The PPH Blog has moved – see our brand new blog at http://blog.peopleperhour.com

We are pleased to announce the relaunch of our blog, with a brand new design and fresh content. We will be featuring interviews, survey results, articles from guest experts on various fields and much more – watch this space!

Check out the new blog and don’t forget to subscribe using RSS if you like what you see and would like to stay in touch! If you have already subscribed to the old blog (i.e. this one) you will need to re-subscribe to the new one.  Subscribe to our new RSS feed now >>

Related URLs:

New Blog: http://blog.peopleperhour.com

New RSS feed: http://blog.peopleperhour.com/feed/

Christmas Offer – unlimited Free Listings

With only 3 weeks to go until the new year, I’m sure a lot of you out there are thinking of how to go about your remaining tasks for 2009.  Who wouldn’t want to begin a new year on a clean slate?

Luckily, PeoplePerHour.com offers you the opportunity to do just that – for FREE! Clear out your backlog of projects with our unique offer of unlimited FREE project listings for December.

In our recent Small Business survey, 73% of you have said that business is growing and that you anticipate a busy 2010.  So get a head start with our great offer. And don’t worry if you’ve already purchased your free listings. You will be able to carry them forward to January, so you won’t lose out!

Start posting>>

And don’t forget that we value your feedback greatly – so let us know what you think of our Christmas offer.

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Transforming Sales/Marketing/PR

Sales/Marketing/Pr is PeoplePerHour.com’s number 1 category, comprising a whopping 32% of total posted projects. It is thus our duty to constantly ensure that both our freelance service Buyers and Providers are left satisfied. We have thus introduced certain project information requirements in order to maximize our providers’ knowledge of the job and hence eliminate the gap between what the Buyer wants and what the provider can give.

At a time where time and patience is scarce to say the least, efficiency is everything. We understand that many of our Providers are distressed by the fact that they bid on commission projects with no clear indication of what their earnings will be or how many hours of work they will have to put in. On the same note, we also recognize that our Buyers are people who want their job done right and quickly, and it can indeed be very frustrating to have to re-appoint a project due to a misunderstanding between the two sides. We have introduced the below as a way of ensuring that no one is bidding for the “wrong” project.

• OTE – On Target Earnings
Our buyers are now obliged to enter a fixed amount (per day, week or month) which the provider can expect to earn if he/she meets the set targets. In this way providers will no longer lose interest in the job after being accepted due to pay being lower than their expectations. Likewise, if the pay is high, this is obviously an incentive for the more capable bidders.

• Target
Our aim is that our providers understand what is expected of them in their “own language”, i.e. the number of leads, sales, calls etc that they will be expected to achieve.

• Desired Time Commitment
We know that a lot of our providers work for extra cash in the evenings and that their time is limited. So by requiring that the buyers indicate how many hours of work they are expecting within a specific time-frame, we have made sure that no one is bidding on projects they cannot take on. This is obviously beneficial for our buyers as well since they will then only have to review those providers who are indeed suitable for the job.

We welcome any more suggestions. Our aim is to constantly improve our recipe for success and we need your help to make sure we have got it right.

PPH gets a fresh look

As part of our ongoing endeavor to make our site as simple and as easy to use as possible, we have now re-designed our homepage. We are constantly trying to improve how PeoplePerHour works internally and we want this to be reflected externally as well. “Packaging” does matter!

By including an outline of the four steps of our project-posting process, we believe that our users will now grasp the concept of PeoplePerHour.com from their first glance at our webpage.

We value your feedback greatly. If you have any ideas on how to improve PeoplePerHour.com and if there is anything that you feel is not clear or easy enough to use, please let us know. Our goal is to satisfy all our users, so please help us understand you.

Bringing you more value: new listing packages

For those who have just joined Peopleperhour, or for those who haven’t been very active lately and are in need of a bit of a ‘shove’ back to work, here’s some information on our new enticing listing packages.

If you’re new to Peopleperhour then you’re only a click away from posting your project.

Just click on ‘post project’ and get your free trial.

If you are a returning user then you have the choice of using either one of the following three schemes, depending on how often you plan to post projects up on the site.

1) One-off – £20 per listing, 100% refundable

For those who would only like to post one project after their free trial, we provide you with the option of purchasing just that and nothing more.

2) Occasional users – £5 per listing, 100% refundable

For all our occasional users whose posting needs vary across different periods, i.e. who want more than one posting but do not know when or exactly how many projects they will be posting, there is no need to worry. We provide a great value offer in which you pay only £30 for 6 listings which you can use whenever you want!

3) Monthly Membership – £2 per listing, 100% refundable

For all our regular users we now offer a monthly membership scheme bringing you incredible value. For just £10 a month you get 5 inclusive listings! Which means you only pay £2 per listing. And if you run out you can top-up your listings at the same price of £2 each – a whopping 90% discount to the one-off rate.

And it get’s better. We also have a special offer of 12 months for a price of 10. For £100 you get a full years membership of up to 5 project listings per month, dropping your per-listing price to just £1.66!

