How to Win Any Job on eLance, oDesk or Guru.com
As an employer with over 30 staff at Interspire, most of the time when I need something done I can call on a staff member in the office and they will take care of it for me. However, sometimes I need the skills of an experienced freelancer for one-off jobs, such as writing a user guide or putting together a product overview video in Flash. In these situations I turn to freelancers on eLance, oDesk or Guru.com.
After posting a job ad, the responses start to come in within a few hours. 95% of the time the candidates have no idea how to reply to the job ad and will either send over:
- The same old copy-paste reply which they use for every job ad
- A vague reply in which they don’t sell themselves to me
Having been on both sides of the fence – as an employer now, and as a freelancer about 5 years ago – I’ve come to learn what makes a great response to a job ad on a freelance site such as those listed above, and I thought I’d give you a few pointers in this article to help you win any and all freelance jobs you apply for.
1. What’s in it for me, the employer?
If you’re replying to my job ad for a freelancer, you need to sell me on your skills and the benefits of hiring you. The best way to do this is with a short list of bullet points, such as:
- Expert technical writer whose written for Microsoft and eBay
- Fully dedicated to your project with a keen eye for detail
- 100% money back guarantee if not satisfied for any reason
- Fast turn around time
In the example above let’s assume I’m a freelancer trying to win a freelance job relating to technical writing. First up I “name dropped” Microsoft and eBay. As an employer this would get me thinking “wow, this guy’s written for Microsoft and eBay. He must be good, I’ll keep reading.”
Next, you’re telling me that you’re a harder worker and you’re SO confident in your work that you’ll give me my money back if I’m not happy. That eliminates all risk for me from the get go.
Finally, you’ve guaranteed me a fast turn around time, which I like because I have 100 other things to worry about and don’t have time to micro manage you.
2. Does your subject line get my attention?
When I post a job for a freelancer, 99 times out of 100 the subject line will be something like “Re: Technical writer position”. If I have 85 emails in my inbox then that wont get my attention.
Be creative with in the subject line of your email and do whatever it takes to get the attention of the person who posted the job. Here are some good examples that have worked on me:
- “You will NOT find a better technical writer than me. Guaranteed.”
- “Delete your post on eLance – read my resume to find out why”
- “I’ve worked with 2 of your closest competitors”
- “I am an expert at using your product and can write your user guide with my eyes closed.”
Compare the subject lines above to this:
Re: Technical writer position
… and you can see what a huge difference just the subject line can make.
3. Are you a real person?
You’d be surprised how many candidates don’t include contact details in their reply to a freelance position. Just because you work from home it doesn’t mean your only communication methods should be email and IM.
Employers want to know you’re a “real” person, so to get the ball rolling and have a better chance of winning the job, try ending your email with something like this:
“I’m located in Los Angeles, California, and am able to begin working on your job right away. Please feel free to call me on 555 0199 to discuss the project any time. I look forward to hearing from you.”
Even if the person who posted the job is comfortable dealing with you via email, just showing you have an open line of communication can make a world of difference when it comes to winning a freelance job. You’d be surprised by how many offshore freelancers pose as being from North America.
I hope these 3 quick tips have given you a few ideas on what you can do to win more freelance jobs in the future. If you have any questions feel free to leave a comment below!
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Great advice.. I think this can be applied to any job you are applying for. Jobs you find on this Job board, Krop.com, AuthenticJobs.com.. anywhere. Show you are confident in your skills and act like you are the best at what you do. If you don’t have that attitude it will show up in your replies and inquiries into new leads.
With the phone contact comment, I wonder how you deal with overseas providers? For example, if I say to you “I am located in Madrid, Spain, feel free to call me on +34-xxx-xxx-xxx”, would that negatively prejudice your decision on who to hire?
I ask because I’m new to freelancing and do tend not to advertise my physical location. I believe this is prudent because a) some people assume it means I’m not a native English speaker (I am) and b) they’re afraid that any problems would lead to expensive phone calls in the middle of the night – hence I prefer IM / email contact methods as these cost the client nothing (and I’ve yet to let down the client in such a way that instant telephone communication is necessary, though I do make my number available to them).
I’d be interested to hear your thoughts on this.
Hi Michelle,
As a newbie writer, this is indeed very helpful tips. I just started in Odesk actually.. It took 2-3 weeks before I managed to get my first project.
Thanks..
Cheers,
Miles
Hello, good advice. Some time ago as i was hunting for jobs on these websites i added offers with much higher (but realistic) prices than others have already offered. In a personal message i wrote a small suggestion which solution i could imagine. 90% of all customers contacted me asking why the price is so high – then we discussed topics like performance, security, … and i asked them to discuss this with the other. In more than 75% of all offers i was chosen – for the full price. So i can say: be cheaper than the others or much more expensive
These are great tips. Often, I wonder what employers are looking for in a freelancer. Your pointers are certainly enlightening!
Good advice indeed, it makes me rethink my approach to contacting employers lately. However, where do you draw the line between confidence and arrogance? That’s always a shady area for me and I’m anxious about tooting my own horn too loudly. Which is more of a deterrant, to be arrogant or humble?
These are great tips for applying for any job really. This stems much further past freelancers and is good relevant business advice.
Nice set of tips Mitchell…. It can be really useful for me few years back.
This is great! Surely is a helpful blog post!
Seems like common sense to me. I pretty much follow that format (apart from the subject line thing as you’re usually required to bid on the site) but I certainly wouldn’t say that it guarantees getting the job.
The only way that you’ll ever win ANY job on those bidding sites is to work for minimum wage or less.
Great tips. I usually have little faith in the opposing end, so I put little effort into winning any if at all from those sites. It’s hard to bid on a complete website with shopping cart for $200!!!
” 100% money back guarantee if not satisfied for any reason”
That’s rather an advise for going bankrupt then for getting jobs.
I agree… I would never say something like that to the client. My time is worth something, even if they don’t like it. Of course I would try to correct the situation, but giving money back is never an option.
