Website Review #7 - Talent.hubstaff.com

Hi readers! I hope you are ready for another review to finish off the week! It's also the end of January soon, time flies by pretty quickly when your just starting out on a new venture! Anyway let's move on.

Today I will be reviewing talent.hubstaff.com, which is another new website that I have come across during my online job search. So far it has been good to me however there are a few things I would like to discuss. Let me tell you more.

Hubstaff Talent is an online employment platform for freelancers to post jobs/projects and get noticed by clients from across the globe. It is the talent division of the work tracking software Hubstaff. The great thing about this website is that it doesn't have any hidden fees for registering as a freelancer and you don't even need to bid for any projects! Why bother with bidding for particular projects when you can just simply submit your application to the client and let Hubstaff Talent do all the work for you? After all, your skills and experience matter more to the client than bidding amounts and proposals.

Compared to other freelancing platforms, Hubstaff Talent is not as well known but it is quite competent in terms of its features and functionality. There are not as many hidden traps and misleading information as you would find in similar platforms, making it stand out from the competition. If you prefer a freelance site that does not require the hassle of bidding for projects and paying unnecessary fees then Hubstaff Talent might be the better option.

The Hubstaff Talent homepage - Very clean and polished design. I like how the
main claim of the company 'Free way to find remote talent' is placed in the middle of the
page in order to convince users that it is true and believable. (Names of freelancers have been blocked out for privacy reasons).

When you register as a freelancer with Hubstaff Talent, you will be instructed to complete your freelancer profile. This will require the usual contact details, social media links, career summary, portfolio, current skills and even uploading your resume. According to Hubstaff Talent's guidelines, it is important that you have a fully complete profile in order to receive more contacts from potential clients. You also have to make sure that your skills and experience are tailored to the types of jobs you are looking for on the Hubstaff Talent jobs board, be it content writing, marketing, administration, IT, customer service and so on. Even if you can't find the right project to suit your business needs at a particular time, there is no need to worry as the jobs board gets updated frequently and there are always a bunch of jobs available. You can also check who has viewed your profile on the stats/analytics page where you will find information such as the date the profile was viewed, the location and the total amount of views within a month. However the clients on this site are very selective and will only contact the freelancers whose profiles stand out the most with regards to industry experience and skill sets. Your freelancer profile is the first step to getting contacted so you'd better work hard on it if you want to stand out.

My experience on the site has been quite good so far, I am always constantly checking my profile to see if anyone has viewed it and looking for projects that are compatible to my current skill set. Although I haven't been accepted into a project just yet I am still keeping my profile open to all freelancers and clients in case someone does contact me in the future. Before finding out about Hubstaff Talent I was searching for other freelancing platforms that I could sign up for to help me in my online job search since I am very interested in working remotely; and I happened to read some positive comments about Hubstaff Talent so I signed up straight away.

This is Hubstaff Talent's job board, where users can use the filters on the left of the
page to narrow their search. The positions shown here are just some of the examples of business/IT/customer service projects that you will find on the job board. (Business names and locations have been blocked out for privacy reasons).

There are definitely some good things to say about this website, however I would like to point out some small things that can be improved to make it an even better experience.

On some occasions, applying for a project on Hubstaff Talent isn't always easy and you may or may not hear back from the client; which is a shame because after spending all your time and effort into perfecting your application for a particular projects you would think that a client would respond and provide you with an outcome. It is understandable that you are competing against other freelancers to land the top job so it would be nice if the reply rate for the clients could be risen a bit more in order to provide quicker responses to the applicants and not leave them hanging. Another thing I would like to point out is there is a small lack of interaction between freelancers on the site. If there was a feature for sending messages to freelancers without hiring them for a project first that would be helpful. It is usually best to communicate with freelancers about their skills and experience first before inviting them to a job straight away (much like in a job interview where you would ask an applicant about previous experiences and future prospects).

Above all of this, Hubstaff Talent is definitely the better choice for entering the world of freelancing. It is completely free of charge and anyone who has previous business experience can join. Very clean web design and good functionality. It could have some improvement on existing features as mentioned above but otherwise a great website with the potential to go further.

Final Rating - 6/10

Thanks again for reading! That's my last review for the month! I hope that you can stick around in February as I have some big plans to take this blog to new heights! In the meantime, I'll see you next Monday!

Website Review #4 - Myopportunity.com

Hello again. I am back on schedule with my fourth review of the month!

Today I will be reviewing Myopportunity.com, which is another website focusing on a serious topic; this time in the form of business networking. This is a relatively new site that I found under a list of alternatives to professional platform LinkedIn, let me tell you a bit more about it:

Opportunity is a business networking website which works in a similar way to LinkedIn, however it is much more different in terms of generating leads and finding like-minded professionals to interact with. The website is described as a great option for individuals to build business relationships, find employment opportunities and even connect on a personal level. When compared with LinkedIn, Opportunity is an easier platform to work with and has its features spanned out across various categories rather than being crowded all over the place, and the site itself has a strong focus on building professional relationships so you don't even need to create a large profile to gain traction or stand out from other individuals. That's too much work for someone who just wants to communicate freely with anyone without any fuss!

The Myopportunity.com homepage - The presentation is as professional and positive as it gets. How inviting is this for the user? 

When you register with Opportunity, you just need to answer a few general questions such as preferred industry, locations, interests, and your current skill set. It's a simple process that won't take very long and once you enter the account portal it's all yours! You can edit your profile at any time if you want to change any details. As an additional bonus, you can also add your LinkedIn profile link or invite your LinkedIn contacts to join if you want to increase exposure. One of the best features in the Opportunity profile is the 'networking pitch' where you explain more  about your current employment, your role at work and interests outside of work. The networking pitch is important as you want to attract the right professionals with the same pathways as you and they will most certainly want to be interested in what you have to offer.

The main section of the account portal is the lead generation page, where there is a long list of professionals compiled together based on the interests and industry experience that you add to your profile. Feel free to contact as many professionals as you like as there is no boundaries for communication here. My first experience with contacting someone from Opportunity was actually quite good. A few months ago I interacted with a guy who worked in an IT company and talked about where we were at in terms of business and professional life. It was a very normal, short conversation and it just goes to show that these individuals are very serious about maintaining business relationships and they are not playing around. With Opportunity, you are basically interacting with the right people at the right time.

The Opportunity account portal and leads page, where you can build relationships with your leads based on experience and personal interests. (Names, pictures and locations of individuals have been blocked out for privacy reasons.)

Now before I finish I would like to remind you that some of the features on Opportunity are part of an extensive PRO upgrade that requires payments every month or so. Some special PRO features included in the upgrade include extra profiles for employment, dating and sales, mass messaging to all your leads and profile verification. You can even interact with special professionals who have a PRO upgrade and verified profiles! If you would like to go the extra mile and get the full package then I suggest you go ahead and try it for yourself. I haven't bought the PRO upgrade myself but I am thinking of doing so in the future. It would be nice if there was a free trial for the PRO features so you could try them out before paying for the full upgrade.

In conclusion, I believe that this website is an excellent platform for business networking and works as a great companion piece to LinkedIn. The professionals that use Opportunity for business relations are real, legitimate people and there are no fake profiles found. Anyone who is willing to maintain strong business relationships and build their professional image can use Opportunity to their full advantage. It has a clean web design and professional presentation, good functionality and interactive nature. 

Final Rating: 8/10

That's it guys! Another review done and dusted! See you on Wednesday for the next one!