When you're not a techie..

Two thoughts here:

1. Go find a friend or associate that speaks the language of the "geeks" and ask for some help with describing what you want to accomplish.

2. (I have done this myself) When you place your ad or job description, make it very clear that you want to work with someone that can "translate" the end result of what you want to accomplish into the correct work or development description. There are some people who are very good at this.

One of the things I always do is read the feedback on similar jobs. Often the person who contracted the job (the buyer) will leave feedback about the fact that the developer was excellent to work with and that they were able to work with a non-technical job order.

By the way, I almost always hire those with lots of positive feedback even though they are not usually the cheapest bid.

Good luck to you,

Steve

Been there done that and got the tshirt. Couldnt explain for the life of me what it was that i needed doing, so i just found a site witha similar functionality and said "like this, but a bit different, make these changes etc"

Works like a charm!

You really don't have to describe the technical qualifications required.

It's moreso a matter of giving a really, really good description of how the project should look and work.

So imagine you're a new user to the desired website. What will the new user do first? What will they do second? What information will they need to fill out? Map out the entire process step-by-step as a part of the job description.

For example, "First I want the user to do this... then they should be able to do that when they click on this button... they should also be able to add this, this and that."

When people bid on your project they'll be able to tell you if they've worked on similar projects and then you can whittle down your choices from there. Just make sure you really look at their feedback. Many coders also moonlight as graphic designers or researchers or writers, so they'll have a bunch of feedback for completely unrelated projects.

Other than that, I believe Elance has a program where they can handle the hiring process, though you might need to have a specific budget.

This is when you will probably will have to pay more for someone based in western world who has English as a first language. It may also be worth asking for video walk through of the key parts of the work done, then you can see for next time what was involved.

Also remember that some jobs require specialist software, and will cost more than just simple edit a bit of code on wordpress.

It depends on what you want, but a clear description shouuld be fine for people here to define it for you.

YOu may also find that there are existing scripts and plugins that might do what you want.

I still review other jobs for something I want done just to make sure I don't miss anything.
One thing I have learned is ask for more even if you don't need it.
It's sort of like IM, you underpromise and overdeliver but this time you over do the work requirements and underdeliver what the final out come in.

Always put that the job is not closed and last payment not sent till I'm 100 percent happy with it and I may have missed something so I will need your help with the project.

Then I put a disclaimer, your bid is the final price if you are picked.

I have been shafted on some that have hundreds of feedback and been estactic with some with no feedback. One thing I try to do is not hire an agency, they have agency mills where a contractor will run as many jobs as they can and they just give your work to whoever is free, I like to actually know who is doing the work for me.

I like it when someone calls me a geek, lots better than jock in school. I should of been a geek sooner and maybe I would of been rich by now.

I will find a friend that understand the jargon and I will ask him to explain to the person that I am outsourcing to. At the end of the day, I think the most important thing is to know what you want for your website.