New system aimed primarily at matching newer sellers with buyers
So now it seems I have to wait two hours before I can bid for a job. This is extremely unfair. Not only do experienced creatives/designers have to compete with an unfair playing field, ie people offered to do a job for £10 when it is clearly worth £100, we are now not allowed to bid for jobs as soon as they appear on PPH. What kind of system is this?!
Awful. Unfair. Unprofessional. Discriminatory.
Regards
C. Howe
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Thank you Michael for your care and strong support.
Just like you removed that 2 hour thing, would you please do another big favour and remove this matching skill rule? Because it really hurts. Just as Martyn said, after my approval I couldn't bid on even one job using website. Can we ask you to remove us from beta tester groups, at least?! If you login using my account, you'll notice how painful it is. Believe me, there is NO NEED for these things. PPH is good enough. Instead, try to teach buyers how to pick the right one, rather than forcing limitations and restrictions which annoy everyone and cause very lost opportunities.
And thank you again for hearing us, removing that bug.
Faryad
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Michael,
I think there's going to be another stream of complaints if PPH persist in trying to match the skills required for a job with a seller able to do the job. I think there's a reality-check required, both on the practicality of doing it at all and on the capability of your team to make a viable selection system. I'd also say that if you are determined to press ahead with this, it should have been properly tested and tweaked before unleashing it on the PPH users. PPH has some very poor development practices.
Don't get me wrong, I can see the attraction of pre-selecting people ( this is what this is about - a form of preselection without the two hour embargo ). I can see that it would guide the right people to the job and prevent no-hopers from applying for jobs they can't do. Problem is that you won't be able to make it work well enough.
OK, so why is this why this is doomed to failure.
1) Skills definition. This is such a nightmare field. How many different kind of designers are there out there? Will you approve a dress designer for a web design job? You might have a designer that can do all kinds of graphic design and paint portraits. I might be a web designer, but not wish to only do web design, because I can also design logos and letterheads. I might be a logo designer that is clueless about web design.
It would be lovely if people were capable of specifying their skills unambiguously. Unfortunately they can't and this is the essential flaw in the system - you can't reliably match skills through an automated system when the skills data that you have is ambiguous, incomplete or even misleading. I say misleading because several sellers on PPH seem to be able to do just about anything - at least that's what they say every day on the clarification board "Sir, I have read your specification..".
I have worked in the computer industry professionally for many years. One of my skill - Adobe Flash - has always been problematic to clients inside and outside PPH. Some people see that skill and assume I am a designer. Sometimes they also assume I'm a photoshop whiz (I am not). Sometimes they want animation and I can do that, but I can't animate cartoon characters.
My point is that a particular skill can mean different things to different people. So what hope do you really have automatically matching terms that there is no common concensus about what they mean?
Human beings mostly get around this issue by looking at experience as well as skill keywords and also the freelancers profile.
You can't match skills by keywords alone.
2) What skills does the buyer want? Well, I've already mentioned the problems associated with skill keywords, even amongst professionals, so what hope does the average buyer on PPH have?
PPH buyers ( like sellers ) go from the highly educated and professional who know exactly what they want and how to express that need, down to the barely literate, clueless.
Very few buyers can classify the skills they need accurately. You can't expect buyers who can't even provide the barest project description to have any chance of accurately naming the skills required for their project.
There is no hope that buyers can accurately specify the skillset required for each job.
- What skills do I have as a seller? Even I'm not sure. I've already mentioned that even basic skills can be interpreted in so many ways. I'm principally a software developer taking other people's designs work, but I do also do some design work but wouldn't classify myself as a professional designer in any field.
That said I have had a PPH client that was delighted with a graphic I made for them. In this brave new world of matching skill keywords, I would have been barred from even applying for the job.
I have worked in design agencies and been verbally berated for placing graphics one pixel off the alleged optimum position, yet I have other clients that think I am a design genius (I am not).
Lies. The fact that a seller lists a skill, is no guarantee they actually have it, in any professional capacity. The same people who can do any project on PPH and make proposal after proposal, or drop their skype id onto the clarification board, can also make up skills.
