Site Review: www.guru.com
*Another Great Writer Wrangler Site Review: www.guru.com
By Laura Spencer
I have been a member at guru.com since before it was called guru.com (the site used to be known as CreativeMoonligher.com. There also used to be related sites called ITmoonlighter.com, OFFICEmoonlighter.com, and BIZmoonlighter.com. All of the sites were part of an overarching site called Emoonlighter.com.). My involvement with the site has always been solely as a guru (independent contractor).
At one time I even had a paid membership. My current membership is a free membership. (Ironically enough, the times I did get work through this site I was not a paying member.)
Things I Like About guru.com
- Navigation. I have looked at several other job bidding sites. I find the interface at www.guru.com to be clean and easy to follow.
- Project tracking. This site provides a project list of projects that I’ve bid on (Project Tracker), a Watch List for project that I’m interested in, and summary of past jobs.
- Online resume and portfolio. I like the convenience of having a resume stored online and readily available for potential clients to see. (Some levels of paid membership also allow you to link to websites that you have created or to create an online portfolio.)Â
- Regular leads. Even as a nonpaying member I receive more leads (averaging about six a month) from this site than from any of the other bidding sites where I am registered as a free member.
- Invoicing tool. Not only does the site provide an online invoicing tool, but also it keeps a record of every invoice that you’ve ever sent. I can still see invoices that I sent out over three years ago.
- Prompt Payment. I was paid quickly (within a few days) by direct deposit for the jobs that obtained through this site.
- Feedback Rating. I like being able to see how other contractors rated employers. I confess that I was a little nervous about being rated myself thinking that I might be downgraded unfairly, but it turned out that I received a high rating.
- Help System. The online help for this site is excellent.
Things I Don’t Like About guru.com
- The Site’s Cut. It’s important to remember that the site receives a percentage of your payment. This percentage is higher if you have a free membership.
- Other Bidders. At this site you cannot see what other bidders are bidding (or at least I haven’t been able to discover a way to do it).
- Project Quality. At most bidding site there is a significant quantity of jobs that are either described in such vague terms, that don’t seem to be anything that I want to do, or that don’t pay well. From what I’ve seen, this site is no exception.
- The Best Jobs. Understandably, the best jobs are usually available to paying members first.
- Unrated Employers. Many employers are unrated, so you don’t know anything about their history or what other contractors have thought about them.
What I Don’t Know Much AboutÂ
- Escrow. The site has it and it does make me feel slightly better. However, I never had a problem with a payment.
- Mediation and Arbitration Services. If escrow is used the site also offers mediation and arbitration services as needed. Again, I’ve never had a problem so I’ve never used these services.
In summary, I have found www.guru.com to be very comparable to the other bidding sites on the Internet. At the current time, I do not get most of my business through bidding sites. However, I am registered at three or four such sites. For a writer who is willing to bid frequently and who is willing to be diligent about searching for new leads, I believe that sites like www.guru.com can play a role in their overall business plan.
Laura Spencer is a freelance writer who specializes in business and technical writing. Laura blogs at www.writingthoughts.com.
*revised editionÂ
May 3rd, 2007 at 8:24 am
Hi Laura,
Good article! I too have some misgivings about Guru. They did afford me some invaluable contacts. However, I once questioned them about why they post the “50 articles for $4″ jobs, stating I felt it was demeaning. Their response was cordial, but I felt it was a “tough nuts” answer, which led me to believe that they don’t really care about quality – just about their cut.
As a rule, I won’t pay for a membership again. I decided I won’t pay for job listings or the slim chance that I’ll be chosen from a slew of bidders. It feels a bit “meat markety” to me.
May 6th, 2007 at 10:07 am
Hi Laura,
Thanks for sharing this. When I was a Guru person it was when they had people who were responsible for various subject areas and had them write articles, answer questions etc – I was the pregnancy guru!
I’ll check this out. I agree with Lori about the 50 articles for $4 thing, but this is standard across the board, kinda like getting you to work at any job for $5/hour. People try and get as much as they can for a little as they need to pay. I just tut, shake my head and say “good luck” to them as I move along to the next “serious” client!
