Obviously, you guys already know that I make money online and from my blogs through advertisements. From time to time, I get direct advertisers contacting me about placing banner or text link ads on my blogs with a fee we have agreed on. And just yesterday, I got another email which raised suspicions that it could all just be a scam. It’s from a representative of a certain Jino Agency who claims the ad is for Lacoste. Her name’s Killian Blanchard. Here’s a screenshot of the email:

It made me suspicious because, first off, it’s for our food blog. Why would Lacoste be interested in placing an advertisement on a blog that’s completely unrelated to fashion? I continued on to see what will happen, already wary that it’s another one of those phishing scams. They said they have different ad banner sizes and would like to know the rates we offer for each.

By this time, I already checked their site – www.jinoagency.com.  I’m a web designer so I know that their site was pretty easy to come up with.

The site’s language is in French so I had no idea what the contents were. I was hoping to see a list of accounts or brands they handle, but found none. I was hoping to translate their site to English using Chrome’s integrated translate feature, but it wasn’t an option.

So, I ended up using Yahoo! Babel Fish which worked like a charm. The translation may not be perfect, but it’s obvious that their contents don’t sound like they come from an actual PR or advertising company.

I continued on to send them my rates to see if they would accept it. The thing is, I gave them very high ad monthly rates (scroll down for the screenshot of how much they’re willing to pay for a month!). Surprisingly, they liked my prices. So, they continued on sending me instructions on how to publish the advertisement.

As it turns out, I need to login to their site with the info they provided and then install a plugin on our blog. The only time I installed a plugin was for a reputable third party ad network and I only have it up and running on THIS blog. I’m just not comfortable installing any script or plugin on any of my high traffic blogs, most especially our food blog.

What I did next was to search Google for any post about them. I only found one link, but it was filled with all the necessary information that would conclude it was indeed a scam – Devious Scam Aimed at Bloggers.

The author and a couple of the comment posters on this certain blog post were very suspicious too of this ad placement. Having been very careful with putting malicious scripts on my blogs, I always make sure to check the code of any plug-in I install on my WordPress blogs and I do my research first. This time, I guess it more than paid off. And I know how important it is for me to share this to everyone just in case they got the same email and were hoping to earn a decent amount of money from these scammers.

Apparently, based on the comments, they won’t pay you afterwards. The codes may seem harmless now, but malicious plugins can give access to your WordPress blog or site to unauthorized people. So, you have to be VERY careful with what plugins you install.

Here’s a screenshot of the site they asked me to log into:

And the instructions on how to install the plugin:

Did they contact you too? If yes, please share your experience. And please, be careful. There are a lot of online scammers out there now and they get more creative everytime.

I’ll be posting more about dealing with direct advertisers here next time. Stay tuned!

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UPDATE: A fellow blogger mentioned about Mana Agency, a company one of the comment posters on the blog post I mentioned earlier revealing this as a scam too. Well, look at their website… doesn’t it look so fricking familiar?

I am moving TheClickers PERMANENTLY to the Scam Sites section of this blog. And since they also own VelvetClix and Cash-Harvest, they’re all in the Scam Sites list, too.

I have posted an update on my pending payment request on TheClickers last month. I requested for my payment on July 4th, but, up until now, I have not received anything yet from them.

Also, for over a week now, TheClickers is down. Their forums is inaccessible and they haven’t posted anything to let their members know they’ll be back.

There have been numerous complaints from other TheClickers members in the past. I was pretty happy with my experience with them. But, the only thing I don’t like about the admin’s interaction with members in the forum was they were too harsh towards those who are posting questions or inquiries about their account. I mean, let’s face it, not everyone can understand English and are quick to follow instructions or understand updates or new rules. They should be well aware of that and be more patient towards their members.

Lastly, in my last post about TheClickers, I mentioned that the admin claimed they were on vacation and will be back by the 19th of August. They said they’re upgrading their site, but, no further updates were posted or shared to their members.

I hate it when a PTC site that’s been so good for years will disappear just like that. I managed to gain many  direct referrals on TheClickers, so, this is really disappointing.

Now, if you’re going to ask me about my account with TheClickers, let me give you a quick rundown:

• I upgraded to TheClickers Omega membership in November 2009. I paid $19.00.
• Since my upgrade, I have received 4 payments, total of $23.55:
• $5.51 on December 15, 2009
• $5.88 on February 10, 2010
• $6.59 on February 28, 2010
• $5.57 on May 18, 2010
• I have a total of 274 downline referrals, 154 of which are direct.

