Your First Outsource Job - Managing Your Project

Once you’ve selected your winning bidder, you usually need to escrow your payment (put it in escrow on the bidding site, to be released to the winner upon your ok), assign the project to the bidder, and finalize communications, and project acceptance.

Managing an outsourced project is not for the weak or the timorous. You need to be firm, or you WILL get walked all over - if not the first time, then soon!

Make it clear in your final discussions what your expectations for communications are, how you expect to be contacted, and what the final format should be.

Setting Initial Expectations

For a series of articles, I would go with something along the lines of:

1. I want rough drafts of 2 articles within 24 hours. I will provide feedback within 24 hours.
2. I expect daily emails telling me of the ongoing progress.
3. I can be reached via Instant Messaging during the hours: xx:xx - xx:xx
4. I expect the final version to be grammatically correct, and in simple ascii text.

When you review the articles, don’t be lenient! Anything you don’t like, bring it up. If it doesn’t have a high enough keyword density, let them know. If the title is bad, let them know. The truth is, at the end, I’ll likely do a final edit on all of them, but I want the ones I receive to be as clean as possible.

If the freelancer misses a deadline, or doesn’t give you a progress report, call them on it immediately! Let them know that these terms are not negotiable, and if they don’t meet your requirements, you will cancel the project, or score them low. Usually telling them that you will not give them a “10″ rating, if they miss the deadlines or meeting requirements again, will straighten them right up.

Let me reiterate, this is how I would handle a small project. For large projects, and for my full time freelancers, I use a project management tool like basecamp, goplan, or project pier (for the do-it-yourselfer).

That’s a lot more overhead than you need for a project like this.

Final Acceptance

When the work appears complete, review it carefully before agreeing that it is done. If you want changes made, say it now! Also, you should check to verify that the work is original, and not re-released PLR articles, or copied text. For this I highly suggest signing up for Copyscape Premium.  For a nickel a search ($.05) you can cut and paste your articles, and search the internet for copies.

If you do find the work is copied, let them know, and warn them that you will not only score them low, but you will tell WHY you scored them low. There should be no question about what was expected, if you followed the directions in Step 1 and Step 2.

Once the work is complete to your satisfaction, you can release the money, and whenever possible, rate the freelancer with a perfect score. Anything less will build up animosity and make it hard for you to get anything fixed in the future. Of course if there were serious problems with the project, you can score them lower.

The freelancer will usually also get a chance to rate you. As you might guess, if you rate them poorly, you might find the same coming back to you. It’s not as critical, of course, for buyers, but it could matter in the long run, if you have a string of bad reviews from good freelancers.

If you’ve made it this far, you’ve completed your first outsourced task! Congratulations.

Now go out there and make some money.