As with all these sites, if they offer vague project descriptions, nail down the details on the site’s message board BEFORE you bid. I don’t know about Guru, but most sites allow you to use a PMB for questions prior to placing a bid. If they don’t and I’m interested I will place a bid that is very specific about what the buyer will get for the bid price I’m placing. I got burned with a vague descriptioin on my very first project – never again! Now I want chapter, line and verse before I give a price
Katie-Anne
May 19th, 2007 at 6:24 am
Y’know I signed up to try this out and there wasn’t one writing job listed that I could apply for. Every job in that section needed you to have some paid level of subscription. For the reason, I’d place it below RentaCoder which allows bidding and no membership subscription payment and elance which does have membership subscription levels but even their basic free subscription allows you to bid on about 2 projects a month.
Seemed some good jobs there so if you’re just getting started and don’t mind investing a little money in the hopes of getting enough work to give a good return, then it could be a good site.
Katie-Anne
May 20th, 2007 at 12:46 am
What are some of the other sites you guys are referring to? I just signed up at guru but I’m interested in other sites aswell.
June 5th, 2007 at 12:03 pm
Guru.com is a scam. I forked out the disgusting amount they requested and despite my DOZENS of bids I got nothing because I bid at the curret fair market price for graphic designers.
I am so disgusted by guru.com I get a bad taste in my mouth every time I think about them.
Read this site to find out more about what a scam guru.com is.
http://www.zenofeller.com/scam-guru.com
August 18th, 2007 at 8:43 pm
So, are you guys happier with elance.com?
January 11th, 2009 at 10:10 pm
I am a photographer based in Cincinnati but I do work around the world. I joined Guru and could not find a single job I could apply for as a free member. I changed my skill set several time and out of about 250 jobs listed, not a single one was available to basic members. I think the whole thing is a scam. I wouldn’t be surprised if Guru.com was making up fake postings just to get people to pay for the supposedly better memberships.
I get more jobs as a wedding photographer, corporate photographer and event photographer by posting on craigslist than I have in more than a year on Guru.com
February 3rd, 2009 at 12:51 am
thanks for the info guys, it is just like going to an employment agency and they ask me to pay a certain fee before I can get the job. Definitely 99.999…% of my conscious will say no.
March 5th, 2009 at 1:30 pm
Well.. I agree with you guys about guru.com to a certain degree. Your giving the upper hand to the employers though when you get on there. I hardly take jobs off of there.. now I work within the animation realm of things, so jobs on there are ok from time to time. I have gotten a few good jobs from there and just having my name out there and people finding me has been nice too.
Granted, the ridiculous request for getting x amount of work done for $50 makes me pretty mad. I wish there were a filter, to give the freelancers a better shot. I have actually paid for my membership and my return has been well worth it. I do still get invited to jobs that I never even here back from the employer and that ticks me off too. Some people seem to like to waist your time.
In all honesty, a huge amount of the people on there obviously don’t have the experience and their work shows it. Overall.. guru can be nice if you start winning the bids and getting reviews. Once your moved up closer to the top, you at least get a few good request that are doable within bending over and taking it.
To each their own though.. but, if your good.. you’ll get a bite once in a while.
October 23rd, 2009 at 2:51 am
I came across this page accidently, but I own a couple small companies i Idaho and I guess I am use “bottom feedersâ€. We are two small to have IT in-house and our companies are dependent on our websites. We have gladly spent thousands using guru.com freelance web developers and programmers. Yes, most are from India, Pakistan, Argentina, etc. But we compete with Fortune 500 companies that outsource, too. We do hire some help locally, but how can I justify paying $1200 to a local company for a small flash animation that I can get done in a couple days using a guru.com freelancer for $50? It may be hard to connect the dotes, but these good values keep our doors open and our employees paid.
December 5th, 2009 at 10:10 am
This account is 100% accurate of what happened.
You can also check out the link here:
http://scammersbeware.wordpress.com/…/uninow-co-uk/
================================================== ===
EWorldCom – UniNow.co.uk – Craig Online Services – Jamil Khan
Email removed by request
172 High Street, Hayes, London, UB3 5DP
Skype: daniboylock
.
Project – Making Calls
Description Posted By Employer:
I need someone who is native English speaker, resides in a mature ecomnomy like western europe, AUS or US to take my calls and make some calls on my behalf.
