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20 Things You Didn't Know about Fiverr

Fiverr is one of the largest online marketplaces for Freelancers to offer their services and for customers to find them for hire. They offer these services throughout the entire world. There are pros and cons associated with both working through the site and paying for their services. To give you a better idea of what these are, here are 20 things you probably didn't know about Fiverr.

1. They're headquartered in Tel Aviv

The main headquarters for Fiverr is in Tel Aviv, Israel. The popular freelancing site was founded in 2010 and has only been in operation for less than a decade. The official owner of the company is Fiverr International Limited and they operate from the website fiverr.com.

2. Fiverr provides work for millions

Here's an impressive fact about Fiverr. They have only been around for eight years but they offer employment for millions of freelance workers. By 2012 the number of registered freelancers who signed up with the site was more than three million. This suggests that if you're looking for someone to do a job for you, Fiverr might be a good place to start.

3. Fiverr is a good place to find an actor or an actress

Fiverr has gotten a kind of bad rap from some of the money making scams that have been exposed. People appearing on videos advertising new and innovative money-making schemes on the internet have been proven to be actors posing as inventors or high ranking, rich executives. Some of them also agree to pose as program participants who have gotten rich using the scam systems that they're trying to sell. As much as Fiverr is a great place to find an actor or actress to advertise a product or service, it's also a place where people hire these freelancers to help perpetuate their fraudulent internet scams. Even if you're only acting to receive five or ten bucks for the gig, a lie is still a lie.

4. Fiverr grew by 600 percent

Fiverr is a company that experienced tremendous growth early in its history. In fact, it's still a young company. What is perhaps the most impressive is that they first launched the service in 2010. Within two years they were hosting more than 1.3 million gigs through their site. The volume of transactions that are conducted on the site has grown by 600% between 2012 and now. That's just six years and it seems that the site is becoming even more popular. In fact, it was ranked among the most popular United States sites in its classification and additionally, among the top 200 within the entire world since 2013.

5. Fiverr had an interesting beginning

The two founders of Fiverr are Micha Kaufman and Shai Wininger. It was Wininger who developed the original concept for a marketplace that would offer a dual-sided platform for buying and selling digital services. It was really brilliant when you think about it. Fiverr is paid for the workers who register to offer their services on the site and they receive fees for allowing them to advertise on the site. They also make profits from customers who use the services through their registration. It's a win-win situation for everybody involved and especially for Fiverr. Incidentally, they refer to each service provided as a "gig."

6. Fiverr had to secure startup capital to begin

Launching such a massive website and the associated services that Fiverr provides was not cheap. It wasn't something that could have been done on a shoestring budget. After their launch in February of 2010, the founders knew that the venture would require some serious finding. They appealed to private funders and angel investors. Gur Gamzu along with several other angel investors from the US gave them $1 million in seed money. They went on to secure an additional $15 million in May of 2012 to help promote the necessary expansion. More funding from other investors brought the total amount of funding from the company to a sum of $20 million in USD.

7. Fiverr released two popular apps

In keeping up with the times, Fiverr developed an iOS app. It was released in December of 2013 and made available in the Apple App Store. They followed up with an Android app in March of 2014. This s available in the Google Play Store.

8. Fiverr went for another round of funding in 2014

Fiverr is a massive online business that not only supports freelance workers in their endeavors, they also manage a massive directory of registered users. Running a business like this that has a continual need for further expansion is costly. They announced in August of 2014 another round in a Series C round of funding that raised another $30 million. Their old investor from the early days, Bessemer Venture Partners and Accel, which was formerly Accel Partners led the pack of other investors who delivered the funding, bringing Fiverr's total funding amount to $50 million.

9. Amazon.com sued Fiverr

Amazon.com filed a legal action against Fiverr in October of 2015. There were claims made against more than 1,100 Fiverr sellers for posting fake reviews on the United States version of the website. Amazon makes every attempt to keep their reviews factual and true and these were actions that violated their terms of use and making these kinds of fake claims are actually fraudulent. Fiverr didn't deny any of the allegations that Amazon made so we're assuming that they were true.

10. Fiverr went on for Series D funding

Just a little more than a year after receiving a funding boost of $30 million, Fiverr was on the fundraising trail once again. They raised an additional $60 million in Series D funding and this time the lead investor was Square Peg Capital. This brought the company's total funding to $110 million as of November of 2015.

