How do you hire the right freelancer?
If you’re wondering how to hire a freelancer to create leverage, begin in the right place. Hiring the right freelancer starts with understanding what you actually need. Before searching through freelancer profiles or selecting a service, you must define the work, the skills required, the level of support you need, and what success should look like.
For small business owners, the challenge often isn’t finding someone who says they can do the work. It’s figuring out what kind of help you need in the first place, then finding someone with the right skills, experience, availability, and work style to deliver it.
When should you hire a freelancer?
Knowing when and how to hire a freelancer is important for avoiding burnout and maintaining focus on your core business goals. It can make sense when work is starting to overwhelm your existing team, you need skills you don’t currently have in-house, or your workload or budget doesn’t justify a full-time hire.
Your administrative work is taking you away from the work that grows the business.
Business owners shouldn’t spend most of their time buried in the backend of the business when their time is better spent serving clients, developing new opportunities, or growing the company. If administrative and operational work is consistently pulling you away from those responsibilities, freelance support can give you back that capacity.
“Even the most successful businesses will begin to falter if the owners are spending more time in the minutia of the backend of the business than on the front-lines,” said Elizabeth Eiss, CEO and Founder of ResultsResourcing. “That simply isn’t what they do best. It’s a waste of their time.”
Your business is growing faster than your current capacity.
Growth can create a temporary or ongoing need for additional support before you’re ready to add another full-time employee. A freelancer can provide additional capacity without requiring a long-term staffing commitment.
You need a skill you don’t have.
Sometimes the issue isn’t workload. It’s expertise. You may need marketing support, bookkeeping, project management, HR expertise, business development, or another specialized skill without needing that person full-time.
You need to expand but money is tight.
Freelance support can give a small business access to experienced talent without taking on the same commitment as a traditional full-time hire. The important question isn’t simply, “Can I afford a freelancer?” It’s: What level of expertise do I need, how much work do I actually have, and what is the value of getting that work off my plate?
How to Hire a Freelancer: 7 Steps
1. Start with the work, not a job title
One of the biggest mistakes small business owners make is starting with a title before defining the work. Instead of immediately looking for a “marketing freelancer,” “virtual assistant,” or “operations person,” start by asking:
- What do I need this person to accomplish?
- What work is currently not getting done?
- What work is taking too much of my time?
- What skills are required to do it well?
- What responsibilities need ongoing ownership?
- What work is project-based versus recurring?
The clearer you are about the work, the easier it becomes to identify the right type of freelancer.
2. Don’t assume one freelancer needs to do everything
A common hiring mistake is looking for one person who can handle every task on your list. That can make the search harder and can ultimately result in hiring a generalist for work that actually requires several different skill sets. Break a large role into its component skills and determine where specialized expertise is actually needed. A generalist may have a lower hourly rate, but if they take significantly longer to complete specialized work, the lower rate may not translate into a lower overall cost.
3. Define what success looks like
Once you’ve identified the work, get specific about what you expect the freelancer to accomplish. Before you begin interviewing candidates, clarify:
- Responsibilities: What will they own? What will they execute? What remains your responsibility?
- Skills and experience: What technical or professional skills are required?
- Capacity: How much work do you actually need them to handle? Is it ongoing or project-based?
- Communication: How often do you need updates? What tools will you use?
- Outcomes: What will tell you that the engagement is working?
The more clearly you define the role, the easier it becomes to evaluate whether a freelancer is actually a fit.
4. Find freelancers with the skills you actually need
Once you’ve defined the role, you can determine where to look for talent. This is an important part of how to hire a freelancer because the source depends on the skills and level of support you need.
- Personal and professional referrals
- Freelance marketplaces
- Professional networks
- Specialized freelance staffing or managed talent curation services
The challenge with an open marketplace isn’t necessarily a lack of talent. It’s the amount of work required to determine which candidates are actually worth interviewing. A large pool of profiles can mean more searching, screening, and time spent comparing candidates who may look qualified on paper but aren’t the right fit for the work. For a small business owner, that search has a cost too: your time.
5. Evaluate skills, experience, and fit
A strong portfolio or impressive profile is only the starting point. When you’re figuring out how to hire a freelancer, look for evidence that the freelancer can do the work you’re asking them to do:
- Relevant experience: Have they handled this type of work before? Can they show examples?
- References: Can past clients speak to their reliability and quality?
- Problem-solving: Can they explain how they approach challenges and competing priorities?
- Working style: Can they work effectively within your business?
Skills and experience matter, but the right freelancer also needs a working style that fits your business.
6. Set expectations before the work starts
Once you’ve selected your freelancer, make the working relationship clear from the beginning. Consider:
- Scope: What work will the freelancer handle, and what remains your responsibility?
- Priorities: What needs to happen first, and how will priorities change when new needs come up?
- Capacity: How much time or availability do you need from the freelancer?
- Communication: How and when will you communicate about the work?
- Process: How will work be assigned, completed, reviewed, and approved?
- Expectations: What does good work look like, and how will you know the engagement is working?
This is especially important when a freelancer is working virtually. Clear expectations give both sides a shared understanding of how the work will get done.
7. Evaluate the relationship based on results
Hiring isn’t the end of the process. After the freelancer begins working with you, pay attention to whether the arrangement is actually producing the result you needed. Ask:
- Is the work getting done?
- Is the quality where it needs to be?
- Are deadlines being met?
- Is the freelancer taking work off your plate?
- Has your capacity improved?
If the answer is consistently no, the role may not have been defined clearly enough, the scope may have changed, you may need a different level or combination of expertise, or you may need different talent.
How to Hire a Freelancer: Hiring Mistakes to Avoid
Trying to find one person who can do everything: A long list of unrelated responsibilities can make it difficult to find someone who is genuinely excellent at the work that matters most. Break the role down into its component skills and determine where specialized expertise is necessary.
Hiring based only on price: An inexpensive freelancer isn’t necessarily the least expensive option. Consider the combination of rate, expertise, speed, and quality.
Skipping the vetting process: A profile, resume, or portfolio doesn’t tell you everything you need to know. Verify experience, review relevant work, discuss availability, and evaluate communication before making a decision.
ResultsResourcing Helps You Navigate How to Hire a Freelancer
Hiring a freelancer doesn’t need to be hard, time-consuming, or riddled with risk. ResultsResourcing handles the heavy lifting to make hiring freelance talent simpler.
ResultsResourcing takes the guesswork out of hiring by matching small business owners looking for virtual assistant services with pre-vetted, experienced teams of freelance professionals based on their unique needs. We start with a conversation to understand what you need, search our network of freelance professionals, and match you with a team who fits yours needs and work style. Then you interview and select the best-matched team.
Whether you need to solve one challenge or have several areas that need support, our team model makes it easier to expand your support as your business grows without having to start the hiring process over again.
Instead of spending your time searching, screening, comparing, and coordinating talent, you can focus on choosing the right support and getting back to the work that matters most.
If you’re ready to find the ideal freelance match, ResultsResourcing can help you navigate how to hire a freelance through a guided process, making it easier, faster, and more cost-effective. Book a Jumpstart Session to get started.
