“It’s a scam.” That’s a phrase that is being thrown around a lot when it comes to online earning. But oftentimes, it’s not all black and white, and the platform just didn’t meet someone’s expectations.
And that’s the case with SproutGigs (formerly Picoworkers), too—when searching online, you can find a lot of conflicting claims.
Why listen to my review of Picoworkers (SproutGigs)? I've completed over thousand tasks on the platform and succesfully withdrawn a few dozen times. That was enough to fully test the platform and tell you about my experience.
In this SproutGigs (Picoworkers) review, I’ll walk you through all the important features, share a few tips on how to maximize your earnings and give me an honest opinion on whether or not it’s worth it.
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My Experience with SproutGigs
I started using Picoworkers when the lockdown hit. I was locked in my apartment for days, and playing video games all day didn’t seem too tempting.
The platform grabbed me and wouldn’t let me go for about one year. During that time, I learned a lot of useful tricks and tips to speed up my work and maximize my earnings.
The individual gigs are very repetitive, so I had a workflow that enabled me to multiply my speed while having fun watching a movie on my second screen.
Since I do not use Picoworkers anymore because of the lack of time, I can share my secret tips & tricks with the world. With what even YOU can earn a lot of money by working a few hours a day.
I mean, look at the leaderboard, people are seriously making a full-time income with SproutGigs. To be honest, to hit thousands of dollars, you would have to give it a lot of time. But once you incorporate it into your daily routine, it becomes a very automatic and easy income.
What is SproutGigs (Picoworkers)
SproutGigs is an internet marketplace that connects freelancers with employers. It acts as a middleman, allowing businesses or individuals to hire skilled people to complete little, one-time gigs for them.
These types of platforms are often called micro-work sites because it’s filled with small, micro tasks that take only seconds to complete—such as watching YouTube videos, commenting on social media, or reading blog posts.
The number of freelancers working from home increased a lot in the previous years. That makes it very hard to push through on traditional freelance sites, but Picoworkers only benefit from this popularity. It is a platform with a very even distribution of workers and employers.
But if you still want to give regular freelancing a try, you can check our list of the best low competition freelance sites!
Employers on SproutGigs
The rest of this article will focus on how things work from the perspective of a worker. But let’s take a moment to look at the platform from the other point of view.
The employers’ role is pretty straightforward. Their job listing can be anything that needs to be completed by a larger quantity of people—want to boost your YouTube views? increase your followings or brand awareness? Those are exactly the types of jobs you would find there.
Once the job is listed, workers from all around the globe can complete it. You then simply review their submission—rating it either as “satisfied” or “dissatisfied.”
One important thing to mention is that the funds needed to pay your selected number of people are locked—so it is in no one’s interest to rate workers as dissatisfied.
How to Post a Job on SproutGigs
Posting a micro job on Picoworkers (SproutGigs) is quite simple. The UI is really great, and you won’t face a moment not knowing what to select or tap.
First, deposit money into your account. Then using the top header, switch your profile to employer. Formerly there was no clear division between freelancers and workers, but now you have separate profiles for both roles.
The first thing you have to do is to select a region and countries you want to exclude from doing your job.
Let's say you want the freelancers to browse and find your website and spend some time on it. But since you don't want visitors from a certain country, you exclude them here. Since SproutGigs have a VPN protection, they won't be able to bypass it.
The next step is to select a job category and a sub-category. It’s important to select the correct categories because some details of your listing will update to match it.
The third step is to make the job as easy to follow and attractive to potential workers.
Write a short and simple job description, describe the individual steps the worker needs to follow, and enter what proof you require to rate their work as satisfactory.
Workers like to swindle—if your job requires visiting an external link (which almost always does), I recommend using a link shortener with a tracker. It will give you an overview of who really did what you require of them.
The last step is job settings. Let’s look at what each individual setting does.
- Workers level – select how “experienced” workers that do your job need to be. Employees get level points by successfully fulfilling jobs. Task costs 25% more for advanced level and 50% more for expert level.