Lastly it's a very silly way to try and improve the quality of sellers proposals. The quality can be controlled by giving buyers a chance to give feedback, by raising the minimum job value/rate so experienced people will compete against no-hopers and finally tempering the free proposals available to those with poor buyer feedback or who have a poor ratio of winning proposals to proposals made.
PPH this is not going to work.
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I agree with Paul's points about the problems with skill matching. There are too many variables involved to allow for really accurate skill matching. His suggestions in point 5 are a more positive and proactive way to improve the quality of proposals, i.e. The quality can be controlled by giving buyers a chance to give feedback, by raising the minimum job value/rate so experienced people will compete against no-hopers and finally tempering the free proposals available to those with poor buyer feedback or who have a poor ratio of winning proposals to proposals made.
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Michael _
the short essay (above) which Paul has taken the time to write in response_ comprehensively covers some of the problematic areas in this system _ it should be recorded and passed on to the upmost echelons of PPH management _
whatever problems pph is trying to sort _ whatever enhancements it is trying to implement _ what is becoming increasingly clear is that certain fundamental concepts about controlling a workforce have either been forgotten or (under new management?) are being completely ignored.
in short_ the thinkers at pph need to take a moment and have a few meetings about getting back to basics _
they need to reflect on this_ seriously!!
the convergence between the individualistic nature of freelancing and the homogenization inherent in software automation can only go so far _ and right now what is blindingly obvious is that the automation pph is trying to implement has gone too far_ to the point of creating more than 'ripples of stress' in the workforce _there is a lesson to be learned from this recent episode _ the diversity and individualism of pph account holders is not being appreciated any where near enough by the people who are being paid to manage them _
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Skill-matching is clearly not working, and I imagine it would be difficult to ever make it work effectively. The buyer and the seller are the people best qualified to decide whether someone has the skills for a job, and that will always be the case. Sure, people who don't have the right skills will apply for jobs - but that's the case with any kind of job advert.
I get that you want to promote quality proposals so you get happy buyers, but that should be done through positive methods (like ranking and CERT) rather than negative ones, like entirely blocking people from bidding, with no appeal or recourse for mistakes.
If someone puts a job advert in a paper or on an online jobs board, they will get unsuitable applications. It's up to the employer to decide which applications merit attention. That's the nature of advertising a job. The alternative is using an agency who match a prospective candidate to a job - but this PPH skill matching is the worst of both these worlds. Publicly posted jobs that buyers imagine are open to a free field of candidates, with a behind-the-scenes selection process of an agency without the human input or in-depth knowledge of candidates.
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As others have eloquently said, automatic skill matching isn't effective and initial selection is best made by the seller unless the buyer knows better. If there was some way for buyers to rate a sellers professionalism in making a relevant proposal then that may give a better metric for selection. Clearly a bid winner would be expected to get a positive rating and all other bidders get a default neutral rating unless the buyer felt the bid was inappropriate when a negative might be available. Too many negatives for a seller might indicate a warning. If negative ratings timed out over a period then there would be scope for folk to up their game. Newbies would not be disadvantaged by an initial neutral rating, but only persistent bad bidders.
Surely a sellers professionalism should be easier to reach a consensus on than the exact names in the list of skills.
I've only recently tried PPH as a seller so maybe my suggestion is way off beam - but the current regime seems such a mess.
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Another reason why automated matching of freelancers to jobs doesn't work....
I've just received an email saying I've been selected to bid on a market research job because of my skill in market research. You actually got one right there PPH but wait for it....
