

Ask HN: Why is it so hard finding a Freelancer? - thekillingtree

I've been looking for someone to build a site for me and after emailing a dozen people, I've gotten no responses.<p>As a non programmer or a non billionaire, it seems like it is extremely difficult for average joes to try to get their idea built without resorting to the race to the bottom sites. ie: elance.  Why does it have to be this difficult?  I can't imagine that developers are so busy that when I'm saying "TAKE MY MONEY", no one wants it (despite saying they are looking for work).  I've tried emailing the full idea with a detailed list of what I want vs emailing a quick summarized note and the results are the same.  No response.<p>Am I missing something?  Is there some sort of secret code I'm not using?<p>edit: Wow, thank you guys.  I'm getting a crazy amount of information and can already see a few things I had been doing wrong.
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trotsky
For whatever reason, most unsolicited leads from websites or email turn out to
be garbage in that business. Meaning if you pursue all of them very close to
0% will turn into real work. Most emailers are dreaming, fishing for some free
work, can't afford it or are trying to get bids for a job they already plan to
hire their friend for.

Somehow you need to convince these people that you're not one of those folks,
assuming you aren't. I'd make the note specific to the person you're emailing
(I liked portfolio piece x and would like something like the operation of y
which impressed me), state clearly that if you can come to an agreement you're
ready to commit to work right away without getting competitive bids, provide
sketches or something concrete that shows you didn't just dream up this idea
an hour ago and will have forgotten about it tomorrow, state your approximate
budget and note that the money is in the bank, and make it clear some how
you're not emailing the whole planet.

Lots of these people will be happy to work with you - but if they state on the
web they're looking for work they've probably been burned a number of times by
people who demanded a lot of attention and yet never had the actual intention
of hiring them (even if they thought they did at the time). Do make sure
that's not you.

EDIT: I Just saw one of your follow ups where you said "I'm not sure if what
I'm asking for is $1k or $10k" - that's your problem, you probably are one of
these bad leads at least at this point. I'd consider offering a day rate of
$500 to have someone help you flesh out your needs and set your expectations.
If $500 is too much to move the process along you probably should reconsider
what you're getting into.

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codegeek
Freelancers who are worth your time are usually busy. If you want to get a
response, try and include the following information as much as you can:

\- HOW DID YOU FIND ME: This is important. Did you find me online somewhere or
was I referred to you by someone I know personally? That could make a
difference.

\- NEW PROJECT vs. EXISTING ENHANCEMENT: It matters if you are looking to
start a brand new project from scratch vs. taking an existing
project/work/code from someone and enhancing it. Reason being: freelancers
will get an idea what they might be getting into.

DETAILED PROJECT SCOPE: this usually refers to _what_ you are trying to do. If
brand new project, explain this in plain english without worrying about
technical mumbo jumbo. Example "I want to build a website to buy and sell
bicycles. It should allow sellers to create a listing, upload pictures and the
buyers should be able to pay online using credit card". This is an example and
any level of details will help. If existing project, you can then provide some
tech. details if you understand it. For example, "the site is already built in
Ruby on Rails primarily with mysql database" etc and I am interested in
using/leveraging the existing code. Provide any URLs if available publicly.

PRICING: This is important. Even if you don't understand whether it will cost
you 1K vs 20K (as you mentioned), you need to do some basic research about
current market rates. If you have a fixed budget, mention it. If you have no
clue, then your best bet is to try and say "Willing to pay market rates and
you tell me what it will cost". Remember, if you low ball, you will never get
a response from good freelancers. Also, there is no such thing as a high
number :).

PROJECT TIMELINE: This is related to Pricing as well. You have to give the
freelancer an idea of tentative timelines. Do you need something done in 5
days vs. 50 days ? Do you need somone Fulltime vs. part time. Weekends ?

LOCATION & COMMUNICATION: Do you need someone to work at a specific location
for this or telecommute etc. Where are you located yourself ? How will you be
communicating with the freelancer during the project ?

TECHNOLOGIES: If you already know the tech. stack because you know what u want
or it is an existing project built using xyz tech. stack, then mention it. For
example "the app is built in Python/Django,node.js, Postgres etc."

If you can try and put these in your initial communication, I think the
response rate will be much higher.

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sopooneo
I don't know if this is the case with you, but most of the time when someone
pitches me (a developer) an idea, they have not thought it through. And I'm
not talking technologically or how to program it, or what computer
language/framework to use. I'm talking much more basic. I mean they haven't
thought through what will happen when people click various things. They
haven't thought through the basics of what information will be presented and
in what basic way and what might happen in various circumstances.

Such people are generally unaware of how much they haven't thought through.
They are super excited about a kernel of an idea without any of the details
worked out.