- Workers needed – How many total freelancers do you want to complete your task? The minimum is 25, and as far as I know, there is no maximum number. For instance, if you want your Reddit upvoting task to be completed by 100 people, enter 100.
- Max Pos/Worker – How many positions can one worker take? That is, how many times one person can complete a given task. Most of the time, you want to leave this set to 1.
- Workers will earn – Enter the value of the task. The more you are willing to give, the faster the task will be completed.
- Required screenshots – The more screenshots you require in your proof, the more you will have to pay. For example, if you require one screenshot, you will have to pay at least $0.05 per task.
- Hold job time – Set for how long a worker can secure their place. I’d recommend setting it to at least double the time you think is required to complete the task.
Under Advanced options, you will also find settings for rate time – how long do you need to rate the task, or you can set auto task rating using PCODE.
The Picoworkers team has also created a video tutorial that walks you through the steps of posting a job.
How to Earn as a Worker on SproutGigs (Picoworkers)
So now that you know what SproutGigs is and how it works, it’s time to focus on the important part—how to earn!
Types of Jobs you can Find
With the rebranding of Picoworkers to SproutGigs, the team also introduced ongoing projects.
This second category of jobs, besides micro-tasks, work as standard freelance jobs—create me a website, logo design, etc. In short: jobs that are completed by only one worker instead of dozens of hundreds.
The second type of jobs aren’t very useful on SproutGigs. It’s full of spammy, low-quality work, and I’m sure that serious employers will look elsewhere for quality work.
But let’s focus on micro jobs. You can find thousands of different small tasks you can complete, which is really convenient since you don’t have to wait for an opportunity to arrive.
These micro jobs could be classified into smaller categories, let’s take a closer look at them.
Engagement-based Tasks
Usually easiest to perform. Requires very low effort, but these tasks are also the lowest-paid ones. You can be instructed to:
- Upvote a Reddit post
- Watch a YouTube video
- Like a Facebook post
- Visit a website or perform a Google search for a specific keyword such as “Picoworkers review”
Writing-based Tasks
Requires more effort than just mouse clicking. But still easy to perform and better paid. But these are a bit tricky sometimes because the job poster may not like your comment and will evaluate it as “not satisfied”.
- Post a comment on social media posts like YouTube videos, Facebook posts, or Reddit posts.
- Write a blog comment on a specific article, this one will usually be associated with visiting the website first.
- Provide feedback on a product, service, or tool.
Tasks that Involve Signing Up for Something
Often you will be asked to register for some online service. Usually, the employer will get some referral bonus off of you, from which you will be paid. These are usually really well-paid and easy to perform.
However, be careful because these tasks also oftentimes contain these weird types of paywalls—you won an iPhone, enter your phone number to continue type of stuff.
Download-something Tasks
This will probably be one of the most widespread categories. You will be asked to install software, an app, or a web extension.
Usually, you will have to download a mobile game, play it for a while and then get really well paid.
Sign Up for a Free Trial
The highest-paid category. However, you will have to use your credit card information to register for the given free trial. I have personally never done any task in this category.
If you decide to do these tasks, don’t forget to cancel your subscription after completing them!
How to Complete your First Task on SproutGigs (Picoworkers)
Register on the Platform
SproutGigs is completely free to join for everyone around the world.
Head to the website and select “Sign Up.” Then fill in your name, email address, nickname, and password. After you verify your email, you can start earning!
Fulfill your First Task
If you have done everything right you will land on a page looking like this.
I’ll admit that it looks a bit intimidating at first glance but don’t worry, we’ll walk through everything together.
On the workers’ main page, you can find the list of all available tasks, including various filters, in the upper part. This is very useful, you’ll quickly find some tasks not so worth doing, and the filters enable you to exclude them.
- Job level – We have discussed job level before in the context of creating your own job offer. In this way, the employer limits who can do his tasks. In the beginning, you will only be able to do the starter level. As you complete more and more tasks, your level will rise.
- Category – If you are interested only in a certain category you can select it there.
