There’s a Shona proverb that roughly translates to ‘Things should be tested, an old lady from Chivi cooked rocks and drank soup.’ In challenging times, we all try to cook rocks at some point. Just a shot in the dark, a prayer into the ether, hoping against hope that we will catch a lucky break. Hit a lick as the kids say.
A few years ago a number of organisations claiming they were experts in cryptocurrency trading crept up promising they could double whatever money you invested with them every month. It was obviously not possible but many Zimbos cooked that rock and what do you know, there was no soup.
The latest entrant promising to make you rich beyond your wildest dreams is E-creator. You can pretty much double your investment every month with E-creator. And that’s the least you can expect because you can get even better returns. Or so they promise.
My spidey senses tingle whenever I see someone promise to double any amount of money in a month. Not even the best hedge fund managers in the world who manage trillions of dollars promise that. Yet, the likes of E-creator can somehow promise this. I find it hard to believe.
I went into this sceptical of the legitimacy of E-creator’s business, in fact, I was 100% convinced it was a scam but I decided to let the facts take me wherever they take me. Spoiler – the facts made me even more confident in my opinion that it’s a scam. This rock does not produce any soup. Let’s talk about it.
TL;DR
If you get something from this article, here is what you need to know,
-E-creator runs a business where the main activity is posting fake reviews on e-commerce sites
-Posting fake reviews is unethical and illegal in many countries
-E-creator offers unrealistic returns for members who are required to post 10 fake reviews a day, promising about 100% of principal in commissions every month
-E-creator requires members deposit money with them and maintain that balance if they are to get the promised commissions
-There is no reason why they should require such deposits and E-creator has been asked and failed to explain why
-E-creator is not licensed to take deposits by the RBZ, if indeed the monies placed with them could be called deposits
-Stay away from E-creator, save yourself
E-creator, the company
As an organisation, they did well enough in making themselves look legit.
Some of the main red flags that can indicate that an organisation is a scam include:
- The organization is not registered with any government agency.
- The organization does not have a physical address or phone number.
- The organisation’s owners and highest-level executives are anonymous.
- The organization’s website is poorly designed or contains grammatical errors.
- The organization is offering unrealistic returns on investment.
So, how does E-creator fare?
E-creator was registered as a limited liability company in Zimbabwe and they proudly display their certificate on their website. The company was registered on the 7th of February 2023.
Speaking of the website, it looks decent enough to be a legit company’s. However, they lose points for spelling their own name wrong in their URL. It says e-creatoerzw.com when I think they were going for e-creatorzw.com. More points are deducted for not having a phone number on their website.
E-creator ticks another item off the legit business checklist though – they have a physical address. They are located on the 10th Floor, Offices 15 and 16 at Joina City in Harare. You can walk in and see for yourself.
They have also made sure their ‘visionary CEO, Justin Kuchekenya,’ and the company’s office manager, Abraham Mutambu are visible. The guy has been on national TV championing his business. Who knows if he really is the guy behind this business or just a pawn placed there by the beneficial owners?
I say this because the E-creator app, available on Android, looks eerily similar to one that belongs to a Nigerian company – Amita E-commerce. The Nigerian company has a similar business model to E-creator’s and is reported to be struggling to meet customers’ withdrawal requests. More on this withdrawal stuff later.
Then when it comes to unrealistic returns on investment, need I say more? Doubling your money every month is as unrealistic as it gets.
E for Effort
So, at this point, it appears E-creator has done a decent job of making themselves look legit. However, it’s still not enough to shake the ‘scam’ label completely. The misspelt web address, the ties to Amita and the unrealistic promises count against them.
Before we conclude, let’s hear them out. Find out what kind of business they are in that allows them to offer 100% returns monthly.
What does E-creator do?
Here is what their office manager, as quoted by Zimtrending, had to say,
Our job is to rate products online and get commission daily. We don’t sell or sell products,…
That’s pretty much it. Of course, on their website and in their promotional material they will say they are into “Global internet operations, promotion and retail services.” Who could possibly know what that means?
For all the “we offer a range of services for e-commerce entrepreneurs, such as consulting, marketing planning, network promotion, product retailing, and more,” it all boils down to rating products online.
So, E-creator gathers an army of people who go onto e-commerce platforms like Lazada and Zaland and rate products. Never heard of those platforms? It’s understandable, they aren’t popular on this side of the planet. Zalando is German and Lazado has a presence in Asia.
