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Tips for Buyers from a Buyer and Seller (I am both) [ARCHIVED]


eoinfinnegan

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I am a buyer who has successfully bought more than 25 times here, including things such as a website, logo design, graphic design, writing etc.
I am also a Level 2 Seller here, meaning I have completed over 50 orders and maintained a high rating.

This article is to help Buyers understand a little more about buying on Fiverr from my own experiences.
For the purpose of this article I am going to use the following as an illustration:
I have the task of Cleaning My Living Room.

When I need to clean my living room, I have 4 options.

  1. I can do it myself.

  2. I can ask my teenage son to do it in return for a few euros.

  3. I can hire a cleaner to come in and do it.

  4. I can wait for my mother to visit and she will do it

  5. Well, I don’t want to do it myself as I am too busy and I never do a great job at it anyway.
    This is the reason you, as a Buyer, are on Fiverr - you want to get someone to do it for you.

  6. I can then decide whether I will ask my son to do it. On the one hand, it will be cheap - a maximum of €5. The drawback of this is that I will more than likely have to be involved in the process, reminding him to do it, pointing out what he hasn’t done and then do the final touches that no teenage boy will ever do (under the couch etc).

There are many “Teenage Boy” type Sellers on Fiverr. Those who will do a job for a little pocket money to cover going out or go towards buying something nice for themselves. This will be something they do in their spare time and is generally not their priority in any given day. The result will be something that fits the rough description i.e. the room will be cleaner than when he started, but you will most likely need to do some directing, editing and finishing touches. If you are ok with that then there are many people on Fiverr who can do that for you cheaply. If you are expecting a perfect product from them then it is YOU who is making the mistake, not them.

  1. Then I have the option of getting a cleaner in. It seems obvious, I need someone to clean my living room - get someone who’s job it is to clean. This will be more expensive and I will need to book them ahead of time or pay a premium for them to come at short notice. On the other hand, I can expect it to be done perfectly, once I have told them how I want it to look when they are finished. If it’s not right, I can question their work and even complain with some justification.

There are many great Sellers on Fiverr, people who take their job seriously and prioritize their customers work. People who view this income as a living just as it is a cleaner’s living wage in my example. For the work these people do, you MUST expect them to cost more than the other options. You MUST expect to need to book them ahead of deadlines or pay a premium for short deadlines (like paying overtime). In return, you will get high quality from people who take pride in their work. You will usually have people who are knowledgeable in their field and can advise you on the best way to do things. You will have someone who will deliver on time and will also be able to take and deal with complaints or problems after the work is done, if there are any.

  1. Unfortunately, my mother doesn’t do websites, logo design, graphic design, writing etc.

That was a rather long winded way of explaining the options available, you must now pick the one you want to use.
HOW TO TELL THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A “TEENAGE BOY” AND A “PRO CLEANER”.

  1. Check their reviews - obvious suggestion but still important. Look for repeat buyers, a variety of people, reviews that say more than 2 words and the response the Seller gives.

  2. Check their response time - not a conclusive factor but if the other factors are in place, this is a good indicator too. How long it takes for them to respond tells you how available they are.

  3. Check their profile and see what gigs they offer - This is a good indicator. What else do they offer, are they an “I can do everything” Seller? If so then it is more likely that they are “Teenage Boy” types. Having more than 2 different types of gig, for me, is kind of a red flag. If they offer ten different types of writing or design work etc, that’s fine, but trying to do a lot of unrelated things - unprofessional and unlikely to be a master of any.

  4. Contact them - If they are looking to get a $5 gig and promise the world for it, then it’s a “Teenage Boy”. If they want to quote properly by getting the details of your job and THEN send a price, then they are at least somewhat more professional. They should also provide some expertise, have some samples of their work etc.

  5. Do they get involved on the Forum and how? This isn’t a definite decider but can contribute to your decision. Are they constantly posting about having no gigs or do they contribute to “society” with insight and helpful advice, perhaps even advice specific to their niche.

Please note: This guide is not conclusive and is simply how I see the world of Fiverr and its occupants. It comes from having a reasonably large experience of buying and selling here.
No Teenage Boys, Cleaners or Mothers were intentionally vilified in this article.
Please add any extra tips you have in the comments.

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Great info in the above post!

I am also a buyer and seller and have been on this system since 2011. Most buyers express their confusion how to order, but as sellers we help the buyers! I also like using the custom offer option as it makes life easier for the buyer and acts as an invoice / agreement between buyer and seller.

I was a TRS, but was taken away for comments made on the forum. But, you know what, TRS has been overblown because there are a lot of naughty TRS sellers that are not up to standards. I’m confident that buyers know that. At least the buyers I deal with know that.

Buyers that contact me know the difference and in our case we provide higher quality HD video and don’t compromise on quality.