- Subcategory
- Payment – See tasks only in a certain price range.
- Location – See only tasks that are allowed in certain regions.
- Emp. Stats – There you can find certain sorting options in terms of employers.
On each task, you can see some basic information about the task. You will see more detailed information after you select a task you wish to do.
Once you find a task that might be worth doing, read carefully all the steps outlined. You really don’t want to get rated as “dissatisfied.”
For starters, your success rate has to be in all situations higher than 75%, if it’s below, you can’t complete any. Secondly, it will higher your submit tasks interval, meaning you would have to wait even multiple minutes between tasks.
How to Level up your SproutGigs Account
You get points for nearly any activity on the platform. As you can see the rules below:
The level of tasks available to you is determined by your worker level. The higher your level, the more you can earn. In order to maximize your point earnings, you need to focus on not skipping too many days when you work. And at the same time, perform all tasks properly – you don’t want to get rated as “not satisfied”.
How to Withdraw your Earnings from SproutGigs (Picoworkers)
After you’ve earned at least $5 you are eligible to withdraw your earnings. And there are a lot of options to choose from. You can withdraw to:
- Airtm
- PayPal
- Skrill
- Uphold
- Or in form of Litecoin
But first, you have to meet other conditions.
“Your task interval timer must be 0”
Task interval means, that every time you submit a task you have to wait a given time before completing another task. If your task is rated as satisfied your timer will be reduced by 10 seconds. But if your task is rated as dissatisfied you will get a 20-second penalty.
There is an 8% processing fee on every withdrawal.
Also, withdrawals are processed within 10 business days. But it is usually a lot quicker—my withdrawals took 3 days on average, and I’ve withdrawn using at least 3 of the methods available.
How to Maximize your SproutGigs Earnings
The best thing you can do to maximize your Picoworkers earnings is to only choose tasks with low time to rate – 1 or 2 days max.
Why would you care? If you were paying attention, you know that you have to keep your temporal success rate higher than 75% at all times. All tasks that are pending are counted as dissatisfied.
Also, levels are not as important as they might seem. Because the vast majority of tasks are open to everyone. But sometimes you can meet some really well-paid Expert level tasks. And it is good to be able to complete them.
I’d most success only focusing on tasks that I could do very quickly. Such as simple Reddit upvotes—open the URL, upvote, screenshot, add it as proof, and done.
Completing multiple tasks at once is also a good idea. You can pick up a task to watch a YouTube video and play it in the background while completing other tasks.
Complete as many tasks as possible per day. Only this will ensure that you maximize your earnings!
And also, withdraw your earnings wisely. Every withdrawal is another 8% fee. Plus if you want to withdraw in Litecoin watch the token price. As your $5 can be a different amount of LTC every moment.
Bottom Line – Is SproutGigs Worth it?
In this SproutGigs (Picoworkers) review, we’ve discussed every aspect of the site.
It is a legit micro work site that gives everyone the opportunity to earn some decent cash online.
As for the question: “Is Picoworkers worth it?” It rather depends on the country you live in. If you live in a rich country, there are plenty of alternatives to use your time. And maybe earn more in the process. But for third-world countries or teens who don’t have the opportunity to go to a regular job, this is definitely a great option.
But as I said in the article about blockchain games. If you have nothing better to do and would rather watch Netflix then it’s worth it.
FAQ
Picoworkers is a genuine internet marketplace that links freelancers with employers. It acts as a middleman, allowing businesses to hire employees to complete everything from little tasks to ongoing projects.
Yes! Picoworkers is legit. You can check on Picoworkers how much users have already earned. Spoiler: Some of them have already made over $5,000!
Picoworkers/Sproutgigs Verdict
The final verdict is NOT BAD. And there is a simple reason for that.
Picoworkers, currently named Sproutgigs, has its ups and downs.
It is a good choice for anyone with a lot of free time. After all, if you do hundreds of Reddit Upvotes a day, you will earn some dollars on the side. But it is not a way to wealth.
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