whats the point of all these service teams ?????

[SSH]

There comes a point where the market has so many teams where it gets harder for freelancers to be unique and actually get commisions. When every other advert is just
[YOUR SHITTY TEAM HERE] Services | Low Quality Slave Labour for the Freelancers while we make money by doing nothing.

it floods the market. It makes small independent creators harder to see as it’s just a bunch of service teams with the same premade bot.

there’s nothing that differentiates the market.

About the bot thing, there was literally a bot called Cambridge that did all of the service team stuff. Like 20 teams used it.[DOUBLEPOST=1596865941][/DOUBLEPOST]

Okay, so what has been said is the case for SOME teams but not all. Take for example I run a development company. However, I pay my developers 100% of the price that they quote. To me, it is ALL about how the team is managed.

For example, all of the developers that I have hired, no one has brought to my attention that they hate working for me. In fact, they love it. A great example of this is one of my contractors Chriisto. He mentioned to an applicant how much he enjoys the company and personally said he loves working for Devoxy. With that being said I do agree that teams should not take any of the freelancer's money as that is money very hard-earned and in a tight market place where they are undercutting most of the time anyway to land a sale, especially on MC-Market where it is highly saturated.

Teams like the ones mentioned that provide all services (Service teams) do generally fail for one of two reasons. They treat their employees wrong and figure that they are a slave to make them money. Or they simply don't have the customer service experience or the management experience to stay open long enough to get the number of sales that they want. Keep in mind that a service team should really only be used as a landing and you need to expand off of it rather quickly to avoid losing clients if you own one. Unless the case you are, say, Senior Team and have the reputation to stay afloat without the need to branch off.

It should also be known that it is usually smaller developers that work for teams to build their portfolio and land new clients that may contact them directly in the future in order to get 100% of the commissions etc. Those are the few benefits I see a developer having to work for a service team.

I would also like to note that I have nothing against Service Teams. I use Midnight Services pretty frequently to get things done that don't usually involve development for my company frequently. Not all of them are bad, but there are bad business practices involved in them. Usually...[DOUBLEPOST=1596855240][/DOUBLEPOST]

I do have to add though that I hate when people add LLC to look more professional instead of actually registering. It hurts companies like mine attempting to show clients that they are actually registered instead of lying to give clients a false sense of security.

Registration isn't a selling point. It realistically does nothing. Also, I've heard a complaint about one of your system admins price gouging and charging to fix issues that they caused. If you'd like, you can DM me for some more info.

 

[/usr/bin/]

Also, I've heard a complaint about one of your system admins price gouging and charging to fix issues that they caused. If you'd like, you can DM me for some more info.

Oh this is getting spicy!!!

 

[Norska]

Service teams should just get banned, would fix so many issues.

 

[Ever]

I can see the advantage of one being that for a new developer or configurator (for example), it helps get their name out there and show that they are good at what they do. Other than that, I don't really see the point of them apart from getting projects for the Devs etc to work on.

 

[solo]

money by doing nothing you say?

well well well, i guess i've found a job!

prepare for: Sparkz Services!

 

[Landon]

Service teams should just get banned, would fix so many issues.

Restricting the market is never a good idea. Service teams create competition in the market, never a bad thing. Increased price-matching for consumers: freelancers want to offer the better deal.

I’ve always stuck to the philosophy of: “If service teams are stealing your clients, you’re doing it wrong. Advertise more, advertise better, reconsider your prices, and make sure your work is quality.”

Competition does nothing except benefit consumers by offering better prices for better quality.

 

[Dessi]

About the bot thing, there was literally a bot called Cambridge that did all of the service team stuff. Like 20 teams used it.[DOUBLEPOST=1596865941][/DOUBLEPOST]
Registration isn't a selling point. It realistically does nothing. Also, I've heard a complaint about one of your system admins price gouging and charging to fix issues that they caused. If you'd like, you can DM me for some more info.

I never mentioned registration is a selling point and all it does is protect myself and my employees. As far as price gouging is concerned our developers and sysadmins quote their own price and are not regulated on how to price things just like an open market. There is a refund request ongoing with the client in mention and if it is determined that he didn't get what he paid for then he will receive a full or partial refund depending on what is found. As it should be which is why dealing through a company or a service team is better then dealing through an individual freelancer because if this would had been taken outside of the company the client may never have had a chance to get a refund.

 

[iMachineNine9]

It feels like you would only really want to join or make a service team if you want to register as a legitimate company and partner with the Mojang Marketplace. So yeah, these service teams don't make any sense. Why even join one if you are losing money and not getting on the Marketplace? That being said I think service teams are good for MC-Market, They create opportunities and options.

 

[SSH]

I never mentioned registration is a selling point and all it does is protect myself and my employees. As far as price gouging is concerned our developers and sysadmins quote their own price and are not regulated on how to price things just like an open market. There is a refund request ongoing with the client in mention and if it is determined that he didn't get what he paid for then he will receive a full or partial refund depending on what is found. As it should be which is why dealing through a company or a service team is better then dealing through an individual freelancer because if this would had been taken outside of the company the client may never have had a chance to get a refund.

