Designers, developers and employers, I need your help

[Josh Johnson]

Okay for my final year University project I am developing a website that makes the process of hiring a freelancer/getting work (if you are a freelancer) as simple and effective as possible. No bidding wars or uniform user profiles for everyone.

What I really need to identify is what annoys/pleases you about freelancer type websites (PeoplePerHour, Freelancer, Guru, LinkedIn etc) and what makes you go back to them.

Thanks!

[Josh Johnson]

@theacefes Do you think that the low expectations of price are caused by the “minimum bidding” system where bidding wars drive the price down? Or do you just think people don’t know how much a website costs?

[Alen]

A lot of the freelancer job sites attract people that are willing to do the job for practically nothing

This will always be the case. Solution would be to prioritize quality and filter clients/freelancers based on that. Then the question becomes how do you do that? Voting system by clients? freelancers? No clue.

There is also the demographic of people who want to get websites made for the sake of making a website or without understanding why/if they even need one.

You mean everyone.

I think it’s our job to clarify this point. As a professional you need to guide the client and suggest/provide/build a solution that fits their needs. The fact that EVERYONE wants a website should be a good thing considering we make our living doing this.

@jshjohnson, what I would suggest is compiling a list of what kind of services they offer, then do the opposite. Or come up with set of rules and stick with them.

Every market will have: bottom-feeders, middle, and high-end… you have to make the decision on what market you want to serve.

[Josh Johnson]

@Alen Thanks for your comment.

It’s interesting to me that you think I should do the opposite of the competition – are there any features that you think current services offer that work for you or have you continuously had bad experiences with them?

[Alen]

Google searching for reviews will help you narrow down experiences people are having with those services. I haven’t used such services in a while so am not sure if my “experience” qualifies. But nothing little research can’t solve :)

The opposite comment was just to get you thinking. You have to decide if your solution will cater to everyone, or will you stand by set forth ideas and isolate some people (which is not a bad thing).

Maybe your site only provides freelancers that are exceptional at Adaptive design. Or UX or whatever… just brainstorming here…

Look for a niche would be my suggestion.

I understand this is a school project, but it could develop into something big. Just like 37signals extracted Rails from their BaseCamp project, you never know…

Have fun.

[Josh Johnson]

Thanks for your comments guys.

I have created a short survey including some of the problems you have mentioned. If you could go over it, I would really appreciate it: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/PTKWQB8

[Dustin]

I think maybe what Alen was saying, is that there aren’t really any legitimate companies or websites satisfying this market. Now if someone were to make one that was the quality of, say, what Treehouse is for training on web development, it would probably eliminate the other websites very easily.

In other words, these places were mostly built around the cheapest prices, and not quality. That’s just my opinion and I’ve used a few of them. Sure, India can probably do some great work, but then there is a language barrier and some other sacrifices there. I could probably be incorrect about that in a few cases. I’ve dealt with some extremely talented individuals overseas for customer service representatives, and just recently it was an individual from India that was able to solve my issue easily.

So I think two things need to happen.

1. Build companies in this niche that focus on quality levels, and try to make the “quality” as what is the most attractive thing on the website. Filter out the low pricing and give it less attention on the design. Explain the benefits of what a quality website and coding do for the customer. There needs to be sort of a “path” for the eyes to follow, a bit of persuasion, leading to where the quality is and how to get people to pay for that. Maybe even filtering certain or random clients through landing pages would work.

2. Designers also need to take it up a step. Countries like India and China are getting an edge on Americans because they are very dedicated and hard working. Who wouldn’t want to pay someone who was like that? They deserve it if they are doing things right, and if they charge cheap prices for the exact same thing, it’s hard to not pick them. I’m not saying everyone overseas who is charging low prices is good, however, some of them are extremely talented. This issue really needs to be tackled at a “world level” and it’s a very political topic. I’ll leave it at that.

Best wishes!

[Josh Johnson]

@Dustin You sir, have given me a lot of food for thought. Thanks!

The more I hear from people, the more I think a system like Dribbble or Forrrst might be the best way to filter quality. I feel it puts people off trying to sign up though. It’s definitely a tough one!

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