The researcher must be based in France and I'm based in Greater Manchester, UK!!Well done PPH, another great match you've made there *slow claps*
Oh and I agree with the proposal rating idea. Good one
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Very bad idea Martyn, as it would be very hard to implement this in a fair and impartial way. What if you make a legitimate bid however the buyer then does not like your portfolio. Not that that your portfolio was bad or irrelevant but it does not suit this particular clients taste. End result could be negative scoring which could affect them adversely. Sometimes lets be honest not all buyers no what they want or looking for. Then may proceed to give all the sellers whom they did not choose a negative score rating for whatever reason. Only to give that one seller that is ultimately chosen a positive score. Again it would cause more problems then it could hope to solve, it would also mean that PPH staff would be inundated constantly with complaints from sellers asking why they have been give a negative score rating and to justify it. PPH would then have to proceed to hire more staff to deal with the new situation. At the end costing it even more to deal with. So unless there is a simple and efficient way that a seller may have some form of appeal if they have been wrongly given a negative rating, it is again going to be a very messy and not so effective system.
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Agree with everybody about the very fact that skill matching does not working and is of no use. Special thanks to Paul for his precise explanation. Yes, he is right and that is what all of us want.
PPH, would you please let us do our normal freelancing?! Why are you trying to get something out of a wrong philosophy? The idea is no good. It is bad. Everyone agrees. So developing a bad idea never settles. Please go back to your simplicity and let people work like they did before. There are too many barriers in PPH. PPHers cannot focus on their working quality and skills. Rather, our first priority has become the challenge, biding on projects!!! We have forgotten why we are here. Everyday we are checking our inbox (spam box recently) hoping the new bugs reversals.
You did VERY GOOD removing that 2 hours thing. Please also remove this and let us get back to work.
Thanks
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For me, Elance has the most jobs, but I must pay if my skills cross over two categories. Guru.com lets me bid in any category that feel I have the skills. PPH (in the past) let me bid on whatever I wanted. So PPH and GURU are my goto places.
At the end of the day we all want PPH to attract lots of buyers, and for them to like the experience. PPH is trying to use Big Data to find out how to get buyers a better experience, and GROW the number of jobs and REDUCE the abandonment rate (buyers getting a job done elsewhere).
And I think we all support these goals.
But Big Data is similar to the best of Crowd Sourcing. Why not invite a group of freelancers on PPH to a forum (could be private) that would be involved in the PPH development process. That group could do two things. 1) Come up with ideas to give buyers a better experience. 2) help PPH with some beta testing. In fact, PPH could allow a freelancer a second account. One used just for testing. That freelancer would work with PPH and create a profile on just ONE skill area. Then, have some free credits to test, test, test. The person's test profile would match their CERT and Feedback score, so no faking.
But the profile would allow the developers to set some restrictions. Data from a small test could then be perfected and then rolled out in waves to more and more users. This allows iterative development.
I think there are a number of freelancers (like me) who would abandon Elance an Guru if PPH had more buyers and these buyers choose PPH freelancers (even if it was not me).
I don't like all the PPH policies, and I do think they spin the truth. That said, it is in my best interest to make one site the best place to find work. And PPH could be that.
I think 20 or so committed freelancers could have ideas and strategies to get more buyers and close more business on the site. I see no evidence that the PPH staff (a small group) can come up with better ideas than freelancers who make all or part of their income from the site.
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As I see it, all the freelance sites are aiming at the bottom of the market. Eric and Karen, I appreciate your thoughts but IMO the best way for PPH to differentiate itself is to aim for the mid market and avoid the bottom feeders. How to convince them that this would benefit both buyers and sellers is the difficulty. Sorry to be like a stuck record but the photolibraries that have survived the cull have been generally ones that have adopted this strategy.
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Ever since these changes have been submitted, every SINGLE job that I wanted to apply for, I have been blocked from with the following message:
"You can't send a Proposal to a job that's not relevant to your skills. Browse other jobs."
Given that I am an ILLUSTRATOR with a profile that highlights my ILLUSTRATION and all of these jobs are from SEARCHES USING THE KEYWORD 'ILLUSTRATOR' OR 'ILLUSTRATION' and are clearly illustration jobs, I am left confused, and frankly angry. I am on this site because I want to work. Before these changes, I had several positive interactions with based on pitches. Now I can't even talk to people who I might be able to do work for. Please please PLEASE fix this -- all I want to do is work.