Your sysadmin tried to charge my client $12 for a 30-second fix which I did for free. I had to run 1 line in the SSH prompt to fix it.

 

[hgbf]

It feels like you would only really want to join or make a service team if you want to register as a legitimate company and partner with the Mojang Marketplace. So yeah, these service teams don't make any sense. Why even join one if you are losing money and not getting on the Marketplace? That being said I think service teams are good for MC-Market, They create opportunities and options.

That's not a service team

 

[iMachineNine9]

That's not a service team

Thanks for the tip. We never speak of this moment lol

 

[SSH]

Restricting the market is never a good idea. Service teams create competition in the market, never a bad thing. Increased price-matching for consumers: freelancers want to offer the better deal.

I’ve always stuck to the philosophy of: “If service teams are stealing your clients, you’re doing it wrong. Advertise more, advertise better, reconsider your prices, and make sure your work is quality.”

Competition does nothing except benefit consumers by offering better prices for better quality.

Actually, competition in a market like this where it's people creating products by hand and offering services is and can be really bad for people who provide quality services/products. When you're a big company making hundreds of thousands of products a year, or reselling those products, that isn't an issue, but when the price changes very directly affect the person producing the product, it can become an issue VERY fast. I can only speak about the sysadmin market, but we have a lot of system admins doing shitty work, and charging dirt-cheap prices for it. That forces down our prices where we were the least profitable industry in the first place, AND gives sysadmins, in general, a bad name. Lots of us provide quality work and all of the sysadmins I talk to are getting people going to them for a quote, going with someone cheaper, and coming back because the setup was done wrong or something happened.

 

[Cal]

I've explained why this argument is flawed a few times now, so let me quote myself.

They aren't "stealing business" from freelancers, they are being out-competed.
Customers aren't irrational, they do it because one thing is offering a better product. One that has a built in middleman to protect them from scams, better support systems, a strong reputation, and incentives that better align with their own.

Service Teams aren't robbing the freelancer, the freelancer is paying for their service by the commission price fee.
The teams offer you advertising, management, charge-back protection, sales services and a streamlined commission process, all at no direct cost to you. You get this all without making a payment because they take a cut.

The customer forms a relationship with the team, not the freelancer. The customer pays the team, not you. The freelancer is there to do the work for the team. If you want to build your own relationships, pay for your own advertising, manage your own sales, and assume the risks the teams do. The teams put the capital in to get the customers, they get the benefit, I don't think that's unfair, if you do, don't join.

Now, look at it from an owners perspective. When you run a service team, you get this huge cash balance. Most of it isn't profit, but if your smart, you can use that cash in the same way a bank would, and invest it and get a return before it needs to be paid out to freelancers.
With publicly available service team bots like Cambridge, you can setup a team in a few hours, and start earning a small profit with very little work. It's a great opportunity for many to maybe make a little (or a lot) of spending money. All without needing that much capital to get started.

 

[Sarande]

Most of us artists don’t want to sign up to service teams anyway. It’s so frustrating when you get a message and you think someone is interested in commissioning you and it’s just “hi we’re a service team and we’re totally non profit!! please join”. From an artist’s point of view there’s not really much of a point if they’re going through MCM anyway, because chances are the person looking for the commission will see your individual thread anyway. Plus, dealing with a middleman(or woman) has it’s risks too. I don’t know why anyone still operates service teams honestly![DOUBLEPOST=1597028501][/DOUBLEPOST]

Actually, competition in a market like this where it's people creating products by hand and offering services is and can be really bad for people who provide quality services/products. When you're a big company making hundreds of thousands of products a year, or reselling those products, that isn't an issue, but when the price changes very directly affect the person producing the product, it can become an issue VERY fast. I can only speak about the sysadmin market, but we have a lot of system admins doing shitty work, and charging dirt-cheap prices for it. That forces down our prices where we were the least profitable industry in the first place, AND gives sysadmins, in general, a bad name. Lots of us provide quality work and all of the sysadmins I talk to are getting people going to them for a quote, going with someone cheaper, and coming back because the setup was done wrong or something happened.

Also I want to second this - I see a lot of teams offering things for waaay cheaper and then I have to lower my prices. A logo usually takes 8-9 hours to complete throughout the phase and I used to charge $45, which meant I would get about $5 an hour - nowhere near minimum wage ($18) in my country. However, because of teams and other freelancers lowering their prices a lot, I’ve been forced to lower mine to $30. That’s $3 ish per hour. At the start of the year, my wages as an artist were enough to live off. I was getting a ton of commissions. Now I can’t even afford to buy food with the money I earn. This is a big problem and I get really frustrated when service teams or other freelancers are undervaluing their talents.

 

[Polarbears]

Difference in quality, pricing, specialty and overall reputation. But I could agree, there is just too many on site.

 

[Ty]

probably as pointless as this thread tbh.