You may be thinking, ‘I rate products on many platforms, but I’ve never been paid for that, how can E-creator promise to double my money just for rating products on those e-commerce platforms?’
Paid/ Fake reviews
You’re big boys and girls, you can handle the truth. Some of the reviews you see online, even on sites like Amazon and eBay are fake. Some sellers do indeed pay people to rate their products favourably on e-commerce sites.
The direct influence of fake online reviews on global online spending is $152 billion. Yes, fake reviews lead to $152 billion worth of business globally. So, you can understand why sellers are incentivised to pay people to post favourable reviews on their products and services.
E-creator is recruiting an army to post fake reviews on the sites they so proudly mention in their pitch to would-be members.
E-creator is implying that they are getting paid to post those fake reviews. Of course, E-creator and others like them have a better term for ‘fake review,’ calling what they do ‘order advertisement campaigns.’
However, even if it is true, they cannot possibly be getting paid enough to be able to offer a 100% return to each private in their fake review army.
That’s not to mention that this is unethical and worse still, illegal in many countries. It is considered to be fraud or deceptive marketing.
People have been arrested and sued for the practice. So, even if E-creator were making boatloads from fake reviews, they would be doing that as criminals. E-creator is a criminal enterprise and that’s not up for debate.
Where E-creator really makes money
If you were starting to think this might all be legit, or that there would be no harm in trying it out yourself, consider the smoking gun – you have to deposit money with E-creator to be able to join the fake review army.
Just why you have to give them your money is not clear. In fact, the office manager was asked this very question and he could not come up with an answer.
This is how it works:
- If you deposit $15-100, you get up to 4% in return (commission) each day after you post 10 fake reviews. They call these fake reviews ‘jobs’. With this deposit, you are considered a VIP 1 member.
- If you deposit $100-$500 and also recruit 5 other people to join as active VIP 1 members you are upgraded to VIP 2. This upgrade comes with a bump to 4.5% in commission.
- You have to deposit over $500, up to a maximum of $2000 and have 5 VIP 2 recruits to be upgraded to VIP 3. Your commission rate bumps up to 5%.
- And so on..
- They also say if you recruit at least 50 people at any level, you qualify to be a manager which comes with a $400 bonus every month, on top of your own commissions.
- Do remember that to remain on the program, you have to maintain your level’s minimum balance. If you’re a VIP 3 member, you have to maintain at least $500 and your recruits have to remain active for you to remain a VIP 3 member.
- E-creator says one can withdraw both the principal and the earned commission at any time and exit the program.
Limitations
Regardless of your level, you have to post 10 fake reviews a day. 10 and no more. They say they limit each individual to 10 for ‘regulation purposes.’
I suspect it could be to prevent the algorithms on the e-commerce sites that they flood with fake reviews from flagging E-creator reviewers. It’s a stretch as it is for someone to be posting 10 reviews every day. Like, how many things does this person buy? Imagine what kind of shopaholic one would have to be to post 10 genuine reviews on 10 products every day.
Note: some sellers utilise bots to post fake reviews but these may be easier to spot for the policing algorithms and so the sellers utilise both bots and humans.
This is a scam
There may be elements to E-creator’s business that actually bring on money. They could be getting paid for the fake reviews.
However, at the very least, E-creator is a criminal enterprise. They are actively posting fake reviews on e-commerce sites, which is illegal in many countries meaning they could face lawsuits and jail time in the future. Where would that leave you as a VIP member who posts positive reviews on products you never purchased or used? You would be placing yourself at risk.
In Zimbabwe, there is the Consumer Protection Act which prohibits businesses from engaging in deceptive or misleading marketing practices. This includes making false or misleading statements about a product or service.
Going beyond the fake reviews that do not really affect Zimbabwean buyers, we find E-creator could be contravening some serious laws in Zimbabwe. In finance, a deposit is defined as ‘an amount of money that is placed with a financial institution, such as a bank, for safekeeping or to earn interest.’
To be a deposit taker in Zimbabwe you have to be licensed by the RBZ and E-creator is not licensed as a deposit taker.
You could argue that the money placed with E-creator is not a deposit since they are not a financial institution and that they are not really promising interest, but rather a commission. They say you are recharging your account and not depositing after all.
