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Phsychology | Article #272 : HELP WANTED – CAN YOU?

You’re hanging out at your favorite forum, or maybe scanning through the online classifieds when you run into somebody who needs help. You read the description of what they’re looking for and the first thing you think to yourself is “I can do that.” Well, before you go jumping into something that you’re going to regret later on, you might want to take a step back and read this article first. It may keep you from making some huge mistakes.

For people who are just starting out, this is one of the most dangerous areas. The reason is because they are so desperate to make a buck that they will do just about anything to make it, even fooling themselves into believing that they can handle the job.

The truth is, when I first learned web design, I was still a rookie and not that skillful. I wanted to believe that I could do many of the jobs that I found under the help wanted signs, but the hard cold facts said otherwise. As a result, I pretty much made a fool out of myself early on and could have ruined my reputation. Fortunately, I hooked up with somebody who gave me some good experience and made it so that I could handle some simple jobs. I never really developed the skills needed to do tough sites though. That’s when I realized that this wasn’t for me. I recognized my limitations and decided to go with my strengths, which were writing. To this day, I only take on jobs that I know I can do. My reputation is too important to risk ruining it.

Another thing you have to watch out for with help wanted ads is how much the person is willing to pay. Unfortunately, most people want something for nothing. I remember a job that somebody wanted that I calculated as costing about $300 to complete. They wanted to pay me $50 for the job. Again, because I wanted to remain professional, I told them that I couldn’t take the job on at that price and gave them some recommendations.

It’s tempting to want to take on a job when we’re struggling, no matter what the pay is. Obviously, the decision on whether or not to accept it is up to you. But you’re going to reach a point if you keep doing this where you may begin to feel like people are taking advantage of you. Let me tell you, it’s not a nice feeling.
Another problem with help wanted requests are that people can be very cryptic about what they want. Like if somebody says they want you to do a sales page for them. Are they talking about just the sales copy, or are they talking about that and the HTML as well, or are they talking about all of that plus all the graphics and the ecovers? Just telling somebody that they need a sales page doesn’t tell the whole story. So what happens, way too often, is that somebody accepts the job, thinking it’s just a matter of creating sales copy, and then they later find out that this person wanted the works, and they’re not a graphic artist.

The point is, if you’re going to respond to somebody’s call for help, make sure it’s a job you can handle, make sure you’re getting paid what it’s worth and make sure you get all the specs.

In the long run, you’ll save yourself a lot of trouble if you do.

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