Your working hours should be 9 to 5 GMT. You don’t have to work all this time but should be available to take my calls and make calls to interested people to close sales.
Can pay $400 as monthly retainer plus $100 for every sale. People from India, Phill, Nigeria, PK etc need not to apply
.
I was awarded this project through Guru.com. Even though the retainer was low, I knew I could close the sales. After their initial deposit (which was not released) into Guru Escrow, I began working on their project, calling people in India and offering prospects to become an “agent†for their organization.
Simply put, to be an agent, the customer has to pay a 1,000GBP security Deposit. This would allow the person to “recruit†students to study in the UK. From the getgo it seemed something was amiss, especially since that they are selling “agent spots†to unsuspecting people from India, Pakistan and Dubai. People, no doubt, who have been profiled as individuals who have 1000GBP readily available to pay out for the “right†to find students who want to study in the UK.
.
This smells of scam no matter what way you look at it.
.
From the first day things went wrong.
The Company had no idea what “licensed and bonded†meant, so I had to explain to them that terminology
When I suggested to company that in order for them to be covered for any payment sent to them by customers from overseas, they should ask the agent to include the Bank Reference/Tracking Number. (Anyone knows that this is standard bank policy for ALL international transfers). They had no idea what this was, and accused me of wanting to know the details for my own benefit.
When Guru.com locked Jamil out of the system for suspected fraud, Jamil asked me on Skype what his employer number was, AND their username.
Guru.com Flagged their credit card as “moderate risk†to verify the validity of their card on Monday night. Hence, for the next 2 days all work was put on hold until Guru.com would establish their credibility.
Credit Card used was supposedly for one “Craig Trauschke†who supposedly works at company. However, Jamil had to “search†for “Craig†in their office to verify the phone number associated with the credit card.
Jamil (as he likes to be called) quickly asked me to register on GAF (GetAFreelancer) website, as apparently GAF has no problem in taking credit cards. Well that may be so, but GAF is also know to harbor a vast many of scammers. I told him that Guru flagged him for a reason, and that it was their responsibility and not mine to have proper payment method done.
When Guru.com did approve their credit card 2 days later, the client locked me out of their database and fired me with no probable cause, other than the fact that I requested that the retainer was paid in advance due to their financial problems with Guru.com
Jamil Khan – representative of the company – hurled abuse at me, and when I told him “Guru.com flagged your credit card, not meâ€, his response was “BIG FUCKING DEALâ€
Company has no idea how to put together standard contracts to cover themselves, nor was their “database†by any means, adequate.
As for the sales? 8 hours on the phone produced 10 sales. In other words, in 8 hours I generated 10,000GBP in sales, pending the agents got their cash sent. The follow up emails were meant to be sent by the client. But where they? No.
So after 2 days of not working on their project, due to Guru.com’s suspicion of fraud, I was fired based on the fact that due to their situation with Guru, I wanted to be paid in advance. That, after I successfully generated 10 qualified sales for the company, or in other words, in 8 hours I generated 10,000GBP in sales.
In further talks with “Jamil Khanâ€, the resolution of the following was reached:
On November 26th, I agreed that:
I worked on the project for 1 day
I agreed that I will be paid $80USD which will be released no later than December 5th 2009
Client and I agreed to close this matter in good faith, and providing that payment is released on said date.
We both agreed not to do anything to defame each other on the internet or otherwise and not to leave any bad feedback on guru.
However, December 5th came and went, and guess what. Yep, you guessed it. NO PAYMENT showed up.
But wait a minute, Jamil Khan DID state in Skype, “I will be in the office on the Saturday so you will be paid.†But was he? NO!
PROMISES, PROMISES. BIG PROMISES FROM A SCAMMER.
Well JAMIL, as you failed to fulfill your obligation, and promise to stand by what you SAID you would do, the agreement you and I made is now NULL AND VOID.
I wonder just how the List Of Universities will take into light your SCAM.
Upon further investigation I found out:
Company has a generic website, hosted by some company in Texas
Company has ZERO Internet presence (although they CLAIM to have been in business 12 years)
Company apparently has NO direct phone number, other than Skype (Convenient)
Company has no business email, other than using Gmail accounts
Company “begged†me to give them good rating, on the basis that for the one day of work I did do, they would pay me $80, but that would not be released until December 10th
Company claims to be in the UK, but Jamil Khan is listed as being in Pakistan, AND company details on Guru.com show them as being in Texas USA – figure that one out!
