Financial security in freelancing

If you believe the statistics, then today more and more people prefer to make money without having a supervisor. Yes, yes, I mean freelancing (and for those who do not like the newfangled buzzwords - we are talking about home-based work). And if people used to work this way predominantly from Western countries, the wave has recently reached us.



Naturally, home-based work, like all other types of employment, has both its negative and positive sides. If we consider each such moment, we get at least a treatise, and at the maximum a doctoral dissertation or a weighty book. Therefore, in this article I will touch on only one aspect - how to protect yourself as much as possible from customers who want to get the results of your work completely free of charge.





Personal experience - in the case!

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I have been working as a copywriter for more than two years, and therefore, based on my own experience, I’ll tell you about the material security of transactions made between the text writer and the customer.



So, if you are deceived by the customer, but simply put it, you should not shift all the responsibility to it. Yes, everyone who works in a remote mode is at risk, but practice shows that the lion’s share of trouble can be avoided, which means that in this situation, the responsibility lies in some way with the worker himself. You must admit that we are not forced to work with this or that person - we choose all employers ourselves.



How to distinguish a decent customer from unfair, willing and not to do anything, and at the same time eat fish?



I will tell you what criteria filter potential employers who are searched for the relevant freelance resources.

1. The first thing you should pay attention to is the reputation of the person who knocked on you with a desire to use the services. Here I mean not only the reputation expressed in numbers, which is usually just practiced in most forums. Reputation in my understanding is a whole complex of indicators characterizing a user (possible future employer) from one side or another. What are we talking about? I will explain in more detail. No one will argue with the fact that the most eloquent testimony to the man of his actions and deeds. So, it is useful to re-read reviews of other users about your potential customer, to see what topics he noted, and for what purpose he created his topics. It is clear that if other members of the Internet community complain about your potential customer and leave reasoned negative feedback about cooperation, then it is worth considering whether it makes sense to contact him at all.
2. Further, if you communicate via ICQ, be sure to check if the ICQ number is listed in the so-called “black” lists . If an account is registered just a few days ago, this is also a cause for serious concern.
3. Direct online communication (via ICQ, Skype, other chat rooms and online customers) with a potential employer allows you to quickly sort out all kinds of "inadequate" . Personally, I will not take up the execution of the order, even if the person’s messages contain a huge amount of grammatical errors. More often than not, after talking for a couple of minutes on the same ICQ, it is possible to imagine more clearly who is sitting on the other side of the screen. Here I do not mean that you hoped to get a pretty girl as a customer, but it turned out that behind a sweet and pleasant interlocutor is a bearded SEO-person. We are talking about the competence of the person who is going to make you an order. So, if a knocked person introduced himself as an SEO optimizer, but your question about what percentage of keys in the text is required, wonders what keys are, in order to avoid further problems with such “customers” it is better not to get involved.
4. Continuing the topic covered in paragraph 3, I note that from the occurrence of claims from the customer, which can result in financial losses for the contractor, a good protection is the availability of technical specifications (TK). That is, all the requirements of the employer must be specified in advance. Naturally, the writing of texts is in some way a creative process, and the customer's assessment can be expressed in the form of likes / dislikes, but if you do not specify in the statement of work, for example, a specific percentage of the occurrence of keywords, then, as they say, you cannot throw words out of the song you can’t cut down what is written with a pen with an ax and the customer will no longer be able to argue that your work doesn’t meet his requirements. In extreme cases, such a conflict can be resolved with the involvement of third parties.
5. It so happens that the customer tested by long-term cooperation recommends you to your friend or colleague. Naturally, all the above precautions in force and relax is not worth it, but still such a moment as a guarantee , has not been canceled. That is, if your customer recommends a person as adequate, this is an additional advantage for cooperation with a new client.
6. To reduce the financial risks of the contractor, a partial or 100% prepayment is also intended for the customer. Naturally, in order to be able to rely on such a kind of "insurance", the contractor himself must instill some confidence in the potential customer, and this means that he must have at least a good reputation, the criteria of which are described above. It even happens that an employee with a good reputation is not taken for the execution of the order, without receiving an advance payment. Here the customer’s business is whether to trust their money to a stranger or not.
7. Significantly reduce the risks and phased payment of work done . For example, for copywriters, this kind of cooperation is quite convenient - you agree with the customer that the articles you write will be sent one at a time (two-three-five - this is how you agree), and after approval by their employer, your e-wallet will be sent payment. Naturally, no one guarantees that the customer will not hide from the received articles, but you will agree that losing your salary in one day is not so offensive as working for some unscrupulous uncle for a week, or even more.

As you can see, in freelancing, however, as in any other business, you should be very careful in choosing potential customers. It seems that for the more or less experienced freelancers, the above rules have long been derived from their own working experience, but it will not be superfluous to refresh useful information again and again. In addition, it should be remembered that by observing a certain set of rules, you can establish not only successful long-term cooperation, but also create an entire team consisting of people united by common goals and interests.