Allowing sellers to give free gigs to buyers (at least for new sellers)

[thesociety]

I’ve signed up to Fiverr a month ago, but posted my first gig only 3 days ago.
I’ve noticed that there are a lot of gigs that are listed every day with content that is simply and completely copied/pasted from other gigs (including their images) by many spamming accounts. This makes it really difficult for new sellers who are serious about providing their services, giving them a hard time proving the quality of their gigs.

Why don’t Fiverr allow new sellers to give away a number of gigs for free to buyers?
This can help in:
1- Proving that the seller/gig is active and serious about delivering services;
2- Helping – to some extent - Fiverr in combating multiple accounts that are spamming;
3- Showcasing the quality of the seller’s services in the reviews, so that other buyers can feel confident about ordering from him/her;
4- Since Fiverr gives a free gig to new users who sign up through others, they can get their free gigs from these new sellers as well.

That’s a bunch of Dodo birds with one stone.

I’d love to give like 30 gigs for free if that’s going to start getting me orders. However, Fiverr doesn’t give that option, and I don’t think that’s allowed under the current TOS because Fiverr won’t be making money from these free orders.
It will be great also if there was an option to give free/discounted gigs if they’re done for non-profit/academic/charity organizations.
Can you guys please share your opinions and ideas regarding this, and maybe the Fiverr support/sheriff can shed some light on it as well.

[Guest magy1808]

If fiverr allows that then people will be doing bunch of things for free, and slowly with amount of new accounts all of us including fiverr will stop earning… why pay for something when you can get it free? you know…it would be a bad thing. If you determinate to work for free, offer to potential buyers free samples of your work to prove you are good at what you selling and serious about it, just don t forget to put your watermark over sample. If they will like your free sample, they might as well order a GIG for full work. What type of service are you selling?

[Guest webdatasolution]

Offering free gigs only imply that you set yourself at the lowest scale point. Plus, it gives scammers the chance to fully exploit newbies. It’s not a great idea.

[emmaki]

There’s a reason the dodo went extinct. This idea is awful. If you want to do free work, by all means do so–but in a race to the bottom, you might as well just suggest that you pay people so you can work for them. How’s that for a great idea?

[thesociety]

Thank you all for responding.

I’m not AT ALL saying that sellers should offer their gigs for free.
I’m only saying to give at least the new sellers the option to give a certain amount of gigs (say their first x gigs) for free, in order to promote their gig, and get good reviews that will make the following buyers confident in buying that gig.
As a seller, I cannot contact any potential buyer until he/she contact me or places an order. So, it’s very difficult to showcase samples (especially for a complex deliverable with many files). It would have been a different case if the seller had a public files library on Fiverr for buyers to download work samples from.
As for my gigs, I’m a new seller, so I only posted 1 gig which is analysis, testing & reviewing websites.

[rudevectors]

emmaki - ahaha, you always tell them straight!

I can see what the op is saying - In a perfect world with perfect people, that ‘might’ work but market forces will see you swimming/drowning with all the other free fishes.

Cynical cap on, I wouldn’t be surprised if some of those spamming accounts weren’t from competitors that are already at the top, I imagine it would slow down new competition but not stop it.

Idea off the top of my head, maybe new sellers need to initially charge their account with $5, after the first sale they get that back or when they close their account. Might stop those spammers creating numerous accounts.

[Guest magy1808]

imma buy you a beer for this comment 🙂

[thesociety]

The “charging $5 for new accounts” idea is great one, but it only solves the spamming problem.
As I already said, I’m not suggesting that sellers offer their services for free, but only a certain amount of gigs in the beginning as a promotion.
It’s a successful system that a large number of major websites uses, like the 7-day full trial, to test the service before buying.