11. Fiverr made a significant change in 2015

Around the same time that Fiverr was granted an additional $60 million in investment funding, they made a decision that was in the interests of the freelancers who worked from their site. Previously freelancers from the United States who offered to do gigs were held at a price of $5 per gig. They did not have the autonomy to charge higher prices for their productized services. In 2015, Fiverr lifted this cap and allowed them to start charging higher rates for their services.

12. Fiverr has made a few acquisitions

It's not unusual for a large company to acquire smaller companies that will strengthen their portfolio. For the first time in its history, Fiverr made the acquisition of VeedMe. VeedMe was common sense and practical move because it was a video creation marketplace that would feed in nicely with some of the services that were being offered by Fiverr freelancers. It's also a service that was and still is in high demand. The deal was sealed in 2017. They went on to purchase one more company that is called AND CO in January of 2018. AND CO is a software maker specifically for freelancers.

13. Young adults dominate the Fiverr Marketplace

The statistics on user demographics for Fiverr show some interesting results. Surprisingly, only two percent of the sellers are over the age of fifty-five. Most of the sellers are young adults. They saw a spike in usage in 2015 with a 375 percent increase of sellers aged 55-64, but the numbers pale in comparison to those in their twenties through their forties with younger adults being the largest percentage of users.

14. There was a public outcry against Fiverr in 2014

Fiverr was the object of criticism when they made an ad that promoted very cheap graphics services. When they insinuated that people were paying too much for design on a Facebook ad, it was a bit too much. They had held their freelancers to a low cost of just $5 for providing graphics services and were making money off them, while the freelancers brought in very little for their services. After the public gave it to them, they lifted the base price of five dollars for the service and started allowing the designers on the site to charge the fees that they felt were the most appropriate.

15. They were blasted for promoting unhealthy habits

Fiverr received even harsher criticism in 2017. They became villainous when they portrayed excessive work behaviors and unhealthy lifestyles as ideals that people should want to live up too. They've been criticized for many of the approaches they've taken in advertising, but this one took the cake.

16. The Better Business Bureau is not a fan of Fiverr

The Better Business Bureau in New York does a great job of rating businesses with a one to five-star rating scale and letting the public know if they are a reputable and trusted resource. The rating that they gave Fiverr couldn't have been lower. They gave Fiverr an "F" rating which is a huge red flag that tells consumers it's probably a business that you should avoid dealing with. The one-star rating that they received is the lowest you can get. They also show a 93% rate of negative reviews from consumers on the BBB website.

17. YouTube fans were angry with Fiverr

Just recently in 2018, Fiverr was again the focus of controversy and negative backlash but this time it was coming from YouTube fans. They were angry because Fiverr allowed a freelancer named Pete Accetturo to produce a satirical video that went viral on YouTube and he was asking the viewers to provide their credit card information. Need we say more about this stunt?

18. Fiverr has been called the platform from hell

There is no denying the fact that there are a lot of freelancers from Fiverr who are doing remarkably well and making lots of money. Having said this, the environment is one that has been compared to "the platform from hell." The competition is insane and some of the demands that are made of freelancers on the site are totally ridiculous. It's almost like begging someone to let you work for hours on their projects for a few bucks and it just doesn't make a lot of sense.

19. Successful freelancers have paid some rough dues

We're not talking about the fees to register with Fiverr, we're referring to the long and countless hours that you have to put in sitting in front of a computer screen to make any money. First of all, you're up against some stiff competition and the ones who have achieved success on the site have either had something easy to do for five bucks a gig at the beginning or its been novel and nobody else was doing it...yet. Some of the orders that come through the site, that pay are very strange indeed. It takes more time to work on content that you're not familiar with. You must also be willing to do things that are a little out of the ordinary in some cases if you really want to make money from the gig.

20. You can find information about the sellers before you deal with them

Fiverr is good at protecting their customers by giving them access to information about their sellers. As a customer, you're going to be able to find out about their feedback score and their ratings as a seller on the site. You can also contact them if you have any questions prior to making a purchase. You have the option of dealing directly with the sellers. Here's an extra bonus to make you feel better about dealing with Fiverr. If the sellers are not following the terms of service that are laid out by the company, or if they're engaging in unethical practices, you can report them and Fiverr will follow up with your complaints. Even though the Better Business Bureau gave them a big F on their business report card, they do offer some really cool services for customers.

Garrett Parker

Written by Garrett Parker

Garrett by trade is a personal finance freelance writer and journalist. With over 10 years experience he's covered businesses, CEOs, and investments. However he does like to take on other topics involving some of his personal interests like automobiles, future technologies, and anything else that could change the world.

Read more posts by Garrett Parker

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