Fiverr Cofounders Set Sights On Amazon, eBay
Fiverr is an interesting site where you can find all kinds of goods and services being offered from sellers all over the world for as little as $5. Established five years ago by cofounders Micha Kaufman and Shai Winiger, they connected buyers looking for some good work done cheap with some sellers that were willing to offer a variety of services. At any given time you can log on to the site and find people offering copywriting, video editing and production, social media marketing assistance, search engine optimization help and even novel writing. Now with over three million gigs being offered by sellers on the site, there is something for everyone who is looking to support an independent worker.
The services market is much smaller than the products market, with sites like Amazon and eBay being a strong foothold, but that doesn’t mean that Fiverr can’t reach that kind of potential as it continues to see growth over time. Kaufman wants Fiverr to become the eBay of services, wanting to and believing the company can reach the scale that Amazon and eBay operate on.
“For the first time in history, we have brought the e-commerce experience to the services market. We have turned service into a product. We are giving talented people a way to turn their talent into a tradeable product. We are the eBay of services – the largest arena for freelancers on the Web.”
The Fiverr community has continued to grow, offering about 150 categories of services to choose from with multiple sellers from all around the world offering what they are best at. Whether someone needs a business card designed, or would like an article translated from English to German, there will be a seller that is interested in assisting them. There are even some stranger things to buy, including a Facebook girlfriend. For each $5 that the seller makes, $1 is collected by Fiverr. The company also collects fifty-cents from each purchase, and its income for 2014 was approximately $15 million. Kaufman thinks that by expanding the freelancers market in North America, Fiverr could be on track to make $1 billion in the next couple of years.
“The freelancers’ market in the United States alone is worth $180 billion annually – 30 percent of the American workforce. It is estimated that within five years this market will grow to $280 billion and employ over 40 percent of the American workforce, but only 0.5 percent of this work currently takes place on the Web. The market we are operating in will grow fortyfold in the next five years. The most exciting companies right now are Uber and Airbnb. They represent activity that was 100 percent offline that has become completely online.”
Many sellers on Fiverr use what they make doing their gigs as extra income, though some sellers have found a niche and were able to quit their day jobs to become full time Fiverr sellers. Currently, Fiverr offers each seller the ability to offer 20 different gigs to buyers, respond to buyer requests, accept tips for a job well done (a new feature that has just been introduced) and to move up in the world of Fiverr.
A seller starts at Level 1, but following highly-positive feedback and 50 sales, the seller can move up to Level 2, able to offer more gig add-ons, allowing the seller to make as much as $160 per gig. Finally, the top tier is a Top Seller; these sellers are handpicked by Fiverr and represent the true spirit of the company with overwhelmingly positive feedback and lots of sales. Anyone can sign up on the site and begin selling; the money made from completing gigs can be paid out directly to a PayPal account, or sellers can use funds to buy gigs from other sellers.
[Image via Fiverr]
