Copyright 2005 Richard Grady
A few weeks ago I touched on the subject of getting other peopleto do your work for you. I want to cover this topic in a bitmore detail as outsourcing is a superb way of saving yourselfboth time and money.
By way of example, let me start with a short story :-)
At 8.30pm one night last week, I started to wonder whether itwould be possible to automate a particular part of one of mywebsite design processes. At present I do this tasksemi-manually and it takes me about 4 hours to generate amulti-page website.
Anyway, by 8.45pm I had scratched out an outline of what I wouldneed a new custom piece of software to do to automate this taskand by 8.59pm the 'project' was advertised on one of the mainfreelance websites....
Within 2 minutes I had the first bid from a programmer....
Within 15 minutes I had four more bids....
Within 45 minutes I had accepted a bid and the programmer wasworking on the project.
Two days and $75 later (and with less than an hours workrequired by me) and I had a brand new piece of custom softwarewhich can complete the task in question in seconds rather thanhours!
With several excellent freelance sites around nowadays, it isvery easy to find a programmer/web designer/writer/whatever thatwill be happy to work with you and the cost (as illustratedabove) will often be far less than you might expect.
If you spend some time thinking about the type of tasks youcould outsource, I am sure you will soon come up with a fairlysubstantial list. The following are just a few ideas:
Website design Website maintenance Copywriting General writing -for example of an entire eBook! Software design/creation (foryour own use or resale) Graphic design Script installation (andcreation) Dealing with your support emails Finding newaffiliates Finding new link exchange partners
And so the list goes on....
Of course, as with anything, there are a few things to be awareof when outsourcing so here are my top tips for a successfulproject:
1. Only post your project on the main freelance sites (listbelow). This will give you the best exposure and the highestlevel of competition from bidders. This means keen pricing and agood range of expertise from which to choose from.
2. When you post your project, ensure that you detail EXACTLYwhat is required. The more information the better. If you startadding to the brief after a freelancer has placed his/her bid,expect the price to rise....
3. Try and keep the brief as simple as possible. Remember thatEnglish may not be the first language of some of the freelancersand whilst I have never had any communication problems (in fact,most of the programmers I have used have a better standard ofwritten English than the majority of my fellow countrymen!), itmakes sense not to over-complicate matters with slang etc thatmay not be understood.
4. Don't always opt for the lowest bid. All of the freelancesites listed below allow you to view feedback ratings forfreelancers and I usually base my decision on this rating. Iwould rather pay a bit extra and use someone with a superbrating than save a bit of money and use a new freelancer. Theymay be great at what they do but unfortunately when you aredealing with people at a distance, you have no way of knowingand in my view, it isn't worth the risk and potential extrahassle. Go with someone that has already proven themselves.
5. If your project is to create something that you want toresell (for example a software product or an eBook) make surethat you stress in the brief that at the end of the project, youwill own the copyright and will have access to the sourcecode/files. Obviously you want to ensure that the freelancerdoesn't come back to you in the future complaining that you areselling his/her work and that you can edit the product if youneed to without having to find the original creator. It wouldalso be wise to include a condition stating that the freelanceris not allowed to use your product in the future for someoneelse or indeed sell it themselves.
As for which freelance site to use, there are three that Irecommend but my absolute fave ishttp://www.thetraderonline.com/scriptlance.html and this isdefinitely my 'site of choice'.
Alternatively, try www.eLance.com or www.Rentacoder.com
About the author:Richard Grady has been helping ordinary people earn online since1998. He writes a free newsletter which is published every twoweeks. To subscribe (and claim your free gifts), visit:http://www.thetraderonline.com/newsletter.html