Fiverr is an excellent freelancer platform that you can use to outsource any recruitment marketing tasks you either don’t have the time for or where there’s a skill gap within your team.
The channel is called ‘Fiverr’ because freelancer rates can start from as low as £5 – and while you’d likely be paying more than that for most projects, you really can pick up something like a logo design for as little as £10-15!
If you’re thinking about outsourcing some marketing tasks to Fiverr but you’re not sure how it works, here are the 7 main steps to getting the process nailed.
Step 1: Choose the right projects to outsource
You can use Fiverr for a whole load of different marketing tasks. For example, you can find experts who can help you improve your recruitment website SEO, write some blog content for you, design you some branded social media headers and loads more.
But before you go outsourcing all your recruitment marketing to strangers, think carefully about the kind of projects that would work best being outsourced as this isn’t an option for everyone.
The best projects to outsource are:
- Tasks that are easy to describe exactly what you want over messages (you can’t call Fiverr freelancers up on the phone)
- Tasks that don’t involve you giving access to any of your platforms or dishing out passwords
- Tasks that don’t involve any personal or sensitive data.
Step 2: Create your brand guidelines
Remember that outsourced freelancers know nothing about your brand yet - and it’s likely your recruitment website gives away less than you think!
Therefore, creating clear brand guidelines that cover everything they need to know is really important as your communication is limited to a few messages across the platform – Fiverr don’t even want you to exchange email addresses.
With this in mind, try to cover everything in your guidelines so freelancers will have all the information they need – including your tone of voice, company fonts, brand colours, logo positioning, styles of images etc.
Step 3: Write a solid brief
When you’re outsourcing to freelancers, writing a solid brief is the most important step of the process.
A clear and detailed brief is the only way to get a good return on your cash and minimise the number of revisions you need to ask for (more on that in step 6!).
Remember that freelancers aren’t mind-readers, so help them out by telling them exactly what you want, and when you want it.
A few things to always include in your briefs:
- Your company name and a link to your website
- A sentence that summarises the goal of your project e.g. ‘To redesign our company logo in line with our new branding colours’
- A clear deadline for when you expect the first draft of the project to be completed (it may need revisions but you can’t dictate a timescale for those)
- A few tangible examples – including links to your own sites and some others that you like
- A project overview – detailing exactly what you want. It might be useful to structure your overview with subheaders if the project is quite extensive.
- Tips on the overall style you’re looking for (or just a link to your company brand guidelines).
Don’t include your budget in the brief as that will be discussed directly with your freelancer later.
Step 4: Find the right freelancer
Fiverr has nine main categories of freelancers to choose from and each of these categories have their own subcategories too.
So essentially, if you want to outsource it, Fiverr will have a freelancer for the job!
You can browse the categories or use the keyword search:
Take some time to read through relevant freelancer profiles and look for the following:
- Look through their portfolio to see if you like their work
- Look not just at star rating but how many reviews they’ve had too (if they have five stars but only three projects under their belt, it’s best not to approach them with any important projects)
- The standard of client feedback – what do people say about their experience working with that freelancer?
- If they’ve had any cancellation incidents
- What seller level they’re operating at. Fiverr has 4 different seller levels: ‘new seller’, ‘level 1’, ‘level 2’ and ‘top rated’. The higher the level, the more skilled the freelancer is or the more positive reviews they’ve had so these tend to be a bit more expensive.
Step 5: Reach out with your brief
Have a look through your shortlist of freelancers and choose a maximum of three to reach out to at a time.
See who comes back to you within 24 hours - anyone who doesn’t reply within that 24-hour window might not be as reliable. But remember to take location into consideration as many of the freelancers on Fiverr are based in different time zones.
When reaching out over the Fiverr messaging platform, keep your message short, explaining that you’re looking for a freelancer to do your project and attach the brief you created in that initial message.
This allows the freelancer to take a look at your project first and decide if it’s the right project for them to take on before they make you an offer.
Step 6: Agree an offer
Once you get a positive response from someone you’ve reached out to, this is when you want to discuss a fee and they will create a digital offer.
The freelancer will ask you what your budget is or just state a price, and you’ll decide if that’s suitable. At this stage, you want to take into consideration a few things before agreeing.
For example, how long should the expected turnaround be? How many revisions would make you feel most comfortable? Three would normally be the minimum but many freelancers are really accommodating and offer up to ten revisions.
Prices are always agreed in US dollars, so use xe.com to convert to your own currency so you know you’re not going over budget – and remember that a 10% tip is customary (with additional VAT on that too) so the cost can creep up.
Once you agree on a price, the freelancer will send you a digital offer that you accept over Fiverr. You’ll be charged immediately but the funds sit within Fiverr until the project is completed.
Step 7: Keep an eye on your Fiverr inbox
Always keep a close eye on your Fiverr inbox in case your freelancer contacts you with any questions while working on your project.
Sometimes, they can also complete a project quicker than your agreed deadline and they’ll submit the work early. The only small problem with this is that if you don’t reply to say you want another revision within three days, Fiverr automatically closes the project assuming it’s finished.
You can click the button that says ‘I need more revisions’ for the number of times you agreed in your digital offer, so it’s also worth keeping note of how many revisions you’ve asked for as you go. You don't want to assume you have more revisions banked only to be left with something that isn't finished!
Sometimes, a freelancer will be kind and still make further changes for you after the project is closed – but you can’t rely on that!
Step 7: Always leave a review
For any project that you outsource to Fiverr, you should always leave rated feedback and a review.
For many of the freelancers on this platform, Fiverr is their sole income, so it’s important to take the time to share your experiences and give them a score to help them get more work.
If you have a good experience and want to work with the freelancer again, reviews are key to building a good relationship so you can rely on them in future. We’ve worked with designers in the past who will prioritise our projects even when they’re not accepting more clients because they value our business.
In the same way we would always end a placement on a good note, you’d do the same thing with freelancers on Fiverr to build lasting relationships you can return to whenever you need their skills again!
So now you know the process to outsourcing some brilliant branding content to Fiverr, it's time to think about what you want to outsource! Download the eBook below to find out what you need to stand out.