I highly suggest getting a pencil and bunch of paper and sketching pictures of
what the main pages would look like. For every link or button you draw, you
should have something somewhere physically drawn that represents what happens
when it is clicked. You will likely be tempted in some cases to take a
shortcut and just write a note that starts "Basically...", or "Kind of
like..." Don't do that. Come up with specific (if not permanent or polished)
pictures for everything.

The point is not to produce a prototype, but to uncover what you don't know
about your own idea. If you are like most people (even me) you will find there
are huge swaths of _questions_ you hadn't even considered yet.

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clockwork_189
To be honest, I am on the other end of that spectrum where I am looking to
build my portfolio and I am finding it extremely hard getting clients.

In terms of your question, it could be a couple of reasons: 1) Either the
price you are quoting is too high 2) You are asking for a long term commitment
with little financial returns 3) You are asking for development, using
technologies that are either a) outdated, b) The developer is unfamiliar with.

Any ways, if you are still looking for some one, you can find my email and
github account in my profile. Shoot me a message if you are interested.

~~~
chc
> _In terms of your question, it could be a couple of reasons: 1) Either the
> price you are quoting is too high_

I do not believe I have ever turned someone down because they wanted to throw
a large amount of money at me.

~~~
clockwork_189
Whoops I meant too low for too much work. hahaha, my bad!

------
rush-tea
I was in the same shoe as you. As other says, you have to state clearly what
you want, for example, if there is a similar website already exist and you
want to build something that is 90% the same, then say, I want to build a
marketplace like ebay. Then people have ideas on your project.

Also, if possible, never ask for estimate on your first inquiries. Why?
Because the freelancers do not have the complete details from you and can not
provide estimate on something that is unclear.

You should try to gauge their interests first.

For example: I saw your profile at github and I have a project that I think it
may interest you. It seems like you have interests in AI, and I have just a
thought of building something...

How you are going to fish if you don't have the right bait?

by the way, there is nothing wrong in hiring freelancers on elance or desk. In
fact, if you have limited budget, you can try build a prototype from hiring at
elance/odesk. True, once you post at elance, you will get many garbage. Be
sure to weed down the garbage, and ask them questions to truly gauge their
interests. "why are you interested in this project?" show me some projects
that you have done in the past that are similar to my idea. Interview them.

------
BSousa
You said you emailed a dozen of people, where did you get their emails?

If from popular blogs freelancers have, most of the time these freelancers
have their schedule full and tired as many others pointed of getting contacted
with bad offers so they just ignore them.

I'll be glad to take a look at your email as well and give you feedback, and
if it is a small project (can't take full time projects at the moment) I may
be able to help you.

------
trezen
I will append to most of the comments here. Describe what you want (describe
as many details as you can without writing a book (ex. basic description,
technology that will be used and a time frame of when you need it by.) Letting
the freelancer know that the a budget has been approved will also help. Many
times I've gone through the time and effort of quoting a project only to find
out that it was in exploratory means of deciding how much it might cost.
Include contact information and best time to call if they have questions.

Then tell the freelancer you are accepting quotes until a certain date and you
will make a decision shortly afterwards. I can do the same if you send me the
above information. I can take a look at your project and see if I can help
you.

sales@se4hire.org

------
fest
Taking on new customers when existing ones are sufficient is risky for
developers as well. I myself only take on new projects from customers I
haven't been working previously only under three circumstances: 1) I'm running
low on my reserves.

2) The project is really interesting for me.

3) Someone I know has referred me, and I have checked with referral that the
person is worth to work with.

Based on my experience with vworker and odesk, in both of which I have been in
both sides (customer and contractor)- there are good freelancers out there-
finding them is tough though.

I would suggest choosing top 3 contestants and giving a days worth of work to
all of them- then continue to work with best performer.

------
jf22
What are you emailing them?

I get emailed daily by people telling me about great opportunities and
exciting projects. Unless your emails stand out I'm afraid they may get lost
in the noise.

------
m2mapps
It may be that your idea is not feasible - I commonly get requests for ideas
that are just not worth investing time and effort in.

Cost is another factor - what is your budget, have you made that clear in your
emails?

How are you locating these people?

12 people isn't _that_ many, keep trying and hopefully this thread will get
you the right person.

------
timjahn
Some freelancers prefer to get work through trusted channels, like a referral
from a friend.

This is exactly why we built matchist (<http://matchist.com>). When you submit
your project through matchist, our developers know we've vetted it and will
only send it their way if it's legit.

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bmelton
There are a ton of reasons for which someone might not respond to unsolicited
quotes, and I'll do my best to explain. Without seeing the specific email you
sent, it's all guesswork though.

