For those that are running websites out there, such as content mills, I can bet your bucks that you have hired a bunch of freelancers to help you with different aspects of your website. You might hire freelancers to keep the social media prescence of your website strong, contribute to the email marketing of your website or simply to create high quality articles to increase your website’s SEO and organic traffic. Whatever you have hired people to contribute to your website online, the key to hiring freelancers is to make sure that you have hired the right person and at the right price. For this reason, here are some ways you can make sure you hire great freelancers and, once you have them, keep them working for you.

#1 Let them Prove Themselves to You First

The first step to hiring great freelancers is to make sure they are up to scratch with the work you want them to do. This usually can be illustrated from their CV, which should show that they are a specialist in the field that you want them to work in. However, a CV is one thing and doing the actual work is another. For this reason, I tend to find it is far more effective to let freelancers prove their CV credentials, be it as a trial on the job you want them to do.

For one of my websites, I did not allow anyone to join the freelancing team until they done such a trial, to prove their worth. Once I saw what they were capable of, I employed them. If I did not like what I was seeing, I would kindly thank them for their time and reimburse them for their efforts.

#2 Don’t be Tight

I can understand that the majority of start up websites out there will have a strict budget to stick to, to prevent the website from failing. However, you should have a little contigency in your budget to please your freelancers. By this, if they have done good work, give them a bonus every so often. If they ask for a pay rise, tell them you cannot do this because of your budget, but offer a workaround (such as more work at the same price). There is nothing worse than a freelancer feeling that there is no progression with the job they are doing, which is pretty much the number one reason why the security of jobs for freelancers online is low.

Ultimately, let’s not forget that freelance work is amazing. You can employ anyone, anywhere in the world, and generally for quite a cheap rate: Fiverr is an example website which takes advantage of this and globalisation. However, this does not mean freelancers are replaceable at the click of your fingers. If you happen to employ a very good freelancer, make sure you keep them!