Why was Fiverr better few years ago than now?

[bokiiii]

Hi everyone, I would like to talk about Fiverr platform and changes on this platform which made this almost impossible for sellers to be successful, experienced and especially new ones. Maybe some of you won't agree, but let me continue.

Here are some changes that made this platform worse:

• Removal of "Buyer Request"

This option was THE ONLY option for new sellers to get some orders and reviews. I got 80% of job from this option and I know a lot of sellers who also got nice jobs by sending offers in Buyer request field. Why was this removed? Because of scammers who copy/paste their offers without reading buyer's request? If buyer thinks seller didnt read his request, then simply they could not answer them.

• Adding Private feedback option

The worst decision ever. Also, whole algorithm depends on this, so this makes this decision even worse.

The thing is, you can see private feedback which your buyer left you, so you actually cant see what bothers your buyer and what you did wrong in that order. Also, there are lot of people who will simply leave you bad private feedback, just for fun, even dough you did everything perfect and you got nice public review from the same people.

Anyway, I am thankful for 2 years of experience which I got on Fiverr, but after you made all those changes, this became one very bad platform, where you compete with others, fight algorithm, deliver high quality work, give buyers more revisions then agreed, deliver finished work before delivery date, and all that for some very low price.

I am very disappointed of what this platform became, but whatever, I know I will find some other places where they treat sellers better. But for all sellers on this platform, Fiverr should consider removing useless private feedback, bring back buyer request, stop making changes which put sellers in very bad positions, and generally, treat their sellers better.

And for all buyers reading this, these are all the reasons why you will get cheap, and not high quality product. Because all prices are similar, cheap, and you cant easily find good sellers, because of algorithm.

Have a nice day everyone

[newsmike]

23 minutes ago, bokiiii said:

And for all buyers reading this, these are all the reasons why you will get cheap, and not high quality product.

Actually, quite the opposite is true. Buyer's requests matched up the very worst sellers with the very worst buyers, all in a $5 race to the bottom. And as far as private reviews, if you are delivering quality services you have nothing to fear. It is only sellers who deliver junk who fear review. 

Edited May 23, 2023 by newsmike

[nickj2013]

Private reviews were a terrible decision to add to the mix here at Fiverr. I agree. Replacing Buyer Requests with Briefs however was a good 'idea.' But briefs don't work, so the 'idea' needs some serious tweaking if it's ever going to bear fruit.

[newsmike]

4 minutes ago, nickj2013 said:

Private reviews were a terrible decision to add to the mix here at Fiverr.

Why? I can think of only one reason why a seller would be afraid to be reviewed.  

Edited May 23, 2023 by newsmike

[visualstudios]

23 minutes ago, newsmike said:

Why? I can think of only one reason why a seller would be afraid to be reviewed.  

I can think of several. Private reviews, in the way they are implemented, are not a good idea. They are worded in a very punitive way, they don't give sellers any feedback (so you can't improve, it literally serves no purpose for you as a seller, only for the platform), they are one sided (you can't leave buyers private reviews), and they skew any public feedback you leave buyers (you better not rate a buyer 1 star, even if they are satan himself, because he can always punish you afterwards in a private review). Also, you better do whatever he asks, be it extra free revisions, etc. because, again, he can screw your placement in the search results and you won't even know it.

They completely distort the platform's feedback system.

 

Briefs, on the other hand, are much better than buyer requests. Still pretty bad, but better.

Edited May 23, 2023 by visualstudios

[newsmike]

49 minutes ago, visualstudios said:

they don't give sellers any feedback

I agree there.  They should give you anonymized feedback to be able to improve. They are too opaque. 

[bokiiii]

1 hour ago, newsmike said:

Actually, quite the opposite is true. Buyer's requests matched up the very worst sellers with the very worst buyers, all in a $5 race to the bottom. And as far as private reviews, if you are delivering quality services you have nothing to fear. It is only sellers who deliver junk who fear review. 

Buyer's request matched up all sellers on fiverr so not just the worst ones. And yes there were buyer requests for 5 dollars, but there were many much higher requests too, and if buyer wanted nice seller, he can easily just look at seller's level.

Edited May 23, 2023 by bokiiii

[bokiiii]

1 hour ago, newsmike said:

Why? I can think of only one reason why a seller would be afraid to be reviewed.  

I can also think of only one logical reason why would seller get bad review. But again, there are people who give you completely different private and public reciew. They do that for fun, they dont care about giving you relatable private review, because you wont even see it.