1) Freelancers are generally busy right now, and it's hard to keep up with
potential customers that may or may not work out when you're already bouncing
time between two or three active, paying customers that are a known-good
quantity. This leads into,

2) Lots of freelancers aren't set up to be agencies. The _main_ difference
between a freelancer and an agency is that an agency has someone following up
on potential work while there is someone different actually doing the work.
For non-agencies, this means that every customer I'm ironing out terms with or
trying to get a sale from is time away from paying customers and real money in
lieu of potential money. Obviously, it costs a lot more to work with an agency
because now you are paying for at least two people, and also paying for the
time that gets wasted, but it is generally the more reliable way to go if you
can afford it.

3) If you mention a specific toolset (e.g., Rails, Django) in your message, it
might be that the folks you're sending to either aren't familiar with that
toolset, or they don't think it's appropriate for the task, or in some cases,
I've seen people simply avoid working with customers that asked for a specific
toolset. The logic there is that people who ask for things like Rails, but
that aren't competent to build the thing themselves, often don't know what
they're asking for and that could be in indicator of a difficult client.
Obviously this may not be the case, you may simply have another codebase that
it needs to work with, or y'know, any of a hundred different reasons that you
actually need something written in Rails, but that is the perception I've
sometimes seen.

Obviously if I don't know your toolset, I can't help you. I've worked with a
lot of customers on a lot of different technologies. I could build something
in Django, Flask, or pretty much any Python Framework, Node, Express, or
pretty much any new JS frameworks, etc., Java, .Net, but if you ask for Rails,
I'd have to (at the least) tell you that I don't have any recent experience in
it, and I don't really love it. The better freelancers will at least try to
refer you to someone else they know, but many of them might just as quickly
assume that there are a million Rails freelancers out there, and you're likely
to find one with the very next email.

All this, and I haven't even mentioned budget yet. People have their preferred
budget ranges. Some guys like small projects, some guys prefer 3-6 month
projects, etc. If you specifically mention budget, it might easily be that
your budget thoughts are too small for the work at hand.

Anyway, hope this helps.

------
coffee
I believe a lot of freelancers are busy right now. I know I get a ton of
freelance email and I always respond, but that doesn't mean everyone does.

Shoot me a few of the emails you've been sending and I'll give you some
feedback (email is in profile).

------
Minneapolis1
Because most good programmers regularly hear from people who want them to work
for free on an idea someone has...with the chance that they will get paid well
once the idea succeeds. Ideas are easy and we all have them; executing them
well is very hard.

~~~
thekillingtree
Yeah, I get that. I do. In all of my emails I ask for a rough ballpark quote
or an estimate of how many hours. I realize how hard it is to do this
sometimes, but you have to start somewhere.

~~~
fizzbar
Wild speculation: if you're at the "ballpark" stage, you probably have a very
vague feature list / overall plan... I suspect if you tighten up the
description and scope you'll have more luck (although given how many offers
for quotes you just got, perhaps a better method is to just post on YC ;)

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pc86
I sent a quick note to your email. I'll be happy to provide a quote or just
offer some feedback on why _others_ may not have been responding.

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robflynn
This has been offered by others already, but I can take a look over your
e-mail as well. My e-mail address is in my profile.

------
Jeremy1026
As with the others, send over what you want to me via email (in my profile)
and I'll see what I could do for you.

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twanlass
I'd be happy to give feedback on your email and provide a quote - twanlass @
gmail.com.

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factorialboy
Good freelancers are surprisingly easy to reach (hint: see profile) :p

------
coderforhire
How many quotes have you received? What is your budget?

~~~
thekillingtree
I've received 0 quotes and I'm not sure if what I'm asking for is going to
cost $1k or $20+k.

As far as a budget goes, I'm not sure really. I understand that you get what
you pay for and I also understand what it's like working as a freelancer, so
I'm not trying to lowball anyone.

I mean, for a down and dirty idea of what I'm looking for is basically
pcpartpicker.com but definitely not a clone and clearly a different industry.
I saw this site the other day and it has a lot of things that I have written
down for features of what I want.

Anyways, I just feel like I've been talking about this site idea for over a
year and have yet to really find anything that's better than what I came up
with and figure it's time to just get it out.

~~~
bmelton
You can bounce it off me as well - barry.melton@gmail.com.

I'll mail you back my take on the offer -- if it's turning someone off to
responding to you, I'll respond as to why. If it looks perfectly reasonable,
I'll let you know that as well.

I will also respond with a quote as to what I think it should cost, in terms
of hours and dollars.

------
ashraful
I sent you an email. My portfolio is at madebyargon.com

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cgrusden
Email me, corey@stevenhallen.com

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centdev
Let me know how we can help.

