So in short: Yes. It helps specially if you're new to italki (and if you use the trials correctly)
Well I did and I benefited from it. As soon as I signed up I took three trials [each person[/id] is allowed 3 trials] to see how italki works in general and if it can be a practical tool for learning or not. So what I did was to 'teacher browse' a while and chose three trials which had all the following conditions :
1) found the least expensive trials offered [after all I didn't know if this italki idea and specially the teachers would be of any real help]
AND
2) chose the teachers with most experience (numbers of lessons) [who had met the first condition obviously]
As I had 3 trials, I chose two professional teachers and one community teacher ... as an additional test (because it might happen in real world) I sent them 3 or 4 followup text message questions ... I stoke out (from the list) the ones who had directly mentioned, reminded, or even hinted in any way that "it is/was a trial lesson and you have only paid for a trial lesson" .... so I stroke out 2 and I was left with one of the professional teachers which I highly recommend if anyone wants to learn Russian and is serious about learning it ... and well after that (not at trial price) I've had only wonderful teachers {knock on wood! :) }
Also in my opinion both 'community teachers' (everyday guys who talk the language) and 'professional teachers' (which supposed to be more literate/read about teaching), both have their advantages. Generally, I expect a 'community teacher' not to think in 'grammar rules' / 'teaching grammar rules' / 'showing grammar tables' etc. ... I guess generally they're natives that without even thinking about a grammar rule talk their mother tongue, and they can be very very helpful to see how a language is spoken in real world [compared to text written in the student books]
