(No, the title is not referring to the latest Naomi Klein book.)
Let’s talk about sites like Scriptlance.com and GetaFreelancer.com. You do not follow me? I have written an introduction post to these online marketplace services.
Cheap labour! Yes, save money! Get it done cheaply! That is what I initially thought as well, but my experiences from 5-6 projects may drift you in the other direction.
Project management skills are essential
For small projects like “Make a cartoon for me - max $20″ these services set you up with people in low cost countries that can do the job cheap and of OK quality. You can not go much wrong with such small and easy tasks. I strongly recommend you to try it out by posting some easy peasy job and getting it done.
For more complicated projects you need to be extremely detailed on what you want to get out of the project. You need to supervise the work very closely. My experience as a buyer of various projects is that you can not and should not expect that the seller of the services posess such a thing as “common sense.” Everything needs to be spelled out so that nothing at all is unclear. The less things that are left open to the designer/programmers judgement, the better.
Also, I need to acknowledge that from a seller’s point of view, they probably prefer clear instructions of what to do in order to do it fast and without the need for consulting you on every little detail.
Bugfixing may be usual activity
On several occassions I have received pieces of programming that once I installed it to a server, would not work. You would think that the programmer maybe tested the solutions before he send off the completed job. This is in many cases not the case. After I received the scripts I found that there would be an awful lot of bug testing to do before the job was done with decent quality and I could pay for the script.
Dear Matador.. but there are so many snowflakes in the world.. not everyone is like this
Of course not. You may strike lucky and find people that genuinly do great work and at a decent price. I have found people like this on several occasions. Once I find someone really good in a particular area, I will get their direct contact details like MSN username, phone number or e-mail. Then contact them directly for the next project.