A lot of selling, if on fiverr or elsewhere is related to trust, credibility, reliability and communication to get the task completed on time without sacrificing quality.

If you fulfill those steps, you’ll have happy customers all the time. You cannot please everyone, you cannot convert every inquiry into a sale. It just doesn’t happen that way.

But, you can also need believe in your mind that you can do anything and know and understand that to attract business you need to believe in yourself first. Most do not understand that concept.

Anyhow, just wanted to add some valuable info learned over the years.

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… and if after doing your research and selecting the “cleaner” that did not deliver, file a complaint and get your money back. It is quite a disappointment when a seller just does not deliver, which is the risk on fiverr, but the good thing is that you can get your money back, except for the processing fee, relatively easy.

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I doubt it to be honest. This is the reason why ALL reviews should be genuine and not paid for or exchanged for something unrelated. As far as I know, selling reviews is not allowed on Fiverr whether for this site or any other so I would be doubtful if Customer Service will help anyway. Those who offer unscrupulous services are usually fairly lacking in scruples themselves so I suggest you take it as a lesson learned and move on from buying fake reviews and subscribers…

And that guy’s only review is from someone who offers the same service as he does, surely that must have looked a bit suspicious?

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you have a real time buyer here, i need an intro for my website, spent many hours looking at samples and found two, problem, can’t send samples out to get response from some associates without fiver getting in the way, this is
business not play stuff, you sellers need to have more control so people like me can get things done properly, i’ll pay fiver a fee, it’s a joke what you get paid, i want to pay more for professional service, time is money, what i saw i like but if i can’t deal direct then it wastes my time, one sample i think i would like to go with is a young person venturing out who has great talent, i’m not going to pay him 5-20 dollars to do something so-so, how can he get creative with restrictions, i’m an old time graphic artist who is not up to date and don’t want to be anymore, let the young creative people prosper. can you help otherwise i have to take my chance with the big companies who don’t have as much resources as fiver with unlimited talent. ************** can’t believe it, the little icon didn’t come up and say you can’t list your email, phone etc.

Admin Note: Please read the forum rules.

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Selling reviews IS allowed on Fiverr, and plenty of sellers have review gigs. I consider it a form of advertising, no different than giving your book to a book reviewer from the New York Times, then buying him a nice steak dinner, and then getting a positive review. You don’t think that happens in the real world? It does.

Here’s what also happens, competitors of a company they hate might post misleading negative reviews. So why shouldn’t they pay for positive reviews? In the ad business, perception is reality, and you can build a positive perception with positive reviews, unless the product is crap. Advertising can never sell crap, if something is truly awful, advertising will only speed up its destruction.

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I strongly disagree with you on this. At the very least a fake review is misleading advertising. How many buyers do you think have been put off Fiverr because they ordered from a seller who had great reviews (all of which were fake) and then got rubbish work from them?
Of course unethical things happen in the real world, does that mean that it’s fair game and everyone should do it?

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Very few sellers on Fiverr buy reviews for their gigs. Think about it, people are broke, why else would they be selling on Fiverr? Why would they spend $50 paying for 10 reviews (one review costs $5). It’s book writers, product sellers, small and big business with Yelp accounts, and others with more money that do that.

Besides, most of the bad experiences buyers have are not about false reviews, but simply hiring the wrong people. If you wrote a book called “Infernal Angel,” don’t hire a Christian art director unless he enjoys designing satanic books.

The incredible growth of Fiverr proves that the positives more than outweigh the negatives. The amount of talent one finds here is extraordinary. There are people here doing better work than what one finds offline, and for a lot less. Of course, there are also a few that can barely design, write, or know nothing of web marketing, yet claim they do. Buyers simply have to use their judgement, maybe hedge their bets when they can afford it by hiring more than one seller. Even so, the refund button exists for a reason, and even if a seller refuses to refund, customer service will do it for you.

In the end, a review is an opinion. For example, Jerzy Kosinski wrote “Being There,” a book that the critics and many people love, except for me. Should I be angry because many people gave it 5 stars? I don’t think so, this was their opinion, and whether the opinion is paid or given free, the result is the same.

When I buy anything, I use many factors to justify my purchase decision. I read the positive and the negative reviews, sometimes the negative reviewer hates things that I actually like. He complains about too much graphic violence which I happen to like, or perhaps a positive reviewer tells me the book has a beautiful love story, which means I might not read it, not my cup of tea.

In conclusion, people buy reviews because they need to make sales, however, a bad product will stop selling regardless of how many reviews it has. If for example, Jerry pays for 100 positive reviews and ends up getting 100 negative reviews, then he’s back to square one. If he’s smart, he’ll either fix the book or take it out of circulation. Maybe in the future he’ll hire a proofreader, make sure he has an interesting story, and then pay for 5 reviews to get sales started.

It’s all about creating the right impression. Just like you dress for a job interview, authors like to dress their books, products, companies, with good reviews. Whether that dress stays on depends on the individual.

