I had a similar situation when I met my fiancee. INitially we thought she should come here to visit, ideally on a work Visa so she could work at the same time. Ideal situation we thought, and it would give us plenty of time to get used to each other. She was living in Israel at the time so I didnt have as many concerns about being scammed as many seem to having met girls online. (At least, until I came here, at which point I became very paranoid for a while!! )

The upshot of all my investigations was this:-
It is impossible to get a work visa unless your gf is VERY highly qualified and there is a shortage of employees in her chosen field.
It is very unlikely she will get a visitor visa unless she is already in a very well paid job and owns property in the philippines that she will want to go back to.
A Visitor visa will get refused if you mention any possibility of changing circumstances once shes here (getting married, working etc etc)
80% of visitor visas are refused (I can't find the reference to back this up - sorry)

For my part, this was a hard blow, but I wanted to keep the realtionship alive and so visited her in Israel 3 times before her Visa expired and I talked her into going home ratherthan overstaying, knowing this would put the kibosh on any possibility of a future visa here. I kept every boarding card and took lots of pictures. I kept call logs, chat logs, email and facebook messages, and made damn sure I had enough savings in the bank to cope if we finally decided that getting married was the right thing to do.

Its been a hard 18Months, but after 2 visits to Philippines this year, she IS now my fiancee, Visa was just granted, and she's due here on the 2nd October.

By all means do some further investigation, but my own was quite exhaustive and there didnt seem to be any way for her to come here other than on a fiancee or spouse visa.

NB The only reason we're not getting married in Philippines is the diffciulty for me in getting extended leave from work (needs 3 weeks and a lot of running about), and the fact that she could only apply for spouse Visa AFTER this, so she'd have to stay in Philippines when I returned and wait for the Visa.

Good luck, and stay on the forum - theres loads of people here who can help out if you need it, but DO get into the habit of searching first. Most questions have already been answered!