HIRING TEAM MEMBERS ONLINE

Hiring online has never been as popular as it is today. Today, there are millions of freelancers and experts from all over the world, offering their services to buyers.

Before we go on, it is essential to define a few terms.

Freelancers: A person that offers his expertise to clients, mostly on freelance platforms. There are biography writing freelancers, writing freelancers, graphics design freelancers, digital marketing freelancers, brand creating freelancers, and more.

Freelance Companies: A freelance company is a company that serves as a platform online for freelancers and prospective clients to meet. Examples of freelance companies include fiverr, truelancer, upwork, and Hubstaff Talent.

Client: A person who is looking for a freelancer that can do a particular job for him.

Job: The work a client or a prospective employer posts on a freelance company’s online platform.

Revision: The number of times the freelancer agrees to edit an already finished work for the client. If the freelancer agrees on three revisions, that means that the client, if unsatisfied, can order the client to change some part of the work at the most three times.  

Contract: An agreement between freelancer and client, stating the tenets or un-breakable principles of the business relationship. The principles include agreed price, delivery time, number of revisions, and other elements that must be present in the body of work the freelancer will create for the client.

Review: Comment left by the client after the contract between him and the freelancer ends. The review shows the satisfaction level of the client; the review is also public on the platform and cannot be deleted by the freelancer; therefore if the freelancer isn’t professional, he will get bad reviews and this will affect the level of jobs he gets.   

How it works: Mostly, the buyer or client goes online and registers with some of these freelance companies and posts a job. The freelancers apply for the job and the employer gets to choose his desired freelancer. They agree through a contract and the client pays before the freelancer begins the job; however, payment doesn’t always go directly to the freelancer. It is held by the freelance company until the client signifies that he is satisfied with the work or until all parts of the contract have been fulfilled by the freelancer. The client, after final work is received goes ahead to give a review of the freelancer’s expertise—this review can be good or bad.

Hiring online has its risks—like “who handles the money?” and “will the freelancer deliver on his words?”

Freelance companies reduce these risks by making the profiles of the freelancers open to view by clients. Freelance companies sometimes handle the financial part of the deal for a minimal percentage. Companies like Hubstaff Talent that do not handle finances leave freelancers and clients to agree on payments—mostly, the client pays after the job is finished.

To ensure hiring the best freelancer, go through these tips:

1. Go through employment records of the interested freelancers.
2. Set a test: A short test can be set by the client to know how good the freelancers are. Interested freelancers will write and submit the test. Note that not all freelancers take tests—especially experienced ones. Such freelancers will never submit any document to a client without an agreement of pay—and a test will involve submitting a document without an agreement of pay.
3. Check reviews. If you have four freelancers who interest you, you can make the final choice by checking the reviews of each. Note that new freelancers do not usually have reviews; that is, they may be new to the platform; these new freelancers can yet be highly talented and capable of delivering even if they do not have reviews at the moment.
4. Follow your gut.    

If you want to learn how to hire the best online team, what you should hire for and tips join me at my free masterclass on How To Build Your Million Dollar Team. Click here to join my masterclass.