Terrible, Awful, Really Bad Advice for Sellers

[gina_riley2]

The forum is full of top ten advice to get orders for sellers. I thought we'd do the opposite and post some terrible advice!

Well, here are my Top Worst Advice to Newbies: 

1. Buyer is King! 

** [Nope. I don't want to be treated like a king, I want to be treated like a client.]

2. Customer Support always support buyers.

** [Not always. I am speaking from experience]

3. Better to cancel then get bad review.

** [Only if you like giving away your valuable time. 🙄]

4. Unlimited revision will get you more buyers.

** [No legit clients look for # of revisions. We look for well developed gigs. You're just asking for trouble.]

5. Buyer's Request, Buyer's Request, Buyer's Request

** [Oye! 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️ Don't be desperate!]

Any other horrible, nightmare, eye roll awful advices you've seen on this forum?

[enunciator]

The forum is a deluge of ridiculous and pointless "advice" threads and posts. There used to be a criteria that 'Tips for Sellers' threads required the OP to actually be an established/experienced seller on the platform. The enforcement of that criteria has completely disintegrated...

Here's a few more for the list:

Be willing to work without an order placed! (and willingly play the part of the conned rube)

Share on social media! (spamming willy-nilly on various platforms is not meaningful nor productive marketing)

Forum activity affects gig visibility! (sheer madness or intentionally malicious deception as the two are not related in any such way)

and the big one that cannot go unmentioned

Stay active/online as much as possible! (enjoy your sad existence tethered to your computer, tablet, or phone for minimal influence on gig visibility) 

[gajuseidi]

On 10/25/2021 at 10:43 AM, gina_riley2 said:

Buyer is King! 

According to most of these fiverr experts, the buyer is not king. The buyer is bro. 😎😄

On 10/25/2021 at 10:43 AM, gina_riley2 said:

Better to cancel then get bad review.

This one is a tricky one for me. We've had lengthy discussions about this exact topic here in the forum and the opinions of experienced sellers differ quite substantially. Some time ago, I've had an order that echoes this issue very accurately. I've had a buyer that was clearly intent on not spending any money on the order. They were demanding and hesitant right from the beginning and I should have noticed this behaviour as a red flag. They asked for a free sample and after I mentioned that I don't offer free samples, they still placed the order with a message "I will place the order if you're sure you can do it". I said that I can achieve a good result and worked on it. After the delivery, they accused me of using a free app to do all the work and their vague feedback was that the result was not realistic and they "have" to cancel the order. I explained that I use a paid version of that app in addition to several different advanced enhancing software to achieve the best results and kindly encouraged them to use that same free app for their photo and see the results for themselves. They went silent for 3 days and after I asked for a more elaborate feedback, they requested to cancel the order and threatened to leave a bad review if I don't.

The thing is, some of these red flags are quite hard to notice. If you encounter a purposely malicious buyer and they place an order, you lose either way. I cancelled the order and from that point on, I'm trying to stay very vigilant when communicating with potential clients to avoid disgusting situations like this. Any malicious buyer can easily hold a seller hostage without any significant risk and I've experienced it first hand.

On 10/25/2021 at 10:43 AM, gina_riley2 said:

Unlimited revision will get you more buyers.

I've just learned today that there is practically no difference if you offer one revision or unlimited revisions 😄 Fiverr sure knows how to treat their customers, huh.

On 10/25/2021 at 10:43 AM, gina_riley2 said:

Any other horrible, nightmare, eye roll awful advices you've seen on this forum?

I've learned that a successful fiverr seller does not eat, drink, exercise or sleep. They just do this:

Quote

[surajkartha]

Na, can't agree with all of them but still... something is better than nothing.. 

[timothykoen]

On 10/25/2021 at 10:43 AM, gina_riley2 said:

The forum is full of top ten advice to get orders for sellers. I thought we'd do the opposite and post some terrible advice!

Well, here are my Top Worst Advice to Newbies: 

1. Buyer is King! 

** [Nope. I don't want to be treated like a king, I want to be treated like a client.]

2. Customer Support always support buyers.

** [Not always. I am speaking from experience]

3. Better to cancel then get bad review.

** [Only if you like giving away your valuable time. 🙄]

4. Unlimited revision will get you more buyers.

** [No legit clients look for # of revisions. We look for well developed gigs. You're just asking for trouble.]

5. Buyer's Request, Buyer's Request, Buyer's Request

** [Oye! 🤦🏻‍♀️🤦🏻‍♀️ Don't be desperate!]

Any other horrible, nightmare, eye roll awful advices you've seen on this forum?

Yes, for instance "Your profile sucks." I think that is only marginally true. Sure a good profile helps but it didn't change anything for me. I spent hours upon hours updating my profile, because it did suck, and it didn't make any difference. Only good thing that came out of that is now I have a graphic template for my profile header image. However "updating youg gig frequently" has been the best advise.

[barrisam]

BR gets more terrible everyday, but it is a good alternative for a newbie to get started. I used it to get my first two orders and they were worth about $50 each. The trick is not to reply to every single offer. When i started, for months, i never made a request. It took time for me to find genuine clients who just want to get their work done. When i replied, i got the job. 

You will know these clients from the professional, clear manner they present their requests, and the reasonable deadlines and prices they set.

[fiveroptic1]

40 minutes ago, barrisam said:

The trick is not to reply to every single offer

I agree - I've posted elsewhere 're the nonsensical stuff I get sent from BRs. E.g, vo work in different languages, different genders and general 'offers' of work that wouldn't even earn a fraction of the minimum wage here in the UK (yes we have one). 

Interestingly, of the ones I've applied to and been selected for (only 2 in 3 months), both my successful bids were way above the price that was being offered. BRs is actually a bit like visiting this forum; you need to sift through a lot of cr*p to find those threads worth replying to... 😃 

[mariashtelle1]

On 10/25/2021 at 2:18 PM, timothykoen said:

I spent hours upon hours updating my profile, because it did suck, and it didn't make any difference.

On 10/25/2021 at 2:18 PM, timothykoen said:

"Your profile sucks." I think that is only marginally true. Sure a good profile helps but it didn't change anything for me.

Timothy, I’ll be honest, I did have a look at your profile out of curiosity however I still think your profile is not there. 
World is moving fast and we all need to adapt. 
Reading your profile description - sounds great, a lot of years of experience, SuperBowl commercials- amazing! 
and then we look at your pictures, your videos and we don’t see any proof of that. 
On your profile picture I can see pixels from the background being removed. Sure that person that works with editing could remove background without pixels and spots and dots? (Even if it’s a video editing)

then we move to gigs and we see just another regular profile with whiteboard animations like thousands of other sellers are offering on fiverr. Then a robot voice for a voice over with just pictures popping up like on power point presentation. 
And then rises the question: where is the Super Bowl quality stuff that was in the profile description? 

Sometimes it’s tough to accept or have an objective look on your own gigs but believe me in 85% cases it’s because something on the profile sucks. Even if it’s a tough truth to digest. 

and of course apologies for my imperfect English as that seems to be a great and only concern currently.