Employer Statistics
Member since: 18-Mar-2008
Dollars spent: $0.00
Projects posted: 8
Projects paid: 0 [ 0.0%]
Invoices paid: 0
Invoices outstanding: 0
Average pay time lag: 0 days
Average feedback rating: No reviews
Location: Houston, TX 77082 – USA
This company is a scam through and through.
Not only did they rip me off for the work I did, but they take money from unsuspecting people to become “agents†AND they also take a fee from Students.
Students & Work At Home people Beware.
EWorldCom/Craig Online Services/UniNow.co.uk is a fraud.
================================================== ===
February 16th, 2010 at 3:49 am
I agree with you guys. Guru.com is one HUGE scam. I recently read they have over 125,000 freelancer for roughly 5,500 jobs. Crazy. If you do the math on the membership fee then it’s clear who’s getting screwed – the freelancer!
May 5th, 2010 at 10:17 am
Most of the jobs are posted by bottom-feeders. And the site is crawling with vendors who will work for incredibly low fees. However, in my 2 1/2 years of membership, I have hooked up with some great companies who value quality work. I generally meet them on Guru and then work with them outside the Guru system.
It has worked for me. I look at it as another channel for finding clients and projects.
But quality employers have become really scarce as the recession drags on…
June 14th, 2010 at 10:08 pm
Oh boy, do we have a story about Guru. After being with them for 5 years and a top 50 ranked vendor we got booted through no fault of our own. Talking to Guru.com is like talking to a brick wall. It is obvious they are all about their own bottom line these days. So sad to see them go from quality first to cash first. Boo.
Read our detailed review on our Cyber Sprocket Labs site.
http://www.cybersprocket.com/2010/project-management/whats-wrong-with-guru-com/
August 13th, 2010 at 8:15 pm
I am an employer who has just found what looks like the perfect frelancer to do my work. I googled Guru.com scam to see what grievnces people had with the site before paying my money into the Guru escrow account. Dispite all the hoopla about Guru being a scam I’ve read above, nobody said Guru stiffed them( as in took their money they were entitled to), it was all about their employers who were the theivs…bottom feeders… con men ect. I am comforted by what I read in that, my intentions are honorable and I’ve got clear understandings and deliverables with my freelancer. Because some of these agrrieved people didn’t do their own due dillegnece doesn’t reflect on Guru.
Now I can’t speak to the worth of it for a Freelancer considering the blind bids etc. but that is the nature of market forces.
I’ll keep you informed of the rest of my experience but so far.. so good.
LB
September 3rd, 2010 at 7:27 pm
I think that Guru is a scam. Look at the prices these people are wanting to pay illustrators and designers! Five dollars an hour?! No wonder they seem to get so much work from India. An example: 25 illustrations in colors for a book, we can’t pay a lot so our budget is $300. Are they insane? And it really irks me to see artists who are so desperate that they are willing to do work for pennies. The owners say, “well isn’t this interesting? Maybe you should complain on a forum, or something.’
Ok. I’m complaining.
November 3rd, 2010 at 12:15 pm
online resumes are easy to submit and they are easy to make and edit one too ”
August 8th, 2011 at 10:01 am
While I am sure some people have a positive experience with Guru.com, it’s safe and obvious that others do not. I, myself has a terrible experience in which they stole over $300 from me. They claim their escrow is safe and you don’t have to release the funds until you’re happy with your freelancer. Seeing this, I thought WOW< this is amazing! Well it's a pack of lies. I hired a freelancer with a "Satisfaction Guarantee". Long story short, he didn't complete the work and the work he did was terrible. We tried to close the project and went through Guru.com's Arbitration process, in which they just gave the freelancer the money. They didn't check the files to see that they were poor quality and full of errors. They didn't look at the fact that he missed every single deadline after guaranteeing us he would meet them. So tell me, how is their escrow safe? How is my satisfaction guaranteed when I paid over $300 and got absolutely nothing from it? STAY AWAY FROM GURU.COM. You are far better off using elance or even freelancer.com. Guru.com takes your money and favors their "freelancers", leaving you the consumer out of luck. This is the second time guru.com has ripped me off. The first time, i paid a "freelancer" for a custom design and he took a premade template, put my company name on it and passed it off as his own. According to guru.com "support", the freelancers are ALLOWED to do this with open source designs. I should have learned my lesson then, but this time I have.
