What is it with people on freelancer sites

[AllAboutCams]

Why the fuck do they promise something and almost never do what they say they do even the ones with a good portfolio.

[Ferus]

Never had that problem on elance

[ExpliciteDesign]

You have to lower your expectations

[Barefootsies]

Originally Posted by ExpliciteDesign

You have to lower your expectations

That is correct.

[96ukssob]

they only care about you until the money is in their pocket. after that, they give no fucks

This is why they are not "in business" and living on day-to-day income. Unfortunately, it's a downside to the Internet were any assclown can trick you into buying something from them.

[PornDiscounts-V]

Because you want to pay them with peanuts

[gogonow]

you pay peanuts, you get monkeys

[Rochard]

I stick to GFY. I posted the other day for a logo, someone reccomended his designer, and he worked out great.

[LeRoy]

Originally Posted by gogonow

you pay peanuts, you get monkeys

[Dankasaur]

Originally Posted by vvvvv

Because you want to pay them with peanuts

Originally Posted by gogonow

you pay peanuts, you get monkeys

Spot on.

[ilnjscb]

I've found you need to search for the perfect person, and be extremely clear with your directives. Then start them with a few small jobs and scale up. I've never had an issue.

[Mutt]

I've had good experiences on freelancer sites - all smallish projects though. i don't think i'd gamble on a freelancer site for anything major.

[bigluv]

Using freelancers requires a specialized management technique.

[candyflip]

When you want to pay $10 an hour when you should be paying $100, you get what you pay for.

Seems pretty simple to me.

[bronco67]

Freelancers who do that are hurting themselves in the long run. You can only get away with that shit for a while until you deep six your rep.

[mineistaken]

Originally Posted by bigluv

Using freelancers requires a specialized management technique.

Elaborate a little bit. Thanks.

[bigluv]

Originally Posted by mineistaken

Elaborate a little bit. Thanks.

I've been tweaking the way I deal with freelancers for years and I feel like to a certain extent my process is a competitive advantage. Without getting into the esoteric stuff, developing your own successful process can't start early enough in the chain.

What I mean by this is, every aspect of your job description, interview process, trial, probation period, hiring, communication, etcetera should all maximize chances of success and minimize chances of failure as well as minimize the effort you need to put in per applicant early on. The trick is to be as clear as possible, gather as many applicants that you can get in the net but also pre-qualify them and weed them out in an as automatic process as possible.

Using training videos, "secret words", trial/demo jobs that are set up on a template basis, and stating up front in your job description who should not apply are all part of the process. Managing them during the job is also extremely important, and thought has to be given to the structure of the job, checkpoints to prevent them going off on the wrong tangent, regular communication to spot any problems, etcetera. Lining everything up in your process to easily support the good ones and weed out the bad ones is key.

It takes a little more effort to start out, and more attention during the first time you hire, but after that, IMO, you can repeat the process easily and reasonably quickly.

I have several shit jobs I freelance out and while I have been burned quite a few times I've learned from and adjusted each time. Generally I pay peanuts and mostly my monkeys do what I want. Built into my expectations is that sooner or later I will experience turnover and have to hire someone new but thats just part of paying at the low end. When I get lazy and stop checking up and they get complacent is usually the point at which things go wrong.

Good luck

EDIT: Another big part of being successful is knowing when they lie to you and taking action based on that knowledge. Depending on where you are hiring from, expecting stupidity and duplicity and designing that into your process can be helpful IMO.