Yeah you should say, I guarantee my werk to be better than you could do.
I agree! Clients are stupid many times and i am in no mood in giving any money back. Ok, just for advertisement purpose, its ok to do such commitments…..
I think I have finally gotten to the point that I need to unsubscribe from this blog for a while, I read blog entries about “free time” and now, a blog entry that really needs editing. Is there a way that this blog entry could be edited and my comment deleted?
A few top-line things that would help this article:
-The use of “whose” in this example is a misuse of the word/grammatically incorrect. Would that really be the first bullet sent off to a potential client (mind you, the client needs a writer and such an error would be understandable but would a freelance writer send this to the client?)
-What about an example of the ad and a one sentence blurb about the company that appears above the bullets? Although Microsoft or ebay may impress some clients, how is the response targeted to the client? An example of the ad/sentence about the client’s company would help the blog reader see the connection
I’m always amazed by folks who expect blogs to be perfect. There are only so many hours in the day, especially for writers. Copy for a blog is hard to keep up with and produce. In other words, geeze, lady, ease up.
Mitchell, thank you so much for your article as the tips can be applied beyond the scope of elancing.
Kind regards, James
These are all great tips, but unfortunately I have to agree with Steve on this one: 75% of buyers on these bidding sites will choose the guy who will do it for 50$. They don’t care that you have the required expertise and client feedback to back it up.
Out of those 75%, I suspect a lot of them have to come back sooner or later and redo the whole thing. What was that line… “Buy cheap, buy twice!”
That’s why I don’t bother trying to impress someone who doesn’t want to be impressed. I think the number 1 tip would be to know how to pick the projects worth bidding on.
I would definitely agree about putting contact details in the mail because it always seems a bit suspicious when someone only allows you to contact them via email and if I want to contact someone straight away I would just contact someone who put there telephone number in the contact.
I would agree with the subject line but not maybe quite as cheesy as some of your examples.
Good points, but I agree with above. Those sites are ridiculous. If you want to do design for $12 an hour, sure that might work. But the tagline: “Will give you 100% on your money back” already applies to those sites, since you really are working for free there.
Mitchell, I’ve just re-purposed your examples to improve my pitch for my web design business.
Kind regards
James
I thought it’s very hard to win a job on these sites, might consider giving it a try in the future
Thanks,
Abdo
At the risk of bragging, I do tend to get many of the jobs I apply for (don’t use bidsites at the moment, but have in the past, and I never rule them out, as I’ve got at least two ongoing jobs from them). I always tailor the response specifically to the job, field, and even the person if I can. I always include my guarantee and I always play up (early) my big name clients.
I gather that I am a persusive writer, which makes me think that I should sell THAT type of writing: resumes and cover letters lol.
These are great tips — but I certainly hope you’re not advertising yourself as an “expert technical writer whose written for Microsoft and Ebay.” I don’t mean to be a grammar nazi, but it’s always funny when people make grammar mistakes while promoting their writing skills. (The proper contraction for “who has” is “who’s.”)
Don’t hire anyone who writes this: “Expert technical writer whose written for Microsoft and eBay”
Change “whose” to “who’s” (who has)
Haha!!! Awesome!!
These are good tips, but to follow them well would be time consuming and may have little chance of paying off. Even the best-prepared submissions will frequently go unanswered. With these job boards, you really don’t know who’s on the other end.
That’s not to say that it’s never worth the effort to apply to job-board postings, but a freelancer has to weigh the pros and cons. Would it be more worthwhile to focus job-seeking efforts elsewhere? I agree, however, with the subtext of this article–either do it right or don’t bother doing it at all.
Agreed! These tips look great. However, some of them are extremely hard to achieve. For example, how many people working for Microsoft or Google becomes a FREELANCER?
Wow! These are great tips! I will start employing some of these right away!
-Trinidad
First up I “name dropped” Microsoft and eBay. As an employer this would get me thinking “wow, this guy’s written for Microsoft and eBay. He must be good, I’ll keep reading.”
Actually, no, seeing “Expert technical writer whose written for Microsoft and eBay” would make me look for a writer who doesn’t confuse “whose” (possessive form of “who”) and “who’s” (contraction of “who has”). I don’t normally indulge in grammar nitpicking, but, when you’re trying to sell your writing skills, you need to be damn sure that the writing in your pitch is flawless.
And I have to agree with Steve as well. I’ve given up on those types of sites until I can come up with a convincing way of saying, “Yes, I know you said your budget is $5 for three weeks of full-time work, but you really want to pay me $100/hour for those three weeks instead.”
Whose =/= who has (who’s)
Thank you for noticing the difference between a possessive pronoun and a contraction. You do deserve a cookie! (He or she didn’t say how log those stints at Microsoft and eBay lasted.)
It seems like you always get automatic replies there. You just need to be personal and not act like a robot. Then you should be just fine on web sites like those.
I have about 6 years experience total with both Elance and Guru. I started out using Elance and then jumped over to Guru since it was a cheaper solution that seemed to be more flexible, albeit more cheap for certain employers.
While I will say some of these are good tips, I do agree with a few of the posters here on the fact that some of these employers receive upwards of 50 bids, sometimes 100 and I don’t know about you but I wouldn’t go through that many no matter what the “title” of the response might be. I look at portfolio and experience over a clever title any day! Although with both sites, there is no real “title” or anything to get their attention right off. Another problem I’ve seen is that many employers barely know what they want or have a scope that is almost impossible to understand.
The thing that I’ve found that works best is analyzing their scope and engaging them with questions related to what they need. Doing this will usually ensure a response unless they are overwhelmed. Another key is being on top of the projects as they get posted. If you’re the first to bid, you’re more likely to have the employer contact you. And last, as someone else said, you have to be a bit picky and make sure you place “quality bids”.
Well that’s my 2 cents.