Catch? No catch. All you need to do is subscribe for a minimum of two months. At any time after that all you need to do is drop us an e-mail and we will disconnect your membership instantly.

And remember – we offer a 100% money-back guarantee to each of the above. If for whatever reason you are unhappy with your bids, just drop us an email to with the project reference number and we will refund every penny back to you.

Extra features

Have you noticed the new features available? Don’t miss out on the opportunity to make your project stand out and get the best results possible.

– £5 per listing

Add the above attention grabbing icon to your listing, for just £5 extra, and you won’t be missed!

– £15 per listing

Target more providers by staying on top of listings up to 30 days! The cost of this varies from an additional £15 for 3 days, up to £60 for staying on top for a whole month!

We value the feedback of our users immensely, so feel free to tell us what you think. If you have any better ideas on our listing options then we’d love to hear them. Constantly improving our listing options and keeping our users satisfied is what we aim to do.

Employers can now limit bids to UK providers

After numerous requests from Employers on our site we have now introduced a feature whereby they can optionally limit their bids to UK Providers only.

Our site is now over 70% UK freelancer, and despite a constant worry by many of you that you’ll be ‘undercut’ by lower bids from abroad, over 85% of bids are awarded to UK freelancers, despite many projects having cheaper bids from abroad.

The data seems to suggest that Employers on PPH rate locality, quality and ease of communication over price. The feature we’ve just added now takes this a step further by allowing our Employers to limit the bids they get only to UK providers if they fear of being  ‘flooded’ by large volumes of bids from abroad (as they’ve often declared) many of which are excessively cheap and ‘meaningless’ in their view.

Surveys we’ve done with our users show a split: some Employers adamantly do not want to get bids from non-UK providers and in fact often find them a nuisance for the reasons highlighted above hence the feature to optionally block them. Others see it as a nice-to-have comparison even if in the end they chose a UK freelancer 85% of the time.

This is not to say that our site is entirely UK: we have multiple cases of Employers awarding their projects to providers abroad with excellent results.  Those that have taken the time and care to submit well-thought out and structured bids have been successful.
The same goes for UK providers, and we urge all our providers to do the same – as we’ve done many a time in the past – in order to win more work.

This is yet another case of quality faring higher than price in our marketplace. The geographic distinction is simply an (unfortunate) interpretation that’s been deuced from the average case. Which is why we are not taking any measures to ban or restrict usage, but rather – as we always strive to do  – give our users more choice.

PPH gets a new look

We have been collecting feedback about the design of the site for a while now; both through the messages/emails we get and also by proactively contacting as many of our users as possible to get feedback.

With that in mind, we have now launched a new, cleaner design that will hopefully address most of the feedback we have been receiving. Please take a moment to check out the new design and feel free to send us any feedback that you might have.

We will continue the redesign exercise over the next few months to improve other sections of the site – it is our ongoing goal to make the site as easy as possible to use and understand so thank you for your feedback so far and we hope that you will like the new design.

Import Feedback

We’ve just added a new feature that allows our Providers to import feedback from people that have used their services outside the site in the past.

Statistically, Providers with feedback have an 80% higher chance of winning work.  Providers who are new to the site can therefore now start on a level playing field by building their feedback rating and winning work straight away

To keep this fair we do differentiate the feedback that’s imported from that which is from the site – so naturally as a Provider your rating will improve the more work you win through the site. Importing feedback at the start allows you to escape the initial deadlock and gain momentum in building your profile.

To import feedback please login your account and click on the relevant button

Tax Bill Worries? Online Accounting to the Rescue?

A common worry among the freelancers we speak to is whether they’ve got enough put aside for their next tax bill.

Failing to make this kind of provision frequently catches those new to freelancing out. Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs are not known for their understanding in these matters, with penalties and interest being charged as soon as you miss deadlines.

The rules for working out the tax bill, and when it’s due, vary according to your company structure and can be quite complex. An accountant will take your invoices and receipts and sort this out for you, but it can cost hundreds of pounds and you won’t know what the answer is until after the tax year is finished.

For all freelancers, Self-Assessed income taxes are due by 31st Jan in the year following the end of the tax year (so 31 Jan 09 for the tax year 6 Apr 07 to 5 Apr 08). There will be payments-on-account from the previous year, and those for the next year, to consider when working out what’s actually due.

For those running Limited Companies, Corporation Tax bill deadlines vary according to when your company’s accounting year ends but you have a similar amount of time to pay. And of course there are VAT Returns and Payroll Taxes to keep track of too.

We don’t know anyone who enjoys this, and even with the best will in the world many of us leave these matters to the last minute. A nasty surprise or missed deadlines can be the result.

There’s some good news, though, in the shape of a new breed of online accounting and tax calculation services which can help you understand what’s due and when, well in advance.

One example is Sam’s Tax (www.samstax.co.uk), dealing with Self Assessment for Sole Traders but also able to work out VAT as well. You subscribe to their online service, which costs £9.99 a month (with the option to pay £99.99 annually instead) and enter your income and expense transactions into the system.

It then gives you access to a set of reports and graphs which detail where your money goes, a monthly breakdown of profit, information to fill in VAT returns and of course the numbers you need to complete your Self-Assessment Tax Return.