We asked the RBZ to weigh in and will let you know when we get a response.
Stay away
If you are still on the line, just ask yourself, what do they do with the deposits that are placed with them? Are they actually buying products to make sure the fake reviews are not flagged?
If so, they would be spending it on products that no one is actually looking for. So, when you then go to withdraw your principal + commission, where do they get the money to give you? From the new schmucks joining the program, that’s from who.
If they are not buying products, where exactly are they keeping this money? Is it just sitting in an account somewhere? I think they use this pool of funds to pay out those that want to withdraw. However, they require new recruits to be able to keep paying out. Classic pyramid and Ponzi stuff.
There is absolutely no reason why you should be depositing any money with them if they are in the fake review business as they themselves claim. So use your brain, this is not legit stuff. This is all a scam. Tell someone and hopefully, we can get this company shut down ASAP, before many more people fall victim.
You will get no soup from the E-creator rock. You will lose your deposit.
Also read:
Beware the scam, you won’t get a UK VISA by sharing an ad on WhatsApp
Scammers can now convincingly fake browser windows, including URL. You can protect against that
Beware of scammers promising to process e-passports for Zim diasporans
I knew this was fake from the day my work mate wanted to sell me the idea…
Pyramid something!
Makes sense they scamming people or they are yet to
people are making money out there with E-CREATOR
My friend is trying so hard to make me join… He deposited waya, so he want to move to VIP 2…kkk
“So use your brain, this is not legit stuff”
Im insulted 😒, did you really think I would fall for that dumb scam? ofcoz not , it’s not like I deposited my last 100 Us dollars in ecreator hoping that it would double in a month so I could buy this cool graphics tablet I want .
…Since you brought it up, what tablet are you looking at? It happens once in a blue moon but they sometimes pop up in the Comexposed Facebook groups. You could even do a Hail Mary and straight up ask if anyone is looking to sell.
Hahaha_nice one Techzim almost had me panicking there , ha ha ha ha ha h ah , im sure you were just joking 😰, all those paragraphs 😨😰or those words all that research , Im sure it was a joke😳 , haha a funny joke , hahahah , thank you guys you’ve made my day 😅
The money is buying gold from makorokoza at wholesale price and the gold is smuggled to Dubai were it is sold at international prices. E commerce is part of gold mafia.
😂😂😂 hoyo
Thanks for the article Leornard. I hope one day you coyld write on online platforms that claim to have debeloped A.Is that can trade forex and cryptos like Daisy, Qianze and FusionX. Like are there any real algorithms that where developed , if any, that can really trade. That’s the new kid on the block( maybe not so new).
Also financial institutions like Fintoch that claim to run a blockchain blah blah blah bank. ROI and crap. Getting 1% ROI everyday.
They are not called AI you can develop an EA Expert Advisor which can trade for u automatically and if the strategy used to program the ea is Powerful you will make money but if the strategy is bad u will just loose ur money using the same EA I develop some EA’s for other big traders and some of them are good they make profit because of his strategy so it all depends on the startegy being used by the EA And how accurate it is
Tell me more
I think no one is being forced to join this E-Creator thing….. It’s your money and your cellphone so why are you so concerned nezvisiri zvenyu kkkkkk Africans you are so funny pari kubiwa chaipo hamupataure….. This is my money and it’s my time and data so live us alone tazvijaira zvekubirwa😂😂😂😂
So take some MICRO WORK as the base blended in with some MULTI LEVEL MARKETING and then plain old PYRAMID SCHEME as the icing
And you get the E-Creator cake
I don’t know if it’s the zimbawean economy ,or maybe it’s desperation or maybe it’s just plain outright greed.
But it seems like if you want a zimbawean to throw common sense out of the window you just have to offer them a 100% return.
They’ll come running.
I almost fell for this pyramid scheme it just sounded too good to be true. All my friends are into this I don’t want to convince them that they will loose their money it will sound like I am being jealous of them making money
Hauna mari ndosaka
I got turned off when i realised that you deposit funds in a personal account,the names that pop up on the ECOCASH accounts are Nigerian…This thing is a whole scam
Micro Work where you work really hard and the pay is micro 😔🤣
It requires someone who is really hard working to be able to make a living out of it.
So what, others are paying rent with it
This app multiplied my investment by a 100 in just 14 days. 2 weeks ago, I invested zero dollars, now I have 100 x 0 stashed away for a rainy day.