As someone who hires off these sites often, my number 1 tip for bidders would be to prove to me you’ve read the requirements. Yes, this means editing the custom reply template you use when responding. When I see this:
“I have created 4 web sites that are very similar to what you’re asking for. Take look at http://www.abc.com/ and http://www.def.com/ for examples. The timeline you are asking for (4 weeks) is easily doable, and I should be able to do it in 2 weeks.”
Even if it’s followed by 4 paragraphs of “copy-paste” response, that’s almost an automatic hire for me. As long as the bid is in range and the example web sites look good, this person READ my requirements and spent 2 minutes addressing MY specific requirements. Almost no one bidding does that.
And what of those freelancers who might be solid workers, highly skilled, and very talented who have not had the opportunity to work for “big name clients” like Microsoft or eBay? Do they just get automatically ruled out because they can’t name drop in the first bullet point? Are they worthless hacks because they might get more personal reward out of working with local small businesses or regional non-profits? Why must they be judged on who they worked for, or the braggadocio in their subject lines, instead of the actual work they did? The only “tip” here that I agree with is the third — and that should be standard practice for anyone in business.
Frankly, I would never waste my time trolling for work on freelance boards. I agree with the others — I can’t compete with offshore freelancers willing to work for almost-free. Price trumps expertise and competence any day.
I was wondeirng–where do you look for work then?
Nan
Great article! Thank you for the tips!
I agree with almost all of this EXCEPT the 100% Money Back Guarantee. This gives the buyer an easy out and opportunity to get work for free. Not cool. Instead I always establish my payment terms (example: 10% down, 40% at midpoint, 50% upon completion). Haven’t had a client balk at that yet.
I also have to disagree with Steve and Adrian – there are a lot of buyers on these sites who will pay top dollar for experienced help. Maybe not in the writing department, but definitely on the programming/development side. The trick is weeding those out from the “I want the world on a silver platter for $50 (or less)” types. I’ve gotten a LOT of good business (and repeat business) from Elance, although their customer support is the absolute worst I’ve ever encountered.
I haven’t used Guru much, and I dislike oDesk taking pictures of my desktop at random intervals to ensure that I’m working (if I wanted someone micromanaging me like that, I wouldn’t have quit my first job out of college). Still, when you need a quick $500, it’s easier to bid on a few projects on Elance/Guru than hitting the pavement to find work.
The subject line thing is a weird one. Some of the suggestions made in the article actually look pretty spammy and they don’t necessarily show that the person was responding to your advert. I’d much rather receive an accurate subject line reflecting the advert they applied for than something that may be indeed be very clever and personalised but in fact makes you look like a spammer.
Plus some of the emails come from automated systems anyway and the sender can’t change the subject line. You’re being a bit harsh on them if that’s a criteria for rejection.
Couple of thoughts:
1) “Expert technical writer whose written for Microsoft and eBay”. The irony in this sentence is just too delicious to ignore.
2) What’s in it for you? The product. I grow really tired of employers who think that they deserve a cookie for hiring freelancers.
3) 100% money back guarantee? That is insane.
These tips are interesting and useful in proposal-writing in general, but in my experience the bid sites are not a game of carefully constructed proposals and punchy subject lines. It’s about the cheapest and the fastest. Quality usually isn’t a concern.
After spending a year searching on Guru.com, I’ve come to realize that (for me) it is extremely time-consuming and very low ROI.
I sifted through over 2,000 jobs on those boards in the past year, applied to less than 500, and won… 3. I only applied to those that looked even close to my rate and sounded like they knew what they were really asking for.
Some of those projects had over 100 bids on them. I can’t imagine someone needing help and wanting to sift (and really absorb) to the bottom of a 100-bidder list. Personally, I would pick the first one I saw that looked intelligent, legit, and on the lowest end of my price range.
Also, I typically had a lot of questions that needed to be answered before I could just throw a number out there. Again, most of the posters simply don’t have time to answer everyone’s questions and just want a low number. The three clients I worked with told me about their experiences. I was fortunate to find those very real people through all the junk.
It’s a numbers game. If you play it that way and don’t expect to make your usual rate on projects, go for it. But don’t kid yourself into thinking that most of the people posting projects are looking for anything but cheap and fast. And cheap. They also want it low-cost and not expensive. And cheap.
When I’ve found projects outside of Guru or Elance, I’ve won 90% of the projects I’ve bid on, and each client has brought me new business since. It’s not a cash cow, but it sure is more rewarding than churning through Guru posts. You also can’t beat the personal contact.
Damn, I wish I knew this earlier. My subject lines was exactly like the dull one you had under the attention-grabbing ones. Thanks for the tips.
A great set of tips. I especially like #2, I’ve not heard that one before but it makes loads of sense. The best advice is something you’ve never thought of, but once you do it seems like common sense.
Thanks a lot of the enlightening post!
Not that I hire freelancers specifically but as a hiring manager I would be more likely to ignore the responses with subject lines similar to those you’ve given as good examples. They all look like spam or desperation to me. Neither of those equate 100% with bad workmanship but I want to see people responding to my ad and not have to waste time sorting through spam or someone who didn’t even read what the ad was.
In fact, in my experience, the subject lines that differ from the “Re: blah blah” often are from those people who didn’t read the ad thoroughly and aren’t even remotely qualified to do the job.
I’m not saying you’re wrong. I think it’s just important for the freelancers out there to know there can be a big difference between how hiring managers perceive emails as you and I obviously have very different criteria on that one point.
Update on my previous response:
Differing from the “Re: blah blah” isn’t a bad idea outright. Now that I think about it I would be more likely to read a tailored subject line rather than a “Re” if it were more tame. Such as:
- Regarding your ad for position X
- I’m responding to your position X ad
Those to me show that the inquirer is taking the time to do more than just reply without much thought but they also don’t look like spam or overselling.
Also, I should have mentioned an otherwise nice post.