September 9th, 2011 at 5:16 pm
In theory guru.com was a great idea, but as so many postings here indicate, it has turned into a huge bottom feeding frenzy with flakes asking for quotes and proposals for jobs that have budgets totally out of whack with reality. The only people making money on guru.com are the owners of guru.com.
The way I see it, the only purpose of guru.com to me is a way to make a connection to a client and then work entirely outside of guru.com. If they boot me for that, no loss there. Guru is going down anyway.
For the most part I’d make more money at McDee’s than trying to scrape out a living with that scuzzfest.
February 4th, 2012 at 2:09 am
Amen! to the complaints about bottom feeders! I just looked at a job wanting 15 illustrations for $80.00 TOTAL and can you believe that there were 9 bidders? An artist who does work for this amount does everyone an injustice. And you can’t make a comment or ask a question unless you pay for a premium “guru” account. Probably won’t stay with them for very long.
May 3rd, 2012 at 4:58 pm
This is in response to lead #11
I posted a project on Guru to hire someone for telemarketing for our student counsleling service in UK. The gentleman I hired, someone from Russia, was never able to sell anything and started recommending changes in the site and business. Other marketers were doing well.
This is some guy from Russia who has multiple identites. He is Chris Jackson authorcamilson@gmail.com and sometimes identitfy himself as C.A. Milson … a self proclaimed horror film writer who is a complete nutcase.
He advertised my email everywhere on the Internet just because I asked to produce results. He used to work on Guru.com. He is not from Australia … this is a lie …
Further investigation revealed that C.A. Milson a.k.a Chris Jackson has also been charged with rape and he is mentally ill …. please beware of this guy.
June 1st, 2012 at 7:40 am
I plan to retire in the near future so I am looking into doing other things. However, I know I will be bored to tears and the extra income will pay for fun things. I’m trying to decide if a free guru membership is what I want to do or if I should pay out the $ to do one of the others.
In doing a review of guru.com, a response on this site lists http://www.zenofeller.com/scam-guru.com as a source of information. Unfortunately, the site no longer exists.
June 1st, 2012 at 8:59 am
I like vworker.com for extra income personally.
June 16th, 2012 at 7:07 pm
GURU.COM IS TERRIBLE!!!
The freelancer used ASP.net and my job title was clearly stated PHP! Guru ignored my money going to escrow and they paid the freelancer without my permission, probably to get the commission. They didn’t give me my money back although not work was done as you couldn’t even log in. Terrible work from the freelancer in India.
I do not recommend Guru. Terrible!!!
June 23rd, 2012 at 8:26 pm
I no longer look to Guru for any serious work. I stay on their email list so I can laugh at employers who want to pay 20 dollars for a 50 page article on golfing and threaten to report me to the plagiarism police (they exist) if my content is not original.
Frankly I find these jobs insulting (even without the threats). It’s sad that people are bidding on them. I wish there was a way to respond (and/or heckle-okay, mostly heckle) the people posting this garbage.
June 25th, 2012 at 3:35 pm
Guru.com is a scam site, I was scammed two times, the last day, scammers say it: As share of our secure transaction process, Guru.com audited all PayPal transactions. As a result of this process, Invoice ID ******* (****** $) is on hold pending verification from the Employer.
I suggest you elance.com or odesk.com, I’m already a worker at elance and oDesk, Guru, but I wanted to try, but both work I didI have been scammed
July 6th, 2012 at 6:51 am
I’ve been a member since 2007 and have had success. You simply have to realize that 90% of the employers there are small fry who are looking for “cheap.” In their minds, it’s perfectly reasonable to ask for a 50-page report for $35.00. Usually, some poor sap will take on the assignment…
However, there are a few gem employers shining against the low-ball wasteland. I’ve found a few. After working with them (and proving my value) on a few smaller projects, I’ve continued the relationship directly, outside of the Guru realm, charging my full rate.
From my experience, Guru can be a good channel — if you keep your focus on finding the gem clients, and avoiding the low-life low-ball types.
