How to hire freelance Salesforce Admins, Developers, and Consultants.

When it comes to Salesforce, hiring freelance admins, developers, and consultants can be an overwhelming task if you’re not exactly a Salesforce guru. You not only have to know what to look for in a candidate but also where to look.

In this article, I will go over the benefits and downsides of hiring a freelancer. I will also list several crowdsourcing and referral websites as places to start for you to find the best possible candidate. Where to search for any certifications and how to tell if they are qualified for the job. Also, I will note the kind of questions you will need to ask, and the answers you are looking for to make your freelancer an offer.  

Here we go!

What are some upsides to hiring a Salesforce freelancer?

Before we jump into the details of how to hire a Salesforce freelancer, it’s important to think about why you’re doing it. Probably the most obvious answer to that question is cost.

There is a pretty thin chance you will find a cheaper Salesforce admin, developer, or consultant than a freelancer. They usually don’t have much overhead, so they have the ability to charge low rates for Salesforce work. This could be great news for a small business on a budget or any size business for that matter.

Even if you’re a larger business with a well of funds for operations it’s still smart to use a freelancer if the Salesforce work is only part-time.

Another upside is that your building a relationship with your freelancer consultant. In the scenario that your need for Salesforce work expands into a full-time requirement, you might be able to offer your freelancer a more permanent position. This way you don’t need to go through the process of hiring someone and training them on the ins and outs of your company.

Small-scale work can also be a benefit to hiring a freelancer. If you have a project that only requires part-time help or is a temporary job, signing on a professional services firm, or even hiring a full-time Salesforce expert just isn’t going to be efficient. A freelancer is ideal in this case because you’re only paying them for the amount of work that’s available.  

What are some drawbacks from hiring a freelancer?

So a freelancer sounds like the right choice for you. Surely hiring and working with freelancers has some drawbacks or we would all be doing it! Let’s take a look at some things that you may want to consider.

When selecting a freelancer you have to be careful with certain profiles offering low prices or undercutting competitors just to get work. Low rates such as $10 per hour don’t always mean the work is going to be bad. However, you might want to do a little more digging. You can easily get excited about finding low rates for Salesforce work but you need to be careful and make sure they have the right qualifications.

If you’re searching through one of these sites and come across a freelancer Salesforce developer offering up their services for $10 per hour, and they have issues spelling Salesforce correctly with no ratings or reviews, I might keep scrolling. Here’s what I mean:

They also have no feedback or ratings which suggests no one or not many people have worked with them. If I am looking at this as a business owner in the market to hire a Salesforce developer, this would raise a red flag for me and I would just keep scrolling….and so should you!

Another downside is that you are most likely not their only client, so not all of their focus is going to be just on the project you hire them for. This can also delay response time when trying to communicate with your freelancer. This can lead to having time-sensitive projects that your freelancer doesn’t get done on time. If they have too many clients, time management could raise potential issues for you.

Most sites that offer Salesforce freelance work do not necessarily require any kind of Salesforce certification. This can be particularly tricky when looking for someone to hire for your Salesforce work, and can really be a set back if you’re not sure. Later I will show you where you can search for their credentials.

There may seem to be more drawbacks to hiring a freelancer for your Salesforce project than upside. However, if you search in the right places and ask the right questions, I have no doubt you’ll find the right candidate for your project.

Where to look for a Freelance Salesforce Professional

We took a look at several sites that offer the ability to search and find a freelancer for your Salesforce project. Here are the ones we think are most notable and gives you the best options. Almost all are free to use, and some have extra features you can pay for to give you more options.

Let’s take a look.

Crowdsourcing Websites.

• Freelancer.com is one of, if not the largest crowdsourcing marketplaces. The site itself is very clean aesthetically, and really user-friendly. Right from the start the home page offers to either post a job, or look for a job.You can post projects offering both details and expected cost rage for your project. Once posted, you allow different freelancers to come to you to offer up their services and choose from there.
  
  Whatever your criteria might be you have the power to select the perfect candidate for your project. You can both search for freelancers and freelancers can search for jobs. It’s a great site for both sides. It is free to sign up for an account, whether you’re searching for a project or looking for a freelancer. However, once a job is completed there are small fees associated with freelancer.com.
• Guru.com is a similar site that offers pretty much the same kind of services. However, this particular site leans heavier on the “looking for a freelancer” side. You can post jobs but from what I see more businesses are searching for freelancers than jobs are being posted.  Its free to sign up and post or search for jobs on Guru, but there are a few cost if you use the service.
  