I agree with Thomas. When I read a subject line that says they can “do X with my eyes closed”, I am reminded of a client that fancied himself a Photoshop expert because he could use the lens flare filter.
This kind of cover letter might work for someone looking for work for getting a second look on a site like eLance, but in my experience it’s the willingness to work for little pay that matters most. However, you’re absolutely right in that you SHOULD tailor your cover letter or proposal to fit the job. As long as you can communicate clearly that you have the skills required and are an accessible, qualified candidate, you have a leg up on most people charging comparable rates.
Honestly, if you can get work outside of auction sites, you’ll be much better off. I can easily spend a third of my time on oDesk looking for work and competing for jobs, and I get “call-backs” most of the time.
P.S. – I would *never* offer a money-back guarantee to someone on a job bidding site, not because I doubt the quality of my work, but because it’s asking for a semi-anonymous client to take your work and run.
Sorry, Mitch, no way. Not gonna do it.
Thanks for the great tips, Mitch! These things are already covered at eLance University’s tutorials but it’s still different coming from an employer. Thanks!
This is great info that I will keep in mind. My frustration with these sites, well elance at least, is that so many of the jobs I apply for are never awarded. Feels like a waste to spend all that money and time and effort creating proposals.
I’ve done a little hiring on Elance and here are my thoughts.
- Like Mitch says in the article, sell the buyer. Tell them the value you get by choosing you. You have to justify your price a little bit, but as long as it’s not crazy I’ll consider it.
- Don’t let the the $50 bids dissuade you. Most of the ones I’ve seen have a pitch like “We provide our clients with the latest high quality software solutions according to top industry standards.” or worse. Address the facts of the job directly. Don’t bid until you understand what the buyer needs.
- You should get good at writing these proposals. The last project I posted attracted 20 bid, 4 of which I considered strong, and only one I choose. Given those numbers, if you’re really good at writing these intros, you’ll only get one in four projects.
- You’re probably wasting your time if there are already 20 bids on a project, unless your skills are much better than average.
Also, for what it’s worth…
- All the freelancers I’ve hired have been from North America and were not the cheapest bid. I would work with all of them again with if the need arose
- I’ve never got (in my opinion) a compelling bid from China, India, or Eastern Europe.
“Buy cheap, buy twice!” That’s it.
i will go ahead and mention am from Africa any way. It just maybe my selling point. Thanks for the article, great advice!
Mitchell, using your ideas (and without nit-picking
this is what I’ve written for myself. It’s not necessarily for the elance-like sites but helps me clarify my sales pitch for my web business:
Why you should hire me:
* E-Commerce lecturer and multi award-winning web dseigner with 10 years of experience
* Trusted by Steve Parish Publishing and Wanless Enviro (reasonably well-known names in Australia)
* Fully dedicated to your project with a keen eye for detail
* 100% money-back guarantee if you’re not satisfied for any reason
* Fast turn-around time (in the case of our “Website-in-a-Day” package, the website is online by 5pm)
Possible Subject Lines/Attention Grabbers:
* “Isn’t it time to blow away your competition?”
* “You can have a professional website by 5pm”
* “You deserve to have a better website than your competition”
Call to action (this would be for the “Website-in-a-Day” package – not so much for our fully tailor-made packages):
“I service the greater Brisbane area and I can book you in this/next week. Please feel free to call me on at my office +61-7-3218-2796 to discuss the project any time. I look forward to hearing from you.”
Incidentally, for those who think that finding work on elance, GAF, etc is a waste of time:
I have recently completed a quick job for a client on getafreelancer.com. I had a provider ranking of zero (I’d not done any GAF projects before) and I bid the highest amount within their budget. I was selected out of 30+ bids based on my folio of work.
Kind regards,
James
“100% money back guarantee if not satisfied for any reason” is a huuuge advantage, for sure. You’re saying “I will work for free, you don’t have to pay, if you don’t like that font I used for the ‘More’ button.” That’s definitely a sane answer that will keep you in green numbers for years.
“100% money-back guarantee!”? Yeah, that will work great for a designer who puts in a boatload of work on a project and then all the client has to say is “Er, no I don’t like it” and the designer is left doing hours of work for nothing. I would never give 100% money back guarantee on a service that is provided. That works for Snuggie or ShamWow, but not for any service provider.
I do appreciate this post even though I don’t agree with most of it.
Jiri, I don’t understand why so many people are scared of offering money-back guarantees. If you structure your terms and conditions appropriately and do good work, the benefit of offering a guarantee far out-weighs the occasional twit who will abuse it.
If it’s a nit-pick over the choice of a font, is the typical client really going to start the project from scratch with a new provider? (by the way, part of the guarantee has to be that they don’t get the product if they get their money back)
If it would become common practice for freelancers to offer money-back-guarantees then employers could hire a number of us, let us all do the work, and then just pay the one he likes best. And in the creative sector it’s already common enough to get ripped of by customers.
That has nothing to do with not being confident in your own work, it’s about securing your finances.
Good advice indeed, it makes me rethink my approach to contacting employers
As a frequent buyer on freelance sites, I have to say that I really disagree with this article. The providers I pick are the ones who read the project details and then post a question or comment about it that shows that they actually understand the project. In a world of canned responses giving the buyer some real attention makes all the difference, not just making a good sales pitch for yourself.
Also have to say that although the commentors before me are being nit-picky about the whose/who has thing they are right. As a buyer I am constantly on the look for providers with a good grasp of the english language, and messing up a sentence in which you are talking about your copywriting skill is a sure way to get me to ignore your bid. Just my 2 cents.
“100% money back guarantee if not satisfied for any reason”
This is quite tricky. About 1/4 to 1/3 of the clients on the job boards make their best not to pay at all. Most of the freelancers have experience with losing a year trying to get their money for a half-a-day project which result is being used by the client. And well… they are good in finding new and new reasons and task that they forgot to mention in project description.
Only desperate or totally rookie freelancers would write something like this.