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As if to show the exception proves the rule - two invites today, both perfectly reasonable, won't be going for either though (one I really don't have the very specific sub-skills required, the other has a rubbish budget). The particular skill keyword involved has a narrow scope though, very unlike my earlier example.
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Re: 2 hour bid block (Preferential Matchmaking)
Well done PPH! I appreciate an organisation that listens to its users and manages to be flexible. I agree (with PPH) that any implementation may cause dissatisfaction among some users, but must also agree with the basics of any implementation, extensive testing and limited release of any beta-ideas.
I have monitored the input on the thread (thanks to the alert function provided) but have had to limit my use of PPH to find appropriate work, which I found elsewhere during the period of the implementation. The coming hours and days will show if the effect of the ban has been limited in such a way that jobs are again offered in quantity and quality – I hope that it was lifted before too much harm was caused. At first glance, it looks quite good.
Thanks for listening.
Re: Matching Skillsets
I think this should be a separate thread, but I agree with much of what has been mentioned above. As a freelancer with a diverse skillset (t_o those that dispute this possibility may it be known that 30 years of hands-on work do make for a broad platform of know-how and capabilities, albeit lacking a distinct and absolute expertise_) and the professionalism to know what is possible for me and what is not, I cannot see PPH being able to assess on which jobs I can or cannot bid. They just don’t know me well enough, and in the extension, they don’t know most of their buyers or sellers well enough.
Objectively, customer satisfaction will not depend only on the skills someone has, but also on the sympathies that are generated, be that rating, submitted proposal structure and content or even the location of the seller (or buyer for that matter) and many more. Markets are governed by many rules, but personal preference will always be the most deal-making criterion for the final choice, again for both buyer and seller. Restricting the potential in any way by a third party will never be constructive, let alone cover the bases, in tendering a job.
Yes, in a perfect world, an optimal pre-selection by an ‘agency’ (Headhuntiers/Placement Buros) can be of help to a buyer/seller (employer/employee) but in all honesty, the final choice will always be with the people involved. When the ‘agency’ does not deliver the right ‘candidate’, the agency loses out – always!
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@Roozbeh.
I agree - they aren’t and I didn’t imply as much. As pointed out in the very first pages of this thread, PPH distinctly mention that. So the point in my previous post is that even those that are employment agencies do not (usually) have the necessary finesse to match the ‘right’ candidate to the prospective job.
I did italicise ‘agency’ and trust that PPH will understand both my correlation to what they are implementing and the poor return on job acceptance it results in. Excellent work is not merely a question of listing and matching skills.
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At the end of the day, its their own business and if they decide to piss on it then be it. they can come on this thread every 5/6 days and post another BS, pretending that they care or whatever! but the fact is that they do not care and whoever they are, they are fairly new in this field and have alot to learn.
I have been a developer for the past 9 years. way before PPH was even thought of.. let alone being developed... and I have never, ever seen an online business to cock up the way that PPH did in the past few months.
in fact I remember when PPH was trying its best to get known back in 2008/2009. at that time i was working on another freelancing site. I just wish they could've kept it the same way as it was back then.
I have a snicky feeling that PPH doesn't really know the meaning of "progress"!!!
and to add to that, they continiously iinsulting our intelligence by sending these appologatic (meaning less) emails that worth nothing!
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I have a question for the web developers among us. The real ones I mean - according to PPH I'm a "web developer"!
I just saw a job for writing a 2000 word ebook for up to £16. I wouldn't touch that with a bargepole but someone wil. By my reckoning PPH will get about £2.80 for that. I can't imagine that actually covers the fixed costs to run the system, let alone actually have a profit? If that job was priced more reasonably at £160 (which is still low imo) PPH would get £28 ish. Is there a flaw in my thinking? What's to stop PPH going for more upmarket better paying sellers which would benefit everybody?
There are better paying jobs out there I can assure you, 'cos that's where i get most of my work from.