September 29th, 2012 at 11:00 am
I requested a tutor for my son on the website NextGuru. The ad said that i will be contacted within twenty-four hours.
Three days later i got an e-mail saying that “I anm sorry the tutor as not available, believe it or not tutors get busy or go on vacation”. What in the world is this?
No name. no hello/to, no telephone contact … just saying to make another request.
What kind of a business is this ??? Surely not a reliable one.
October 11th, 2012 at 4:52 pm
What I learned as a employer:
If they have a lot of jobs and very little feedback- that is BAD BAD BAD and means that the freelancer doesn’t accept the feedback into their profile because the feedback about them is NEGATIVE NEGATIVE NEGATIVE.
Little something for the newbies.
February 20th, 2013 at 4:38 pm
I was scammed on Elance.com and came over to Guru and found the company who had had their account shut down on Elance, fully active on Guru.com. Guru have refused to take any action as the scamming happened on another site. So by using their logic, a man can murder someone in France, then come to Canada and live happily ever after without any consequences. The world doesnt work like that. I emailed them, contacted them on Facebook, and Twitter. I even messaged the CEO Inder Guglani on Facebook. The emails have stopped, they blocked me on twitter and facebook instead of realising their mistake.
February 27th, 2013 at 12:21 pm
They are FRAUD people. I had bad experience twice.They do horrible and broken work for you and take several months and will release money to their people in india so called freelancers without your permission.
March 14th, 2013 at 8:27 pm
BE CAREFUL! DO NOT USE GURU they act illegally and FRAUD members!!! I am taking legal action.
Thank God both Paypal and American Express supported my claims and refunded the whole amount.
I posted a project specifications and selected a freelancer. The freelancer offered to deliver the work in 2 weeks for an agreed sum.
He was 4 months late and the delivered work did not meet AT ALL the the project description – in fact Paypal and AmEx concurred with me 100% and, THANK GOD, they saved me by refunding me 100%!
I refused to release the remaining portion of the payment and the freelancer opened a claim.
Guru asks you to open an escrow account BEFORE posting your project with the whole amount.
At the freelancer’s complaint, guru ARBITRARILY, without my permission, seized and blocked my funds.
Guru did NOT BOTHER to read the project description (available publicly on their website) and said that it was MY responsibility to furnish GURU with evidence that the freelancer was wrong within 48hrs and not their duty to verify!
Again: pls note the project description was POSTED ON THEIR WEBSITE !!!!
I had work to do (I run a small company) and after 48hrs they assigned the money to the freelancer!
With Paypal’s and AmEx’s concurring that I was right I sought a lawyer and I am demanding reparations.
BEWARE – they act illigally and fraud members.
March 14th, 2013 at 8:31 pm
Wow…
Good to know, I was about to open an account with GURU… Thanks for sharing.
March 14th, 2013 at 8:34 pm
BE CAREFUL! DO NOT USE GURU they act illegally and FRAUD members!!! I am taking legal action.
Thank God both Paypal and American Express supported my claims and refunded the whole amount.
I posted a project specifications and selected a freelancer. The freelancer offered to deliver the work in 2 weeks for an agreed sum.
He was 4 months late and the delivered work did not meet AT ALL the the project description – in fact Paypal and AmEx concurred with me 100% and, THANK GOD, they saved me by refunding me 100%!
I refused to release the remaining portion of the payment and the freelancer opened a claim.
Guru asks you to open an escrow account BEFORE posting your project with the whole amount.
At the freelancer’s complaint, guru ARBITRARILY, without my permission, seized and blocked my funds.
Guru did NOT BOTHER to read the project description (available publicly on their website) and said that it was MY responsibility to furnish GURU with evidence that the freelancer was wrong within 48hrs and not their duty to verify!
Again: pls note the project description was POSTED ON THEIR WEBSITE !!!!
I had work to do (I run a small company) and after 48hrs they assigned the money to the freelancer!
With Paypal’s and AmEx’s concurring that I was right I sought a lawyer and I am demanding reparations.
BEWARE – they act illigally and fraud members.
September 25th, 2013 at 2:29 pm
Hi folks! Brandon from Guru.com here. We’ve had alot of updates since this article was posted and are releasing some new ones very soon! Come by and check out what we’ve been up to!