Freelancing is freedom from bosses, flexible working hours, the ability to choose projects that are interesting for you. These factors stimulate more and more people to work as freelancers. Therefore, there are a lot of employees on stock exchanges, special sites, and just in social networks who are always ready to work. For business owners, hiring a freelancer also has a lot of benefits. They don’t have to spend money on monthly salaries or taxes.
But finding a suitable person isn’t enough. It is necessary to guarantee payment for services and make sure that the quality of the task will be high. For this, you need to know 5 main principles for effective partnership with freelancers.
1. Search freelancers around the world
One of the main advantages of freelancing is that there are no geographic restrictions. When hiring employees for in-office work, you can rely only on residents of a particular city or the territories close to it. There are several people who are ready to spend more than one hour for the road to the office. Freelance allows hiring the most talented specialist even from another country or continent.
But in such conditions, employees always want to make sure that you can guarantee timely payments for work. For this purpose, you can use international payment services like PayPal, Amazon Pay, World Pay, and others. To protect yourself from swindlers, to sign a contract.
2. Prepare a freelancer for work
The freelancers aren’t full-time employees, so you need to explain to them all the requirements and principles of your company’s projects before starting partnerships. Payment terms should also be discussed in advance to prevent controversial situations.
If you are planning a long-term partnership with one freelancer, then you should first give him a test task to make sure that his skills meet your expectations. It is also important to test specialists like accountant, programmer, SEO professional, and writer.
If you already found a suitable freelancer, this doesn’t mean that no questions will arise during the work. Sometimes your support may be required at various stages to ensure good results. You need to connect a person to corporate networks for communication with other employees involved in the project. Even if you explained the terms of reference in detail, discussed all aspects, and are completely confident in the contractor, you should still control work and stay in touch with the freelancer.
3. Automate payments
Entering details to pay for the work of each performer manually is an impermissible waste of time. There are a lot of tools that can perform such operations for you almost instantly. Most such tools allow you to make massive payments to cards and e-wallets in one transaction. To do this, it is enough to download the list of recipients, and the system will process the payments on its own. Freelancers will be happy to work with you, because the majority of the system doesn’t charge a commission from the freelancer, and the customer pays for the services.
4. Encourage open two-way communication
It can be tempting to think that you can describe project requirements, relax and wait for an amazing result. Sometimes it’s really so simple but most projects require discussion. You may need to report changes in design or illustration. You don’t need to settle for the first result you get if it doesn’t meet your needs. Share your opinion with the freelancer and provide the opportunity to make a few changes if necessary to get a result you can fully accept.
It is equally important to encourage the freelancer to ask questions. The freelancer may not know the requirements or need additional information. The more a freelancer understands your needs, the better will be the final results.
5. Clearly outline the project
Be clear about what you expect from the project. When it comes to a project, the freelancer and you should come to a consensus. Take the time to clearly outline the results you want to get and what you think is a successful project.
Examples are very helpful. Prepare a list of examples you see online or in a freelancer portfolio to describe what you are looking for. Examples save time and let the freelancer more knowledge to complete the project successfully.
