Are you looking for someone that generates the content of your website in the long-term?

When a company is about to hire someone, it likely develops a long hiring process. However, when choosing a freelance some people just pick one that seems OK. Why choose one that is OK, when you can choose one that is perfect?

Ok, perfection maybe doesn’t exist, but you can try to go close to it.

The truth is that you won’t know if someone is accurate for your needs until you hire him or her. Let’s see some tips to improve your chances to select the best one.

How to find the best freelancer

1. Take your time when writing the job description.

Most of freelancers that fail giving an accurate work claims that they didn’t know what the client wanted until they deliver the job done and they saw his claims.

Think about everything you will need done. Be realistic and decide if there are chances to find someone with all these skills. Maybe you should hire more than one person to do the job in small pieces for different areas of expertise or maybe you just need to assume that you need a superhero and your budget is not enough.  But is a really good thing if you are aware of that, even if you can’t afford it because it will give you a better idea about what you can get.

Important things you have to take into consideration:

• Skillset needed
• Volume of work
• Job particularities
• Deadlines

If you take some minutes to write a good job description you will get more suitable applications and a better idea of your real needs.

2. Ask to see a portfolio

It is a good idea ask for some examples for freelancers, but take into consideration that each client is different, so maybe they don’t have something really accurate for your needs. If that is the case, you should ask them for a test because in the end each job and client is different.

When looking a portfolio, you should look at how the copywriter has adapted his work to the job needs, not how similar this job is to what you need. Someone that knows how to adapt the work is better than someone that only knows do one thing.

3. Ask for a test

The easiest is to ask for a free small test. However, my recommendation is trying to agree for a paid test for a lower price. Of course, this is only applicable to long term jobs. But, if you want to hire someone for the coming months, can’t you pay for 5 or 10 examples of different freelancers?

A paid test is more real, and let your freelancer know that you are taking this job serious. In the end, most of freelancers work for money, and they do their best for something that will let them pay their bills.

4. Try to get some opinions about the freelancer

This is easier now that many freelance work platforms exist, but if you are not in one of them, you can ask for recommendation letters or references.

5. Do not hire the first one that applies

When you publish a job offer, you will get applications very quick. Some of them will look great. But, wait for some days, and be patience. Maybe one the first application seems very good and reliable, and when you hire this person, you get another application for someone that seems equally reliable but also have more experience doing the tasks that you need done.