Eh Bien, what do you mean when you say now you have 100 × 0 if your investment has multiplied?
Honestly am enjoying this money why am saying so l recharged $100 then within a month l withdraw my money back. So l started using their profits am a risk taker.. Am making money this is similar wen you buy tomatoes with wholesale price then oora madomasi acho unobvunza ani..
these clowns managed to get on ZBC news
You know nothing
What’s funny is that you have a whatsapp group here on techzim, you are promoting this company and acting like you are against it kkkk
I’m not in these groups so please bear with me. To be clear, are you saying a representative of techzim in their capacity as a member of techzim promoted this in the group or that some rando who’s only affiliation to techzim is reading the site and being in the group promoted it?
Whether fake or not fake, after writing do you give people money? If you claim to have written facts beyond proving go and report to the police. Your opinion does not represent the truth, you just don’t know what you are saying. This company seem to have a big deal, I wanna pay it a visit
e-Creator is true
I don’t know. All you’ve managed to do is half-convince us what they do is illegal (posting fake reviews) You haven’t proved that people lose their money when they join. Or they don’t get commissioned as stated. This actually looks like a smear piece to be honest. I’m never joining anything like that but this article is poorly return with very minimal factual findings. You need to do better.
By the time people start losing money, it will be too late for a warning article like this
We need to assess the facts and the trends. Based on this tthe model, it is likely that creator will start delaying people’s withdrawals soon. Someone already commented that the deposits go to personal ecocash accounts with Nigerian names. I’m sure after we have recruited and recruited tasvika mathousands or whatever their target is, the said Niger will withdraw the money and dash. So the venture works until it stops working. It’s wisdom to not be in their number on that unknown day
are pyramid schemes legal in Zimbabwe?
Easy Come, Easy Go: The Myth and Law Behind Pyramid/Ponzi Schemes in Zimbabwe
https://www.mmmlawfirm.co.zw/easy-come-easy-go-the-myth-and-law-behind-pyramid-ponzi-schemes-in-zimbabwe/
By all means Chad, let’s wait until E-creator starts defaulting on withdrawals to point out that this is a scam. People are not yet losing money, there have been no such reports. That’s how these schemes work, they start out paying out on time so that everyone joins, then they dip.
You might have me on the piece being poorly written but this is definitely not a smear piece. It is a warning.
Marii kuvanhu
e_creator is true techzim tikuto dripper nayo
tikuto dripper nayo
At least you have been warned. You know now that next time, it might be your tears dripping
I think no one is being forced to join this E-Creator thing….. It’s your money and your cellphone so why are you so concerned nezvisiri zvenyu kkkkkk Africans you are so funny pari kubiwa chaipo hamupataure….. This is my money and it’s my time and data so live us alone tazvijaira zvekubirwa😂😂😂😂
If they do it well it might work. Paid reviews are a thing in developed countries. E.g. Yelp. Maybe they should slow down and not spend money showing up in the press all the time, end up broke and scamming people to pay off debts.
Iam also a VIP 1 member guys I have invested and got my money back but guys don’t fall for this E Creator 1 day umwe achachema chete
Guys be warned iam also a VIP 2 member but I don’t trust this E Creator
You may call it scam but I’m making a lot of good money with E-creator,
It’s quite normal to make good money from a Pyramid Scheme especially during its early days. It’s crucial that they earn your trust otherwise it won’t work.
Mari kuvanhu asi ukavharwa ndezvako
where is trafficmonsoom with our monies, its exactly as e-creator
You dont know how it works stay there and keep quiet. Hauna kana udea TechZim. E creator kuseri. Your explanations shows you know nothing about it.
You are just looking for attention and likes, do a deeper research, by the way you have limited knowledge about E-Commerce. TechZim washaya apa.
I have withdrawn more than 1000usd and cashed out, yet I only recharged 40 dollars… I honestly don’t care if it’s a pyramid scheme.. I went in early and have benefited so yes… taurai henyu isu tichidya
Risk takers are rich. 😂😂😂😂 Let those who put negative news in their minds do so. Some of us we are moving on positively.apa inonaka sei marii ye E creator
Risk takers are rich. 😂😂😂😂 Let those who put negative news in their minds do so. Some of us we are moving on positively.apa inonaka sei mari ye E creator
Thank you so much lenard for bring to our attention and being upstanding citizen.