[bokiiii]

1 hour ago, visualstudios said:

I can think of several. Private reviews, in the way they are implemented, are not a good idea. They are worded in a very punitive way, they don't give sellers any feedback (so you can't improve, it literally serves no purpose for you as a seller, only for the platform), they are one sided (you can't leave buyers private reviews), and they skew any public feedback you leave buyers (you better not rate a buyer 1 star, even if they are satan himself, because he can always punish you afterwards in a private review). Also, you better do whatever he asks, be it extra free revisions, etc. because, again, he can screw your placement in the search results and you won't even know it.

They completely distort the platform's feedback system.

 

Briefs, on the other hand, are much better than buyer requests. Still pretty bad, but better.

Definitely right about this. If you give bad public review to buyer because he deserves it, he will definitely give you the worst imaginable private feedback.

So dear sellers, thats how you are treated, you have to work hard, fight algorithm, work for vey low prices, and above all that you cannot give your honest oppinion about buyer. LOL Fiverr team really made this and thought they did something good.

[leannelrivers]

6 hours ago, visualstudios said:

and they skew any public feedback you leave buyers (you better not rate a buyer 1 star, even if they are satan himself, because he can always punish you afterwards in a private review).

I couldn't agree more with this. The fact that buyers get the request to leave a private review days after the public one is stupid and means I don't bother reviewing a bad buyer at all unless it was a truly horrendous experience. If Fiverr insists on private reviews, they should make the three pointless questions relevant to the overall experience. As it is, if they have a negative experience with the platform functionality and express that in the private reviews, it's the sellers who take the hit. Ugh, we've said this ALL before. 

[visualstudios]

10 hours ago, bokiiii said:

fight algorithm, work for vey low prices,

Hmm, not really.

[nickj2013]

15 hours ago, newsmike said:

Why? I can think of only one reason why a seller would be afraid to be reviewed.  

In all my years of shopping online from Amazon, to Ebay, Wayfair, hosting sites, domain sellers, etc... I've NEVER been asked to leave a private review. I've only been solicited privately, to leave a review when I failed to leave an open (public) review. So for example, if I bought something from Amazon, received it, and never left a review. Then Amazon would send me an email later saying... 'How'd you like this product, or seller?' Other than that, when I left a public (open) review. That was it. Never got a solicitation email from anyone. 

Also if you check out most shopping sites freelancer or otherwise, public reviews are what people take into account the most when buying anything. They're basically like warnings to future purchasers. You know how many things I didn't buy, or how many final decisions I've made on purchases based on public reviews? If anything, a private review just seems like a way to goad the customer into giving the seller a bad rating. It's similar to stating something in a business meeting, and then having you co-worker approach you later in private and ask... "You don't really believe all that crap you said back there do ya?"

And if you said... "No," now your co-worker has leverage against you in future dealings. I just don't find private reviews productive as a frequent online shopper who ALWAYS scrolls public reviews when I buy anything. 

[nickj2013]

14 hours ago, bokiiii said:

Buyer's request matched up all sellers on fiverr so not just the worst ones. And yes there were buyer requests for 5 dollars, but there were many much higher requests too, and if buyer wanted nice seller, he can easily just look at seller's level.

Buyers requests were really easy to sift through though. My method for example, was to send offers to clients in my niche regardless of their price. If the client was serious, they'd hit me back and we'd do business. I often found the $5 offerers were a mixed bag. Some really thought anything over $5 was too expensive for your services. Others, seemed to just be using it as an ultra low point for serious negotiations later on. And some... would take your offer and pass it along to someone willing to spend more money in the marketplace than they were.

[robinrakibul]

There are many factors but I think Fiverr has grown in popularity, more freelancers have joined the platform, resulting in increased competition. This saturation of the marketplace can make it more challenging for some freelancers to stand out. Also quality has changed, base price got few changes, buyer requests feature removed and there are many more reasons!

[imagination7413]

Buyers Request... I'm not going to repeat myself, so here is a link to what I've already shared. (Included is a list of many of the broken bits.)

https://community.fiverr.com/forums/topic/290975-bring-back-buyer-request/?do=findComment&comment=1880450 

I'll admit, I really liked the idea of Buyers Requests, but there was too much abuse. 

[dbarik403]

Buyers Request was more easier for new seller but now buyers notification is difficult to get new job   

[asif_abeer]

The Fiverr marketplace is now really overpopulated with sellers, and there are some sellers who don't know how to work properly. And for them the buyers get dissatisfied as well. The algorithm also makes it difficult for the new sellers to get work as there are many people. Then the buyer request is also gone so the way is much more shrunk than before to get a new order. But it is also true that if you could convert some clients then there's a really good head start. 