You are a smart person. I was about to say the same. I am a full-time freelancer, making a living exclusively from this. However, the problem with freelance websites, be it eLance, Guru or Freelancer is that a good number of employers are not professionals.
They are not professionals because they do not have extensive experience in hiring/doing business. Offering a ‘moneyback’ is not something that sounds wise for me.
Is this article a joke?
Or is Mitch just not satisfied with the general level of talent, experience, expertise, professionalism and service found in the “lowest common bidometer” model of trolling these sites to get last-second work done (a web site by 5PM today!) for his shopping-cart software company?
Either way, you get what you put in, and what you pay for. It’s an immutable law of life and business:
Fast. Cheap. Good.
Pick Two.
Crowdsourcing models (which so often seem to be student/newbie/hobbyist/sucker/spammer-sourcing) don’t alter that truth.
That’s a lot of comments on this post in a short period of time… why is that?
Is it because people feel passionate about the subject of finding jobs in the current economical conjecture? What else?
I am interested in your feedback on that as I am reading a book on crowdsourcing right now… I have a feeling that this is all related somehow…
Does anyone here have any experience with oDeck.com? I look at the website and I don’t like what I see. They want you to install their software. To me it is an invitation to install a computer virus on your computer. Overall, too many rules on oDeck.com. And the fees are very low…
> Only desperate or totally rookie freelancers would write something like this.
I disagree. I’ve been making websites for 10 years.. at different times as a freelancer and as a business owner. I have hired employees, outsourced work, and dealt with a lot of clients.
Sales 101: Include a guarantee.
Word it how you like – try different wordings – but make sure it’s in there. In ten years I’ve had two clients d*ck me around.
I use Elance as one avenue for finding work, and I currently get 1 out of 4 jobs that I bid on. I don’t submit lowball bids, either. I’m a full-time freelance writer, and in my experience, trying to compete on price is counter-productive. You get stuck working for clients who aren’t paying well, and then have to turn down work from clients who are willing to pay well. I agree with the main premise of this blog post-personalizing your proposal works!
However, offering a money-back guarantee is like asking to be taken for a ride. Instead, I offer up to 2 revisions included in my price. This way, I’m guaranteeing my product without leaving myself open to being ripped off or being stuck doing endless revisions for clients who don’t know what they want to begin with.
I’ve been making websites for 10 years without a guarantee, and I would say 99% of my clients have always been satisfied with my work. I may have to put in extra time to satisfy them without charging, but it was worth it to keep the client happy. I require 50% deposit, and 50% upon completion, but also work with the customer on a payment plan if they need to — this works for most people. For those it doesn’t, it’s because they have impossibly low pricing requirements that I just cannot fulfill, and I turn them down.
Re the open line of communication – what if you’re deaf?
I don’t like to advertise that I’m deaf, because in my experience, people are (whether they admit it or not) uncomfortable. So I usually don’t include that little snippet of info and leave off a telephone contact number, which would require a relay service number and an explanation of how it works; including all that would be cumbersome and overwhelming in an email.
Thoughts?
@Jessica, is that really true? i never visited odeck.com before but if they attempting to install any kind of software, then you should be aware, not all job site i got involved has ever asking me to install that thing
nice tips. i’m sure these will be used on my next bids.. =)
As I am starting my business now, I am thankful for the helping hand, I can surely use this knowledge to find some project, yet so far nothing came up… As they say: I won’t give up
your sample subject lines are also a sure fire to get labeled spam in allot of default mail client spam filters.
You are right.
I have used eLance a couple of times and many responders pay only cursory attention.
Spend some time reading what your potential client wants and hit his target.
Wading thru useless information is no value to anyone and so you lose your opportunity quickly.
DEAR SIR,
I WANT TO WORK ON ELANCE. WHAT IS THE PROCEDURE
For the past four years, my consulting company has had a money-back guarantee in place and we’ve been told that it’s usually the difference between selecting us and selecting our competitors. Not once has a single client ever invoked the guarantee and requested their money back. Why? Because the guarantee is just one part of our marketing message. Along with our other marketing messages, new clients get a “warm fuzzy” from working with us that they can’t get from our competitors who are too afraid to offer the guarantee.
I would never use this technique for a bidding site, though. The clients out there do not match our other qualifications (size, location). But to those who would dismiss the tactic out-of-hand, I can tell you that it works great for us and we’ve been nearly 100% booked for the past 3 years.
Fantastic article! You provided tips that I will implement immediately!
I am a little bit wary about saying I will return money if the client is not satisfied. that is fine if the client is a scrupulous employer such as yourself but that is not always the case.
Mind you I may take your advice because if I have to write and spin one more article on real estate for a fiver, I may shoot myself.
Good Tips. I think this can be applied to any job you are applying for. Jobs you find on this Odesk.com, Elance.com. anywhere. Show you are confident in your skills and act like you are the best at what you do.
“Expert technical writer whose written for Microsoft and eBay.”
::blink:: Yeah, that’s some expert writer, all right. I would consider advising aspiring writers to learn grammar and spelling before they start worrying about their money-back guarantees.
Does anyone edit these things?
Thanks for the tips I was very much wondering how to give a entry to it and win over projects
Everyone needs to lay off. Grammatical errors happen sometimes, Mitchell was just trying to help us. I really can’t believe how unprofessional some of you are being about this. Great article Mitchell, and thanks for the tips.
” 100% money back guarantee if not satisfied for any reason” lol – ridiculous – of course he’s a buyer – and @james stop being so naive – it’s clear you don’t have any experience with those sites – they’re filled with people who want to pay nothing – just give them the chance and they’ll take it…no matter how good you think you are.
All the haters are out.
To be clear, Mitch said that he is a potential employer on elance, not a provider. As a potential employer he is telling you what he would look for in a response. Good suggestions all.
To be critical of his grammar is the height of stupidity. I recently posted a job in a newspaper, and one of the resumes that I got back actually pointed out a grammatical error in the ad. Her resume got discarded even faster than the other 95% of resumes that were discarded.
