and/or Microworkers? Let us know about your experience in the comments.