  Once a project is completed you pay the “Guru” through the site.  For businesses, there is a 2.5% handling fee when paying out an invoice through Guru, and Guru’s pay around 5% to 9% out of their earnings. There is also a paid membership if freelancers choose they can have “privileged access” to jobs and employers.
• Upwork.com Is another widely used site for businesses looking for freelancers to work on short-term or part-time projects. You can find a number of Salesforce experts based on your criteria and job specifics. You can invite your favorite freelancers to bid on your jobs, you can browse profiles, review proposals, and even schedule chats with prospected freelancers.
• Profinder is a service offered by LinkedIn where you can find freelancers through social media. However, there is a little more guesswork involved as “Salesforce” isn’t a keyword for its search engine. So, nothing really comes up, but if you search hard enough you can come across several profiles that have different Salesforce qualifications listed. This wouldn’t be my first options as it’s not as user-friendly as the first few that I’ve mentioned but if you have the time to do some digging, I’d say go for it.
• Fiverr is another great place to find freelancers for you Salesforce projects starting at around $25 per project. Right from the homepage you can type in the specific service you’re looking for and pages off freelancers will show up offering up their services.
• OnSite is a great marketplace for a freelancer. What’s nice about finding a freelancer from this site is that it is an invite-only site where the freelancer has to provide some work examples to be considered to their platform. This can eliminate much of the guesswork involved. Onsite only matches you with qualified candidates. Here is their FAQs page to give you a better understanding of how it works.
  
• Skip the Drive  Has a database of searchable remote freelancers that can work with your specific needs for most Salesforce projects.
  
• CloudPeeps Is an online community that helps businesses find local or remote freelancers to help with different projects. If it’s in your budget you can pay a fee with CloudPeeps to have them match you with the best freelancer for your project. You can also pay to have your project promoted to have more freelancer see your job posting.
  
• Stack Overflow is one of the most popular freelancer search sites for employers looking specifically for tech-related jobs. From what I can see some are locations based but you can also find freelancers that work remotely.

Word of mouth and referrals

Companies or partners you have might have a list of Salesforce freelancers they are currently working with or have worked with in the past. You can really bypass a lot of the process of selection just by knowing someone that another professional has already worked with. A benefit to this is that you can see their work. So when looking for a Salesforce freelancer, don’t be afraid to ask around. If they have built up a good pipeline you’ll know your probably getting a high-quality freelancer for your project.

• Folyo is a great referral site where you can send them an email with your project, timeline, and budget. Once they get it they will put together a list of qualified candidates for you to choose from. This could help save you some time by narrowing down your candidates to people who are pre-qualified.
• Freelanced is a social media site specifically for freelancers. Here Clients can give “Kudos” points to rate the freelancer. You can also ask around to get referrals for your project.

How to pick the right candidate.

Once you have narrowed down your options to who you think is right for the job, one way to know you getting a qualified candidate is to check their credentials. You can do this by entering their information on the credentials verification page on the Salesforce site. Its a quick and easy tool you can use to make sure they have the right certifications that fit the type of work you’re asking them to do. Simply just by entering their full name or email address you can find this information.  

Resumes and the online professional bios on sites like freelancer.com can be a bit talked up. So how can you tell if someone is truly experienced in Salesforce? What kind of questions do you ask? And what kind of answers should you look for to know you’re getting the right person?

Searching for a freelancer with Salesforce expertise it can be difficult to differentiate the experts from the bad seeds. So not only knowing the kind of questions to ask but also knowing what the right answers are can be crucial when hiring a freelancer to work on your Salesforce projects.

I asked Jessica Howard, our hiring coordinator some questions about hiring a Salesforce experts. And what types of things she looks for and the questions to ask about Salesforce to be able to get the best possible candidate.

Once you’ve gone through all the steps and endless searching for the right candidate, dialog with your freelancer is important. Jessica says it’s really less about the questions themselves, rather their “performance on technical assignments and attitude”. She tends to ask more behavioral questions such as “can you tell me about a Salesforce development project that you worked on that was incredibly challenging and walk me through how you handled that challenge?  Or, what is your initial reaction to changes in sprints or changes in project scope?  How do you adjust to those changes?”.

Jessica also looks for the room for growth. Certain answers will give her an idea if the candidate has the ability to grow. And answers like “I can’t remember the last time I made a mistake” raises a red flag for Jessica and gives her the idea they might not have the ability to grow.   

Know the lingo! Ok, so your not exactly a Salesforce expert…. I mean that’s why you’re looking for a freelancer in the first place right? However, you do need to speak the language. As someone looking to hire a Salesforce expert how knowledgeable to you have to be about Salesforce? Jessica states that “it’s not only important to not only know the lingo but to be able to speak intelligently about the platform and its capabilities”. That might sound scary if you know very little about Salesforce. And even though she says there is a learning curve, she doesn’t think it’s not a giant one.

Her advice, get on Trailhead and take free training that Salesforce offers. Take notes about Salesforce topics that you might not understand and learn. Remember it’s your business so if you’re going to work with a platform like Salesforce you should get know it a little bit before hiring a freelancer.  

When searching for a Salesforce freelancer Jessica does look for certification, but that’s not a deal breaker on whether they get interviewed. She says that “there are plenty of great Salesforce developers that choose not to get certifications for varying reasons.” That certification might give you a competitive edge, but it’s not all you should look for in a qualified candidate.

So when looking for a freelancer for your Salesforce project, you can see you have a lot of places to look. You also need to know the kinds of questions to ask and know enough about Salesforce to know the type of answers you’re looking for from a candidate. We hope this article helps and gives you a little more insight on how to hire a freelance Salesforce professional. Good luck! And happy hunting.