As an employer, I could not agree with Mitch more. If you do not stand out and make me understand that you are uniquely qualified for THIS job (not just any job) than you will not receive more than 30 seconds consideration of your resume.
I hire on odesk.com quite frequently. So as a potential employer, I tend to agree with the tips in this article.
My personal preference is for responses clearly tailored to my specific posting. Not too long and not too short. Some people tend to send 200 reference URLs in response to a single post, and some people send one line “I can do this.”. Both types of response get rejected.
The ideal response would only take a few minutes of the provider’s time to write, and would go something list this:
“Your posting sounds like it was written specificly for me! I have 5 years of .NET, HTML, CSS and have developed two sites that almost exactly match what your looking for (http://www.example.com and http://www.anotherexample.com). I know you said you will be providing the graphics, but I am quite proficient in Photoshop if you need a bit of tweaking. I should be able to do this in half the time as you requested, which should leave plenty of time for testing and minor edits.”
This makes me feel like the person actually read what I wrote and is not a copy-and-paste reply. As long as the price is reasonable, this person is hired.
The only disagreement from me is that you should not include your direct contact details in an initial response. Why? Because it can get you banned from oDesk! Always check the site’s rules before posting your phone number. If you’ve been invited to interview on oDesk, then definitely give your phone number or skype details.
Some buyers will go for the $50 offer, but I frequently pick up “repair/re-do” work from people who do that. It costs them hundreds more in the long run than just getting it done right the first time!
Awesome, super helpful advice man! I was just stumbling around looking for general tips on how to write proposals, and this definitely hit the nail on the head.
The advice about not sending the subject at “re:” and the old title really hit home. I do that all the time not even thinking! Thanks for the tips and help bud.
Really helpful advice. You have provided some really helpful tips that I will be implementing right away.
Hi Mitchell, thanks so much for these great tips, kind of made me realize that to understand how to approach an employer you need to remind yourself “well what makes a product more attractive to buy?” thanks again,
Thanks for your great tips, i think this tips can be apply to get any jobs from online.
I will implement it soon.
Hello sir,
You have mentioned that many applicants reply to job posting without knowing requirements completely. What you said was right!
But as a freelancer, I experienced many job posting is also similar way. Most of the job postings are not briefed properly and it looked like employer themselves do not have any idea about their job!
Most of the time, their description about job is limited to few sentences and that is not enough to understand the nature of job correctly and bid for the same. I noticed many job postings do not carry very necessary information like quantity of work or duration of work ( In case of hourly job). I experienced this couple of times and I posted messages in public room asking for more details about the project but never got reply for them. I feel, most of these employers also need to know how to post jobs and briefed clearly about the nature of job and quantity of work to make bidding very smooth and accurate. Unless they make correct at their side, job seekers will not consider proposal submission seriously hence continue posting stereo typed proposals. I am not justifying their act but try to convince you about the improper way of job postings. I doubt, those employers do really know how to use elance facilities becuase many of them never bohtered to reply to their private messages from applicants.
Any way, I was narrating other side of the story.
regards
Salman
Interesting article.
My only query would be with your point about subject headers. Writing a header that is eye-catching yet not too salesy and cheesey can be difficult. Obviously it needs to be one that stands out but I think if I received an email with “Best writer ever” as the title I would automatically consider it spam. I guess it depends on your target audience as to the tone.
What are your thoughts on this?
Thanks
Hi dear sir great post but most of companies doesn’t allow to open contact details in cover letter ?
Very helpful article.
I really appreciate your thoughts.
Can you provide little more stuffs regarding this topic.
I’ve been bidding on eLance for several months now with no wins and no feedback. Frustrating at best as I’m highly qualified and am paying to bid in multiple categories. Thank you so much for the tips – I have a much better idea now on how to customize my proposals.
Correct me if I am wrong:
1) The crux of bidding is to estimate price for the project effort efficiently(freelancers first job) before bidding. Add a bit more price which is your profit margin and then place a bid.
2) Provide prefect work samples to the employer need for that project. Save time and hit the target after all employer wants his job to be done. No bluffing.
3) Dont price too high to attract the employers, they know from years now that freelancers are capable of working good for less price. All freelancers provide quality work, evident from large no. of bids placed with high employer review rates for the freelancers.
Very helpful tips for all freelancer except one “100% money back guarantee if not satisfied for any reason”. I just lost $100 for this comment. But Still I am really thankful for wonderful tips.
yeah, very dicey to put that on subjective work. Another way to get people to work for free which is what people in power want to do so they can enrich themselves more instead of engaging in fair play.
Isn’t it against the rules to provide your contact info on eLance? I’m an eLance newbie & thought I read that in the rules. Thank you for your helpful tips.
Mitchell, Nice tips. I’m not too sure about the money back guarantee thou.. But I have certainly do tell them that final payment is upon “complete customer satisfaction”
I have been guilty of some cut and paste when responding to projects, and have now started using a personal flavour.
Indecently, I have found making myself very available for detailed chats works very well with winning projects.
I do agree that good writeup helps. But only for those who want quality work at good price. There are people who choose freelancer just because of there less prices. Any comments.
Very well said and very helpful! I’ll keep these simple and yet effective rules in mind, now that I am considering focusing about working from home. Thanks Mitchelle.
the problem with these sites is that unless you’ve posted a job as an employer, you never get to see what the employer sees of how you bid is initially presented to them. I’ve suggested this to all these sites, to show to freelancers what the employers sees as an example so we can better optimize the bids.
They don’t seem to responsive to this, maybe others could write into these sites and suggest it too.
These sites should also encourage employers to comment on bids in an optional but simple yes/no method to give feedback to feelancers…
For example:
was the bid clear?
was the bid price reasonable?
did you feel the freelancer was qualified for the job?
other comments…(optional)
These sites should at the least let freelancer know if the employer even opened and reviewed their bid.
