planiko

The individual success score on one of my gigs has dropped from 8 to 7 right after an order is automatically marked as complete. Why in the world would Fiverr consider this as a negative factor? At the very least, it should have no impact, if not considered a positive factor. If Fiverr really wanted a new level system to be more transparent, why isn't this mentioned anywhere in the Help Center? Speaking of transparency, it doesn't make sense that a gig with a success score of 7 has no suggestions in which areas it should improve. It feels like a guessing game right now.

I can't agree with you on this. I always check buyer reviews and, more importantly, reviews they are giving to sellers. It's not perfect, but googling the buyer's username + fiverr usually gives this information. If they were unhappy with one seller, that's ok, but anything more than that is a red flag and I'm not available/lacking the skills that they need. I think that in the long run buyers with bad reputation are losing money because they are missing the chance to work with decent freelancers. Of course, Fiverr knows this would be a problem which is why they will never implement a similar feedback system that they have in place for sellers or be more transparent about buyers' past behavior/"success score". The buyer and seller could never be equal. The buyer is Fiverr's customer who brings money. Seller is just a product that Fiverr is selling to their customers.

I agree that establishing a time frame for calculating success scores is essential. Evaluating a seller's performance based on their work from 10 years ago does not accurately reflect their current abilities and performance levels. The system should disregard orders that are more than 2 years old. Introducing time frames of 3 months, 1 year, and 2 years for score calculations, and selecting the best score from these periods, could be a more equitable approach. The primary issue with the new system is its complete lack of transparency. Improving client satisfaction becomes a challenge when the factors influencing this metric remain unknown. Furthermore, the concept of private feedback is inherently problematic, although that is a discussion for another time. It is well-documented that people are more inclined to leave negative feedback. Putting so much weight into this is bad for everyone, including buyers, in the long run.

I believe that orders which are automatically marked as complete, those without feedback, and even cancellations—such as when a buyer mistakenly orders two gigs or fails to provide requirements—contribute to the success score. Basically, anything that makes the order unsuccessful (in Fiverr's eyes) is the seller's fault. This is a copy-paste of the job success score - the worst thing that happened to Upwork a few years ago. This metric would only make sense if they also showed a Success Score for buyers so that sellers can avoid buyers with low success scores. I have a gig that has received 13 orders, with 8 reviews (all 5-star), and there is one order pending without requirements since November. My success score stands at 4. Since no one has raised any complaints, I am at a loss as to what I should improve.

You are trying to break into a very competitive niche - SEO. The keywords you're trying to target are very broad, in my opinion. SEO, backlinks, guest post... I would suggest trying some long-tail keywords instead. Maybe you can focus on a specific industry, like "fashion guest post".