Website Scam Beginner’s Checklist: How to know if a website is legitimate

(First of the three parts)
 
Finding an authentic website that offers waysto make money online is like finding a needle in a haystack. You must always be on guard to avoid falling prey to such fraudulent activities. Below is a quick checklist to serve as a guide to those who want to earnmoney at home.

Website layout, content and design. You need not be a tech savvy to detect if a website is scam based on how it looks and feels. A legitimate company can afford to have the content written explicitly, the layout designed professionally, and the overall look/feel pleasing to a reader’s eye. Poor design, content and layout may be one of the first signs to watch out for:

·         Website consists of one page only

·         Screaming colors and extra huge fonts trying to desperately catch the reader’s attention

·         Words badly written, misspelled words, bad grammar

·         Overwhelming advertisements

·         Too many or too frequent pop-ups asking you to register and pay

·         Unsecured payment page or a page that redirects to another website

·         No terms and conditions page or privacy page

About Us/About the Company. This page should be able to share their history, mission/vision or objectives and give names of people behind the team.

Contact Information. This page should be clear in stating the company address, and telephone number. A professional local company would even add a location map. Email address should be under the domain name. Example: The website name is www.howtomakemoney.com. Email should be admin@howtomakemoney.com. Items to avoid:

• Toll-free numbers listed as contact information for a local company
• For out of the country location, no option to dial a local number
• Only uses contact form and does not provide any physical address
• Contact email hosted by free web-based email clients such as yahoo, gmail or msn.

Offer too good to be true. Beware of words that promise huge earnings with less hours worked. Too many testimonials or testimonials that are too hard-sell is very suspicious as well. Dead give-away is offer that has the following clauses:

• Requires registration and payment to view more details
• Requires bank information to complete personal profile
• Asks for unnecessary personal information

Scamwatch websites. Make a research about the website.

• scam.com or ripoffreport.com: check if the website is listed there
• whois.net: check who owns the site and beware if it’s a private listing
• google: type the website name and append ‘scam’ to check if it’s a scam website or if it has a bad online reputation 

Next in the series: Howto know if a website is legitimate using Search