The problem with Elance, Odesk and GURU is that the freelancer is blind to this type of info that helps them improve.
Please write into these sites to suggest these improvements, I have.
The problem with these sites and why they are a waste of time for professionals is that the prices are driven down too too low for serious pros to keep working on them. Eventually it will move to an almost free system. Look at ODesk’s stat’s on pricing for graphic design. In four years it dropped from an avg. of $15/hr. to $9.50/hr. That is a a 35% reduction.
Its a nightmare to find a job there as new service provider!
You invest a ton of time and some bucks to find out that those who have a good rating have a print money card while you are offer high quality services even dont get a job when selling yourself massive under market value.
In today’s very dynamic and ever changing labor market, there is more than just the conventional 9 to 5 job. There are a lot of options to work at home, doing exactly what you like, at your own price. Some of these solutions are: Jobsfor$10, Elance, Odesk and others. I have tried them all, and I chose jobsfor10$. The main advantages that Jobsfor10$ provides, by comparison to the other similar options, are:
– you can find very specific services (example: 70 High Backlinks from sites with PR6-8, 35,000 Traffic Visitors To Your Website, submit your site to 230 Plus Search Engines, 2 ebook cover design, upload, install, and configure any script for your website, write a best 300 word above article on any subject , etc)
- The prices are low ($5 – $10 – $20)
- The work and payment are 100% guaranteed
- There is no negotiation, as the prices are fixed
- The signup process is very lean and easy
- The website has a very smart services ranking service, that allows the customer to make the best informed choice
this is a tip for freelancer but I believe they will do well in a dayjob application.
Wow, what a great advice!
I am a newcomer in freelance world, have have a little desperate moment when my proposals get rejected (well, it’s not rejected actually, but the buyer choose another provider LOL)
Sure I’ll use your tricks on my future proposals.
odesk and other such sites are great for student programmers and hobbyists. As long as you are willing to work without making profits[just for fun or experience]. Otherwise, it does not work. $2 an hour would mean you are paying for the privilege of working if you are from India. Forget about trying to recover the cost of electricity, internet, phone, hardware.
However, there are a lot of student programmers and bored housewives out there. Sites like odesk and freelancer give them good experience for a fair price. Most clients don’t know what real development looks like anyway. So it is a fair exchange.
In my opinion, one should use these sites just for the experience and quit early. Get a real job. Don’t try to recover the cost of your education here.
I’m a professional freelance writer and am able to make a good profit through ODesk and the client leads I get on the site. The trick is knowing how to make a client happy, and then have them come back to you. Once you pass the “hourly-rate phase” with a client, you can often work out better terms for future projects.
I resent the fact that you say ODesk is for “bored housewives” and that it gives them good experience. My experience mostly comes from outside of ODesk, and I use ODesk as one of many tools to bring in clients and to make a profit and a living, not because I am “bored.”
Freelancing is very much a “real job.” What other job requires you (as an individual) to sell your services, manage customer relations, perform the services, keep your skills fresh, do the invoicing, accounting, expenses and taxes, and bring in enough work to make your business stay afloat?
Hi Mitchell,
I am a proposal writer in an Indian Company.
My boss wants me to write a killing proposals on elance,
And every time he expect that employer should reply with appreciation to my proposal.
Give me some suggestions.
Looking forward for your reply.
Regards,
Aksh
Really interesting post, especially for newbies, however I do not agree for some parts or didn’t get it right:
1. “Expert technical writer whose written for Microsoft and eBay” >>> What if freelancer didn’t write for such a famous companies ? Does the author means that freelancer should lie ? Same with “I’ve worked with 2 of your closest competitors” >>> What if not ? I understand that these are just examples and the rest depends on freelancers creativity, but still…
2. “100% money back guarantee if not satisfied for any reason” >>> I don’t think if this is a good idea! To give option for several revisions, yes, it is ok, but while working on one project probably freelancer will reject some others, it means to loose potential customer, it is ok if he/she will get payed for current job, but what if client requests money back ? Does not it mean to loose 2 times more ? – Seems to be risky advice!
Rest I think is very good advice for beginners, especially for creative ones!
Good Luck !
Very interesting discussion going on. Well apart from how providers respond to bids and how clients do their job postings, the other concern is about the price.
Recently I saw a writing job posted on elance for more than 10K $ and in the description the job posting said, “one article will get you 4$ and in total we are looking for 8 articles, so if you write all of them as per our requirement, you will get 32$ and we may consider you for future writing assignments”.
It was so funny, I did report about it to elance. I wrote them saying that I was under this impression that the job cost is for the current job someone is posting and not for what one may post in his/her lifetime. Why the cost is so misleading when a 32$ job is posted in the category of more than 10K $.
So many of the job postings seem to be fake.
Still it is a competitive world and if you are lucky and you can write good proposals with very competitive price, you will get the project for sure.
BTW I do not take writing jobs
nice post…I am working on freelance but I never had the amount of success that I always wanted…after reading this post my mind clear now..
Hi Mitchell,
Thanks for your advice. I am planning to start working as freelancer and it is really great and helpful tips for me.
Thanks a lot.
Pinak.
Two points:
1) It is against the Elance TOS to include your contact details in your proposal. Do most providers simply ignore this? MUST you ignore this to win work on these sites as a general rule?
2) “You will NOT find a better technical writer than me,”, should be “You will NOT find a better technical writer than I…” To quote Henry Higgins, “If you use proper English, you’re regarded as a freak,” but there you are.
I’m new to the ‘e-freelancing’ world and recently joined eLance, I’m focusing on the ‘Design & Multimedia’ category and some people are ridiculously vague with what they want, even going as far as pasting the title over and over just to fill the word count, whereas some are requesting the “best of the best of the best” for their company logo at a price band of ‘under $500′ and then state that they won’t pay e.g. more than $60 or something and it feels rather futile sometimes bidding when there are Asian ‘companies’ (which seems to defeat the object of freelance) with jobs of 50+.
