Value and values Mike | May 20th, 2008
crowdSPRING values creativity. crowdSPRING values creative people.
We put a great deal of thought into ways we could walk this walk in our business model. We developed for tools and features to protect creatives that other sites do not offer. We insist that buyers deposit with us the full amount of the award and we take on the responsibility for paying the winning creative. We do not allow projects to be canceled or abandoned. We provide legal contracts for buyer and creative. And we are busily developing the IP Registry, which will further protect creative works.
Having said all of that, we are also here for another purpose, and that is to provide great value to buyers. To help achieve this, we set what we thought were reasonable minimum prices for projects in all categories. Our hope was that the market itself would help to determine the actual awards that buyers offered on their projects.
Over the past week we have been following closely the projects that are posted, the user behavior in those projects, and the creatives participation in those projects. We have also been listening to all of you. In our forums and through our Contact Us form, many of you have complained that low-price projects weaken the model and undervalue the work. We hear you. As of today we are raising the minimum awards for all projects. Logo design, stationery design and other graphic design projects will now have a minimum of $150. Web design will have a minimum of $250. And next week we will introduce a “bundle” for buyers who need a logo and business card design in one project. The minimum for this will be $250. We will continue watching and listening.
So, thank you for the feedback and thank you for being members of our community.
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6 Comments
This is good to hear, Mike. There are enough agencies/services out there already that puts low value on creative work.
Another phenomenon that might be interesting to note is the sudden appearance of a number of “recreateThis” projects, e.g projects where the buyer just wants an existing piece of art vectorised or remade in other ways in exact accordance with the existing art. Adding a letter to a wordmark for example. That kind of projects doesn’t seem to fit into the cS model, at least not as far as I see it, so it might be worth stating loud and clear somewhere the basic requirements for a project. Or maybe what kind of job isn’t suited for cS. After all, cS is different than Elance, Guru, iFreelance, WhatHaveYou™ etc. In a good way.
It’s just a thought.
@fredK – right on! It’s really great to see crowdSPRING’s approach to creating a fair marketplace for creative services. I haven’t been a member for long (browsed for a while before I joined), but I am really liking what I am seeing. Great job!
cS – thanks for listening! There is a lot of noise on the internet – particularly from start-ups. Having lurked for a while and observed the forums and the projects – I am really impressed by your approach to building this community – and your dedication to protecting your users. Really makes me very happy that a friend recommended I take a look.
Hi guys and thanks so much for the kind words. We actually pulled a project yesterday that was a straight up “recreate” because it really didn’t fit the model. We are discussing ways that we can more explicitly inform the buyer about what is/isn’t a good project on cS and will work towards that goal. In the meantime thanks for sharing your thoughts and we will do our best to continue listening.
Mike
[...] Last May, I wrote here that crowdSPRING values creativity. crowdSPRING values creative people. [...]
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