Ideasicle X is a virtual idea-generation platform where a customer (an ad agency, say) recruits 4 creative people to form a team and come up with ideas together. All four members of this team may be living in different cities, but they are brought together on this platform to do nothing but come up with ideas. No meetings, no presentations, no politics, no hotels, no travel, just ideas from your computer, your tablet and/or your smartphone when those ideas hit you. And, if it’s a paid project, you’ll get paid after the project is over right from the platform when you link your profile to your bank account via Stripe (employees do not need to do this step since you’re already getting paid by your employer).

You don’t have to accept any jobs if you’re too busy or have any conflicts with the assignment. There are no quotas. Just an expectation of participation when you do accept a job.

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Filling Out Your Profile

When you first raise your hand for your first job you will be taken to a profile page where you can fill in your name, create a password, key in a short biography, and your LinkedIn profile link. There is also a place to create “Skill Tags,” to flag any specialties or expertise you may have that customers might be looking for. When the customer searches for freelancers it will crawl this information you input.

Note: if you were invited by your employer to job, your profile will only be visible to the employer, not to other customers.

Coaching tip for paid freelancers: be honest with your bio and your Skill Tags. Customers will quickly learn if you don’t really have auto experience on an auto creative assignment, and that will only hurt you when they consider you for future projects.

You can upload your W9 and fill in your bank account information towards the bottom of the page. We use a third party financial vendor for all financial transactions (Stripe), so you can feel confident that your personal and financial information is completely encrypted and safe.

Note: paid freelancers, you’ll notice you can’t save your profile until your W9 is uploaded and bank account connected.

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Start new ideas from anywhwere.

You can then post your own new ideas using your computer, a tablet, or smartphone, by clicking the “Start New Idea” button and then use the powerful idea tools to bring your ideas to life. When you post an idea your team will be auto-notified via email. They are invited to check out your idea, build upon it and riff new ideas. You can do the same with theirs. Just know that the “vibe” of Ideasicle X is that you and your team are all in this assignment together. The button doesn’t say “Post New Idea,” it says “Start New Idea” for that reason.

Powerful tools, but still simple.

Be sure to take advantage of the toolbar when posting ideas. You can embed images and videos as reference, you can change the fonts and sizes of type, and there’s a thesaurus you can use (great for naming projects). Whatever you need to get what’s in your head out for your team to take in.

No timesheets!

Keep in mind it’s not about timesheets at Ideasicle X, it’s about participation. So if you raised your hand, be sure to jump right in frequently. The website dynamically optimizes for both desktop and mobile devices so you can post whenever inspiration strikes. Just log into your account using any device at app.ideasiclex.com.

And remember, any new idea you start or build you post is likely to get built upon by others. That’s the whole point.

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Getting Paid (if it’s a paid job)

At customer’s discretion.

Once a job is complete the customer will be able to close the job and pay all the paid freelancers (sometimes they include their own employees who don’t require payment). 99 times out of 100 they will pay you what they proposed, assuming you’ve lived up to your end of the bargain. But know that a client does have the power to change the payment prior to paying you if they feel you didn’t show up enough or post enough ideas or builds. It’s rare, but it happens. They can also bonus freelancers who put in extra effort. Regardless, all payment amounts are at the discretion of the customer and all decisions they make are final.

You will receive an email notifying you that a customer has issued payment. We use Stripe as our financial backbone, so once payment is issued, Stripe takes a few days to actually move the money to your bank account. Be patient, as it can take as long as a week.

Important note:

If you are paid for projects on the Ideasicle X platform, then, for those projects, your professional relationship is with Ideasicle X, not the customers who recruit you and pay you. Meaning, you uploaded your W9 to your profile one time and that means Ideasicle X will handle your 1099s every year. That way, you don’t have to issue separate W9s to every customer who hires you.

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Tip 1: if you agree to participate, then participate

Seems silly to call this out, but just know that if you are assigned to a project and then do not participate, or your participation is light, it not only hurts the project (your customer needs all four team members), but it will mean risking your financial share of the job. All financial decisions will be made by your customer. All decisions are final. So participate with new ideas and your builds and riffs to your teammates’ ideas (just as valuable).

Tip 2: your value is not measured in time

Your value to the customer’s job is not measured in time spent, but by the quality and frequency of your posts, builds and riffs on your team’s ideas. Let creativity happen naturally. Take in the briefing materials (video and pdf) as soon as they’re posted, be inspired, and then when ideas hit you, post them. And when your team posts ideas get in there quickly and comment. But no timesheets.

tip 3: jump in early

Once you are assigned to a job, try to get into the assignment as early as possible. Every job has a deadline and we’ve found the more ideas earlier in the process—even bad ideas!—the more exponential the entire job ends up being. And the better the ideas ultimately are.

tip 4: Fear not! when in doubt, post it

When posting, you may have a thought that’s not quite an idea yet. Go ahead and post it. Your team might be inspired by that thought and run with it. We once had someone post that he had a dentist appointment and would get a late start on that project. Even THAT turned into an idea from the team members. So when in doubt, trust yourself and just post it. You were invited for a reason.

tip 5: leave egos at the door

Be sure to read other teammates’ ideas and comment, build upon, and otherwise polish those little gems. No one will be offended if you try to improve their idea. You are all on the same team. Egos at the door.

tip 6: if the money isn’t right, don’t do it

You will always know what the income will be for each project before you decide to accept it. The money varies depending on the project and customer budgets. So you don’t have to raise your hand for any projects you don’t want to. Consider it market forces at work.

tip 7: Remember the terms of service

By now you’ve accepted our terms of service. Be sure to read that document completely so you know your rights. As an example, each project will include confidential information. By accepting our terms of service, you are vowing not to share confidential information for any of your customers. Please remember that. Do not accept jobs that are in conflict with other work you’re doing, other agencies you’re working with, or in any other way that will put an Ideasicle X customer (or yourself) at risk. It’s not in your interest and it’s not in your customer’s interest. That’s just one important point found in the terms of USE.

CLICK TO READ THE TERMS OF USE.