melissaharlowvo

They are referring to an expression and asking WHY are you a freelancer? What is your WHY?

Fiverr has been a launch pad for so many personal reasons. The platform is so tight with TOS that it has literally made me an incredible business person. I feel like I have gone to Montessori school and when I go to kindergarten and compare my skills and business savvy to my peers, I almost feel light years ahead. The personal connections I have made on Fiverr, both on platform and behind the scenes, have helped me through some dry patches of loneliness. But it all takes such a valiant effort to do well on Fiverr. It’s also been the hardest career role I have ever taken on. Fiverr is not a get rich quick platform. It simply has the tightest “best practices” I have ever seen and is superior to any freelance website. How about this? Those who spend hours and days sending out auditions and proposals without even a nibble are making less money. In my voice over beginning, I belonged to a paid audition platform. I was sending about 5-10 auditions per day. If I did get a job, and averaged out the time it took to give my work away in proposals and auditions, verses what I got in return, I was making about $2 an hour!! It didn’t make sense to me and still doesn’t. I should diversify, but now I have acquired the skills to be successful, but do I go back to the low ROI just because? Not sure. What do you guys think? If things stayed the same and we weren’t challenged and pushed to be better, then how would we grow? However, sometimes I don’t respond well to being pushed but I do respond well to a challenge…as long as it’s on my terms. Fiverr is always pushing the boundaries and lucky for us!

I couldn’t agree more about the file size in the portfolio. It’s a bit like the first digital cameras lol they had storage cards that only held about 200 mb! That can easily be 1 quality file today! I have to take my time to create a portfolio entry only to find out my file is too large and I end up cutting out parts that make it sizzle!! I own a website so I understand the data storage must be massive for Fiverr. I am in the process of updating my voice over demo and I suspect a 4k resolution for a video demo is laughable 😂 so I will have to create a sub par version of the high quality just to fit. Although I love being able to transmit 2g!!!!

After years of doubt on this topic, I decided to leave no review if I feel the buyer was less than stellar. I feel a bit dirty leaving a good review for someone who didn’t deserve it. What completely stumps me is a buyer who gives a 3.7 but the actual narrative couldn’t be better. So I just try to think back on my misinterpretations or lack of flowing exact direction or whatever it was. But at least not leaving a review is my subtle way of wiggling out of my real opinion. I also feel that someone who gives a lower score must have some kind of internal guide that makes them feel bad or regret it when giving someone such a score. And… it’s ALWAYS the ones you bend over backwards for.

Same here. I noticed all the sellers on the first page have also had their rating dropped. Very few 5 star sellers now. Definitely frustrating and confusing.

I made a simple mistake in my initial chat and the person seriously thought I was from Russia lol!! Buyers are so afraid of getting “chatted” that the initial chats need to be very authentic. He also said that I responded so fast, he thought I may have been a bot. Oh dear!!

Julia, Congrats on your new gig. Once you get an order, your dashboard and order will guide you through it. The most important thing is to respond quickly, be professional, kind and have solid order requirements so your buyer knows what you need. You should read all the Fiverr help guides that you can. You should find them easily at the bottom of the website in the footer. Fiverr is an amazing platform and gives you so many tools to succeed but it starts with you.

From a seller’s perspective, I agree about messaging that seller. When a buyer reaches out to me and doesn’t engage with me or have a willingness to answer my questions, then I always feel this buyer won’t work with me as a collaborator. Since Fiverr is an online platform, we have to collaborate to get the best result for the project. We have chat or video so we have to use either. Otherwise, I always feel revisions are coming my way. Because the buyer did not communicate with me. Rarely do I not have at least a question after I get an order. You have to communicate with your seller…period.

Wow everyone! And @cyaxrex you ARE an amazing writer. Although my gigs are voice over, I take the same stand. I say that “this is not an audition platform, rather an order platform.” I think asking for FREE work on Fiverr should be against the Terms of Service. That is what a great portfolio is for.

This is the perfect reason why you need to be vigilant about checking your stats and overall account. I check at least 10 times a day! I have spotted things and when brought to Fiverr’s attention, they swiftly take care of it. Thank you @breals for adding your scare to the forum! My heart would fall right out of my chest if I saw that!! I appreciate that you told us your situation because if I see this on other gigs or my own, I will report it ASAP!

For the first time since 2018 I fell below a 5 star rating on a new Pro gig. I only have 6 ratings because the gig was new. After this new rating system, I received a custom request and they insisted on a directed session which takes at least an hour. Plus editing and delivering the file. It was all amazing and I even added some takes of my own for free. It took hours to edit the file and deliver it how she wanted it. I charged a directed session fee of $100 because this is VERY time intensive to conduct a directed session. I can make $100 in about 10 minutes so my value for the money was VERY LOW on my end as the seller. I proceeded anyway with a great and positive attitude. The buyers narrative review was glowing and perfect, but she gave me a 3.7! What? Ughhhh! Shocking! The value for service was average (3) So the challenge now is, my gig now says 4.8 and that is unacceptable for me and to be honest embarrassing in my Pro status. I even asked what I could have done to improve my work…and crickets. She even said she would be coming back. I don’t think so! No more custom offers from me. My public response was, “part of growing is trying to listen and foster honest feedback.” So yes, this makes me very nervous!

I think over time people will start knowing what a ChatGPT script sounds like. I already get orders to re-do an AI voice because it sounds so terrible. It’s a real skill to take a ChatGPT script and make it sound conversational as a voiceover. Now everyone thinks they are clever by using chat when in reality unless you know and understand prompting, then you will just get a regurgitation of everyone else’s script. I wish more people would chime in to this conversation but thank you!

I am seeing more and more scripts sent to me that have been created by chat gpt. They are cliche and wordy and no one talks like that!!! I’m going to start charging to edit a chat gpt script. The buyer will say, “feel free to edit” and in my head I am thinking, “so you want me to make this conversational with cliche wording and sentences that are meaningless and sound like everyone else’s wordy stupid scripts?” I don’t mind a word or two but seriously, these scripts are so bad. “Are you tired of feeling overwhelmed?” ”What are you waiting for?” ”Take charge of your destiny!” Need I say more? How are other creatives working around the awful ramblings of Chat GPT?

@chelseavo yes And so far, I have not had any issues. Go to the NAVA website as it’s a huge help! You do not have to be a member to get the AI rider.

I added a few phrases in my order requirements to challenge this issue of people using my voice for other purposes or outside of the project they paid for. Although it would be difficult to enforce, I think it slows down and prevents someone who wants to steal my voice. I think it makes them nervous to agree to such statements. The first statement is: You agree to not use or extend usage to any party of any recording or performance of Melissa Harlow VO, in order to train machine, learning, and The second statement: You also agree to not create any synthesized or digital double voice, or likeness of Melissa Harlow VO from this order. The buyer cannot move forward to order without agreeing to these statements. Also, thank you for NAVA and the industry work it’s doing on behalf of all voice artists. Some of the wording was taken from their contract rider. They give open permission to use any and all parts of the rider. www.navavoices.org