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I’m not broke, but I am on Fiverr - like you say its a great marketplace for both selling and buying.
When I hire a new seller with few reviews I check their reviews and reviewers. You would be surprised at how many sellers buy “something” from each other. Therefore, they both lose $1 in fees for their reviews. It is a lot more widespread than you think. There are also ways around having only one account and I do believe some people have multiple accounts that buy off each other.
I’m not going to do a big response here, just to simply say that when a seller pays for 100 positive reviews and gets 100 negative reviews, they are not back where they started.

  1. They will probably have earned more from their sales and their buying of reviews.
  2. They will have created 100 angry buyers who did not get what they wanted and will either not come back to Fiverr or will be a lot more difficult to deal with for the next seller.

I do say in the article that buyers should not go on reviews alone, but wouldn’t it be great if you could look at someone with an average of 4.8 stars after 100 orders and be 100% confident that their work would be good?

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I once had a buyer who told me that she’d seen my bad reviews and now understood why I was such a lousy seller and needed those fake reviews.

Thing was, I didn’t have any bad reviews at that time. Sure, some 3 and 4 star reviews floating about, but no “THIS SELLER ATE THE BABY JESUS AND GAVE ME PARTIALLY DIGESTED RESULTS! MY TODDLER COULD DO BETTER!” kind of reviews.

So bad reviews are obviously a point with some dense buyers, but anyone with half a mind will do their research and think, “well, can’t please everybody, but with 1000+ positive reviews or whatever and a couple of bad reviews with a well-reasoned response from the seller, I think this could be the guy”

I think there’s way too much emphasis on reviews. People have opinions. Others game the system. At the end of the day, Customer Support can help with really skewered reviews that are completely unwarranted, and doing the best work you can is the only way you can go about it.

That said, it’s really damned annoying when you get 3 stars for work and know your gig has just been tanked due to bad buyer behavior (not reading gig, refusing to give details, whatever, bleating customer is king, customer is king, I am king, I am king, satisfiy me now or else–you have no skills otherwise you’d be a millionaire not my serf on Fiverr).

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It’s very simple, if you’re a crappy seller, you’ll get a lot of bad reviews, then your gig will drop to 80%, 50%, and you’re basically dead. You won’t get anymore orders.

By the way, the worst review you can get is: “Cancelled. Seller failed to deliver on time.” I never order from anyone that gets such reviews.

A review is advertising, and if you’re doing crap, it will only speed your downfall. That has been proven many times. Pets.com for example, did a Superbowl commercial (those costs millions of dollars just for the airtime) and unlike Amazon and Petco, they were not prepared for all the orders they got which means they were late in deliveries, got a horrible reputation, and in less than a year they went bankrupt. They would have been better off not advertising.

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I love the teenage boy, pro cleaner and mother reference. haha! 🙂
I’ve finally gotten some time off to read more posts around the forum. This is actually one of the most interesting and witty posts I’ve ever read around here. Thank you for sharing.

Hopefully more buyers will get to read this!

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  • 2 weeks later...

I think it matters. For me personally, many (as in 1 in 7 or so) buyers comment on my picture for one reason or another. In general though, I also think it is important. Any deal on Fiverr is a deal between 2 people, knowing what the other person looks like is important to most people - we can debate whether that is a nice idea or not but I believe it is the reality. Nice dog by the way, I hope you are not trying to take my dog-loving customers away from me! 🙂

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Okay, thank you for the advice, Eoinfinnegan. I did change my profile picture to the dog photo and then I changed it to my picture again. Haha! I just love dogs a lot 😛 

PS: I never want to take your dog loving customers away from you, I don´t even know and never thought you have ones (never crossed my my mind until you mentioned it). Bare in mind, everyone is replaceable anyway. But with your good skills and if you maintain good communicatin with your customers, I am sure they will be loyal to you. Cheers 🙂 

PPS: I have been wondering if your dogs are kuvazs or golden retrievers? They look cute!

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I’m new to fiver and have just brought my first gig, that went through perfectly…I have made a point when I made the decision on what gig to choose was to choose a Level 2 seller and with good reviews…
So found this thread very helpful, at the end of the day, we get what we pay for…

Hoping Seller will deliver in timeframe stated. and gig is as stated, in which case I’ll be repeat customer…

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I suggest that you are careful with every purchase, regardless of the level. The quality of the finished work does not necessarily depend on the level as levels are earned by quantity of orders and reviews. If for example, a seller is the “teen boy” type seller and has 50 sales to people who are willing to accept lesser quality work for less money then they will all rate the seller with 4/5 stars. Does this mean that his work is the best of the best? No, it means he delivered what he offered at the price agreed. If you require top quality work you need to do your homework on a seller regardless of whether they are new or have a nice and shiny Top Rated Seller badge.

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