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I was a pretty regular worker on vWorker -- in the top several hundred in terms of income -- and I've been very unhappy with the transition to freelancer. The

by Dove 13y ago

I was a pretty regular worker on vWorker -- in the top several hundred in terms of income -- and I've been very unhappy with the transition to freelancer. The major issues I've encountered are: * Extreme difficulty communicating with clients on the site during the bidding process. If there's a way to discuss terms and details on a prospective project, I haven't found it yet. * Getting paid, in the US, is difficult, expensive, slow, and impossible to automate. (It was none of those things on vWorker). * The vibe of the site is incompatible with high quality, professional contracting. If I send clients to your site, they don't hear about cost and schedule and deliverables. They get asked to follow you on twitter so they can level up and win a free t-shirt. * No sub-accounts. I can't give an administrative assistant or subcontractor partial access to my account; it's either cut and paste or give out the master password. * The whole setup seems geared toward people with a very different business philosophy than me -- hundreds of bids per month, dozens of skills on your profile, tens of client relationships. And if I work hard, I could get more of all of those things! That actively drives me away. I have dozens of skills, but I only want to list one or two. I want to make one or two bids per month. I want to work with one client at a time. Overall, the system says to me, "This is a place for spammy contractors to take tiny jobs," not, "This is a place for serious professionals to do quality work."

octopus 13y ago
I'm a not a big Freelancer fan, as you can see from my other comment. However, I think Freelancer does a better job at sorting the low spam bidders than ever did vWorker. On vWorker I've seen $1 - $3 bids on certain projects.
lotharbot 13y ago
[context: I am Dove's husband and acted as her administrative assistant on vWorker] Really, what it comes down to from my perspective is that freelancer is not geared toward the type of freelancing we're trying to do: making a living as professionals in a first-world country. As professionals, we have reason to want to grant limited account access to a secretary, accountant, or sub-contractor. This feature existed on vWorker, but not Freelancer. As professionals, we want to be rated and visible based on delivering quality work on time and on budget and making our clients happy. On vWorker, ranking/visibility was based entirely on revenue x client rating, with a bonus "top worker" designation for never missing a deadline or having a bad rating. On Freelancer, we level up by following you on social media, get badges for logging in every day for a year, and generally get ranked according to tangential criteria. It's distracting, and appears unprofessional to clients who are being asked to "level up" and "earn badges" themselves when all they want to do is hire us. As professionals, we don't bid until we've already come to terms with the client. On vWorker, we'd regularly have dozens of messages with clients establishing the details of a project, discussing timelines, etc. and then we'd put in a bid with that full understanding. Freelancer seems geared toward submitting a large number of bids without having ever really discussed terms -- the sort of thing that might work for "transcribe a 10 minute audio clip", but not for projects measured in months and costing $x0,000 to complete. As professionals, we want to pay our $50 monthly fee and our 2% per-contract cut, use the site to connect with clients with real large-scale contracts, and get paid on a reasonable timescale. Trying to do that on freelancer is an exercise in frustration.
- mattbarrie 13y ago
  Hi Dove/lotharbot, Thanks for your feedback. Some of the vWorker freelancers I agree were exceptional - this is why they are now at the top of the leaderboard in many categories. vWorker users earnings are, on a whole, up about 50% post acquisition from what they were before. If you send me an email I can look into your accounts and see if I can make a recommendation for you, if you like (my email is easy to guess @freelancer.com). Re/ sub-accounts, we are looking at this, the actual use on vWorker was very low (less than ~500 users out of 2.5m). This is why we haven't implemented yet. We are looking at it, however. You are mixing up the Freelancer leveling system with reputation. Reputation is completely distinct. Reputation is simply volume (dollar) weighted ratings on a per category basis. Thus the highest rated, most paid freelancers are at the top of reputation for a given skill. The gamification system is completely distinct and has no influence on the bid list, this is purely like a frequently flyer program in giving back perks to users who are good on the site (as distinct to those good at work). Yes, we are a much bigger marketplace than vWorker. So there are more bidders, but also substantially more projects. We do have projects that are well over $250,000 on an ongoing basis. No platform charges 2%. vWorker charged 15% flat. You can get down to 3% on Freelancer, the lowest commission in the industry for $49.95. If you get in contact with me, I will see how I can help. Regards Matt
  - lotharbot 13y ago
    > "You are mixing up the Freelancer leveling system with reputation." This sort of confusion suggests the leveling system is far more prominent, and therefore distracting, than it needs to be.

by Dove 13y ago

octopus 13y ago

I'm a not a big Freelancer fan, as you can see from my other comment. However, I think Freelancer does a better job at sorting the low spam bidders than ever did vWorker. On vWorker I've seen $1 - $3 bids on certain projects.

lotharbot 13y ago

[context: I am Dove's husband and acted as her administrative assistant on vWorker] Really, what it comes down to from my perspective is that freelancer is not geared toward the type of freelancing we're trying to do: making a living as professionals in a first-world country. As professionals, we have reason to want to grant limited account access to a secretary, accountant, or sub-contractor. This feature existed on vWorker, but not Freelancer. As professionals, we want to be rated and visible based on delivering quality work on time and on budget and making our clients happy. On vWorker, ranking/visibility was based entirely on revenue x client rating, with a bonus "top worker" designation for never missing a deadline or having a bad rating. On Freelancer, we level up by following you on social media, get badges for logging in every day for a year, and generally get ranked according to tangential criteria. It's distracting, and appears unprofessional to clients who are being asked to "level up" and "earn badges" themselves when all they want to do is hire us. As professionals, we don't bid until we've already come to terms with the client. On vWorker, we'd regularly have dozens of messages with clients establishing the details of a project, discussing timelines, etc. and then we'd put in a bid with that full understanding. Freelancer seems geared toward submitting a large number of bids without having ever really discussed terms -- the sort of thing that might work for "transcribe a 10 minute audio clip", but not for projects measured in months and costing $x0,000 to complete. As professionals, we want to pay our $50 monthly fee and our 2% per-contract cut, use the site to connect with clients with real large-scale contracts, and get paid on a reasonable timescale. Trying to do that on freelancer is an exercise in frustration.

mattbarrie 13y ago
Hi Dove/lotharbot, Thanks for your feedback. Some of the vWorker freelancers I agree were exceptional - this is why they are now at the top of the leaderboard in many categories. vWorker users earnings are, on a whole, up about 50% post acquisition from what they were before. If you send me an email I can look into your accounts and see if I can make a recommendation for you, if you like (my email is easy to guess @freelancer.com). Re/ sub-accounts, we are looking at this, the actual use on vWorker was very low (less than ~500 users out of 2.5m). This is why we haven't implemented yet. We are looking at it, however. You are mixing up the Freelancer leveling system with reputation. Reputation is completely distinct. Reputation is simply volume (dollar) weighted ratings on a per category basis. Thus the highest rated, most paid freelancers are at the top of reputation for a given skill. The gamification system is completely distinct and has no influence on the bid list, this is purely like a frequently flyer program in giving back perks to users who are good on the site (as distinct to those good at work). Yes, we are a much bigger marketplace than vWorker. So there are more bidders, but also substantially more projects. We do have projects that are well over $250,000 on an ongoing basis. No platform charges 2%. vWorker charged 15% flat. You can get down to 3% on Freelancer, the lowest commission in the industry for $49.95. If you get in contact with me, I will see how I can help. Regards Matt
- lotharbot 13y ago
  > "You are mixing up the Freelancer leveling system with reputation." This sort of confusion suggests the leveling system is far more prominent, and therefore distracting, than it needs to be.