Also available is the popular service FreeAgent (www.freeagentcentral.com), which is built primarily for freelancers and provides plans to suit Partnerships and Limited Companies as well as Sole Traders.

Like SamsTax, FreeAgent handles Self-Assessment Tax Return figures and VAT Returns, but also handles Corporation Tax and PAYE/NI (payroll) taxes, and provides a ‘Tax Timeline’ – a calendar of tax due dates and amounts that you can view in your Outlook, Apple iCal or Google calendar.

FreeAgent is slightly more expensive at £15 a month for Sole Traders, £20 for Partnerships and £25 for Limited Companies.

Both services offer a 30-day free trial, and FreeAgent also provides access to a number of demonstration accounts so you can try it out without signing up.

We’ve checked out both services, and they both look like they would take a lot of stress and hassle out of managing your money.

Now there are no excuses for not knowing how much you owe and when you owe it. But it’s still up to you to ensure you set that money aside!

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People per Hour are pleased to have negotiated a 10% discount for all our Providers when you sign up to FreeAgent using the the ‘Recommended by PPH’ FreeAgent page. We’re also working to provide you with a fully integrated solution so that all your PPH invoicing is synchronized with the rest of your accounts automatically without having to re-enter data.

Premium Provider accounts update

Thank you to everyone that has provided us with useful feedback, positive or negative, on the Premium membership scheme that will be launched in September.

We have collected and analysed all the feedback (from the blog and also from your emails) and have used it to identify the main concerns about the scheme and modify the scheme to address them.

Below are the highlights/main points from the feedback and how we have modified the subscription scheme to address them:

• The bid allocation for the standard and gold membership was too limiting

• o We have increased the bid allocation for Standard members to 15/month and for Gold to 40/month.
• o The bid allocation to Gold members has now been doubled to 40 bids/credits.
• o Also, we have decided to keep the cost of each bid to 1 credit regardless of the project value, which means that essentially everyone will on average be able to bid for double the number of projects with the same credits.

• It would be more fair to ‘refund’ the bids if the project does not get awarded

• o We see this point and do agree that it would be fairer to have such a system but unfortunately it would not be possible to ‘refund’ bids because everyone would have to buy bids, then wait until project expiry to before the bids can be refunded.
• o We decided that it would be more practical to give more free bids (see above) to everyone that will in practice neutralise the effect of some wastage.

• The number of categories allowed were too restricting

• o We can see the point that a lot of providers have skills that span two categories so have doubled the free categories for both Standard and Gold members to 2 and 4 respectively.

• It would be very difficult for new providers to win work

• o Again, this was one of the major factors behind the big increase of the free bids for the Standard membership.
• o Also, we are working on a new system to allow providers (new and existing) to ‘import’ feedback from projects they have completed outside PPH. We’re hoping that this will help new providers start with some feedback and win work.

On another positive note, from the buyers asked separately about the scheme, the feedback was almost 100% positive about introducing some type of premium accounts for providers and also to limit the number of free bids to increase quality.

We expect this to improve the percentage of projects awarded, as the common complaints by buyers are that they have often have to go through a large number of bids from providers that do not necessarily have all the skills needed and also that some providers do not respond to the buyers during the bidding stage (and sadly, some don’t even respond after they have won the work!).

It’s worth stressing again that the main drivers behind this is to increase the bid quality and number of projects accepted, as well as provide an avenue for those who wish to benefit from lower commission fees. Without wishing to spark a debate about this (and you’ll have to take our word from it or just ignore this comment!), it’s worth noting that we actually estimate (based on the figures so far) that any financial gains from the bidding will be offset by the reduction in commission, so there will actually won’t be any significant direct financial benefit for PPH – we are however hoping that the increase in the number of projects awarded will benefit both PPH and our provider community.

In summary, the new scheme will be as follows:

	Standard	GOLD	PLATINUM
Monthly Fee	Free	£7.95	£14.95
Monthly Credit allowance	15	40	80
Additional credits (per bundle of 10)	£5.95	£4.95	£4.95
Service Categories	2	4	Unlimited
Max No. skills listed in profile	10	15	20
Profile listing	√	√	√
Hosted portfolio	2Mb – 5 files	10Mb – 10 files	20Mb – 20 files
Additional service categories	£5.95/mo	£3.95/mo	Free
Service (Commission Fee)	10.00%	8.50%	7.50%
Minimum service (Commission Fee)	£15.00	£10.00	£10.00
Project Value	Credits/bid
Less than £250	1
£250 – £500	1
> £500	1

 Some other amendments to the scheme include:

• Longer expiry period for purchased bids – this has been increased and instead of expiring at the end of each month, the bids purchased will only expire at the end of the following month e.g. if purchased on 10^th of September, the bid credits will expire at the end of October)
• Free period when upgrading to the premium accounts – the period between the date of upgrade the end of the current month, will be free of charge for those who choose upgrade to Premium accounts e.g. if the upgrade takes place on the 7^th of September, the rest of September will be free and the firstly monthly fee paid will be for the month of October.