[calieyseo]

Fiverr Support no more offers a clear response like earlier when asked few questions they act like a bot and keep sending you links to the guideline without properly explaining they have target to close the ticket instead of replying them properly

[melroygeorge]

Main is discrimination on gig creation which I have seen... I can clearly see there are multiple account whos gigs are live and if you place and offer same service then your account will get warning..saying against policy.. then how come they can offer service and those are still live after multiple reports??????

 

worst support ever who threaten and behave incorrectly ... they dont even under stand issue.... 

[calieyseo]

Completely agree and they do not even tell you why your gig got removed they just have this lame excuse saying it is against tos and no specific response

[datwriterguy]

Buyer request had its flaws but the new briefs are seriously no match for it. I have not had a brief in months and seriously don't even know why it is there. On the other hand, when orders dried up in the past, I could go through buyer request and find one or two that I could easily bid for. It came through most times orders were running low through search.

I won't even bother ranting about the private feedback and the algorithym. 

Invite only features that seem to segment and favor some regions rather than quality of work and years of experience on the platform. 

Poor buyer support. It gets worse by the day. Everyone gets the same template response. I don't even think they read your concerns, they just copy and paste you a reply.

 

[shenteriamarie]

This platform is FAR worse than it was. I have been a seller on Fiverr for 8 years now and it keeps going further and further down.

Removing the buyer's request section was a bad move. Now new sellers have no way whatsoever to succeed. At first they could try to get sales by putting in offers to the requests, now it's pointless. The new system provides practically ZERO results. 

They also allow buyers to run the platform. A seller's opinion does NOT matter at all. If a buyer wants something done, it gets done. If they want a refund even if you have put in a lot of work for them, Fiverr will simply provide them with a refund. Nothing else matters.

If you protest in any way and keep messaging them via customer support, they find other ways to penalize you and try to kick you off the platform. Because I was protesting the fact that they refused to provide a partial refund to a buyer whom I did a LOT of work for, they are now penalizing me.

They removed my animation gig today for no other reason other than it supposedly goes against their TOS. Saying my gig has unoriginal content but didn't provide any explanation as to what the unoriginal content is. They don't care to work out any solution, talk about unfairness. That gig has been posted for the past 4 years and NOW they conveniently find an issue with it, go figure. I thought this platform was great, but this year it seems to be extremely frustrating and impossible to even try to earn significant money on this platform. 

Also having a Fiverr Success Coach simply means you get to voice how you feel with no solution to your problems. They have no power to really do anything. This platform has become extremely disappointing.

They also don't care about all the negative reviews online. The BBB (better business bureau) website has so many negative reviews for them and they could care less. 

[calieyseo]

22 hours ago, shenteriamarie said:

If you protest in any way and keep messaging them via customer support, they find other ways to penalize you and try to kick you off the platform. Because I was protesting the fact that they refused to provide a partial refund to a buyer whom I did a LOT of work for, they are now penalizing me.

The same thing happened to me. Every time I went to support they penalized me for some absurd reason, I was asking for a reason on why my gig got removed suddenly when everything was so fine for 2 years instead of replying they will just you community guidelines or terms of service gig and if you ask them more on what exactly happened as I did they will penalize you.

2 times I went to support in the past month and they penalized me and did not fail to get me off Fiverr without any proper reason. If I had gone off Fiverr with clients I would agree that I am wrong or any such reason but these reasons can not explain this WE WANTED YOU OUT OF FIVERR AS YOU ASKED US FOR A REASON ON WHY YOUR GIG GOT REMOVED

[shenteriamarie]

41 minutes ago, calieyseo said:

2 times I went to support in the past month and they penalized me and did not fail to get me off Fiverr without any proper reason. If I had gone off Fiverr with clients I would agree that I am wrong or any such reason but these reasons can not explain this WE WANTED YOU OUT OF FIVERR AS YOU ASKED US FOR A REASON ON WHY YOUR GIG GOT REMOVED

That is extremely frustrating and so messed up. I am sorry that happened to you. There seems to be no way to reason with them. When they decide we are done, that is the end of it and sadly there is nothing we can do about it. They simply do not care. But every business has a beginning and an end, as more freelancers share these bad practices they have at some point something will be done. It's so unfortunate because I started out on this platform so long ago and it initially was great. Now it is very questionable. 

[whollyjordan]

The problem with private reviews is it gives people the power for their subjective view to destroy your objective income and livelihood.