The greatly rumored and one of the most secret projects of Google is right here. Google Helpouts! A video chat based service that is offered by the users for the users. For what you ask? To help them solve problems and learn new things. Many services are fee and some services are paid, the choice depends on you.
You can either start a helpout page or view another’s. Interest towards this new service has already gained momentum. See the data from Google Trends about the interest in the phrase.
The categories for the helpout are Home & Garden, Computers & Electronics, Health & Counseling, Nutrition & Fitness, Fashion & Beauty, Art & Music, Cooking, and Education.
I still couldn't understand it?
So let me break it down to you. You are an expert in the field of botany, you know flowers and stuff. Now you want to monetize your skill. What would you do? You would create start a Google helpout page ( A platform which would assist you in your online endeavors).
One a page is created, you would schedule a helpout stating that at (let’s suppose) 4:00PM you would be available online for an online video chat session. Now, its 4:01 PM and you find a person who has a doubt or want to know more about “Rafflesia arnoldii” (It’s a flower of course). You listen to his questions, give your opinions and after half an hour of serious conversation about the flower, the customer leaves satisfied. You billed the customer at 0.5$ per minute and you shut down the computer satisfied with considerable earnings.
How does it help?
The helpouts can help both sides of the economy, the consumers as well as the businesses. Let’s see how.For Consumers,
- Google Helpout has the potential for helping users learn new skills and attain knowledge without actually having to travel to far off places in search for a bright teacher.
- Consumers can troubleshoot their problems, find out answers and learn things easily. It is equivalent to having a coworker or a colleague helping you out in times of distress.
For Corporations,
- Suppose you have a computer of ABC brand, it fails and you experience problems, you could either call their technicians and wait for some days or just view the company’s helpout page and do it yourself. It is that easy!
- Corporates can increase their reach to more and more consumers.
- Helpouts are also fee based, so small businesses can use this service o their advantage, charging some fee for their expertise.
Note. However there is a restriction to age for helpout users. Customers must be 13 years of age or older and Providers must be 18 years or older.
What about my $$ Money?
Payment is done through Google wallet, where providers have the option of getting payment per minute basis or payment per helpout basis. More information can be found out at, Google's Support Pages. Of-course Google will charge some fees for giving you the platform for earning, the current transaction fees is 20%, This fees is not applicable to free helpouts. Also it is on the net amount and does not include taxes. So if you price a helpout at 10$ 2$ will go to Google. Suppose tax levied is 1$, You would finally get 7$.
The shortcomings
But there are some problems that I think would keep Google’s Legal team on toes,
- The “100% money back guarantee” is turning many heads. Another potential problem that might occur is the authenticity of the help offered.
- If the assistance you got from the helpout page was wrong or misleading and that led to some monetary or health loss, who would be held responsible?
- Helpouts will also suffer with the same disadvantage as YouTube, i.e. low internet speed will render the service useless. Not everybody has a fast internet connection and not everyone can have access to fast internet connection.
More Information
To use any service, you must first understand the terms of service.Here are the terms of service for consumers, for providers, the content policies are not like yet another blogger content policy, It is a wee bit different. Helpouts have also been launched in android app store.
This answered your question,
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