It’s clear some ppl are benifiting and the very same calling it a Ponzi at the expense of every one else…it just goes to show how greedy we have become and ppl will turn a blind eye when they on the gravy train
Thanks Lenard for the , but it seems some people are ignorant ..the facts are and the red flags are there ….this e creator guys researched very well when it comes to know their customers,they know that Zimbabweans are still knew to this scam thing …this problem is going to exist for a long time,because most of us don’t know what a scam is or what it looks like. The 100% returns are too good to be true …just like any pyramid scam the first batch gets paid
IF you join E-Creator we all earn and if you do not join we will continue earning
This is actually not good to to release the news about E creator being fake why in the first place did the platform like ZBC tv take it to shows instead of evaluating the model of the company so it means if these platform failed to see that and published it to the nation it means they also will promote scam.
Yu know the things with black minds is that always have a negative mindset of something that comes up yu always find a way to criticize it for instance in forex and cryptocurrency investment they are some that are totally legit have personally tried them myself and l got my money so don’t quickly judge something first before thoroughly analyzing every possibility outcome hre mister maybe yu were scammed one time in yur life but that doesn’t imply everything out their isn’t probably legit. Don’t put money in yur accounts when trading on different platforms such as MT5 or MT4 accounts knowingly that there risk involved in there so my friend don’t be quickly blinded by your human error of misjudge. Let those who want to try something out do it we all learn from our mistakes such like a child playing with fire not knowing it’s dangerous so it doesn’t hurt to try something out
Chenjerai kuzo royana nevanhu vanenge vabefita imi maruza. I know one guy who did so well in Zimbabwe’s first pyramid scheme frenzy in the 90s, he died an painful and mysterious death. Some folks vanoti akaroi.
Tanzwa nemarii dzemahara
These grifters just know that they will get those curious enough to just try – and then you have those who want to cheat the cheater and get out before it collapses.
The good thing is when it collapses (which it soon will) whoever loses deserves it because they are either a fool or they wanted to scam others into joining.
Well done for making a stand, it’s easy to have fallen for a kickback and write a puff piece somehow promoting the thievery.
Greed is bas Greed is bad Greed is bad
Greed, for lack of a better word, is good.” Gordon Gekko. WALL STREET
Hauna mari ndosaka
Life injuga wangu as it is kana ukasa risker hauhwine pamwe unodya pamwe uno looser chikuru kuzama.
So far so good kana muchida kujoiner follow the iro tidye mari ichiri kubuda
https://e-creatoerzw.com/#/register/index?code=450862509378
Munhu akagadzira e creator ndowando respector but vari ku joiner you need to read books anotaura how to make these things , kana waverenga unogona kuto discover kuti zvogadzirika nyore , woita Mari nechi scam chako , in Zimbabwe vanhu vakapusa , so there’s opportunity for you to make money wagadzira chi scam chako ,
Well we shall see, I’m not investing much hangu I’ve already recovered my initial deposit
Everything we do in life is a risk even doing the actual business it’s risk that is why we have HR with certain algorithm to help them to predict the future and the weakness an after that models are made to maximize rewards therefore e Creator is here with the vision to help people maximize profits and if you win you win then good but if you loose its okay because it’s part of thr game.If the model being used by the e creator is wrong then why did RBZ not taking action like it true on Innbucks.
Strive Masiwa is now rich because he risk and now rich
I see what’s going on here , you guys are more than happy to pay so that you can wash the car 😳 , hee Risky risky , heee risky is equals to get richi , idiots , you don’t just take risks , people don’t become wealthy because of risking , it takes delicate planning , you don’t just stab into the dark , anyway I don really care what y’all do with your lives but i gotta say , it doesn’t make any sense to pay someone so that you can work for them to maybe get your money back
Lol the login button on the site says “Login in”
Not a lot of effort in the planning – typo’d domain and typo’d content.
I see what’s going on here , you guys are more than happy to pay so that you can wash the car 😳 , hee Risky risky , heee risky is equals to get richi , idiots , you don’t just take risks , people don’t become wealthy because of risking , it takes delicate planning , you don’t just stab into the dark , anyway I don really care what y’all do with your lives but i gotta say , it doesn’t make any sense to pay someone so that you can work for them to maybe get your money back