The Real Reasons You Aren't Getting Sales

[rachelbostwick]

1) You are not that good at what you do.

No SEO trick is going to make a customer buy from you if your work is ugly, or badly written, or copied from someone else. Instead of worrying about what keywords you can use to get your gig higher in the platform, focus on making your work so good that once someone finds you, they will want to hire you and no one else. 

Every single time you feel yourself tempted to go on the forum and ask somebody how to get a sale - go get better at your skills instead. Make new art, write a story, record a new voice file, whatever you are selling. Almost without exception, most of the people on Fiverr are selling mediocre work. Yes, there are thousands of people doing what you do, but to stand out the most important thing is not to yell louder than they are, but to be better at their job than they are. Practice. Right now. Every time you get better, replace the old boring pictures in your gallery with something better. When you get a LOT better - raise your prices.

"But Rachel, noone will hire me if my prices aren't the lowest." Sometimes my customers hire me because I am charging more than my competitors, and they believe that means I know what I'm doing… and they are right and they are going to get what they pay for. That's what you want to do, too.

If you're so, so good that you're the absolute best at what you do and no one is hiring you, then you can hire someone who is so, so good at SEO that he can help you with that part. But if you're wasting your time thinking about that, you're not getting better at your own work.

2) COMMUNICATION

If a buyer contacts you about a sale, you can bet they has contacted other people, too. Getting the sale depends on how you speak to the customer now. Some of us need to work on how to be polite, sound confident, how to listen to everything the customer says and make them feel that hiring you will give them exactly what they need and they can stop worrying now. This takes practice, but it mostly involves putting yourself in the customers place and thinking about what their goals are and what they need. It's just as important at this stage to also be clear about your own expectations and boundaries so you can avoid miscommunication later and get a bad review or a bad sale. Despite what some people on the forum will tell you, taking care of yourself is just as important as taking care of the customer. You are not a machine and if you don't set boundaries you will burn out fast and have to go back to being broke and sad.

Listen to what the customer is NOT saying, in addition to what they are saying. For example, if they start complaining about a previous seller, listen carefully. Did a previous seller drop the ball, or are they an abusive person who expected unlimited revisions without having to keep paying? They may be telling you they are nervous about the project they are undertaking, and if you can make them feel supported, like you will be the one that helps them get past the hurdles to get their project done, they will hire you even if you are the more expensive worker, even if maybe their project isn't something you can give them clear samples before. 

And some of us just need to work on our language skills. For me, English is my first language and Spanish is my second. I have completed two or three sales in Spanish, and I let my customers know that my skills weren't that great, but you can bet that I am constantly trying to improve them. They were very understanding and I got a few great reviews in my second language on my profile. That made me feel so great! But I am still constantly working to improve.

So, honestly, a lot of people on here are really, really good at their work but really not good at English, yet, and if you want to sell to english speaking people, it would help you so much to get better at it. If you've read this far (wow thank you!) and English is not your first language and you'd like to improve, I have a game I think would be fun to play here on the forum. Okay not really fun, but a meaningful way to engage and improve each other's language skills in a thread, so instead of posting "good info thank you" you can post "I would like to play a game to get better at language" and I'll make a new thread and you guys can play, too. But I want to see if anyone is interested, first.

[sk_moni]

Great speech

[listing_guys]

Really great information 👍

[gmkhondaker]

Thanks for your nice information