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@Julian:
You are absolutely right, but the economics don’t work in your argument’s favour. PPH (and also many jobboards/suppliers/distributors etc.) work on the principle that earnings come by selling large amounts of ‘cheap’ items – they do volumes. What looks like a small amount adds up to large amounts when there are many sales at low prices. Their systems run on ‘every cent counts’ which is fair enough by my book, as long as I have a choice. I am not condoning the buyer that is out for a freebie!
The idea of the platform is probably:
- have a large number of bidders (many hundreds per job would be ideal)
- have a large number of jobs (thousands looks good for sellers)
- intersperse the multitudes with a few cherries (keeps the real pros happy)Basically it is the Buyer that needs to be educated and any platform offering jobs could only do something by limiting their acceptance of jobs based on price which, for some tasks, is a no-no. Also consider that someone may have an article waiting to be published, and by fluffing it up can extend some 1500 words to 2000 inside of 20 minutes.
My take is:
- don’t bid below what you’re worth – evaluating my investment for a job and bidding accordingly is paramount
- bid on low paying jobs that you can do inside of your hourly rate as fillers and bid the rate – never underbid
- just because someone reckons a job can be done for X-amount doesn’t mean you can’t make a proposal beyond their budget (it helps to have eye-openers). You probably won’t get the job, so don’t invest too much to submit the proposal.You won’t be able to change stingy and poorly informed buyers and where there are takers for the low-paying jobs they’ll always find sellers that are prepared to do them – quality unquestioned
You probably know all this anyway...
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Is there a flaw in my thinking?
Possibly ;-) but not with respect to PPH!
I have made a similar case in the past. Personally, I have found that the buyers with lower budgets are the most problematic and have resulted in my very few calls to PPH customer services.
It costs a certain amount of money to run a website and the overheads of doing so are broadly the same regardless of whether the job value is £6 or £600. I suspect that the overheads of lower value jobs are probably higher, simply because they are more likely (in my opinion) to generate extra support effort and require more system resources.
For a £6 job, the income is going to be between 18p and £1.05 depending on the amount of revenue that month. I'm pretty sure that PPH can't exist on revenue of 18p per job. Of course it's the mix of job revenues combined with the monthly commission system that determines income. I suspect that for a lot of low-cost sellers, their income is going to attract the higher commission rate.
If you lump the cost of web development plus website, CS and publicity costs together and divide by the number of jobs, I really wonder what that figure will be. If it's not considerably less than £1.05 then PPH will be losing money on low-end jobs.
Ironically, PPH seeks to raise seller quality by skills filtering, yet support low value jobs where suppliers are more likely to have quality issues. They also undermine their own market by changing buyers cost expectations downwards ( and incidentally by promoting PPH as the ideal place for students and hobbyists to make money in their spare time) by allowing these cheap jobs.
I think PPH would make more money by removing these low-cost jobs and it would promote quality - at the moment quality sellers won't bother with low-value jobs because they can't live on that kind of income.
I think lowball jobs are key to seller quality, but if you have no barrier to entry then poor quality sellers will always be able to make proposals on jobs they don't have the skills for.
Look at Apple. Everybody talks about the way Android and other manufacturers are gaining market share at the expense of Apple. That may well be true, but nobody is making money like Apple does by making more money per item on fewer sales. PPH should be using that model, not the volume one.
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Roland, good points, but (you knew it was coming) buyers are diverse. The better ones are looking for quality and understand that lowball budgets result in poor quality or gambling that they are lucky enough to get a great seller.
In the volume game, there are always sellers willing to undercut, but with a higher lowest job value, more quality sellers should be able to compete.
I still think lower volume at higher value always trumps high volume. PPH will never sustain high volume if perceived quality is an issue with buyers.
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Paul: absolutely. Market diversity is part of the deal and I too prefer quality over quantity! Your observations are spot on (as they have been throughout this thread). imho there are jobs that can be done low-budget: translate 250 words, convert a simple graphic to curves, split a PDF-document, install WordPress, check HTML or CSS on a single page etc. If the job is clear and simple I can relate. If there are lots of those jobs and lots of bidders...
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