Adventures In Personal Outsourcing Pt.2
Posted by Steve Munroe | Under Data Management, Work, productivity Thursday Jul 10, 2008
Way back in April, I posted about how I was going to find a personal assistant to list on Amazon all the old books I wanted to get rid of. The basic idea was to test out this whole personal outsourcing idea with a task that was easy to do, but time consuming for me. I hoped it would at least pay for itself and perhaps make a little bit of cash. I supplied the ISBN’s of a set of old books I wanted to get rid of, and asked for whoever was to do the job to find the books on Amazon and list my books 5% cheaper than the going rate for a used copy already listed.
Since then I have put up the details of the task on several websites, such as Your Man in India, Get Friday and DoMyStuff, all to no avail 
The sites either never got back to me, or the task is still listed with no takers for the job. Undeterred, I found another site called Guru.com where I posted the task again. The very next day I had close to 50 people bidding to do the work! The bids ranged from $20 to $200(!?), coming from places like the US, India, the Philippines, and Canada. Guru.com allows you to review each bidder in terms of past projects completed, samples of their previous work and lists of reviews of the bidder given by previous customers. After examining the bids, I settled for one submitted by Karine (not real name), who works out of India. The bid Karine gave for my work (73 books to be listed) was $25.00. Here’s Karine ’s bid letter:
Proposal:
Dear Sir / Madam,
This has reference to your project ID 423820, “Amazon Book Sales”. Please find all information relative to my skills and experience uploaded in my guru profile. Also cost & time estimates for the project
In addition to my 8 years of experience in different type of projects, possess a Bachelor’s Degree in Commerce with specialization in Accounting , and Advance Course in Computer Software Applications.
Given your desire for Amazon Book Sales, I submit a proposed cost estimate of US$ 25 to complete 73 records. 1 day turn around time.
I have been doing this support work for www.Finterra.com since 2 years.
Ability to perform consistently with quick results.
In addition, I propose that we utilize Guru.com’s Escrow and Mediation and Arbitration services to protect our mutual investment.
Please feel free to contact me by email at *********@yahoo.com.
I look forward to this project.
Sincerely,
Karine.
Guru.com Professional
Here also is a (partial) list of reviews of Karine ’s previous work:
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Employer: 233657 |
$100.00 | 07/09/2008 | |||||||||||||
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Employer: 233657 |
$100.00 | 05/16/2008 | |||||||||||||
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Employer: 233657 |
$190.00 | 04/12/2008 | |||||||||||||
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Employer: 234605 |
$50.00 | 03/11/2008 |
They all looked pretty good to me so I have just awarded Karine the work! Guru.com allows you to use their escrow service in which you deposit the fee, where it is held until the work is completed and you sign it off as acceptable. Once you have agreed the work, the money is taken out of escrow and paid to the employee. So, now all I have to do is wait for Karine to complete the work, whereupon I will be able to go to Amazon and see my books listed, ready for people to buy. In summary, I’ll have 73 books listed (which would have taken me hours to do) for the equivalent of £12.50! 
I’ll be sure to keep you up to date on what happens next.
