Why 50% Of All Gigs On Fiverr Fail?
This is a guide on what NOT to do when starting on Fiverr.
4 years ago I had a genius idea. Create my gig on Fiverr and overnight make at least a couple hundred dollars.
Disclaimer: This is my experience and I speak honestly about the things I did wrong and what I learned. Some of the tips may have worked for someone else.
Here is the idea: Book promotion.
This is the background story. During 2015 I was lucky enough to work with several authors who needed help with promotion. These people had self-published books on Amazon Kindle and needed someone to promote the book, get few reviews, send few newsletters, write some emails, send free copies, and so on… not to bore you with the details.
During this period I gained a lot of experience and knowledge and I was confident enough that I can do the job properly. So instead of focusing on one client and spending months on one book promotion, I thought maybe I can transform my service into smaller bits and offer various parts to people who needed a boost in their promotions. My target group were people who already had books published on Amazon Kindle and needed boost in sales after a stagnant period, and new writers who needed some guidance and help to start rolling.
In this way, I could work on one book for 2–3 days, take a smaller payment, guide them in which direction they need to go, and leave. If they liked my service and wanted to continue working with me I would take the job out of Fiverr and work as an individual contractor only on their book. My idea was that I will earn money and still be able to work on various projects and books. If I liked the idea of the story I can take the client full-term and dedicate my time to their book, if I don’t like the book or I don’t think it has potential I will just have an excuse to leave while still earning money from other projects.
Genius, isn’t it?
So I signed up for Fiverr, completed my profile, posted my gigs, put a price of $5 (Fiverr actually advises you to start low and although I was sure I was selling myself short I agreed on this just to get the first 2–3 reviews and after that, I planned to raise my price), and waited.
After 7 days nobody contacted me.
Another 7 days went by and absolutely nobody contacted me.
But I wasn’t worried. I read on online forums that it takes time so I wasn’t much worried. In the meantime, I read the “much ado about nothing” guides on Fiverr, instructions for new sellers from all websites, and altered my profile a bit. I added a few pictures as a portfolio and attractive catchy header with a picture.
And waited another 2 weeks. Again nothing happened.
At this moment I decided to contact a few of the people I knew were successful on Fiverr and they told me that I need to promote my gig and that sales won’t fall from the sky. Okay, no problem, I thought.
I started sharing my gig on all of my social media, I posted my gig in all Facebook groups I had, I joined Fiverr special groups and started posting there. I adjusted the descriptions to be more SEO friendly and more catchy, I diversified the offers, I wrote in the most simple and easy language, and I even made a free trial offer hoping that something will lure a potential client.
Two more weeks passed and nothing happened.
Again I sat down and started religiously reading every blog post, guide, list on how to get your first client of Fiverr. I was posting in the groups every single day, I was writing to all my known and unknown contacts and only God knows how frantic I must have looked while trying to get any client.
And I failed.
The n.1 problem I and most of the people trying to sell of Fiverr have is that we (yes I put myself in the same basket as I am no different) don’t know where to search for the right buyer persona.
I know my job well, I know my target audience, I know my buyer persona but I am looking in the wrong place. While I was busy waiting, posting in groups and reading forums out there, somewhere, somebody was making money. Sadly, that somebody wasn’t me.
Lessons I learned:
- Fiverr is a great side business if you have a way to promote your content.
- The most successful people on Fiverr had blogs, podcasts, big social media presence, youtube channels, other jobs, etc. and were using Fiverr to a) promote their gig and get started, and b) after they got the first 10 reviews they didn’t have to bother promoting the gig as new clients were organically discovering them.
- If you don’t have any social medial presence, you don’t have a blog or podcast and you don’t know how to promote it then you have to find somebody to do that for you.
- Frantic posting in groups will get you banned and create a bad reputation as a spammer — don’t ask me how I know.
- Always have a strategy when, where, and how you can promote your gig.
- Optimize for success and I don’t mean just adding few keywords here and there. Make a banging headline, amazing picture, glowing portfolio, video.
- Find out where is your buyer persona hiding instead of wasting your time posting randomly.
- Educate yourself. Read all forums and guides before even you sign up for Fiverr. Chances are you may find luck at some other place.
I promised myself that one day when I learn how to work Fiverr and will go back and enter with a bang but until then share your tips in the comments below!
Good luck!
Have you ever worked on Fiverr? Do you have a tip on how to be successful?