[Guest magy1808]

yeah, you wont get a beer…

[Guest magy1808]

does it even cross your mind how maybe there is maybe 1000 new sellers daily on fiverr? so in one day there will be 1000 free GIgs, in a week 7000 free GIGs, if every new seller gets like you initially said 30 free GIgs, then we will have weekly 210000 free GIGs… With that amount of free GIGs, you really think someone would buy your GIG after a trail? No, because there will be 210000 new free GIgs…-.-
Now, in just that one week, Fiverr will feel a drop in earnings, I will feel it, all other sellers will feel it… And bunch of scamming buyers will be happy and feel like it is Christmas 🙂

Instead of proposing bad economy, why don t you rather work on your gigs, send offers on buyers requests, promote trough social media… ?

[rudevectors]

thesociety

I totally see where your coming from but wouldn’t human nature see buyers just searching and moving from one free gig to the next. In the end it would be detrimental to both buyers and sellers, as overall quality drops, with matching drops in revenue. It would make the review system less meaningful, as buyers search for free, rather than any other metric.

[rudevectors]

You beat me to it, was writing a reply and see you already pointed out the same thing

[Guest magy1808]

do you wanna chips with that beer?

Yeah, I really don t understand why would someone work for free… I know when I just started I was telling myself, this $5 is almost as free but way to get a new level and reviews and feedback…so, $5 for full delivery of whatever who is selling in a start is basically almost for free… I know I charge things I did as starter $5 now much much much more…

[thesociety]

Both of you have a very valid point. I agree that many people might not be nice and honest, and abuse the promotional free gigs thing.

So, if that might be dangerous to go through for sellers, maybe Fiverr should implement something like what I suggested - a public file library for work samples -
I know that Fiverr already changed many things in their platform since it started.

[rudevectors]

This is actually not a bad idea, although the gigs themselves allow you to upload certain aspects of your work, it is limited and can be frustrating at times. Better facilities to showcase watermarked work would be handy, although I imagine this comes up against infrastructure requirements and associated costs, therefore it’s unlikely to happen.

[Guest magy1808]

You can upload video (up to 1 minute and 50Mb i think), and up to 3 images inside of your gig, and one header image. So, isn t that enough room for sort of portfolio or public file library? It is not about quantity of work anyway, it is about showing quality, skills and knowledge.

[Guest magy1808]

You beat me to an answer, I want my beer back.

[rudevectors]

Doh, now I’m hungry and thirsty!

Wait
Now I even have to give the beer back!

[thesociety]

I already used the video, 3 images & 2 PDF for describing the service in detail. The work samples of the deliverables that I want to show are complex, they consist of several files and pages.
A showcase area by the way shouldn’t cost Fiverr if they made it using a dropbox integration (or similar file sharing plugins).

[Guest magy1808]

well, it happens… it is a pain in bumbumhole, isn t it?

[emmaki]

interesting discussion! Fiverr could certainly do with expanding its portfolio abilities. Adding a “portfolio” tab to each seller profile with say 10 slots couldn’t harm the gig economy, while also making it easy for sellers to upload their best work and giving buyers samples (or at least a simple link to samples).

$5 is not that much money in the West. $0 is worth nothing anywhere. If you wanted to implement such an idea, you could run a promo on My Fiverr gigs, Twitter and elsewhere with, a promo: “buy one gig, get three free!”

As pointed out above, Fiverr won’t do this. Where’s the money, and what about people who work hard to build up their own platform? An individual can choose to do this, but making it a thing… well, like I said, dodos now don’tdon’t. Humans made the dodo extinct. We’re fundamentally greedy and ask what’s in it for me. As a seller, I say “nothing!” as a buyer, you might say “awesome, free work!”.

I took the chips and beer when you weren’t looking. Delicious!

[Guest magy1808]

i wanna refund on beer and chips!

[misscrystal]

There’s not much difference between free and $5.

[fonthaunt]

How about coupon codes for 25-50% off (sellers still would owe Fiverr a buck per gig) & a notation/mark by the review to indicate the buyer got a discount?

[rudevectors]

I still think you’d have many buyers just searching for sellers that have a coupon code. Unless maybe the coupon code can only be redeemed on orders over a certain amount, which would stop the bottom feeding.

Don’t buyers get a free gig when they sign up?