3 Important Reasons Small Business Entrepreneurs Should Avoid Mega Job Sites
As a small business entrepreneur, you no doubt have been faced with the demands running a business requires. There is always a to-do list a mile long from tracking expenses, updating your website, email marketing and creating social media content with just not enough hours in the day to tackle it all.
Maybe you have reached that pivotal point in your business where you can begin to set aside a budget and outsource the tasks you either don’t have time to do, don’t have the skill set to do (and don’t desire to learn) and/or don’t enjoy doing so you can focus on more important tasks like revenue generating activities. It’s an exciting step to reach in your business but it can also be a scary and overwhelming one.
Now that you are ready to spend your valuable time looking for and interviewing potential candidates who are qualified and a good fit for the mission of your business, it’s tempting to turn to mega job sites like Freelancer and Upwork as they can seem like a logical place to start but they aren’t always the best option for small business entrepreneurs and here are 3 important reasons to think about:
- Overseas Workers
Many of the freelancers and subcontractors you find on mega job sites live outside the U.S. and while you may find their rates to be cheaper than a U.S. based worker there are important factors to consider such as:
- Language and Culture Barriers. If you are looking for someone to respond to or create emails, social media comments and blog writing, you could be spending more time proofing and rewriting content than actually creating it yourself. Hiring someone to create content on your behalf should have a good understanding of how to represent your brand voice and business. Language and culture barriers can make finding a qualified candidate well versed in U.S. business culture difficult.
For example, it may be customary and an understood practice in the U.S. for a client and contractor to have a co-creative working relationship with good communication being a “no brainer” but in other countries, this practice is not well understood resulting in you finding yourself constantly having to follow up with your contractor for status updates. Spending more to hire a high quality U.S. based candidate is well worth it in the long run.
- Legal and Tax Ramifications. You may not be hiring a part-time or full-time employee but that does not exempt you from legal or tax obligations and when you hire workers from other countries those rules and regulations can become even more complex.
- Time Zone. Hiring workers that are half a day ahead of you can often work against you. Let’s say you are just getting your day started at 10am and wake up to an email from your contractor who is delivering you the project you asked for but it’s plagued with mistakes and issues but unfortunately your contractor is 12 hours ahead of you and are already offline for the day. Now you have to decide if you are just going to fix it yourself or wait another day for it to be corrected versus working with a U.S. based contractor who can respond much quicker and not delaying your project.
- Mega Job Sites Take A Percentage Of Earnings
Here’s a recent email we received:
| “Hello, I am a freelancer who currently uses Fiverr and UpWork to gain writing gigs. I write website content and articles for businesses. I am tired of paying out 20% per project…..” |
As a small business entrepreneur, you may not be aware that mega job sites take a percentage of earnings from the freelancers you hire. For example, if a person’s rate is $20 per hour, they can expect to earn around $16 per hour which means freelancers on mega job sites will actually charge more than they should for their work and skill set in order to help offset the fees that are deducted which means you pay more for the quality work you can expect to receive.
- Scammers.
Anyone can create a free profile on mega job sites so quality and legitimacy are not guaranteed. As can be expected on such an open platform with millions of job seekers from all over the world, there is the potential for scams:
- Freelancers who do not perform the work themselves (so you are hiring someone based on their credentials and they are in turn outsource it to someone else who is less qualified but still charging you a higher rate. Yes, this happens.)
- Freelancers who have fake reviews in their profiles and they can actually remove negative feedback as well (yes Feedback Removal is a real thing).
- Freelancers who have fake identities and therefore claiming to be of different nationality than they actually are.
This means you will spend way more time than you need to in order to weed through applicants to verify they are who they say they are and can do the work they claim they can do.
As a small business entrepreneur, don’t let this process overwhelm you. We have talented North American-based mom professionals ready and qualified to tackle your jobs and projects so you can focus on growing your business. The candidates on HireMyMom pay a small membership fee to receive these job leads so they are more serious job seekers who are willing to invest in themselves which also means you will not get 100s or 1000s of applications from a platform that lets anyone sign up and apply for free.
At HireMyMom.com we are mom owned and mom run. We are entrepreneurs running our own small business. We understand the needs and challenges of both sides and we aim to create a platform that works perfectly for both. Unlike the mega career sites and platforms, HireMyMom.com focuses strictly on home-based jobs and projects that work perfectly for today’s savvy entrepreneurs and modern small business owners just like you!
Over the past 12+ years, HireMyMom has helped thousands of small businesses find the perfect candidate for their projects while helping place thousands of mom professionals in their dream jobs. We do that by providing a platform that brings the best group of qualified and passionate women together with the best group of successful and growing companies who are looking for highly qualified virtual professionals with skills, experience and expertise.
Why Post Your Jobs Hire My Mom
We all know….. Moms are awesome. Moms are reliable. Moms are dependable. And moms make great virtual employees or contractors.
FACT: Over 5.4 million mothers put their careers on hold to stay home with children*. That adds up to a lot of talented women with experience, education, skills and the motivation to find flexible work that can be done from their home office. (*Source: U.S. Census Bureau)
- Save time.
- Save money.
- Save on office space and office equipment.
- Save Your SANITY!
- We do NOT take any commissions from You or our Job Seekers!
- You will have more time to focus on your clients and improve your business.
- Your project or job is posted to our entire pool of talented work from home candidates saving you valuable time.
- You save money by not paying high salaries and benefits for traditional employees.
- You interview, evaluate and decide which candidate is best suited for your business (or you may choose our Small Business Concierge program and allow us to do it all for you).
- We provide the candidates. You provide the work. We get out of the way.
- We’ve been around since 2007, and as moms and entrepreneurs ourselves, we are committed to helping small businesses, entrepreneurs and moms find mutual success!
Who are HireMyMom Professionals?
They are talented, experienced freelance professionals looking for real work from home jobs in a variety of fields including:
- virtual assistants / administrative assistants,
- blogger / writers / editors,
- social media marketers,
- marketing / public relations / advertising,
- legal & real estate assistants,
- researchers,
- graphic designers,
- accounting / bookkeeping / payroll,
- web designers,
- customer service reps / sales,
- e-commerce specialists,
- human resources, and more!