As you can see, I did make a little profit from my membership. But, still, that’s only a few dollars. *sigh*

Well, that’s how online money-making goes. There’s always a risk in all the online money-making programs you join. You just have to be smart about it. Still, there’s no assurance a site, especially PTC sites, would stay online as long as you would want it.

Please, feel free to share your experience
with TheClickers in the comments section.
Thank you!

I knew this was coming…

I have moved Palmbux PERMANENTLY to my Scam Sites list.

Here’s a screenshot of the statement from the admin. I decided to take a screenshot just in case the thread “magically” disappears *grin*. Click to zoom in.

You can also check out the forum thread here. You need to login to see the post.

The first time I posted here about Palmbux’s Paypal account getting frozen was back in January 2010. They managed to get their account restored. But, this time around, I don’t think they’re even planning on fixing their Paypal account.

Palmbux also implemented automatically charging members an advertising fee when withdrawing their funds, which is the same as requiring members to invest on the site to receive payment – a clear sign of a scam site.

I just find it funny that the admin is claiming that they are not earning anything from their site. They said “Payments are to 100%, what we receive we send it out“, which I highly doubt is true. Who, in his right mind, would stay to keep a PTC site running without earning a single cent from it?! He said this has been happening for months now. WOW.

If you ask me, PalmBux is just trying to hook or fool more people by coming out with the truth, like they’re now being honest to all the members. C’mon! You’re just doing that so people won’t leave your site and they’ll all agree to reset all the balances to zero. I’ve seen that before! And that site is now on my Scam Sites list.

What I’m doing now with PalmBux is continue clicking for the advertising credits. But, as soon as they reset the balance to zero, I’m out. And, please, let’s stop making excuses for them. Palmbux is now a scam site and the admin doesn’t seem to really care about all the money the members have lost. I just wish there’s some way Paypal can show us the real status of Palmbux’s account with them. I bet they’re now running away with thousands of dollars from their members.

For now, check out my complete list of trusted online money-making sites.

I am finally moving TheClickers from my trusted Paid to Click sites to Scam Alerts TEMPORARILY. Temporarily only because I am giving them a chance based on what they’ve explained in their forums. I’ve trusted TheClickers for the past year I’ve been with them. I even upgraded my account to Omega. So, I’m still hopeful all the mess they’re in now will get fixed.

Because of the following reasons, I am moving TheClickers to Scam Alerts:

• I have requested my payment from them on July 4, 2010. Up to now, my payment has not been sent to me.

  Here’s a screenshot of that payment request (click to enlarge):

  
  There are a lot of members complaining about non-payment. Some have been waiting since June even. There are also members who claim that they were banned from the forums and got their account suspended after they complained about non-payment. You can read more complaints here and here.

• No new posts from members about non-payment. So, this only means that the complaints about members getting banned after posting a complaint in the forums are true.

• The admins posted an announcement in the forums (read here) that alkinoos is on vacation because he got married last July 31st. They said they’ll be back on August 18 or 19. Admin adriana said she’s also on vacation and should’ve been back last August 9th. But, there are no further updates on what’s happening with the payment queue.

  They said TheClickers is undergoing a redesign and script upgrade. Last time we heard from them was on July 27th. So, I wonder where adriana is now. If they don’t post any updates by August 19th, I’ll be permanently moving them to my Scam Sites list.

Keep posted for any update regarding TheClickers. I really hope they’ll get back on their feet ’cause they’re my top Aurora PTC site.

April 1 to 10, 2010:

• Bomblogic – Site has been for sale and no updates yet if someone already bought the site. I removed them from my recommended PTC sites list.
• EgyptianClicks – Account (hosting) has been suspended. No updates or news yet from the admin or owners. Currently on Scam Alerts.
• Earn.BZ changed their Terms of Use:
  

  Standard members:
  You will receive your payment within 45 days.
  To request your first payment you will need to have atleast 10 referrals and 1$ in referral earnings or more.
  To request your second payment and all the payments after that, you will need to have atleast 20 referrals and 2$ in referral earnings or more.
  50% of the referrals must be internationall, meaning that they can’t come from the same country.
  You can’t convert your account balance to rental balance by opening a support ticket like premium members.
  To rent, you will need to deposit money by using alertpay or paypal.

  Read this important update from the forums, directly from the admin.

  They did this to limit payments that are being requested on Paypal. It was a bit of a shock that I’ll have to wait over a month to get paid since I don’t have plans of upgrading with them yet.

  I already have 20+ direct referrals. Not sure if I already earned $2.00 from them since I can’t find a tracker for that anywhere on the site. And regarding the international referrals, you can’t also find a way to check that. Sheesh.

  With this much limitations for Standard members, I doubt there’ll be active referrals left. I don’t think they thought of that.