I am fairly fresh out of uni and haven’t actually designed something for money outside of friends and family (mates rates = free, or, a free drink) and I’m tbh abit nervous of not being able to meet the requirements of a client, so atm I am trawling for jobs that post specific information about what they want/that I’m inspired by and creating it as a kind of practise. Then when I’ve finished, I send them a copy of it with my proposal (this is stuff like logo design etc) with text about if they like it then they can contact me with revisions they want to make etc. I’ve only done about 3, I am charging the minimum ($50), because right now ANY kind of money would be nice for stuff that is normally a ‘favour’.
In regards to this article, most of the advice seems like common sense, I did chuckle when I read the ‘email titles’ which are so spammy I found myself glossing over when reading them out of habit!
What makes me laugh is that about 95% of the jobs posted on eLance have HORRIBLE spelling and grammar mistakes (note. the foreign posters have better English than the ‘natives’ so my criticism isn’t there), you’d think that if the work was so important to them, they would atleast read it through before they post it, it actually puts me off being interested in bidding because if they can’t even get That right then how bad will the communication be e.g. “yu do this now fo rme”, it makes me cringe.
The best bit about the site is the constant variety, trying not to take it too seriously and basically using people’s briefs as a way to keep up my design software skills and sending it to them just incase they would like what I made, atleast I know how long it took me, Uni projects etc just don’t give you a real feel for how long things take.
I love learning, really, give me some design software and video tutorials and I’m content, so this place makes me realise more than any education system what people in the so called ‘real world’ want for their business and what skills you need e.g. custom WordPress templates etc.
Hmmm abit of a rambling rant, good job I’m not in the ‘Writing’ category
I shall be taking all articles like ’10 AMAZING TIPS TO SELL YOURSELF, YOU CAN’t LOSE!’ with a pinch of salt.
e-fairy.
I am just starting out doing freelance after quitting my full time job so any help I can get is great. Thanks for the tips – let’s hope I get my first project soon!
I second that, all of your points are very well explained.
From my personal experience of years of Freelancing, its best to be professional and organize yourself from Day 1. Great post.
Freelancing is fun, but it takes lots of work. I am only finding about 20% of my work on elance, oDesk, ect… In my experience most of the advertisers on these sites have no intention of hiring anyone. There is another group that is looking to get something done for nothing (in the case of writing assignments, own the work as well), there is another group that are engaging in academic cheating by paying people to do their work. But there is another group that are great to work for and are great clients. It just takes lots of work to find them. You may bid on a hundred projects for each job you get.
Thank you so much for your advise. I was not much aware of this kind of things while bidding for projects. I am sure that these tips will influence on my further bids.
Thanks again.:)
Kevin
Not a bad post, but there are no subject lines on Elance. And it’s against their terms and conditions to include contact info in your initial proposal. Point one is good though, but I don’t think “sell yourself” would constitute a sure-fire guide on ‘How to Win Any Job on eLance, oDesk or Guru’.
What if someone else sells themselves in their proposal?!
I’ve been reading through this board and I have to admit, the advice Mitchell gives makes sense. But after clicking on folks bios, I have come to see that most of you guys that are getting work are programmers and website developers. As a freelancer that has been looking for work on eLance for a week, I just don’t see how you can make any money at all. I have worked as a script editor for almost two years now and I can’t compete with someone who claims to have sold a screenplay to a studio–even if it was awful, and even if it was shelved and never made (otherwise he would be mentioning the titles) he will get the jobs before I do. Other jobs are just so cheap that they aren’t worth applying for.
I wrote for eHow last year before I got out of college and until this past August. I hated working for them although I did enjoy some of the articles I produced. I wrote 650 articles in a year with only 11 rejections (only a few of those were undeserved). I grow so frustrated looking for work. Any advice or encouragement or leads would be greatly appreciated. eLance does not seem to be worth my time as I am just a writer and there are a billion others out there who will do it much, much cheaper.
Thank you so much for your advise. I was not much aware of this kind of things while bidding for projects. I am sure that these tips will influence on my further bids.
What are the other freelance websites similar to Odesk.com please?
Hi Mitchell Harper,
I have read your points and I found them useful. I will use these points in my bids.
Can you please provide some more useful information on getting the projects from free lancing websites?
Thanks!
Successful freelance is actually quite simple provided you can join all the dots.
For a provider/contractor (the freelancer), it is all about finding the right employer. 95% of posts on sites like these are amateur at best, they have unrealistic expectations and frequently have no real idea of exactly what they want. Avoid them at all costs, it just isn’t worth it in the long run.
From an employers point of view, you will find no shortage of very keen (yet very naive and under qualified) individuals who are so desperate for work, they are prepared to do whatever it takes to get it.
A combination of a lack of experience, lack of required skills and a lack of sustainable pricing adds up to amateur quality products. In short, it is a recipe for disappointment.
Finally, never ever give a moneyback guarantee on these sorts of sites. Its different in locality based business, in the online business it means ‘work for free’ on all small jobs.
The last thing your fragile ego needs is to be told that your efforts are sub-standard and that you wont get paid.
For Service Providers, If you want to get paid directly, and don’t want the
middle men take a cut, I’d suggest using http://www.linkmysource.com.
For Providers, linkmysource.com is offering their Silver subscription plan free
for life at this time.
We have tried elance without much success. It is actually a lot easier and fruitful to work with a company. That gives a lot of respect, good salary a nice life.
We outsource a lot of work to these sites, its always good to give it to individual with good review (5*) & lot of them. Those are usually most cost effective & do the job well.
this is what I am looking for ,I am a newbie on elance as worker. thanks guy
I think this is excellent advice but if I may, Elance, though it is a great site, is extremely strict on contact information. I think it’s a great point to try and throw it in there and I believe Elance should change that policy, even slightly to include it. Currently however, if you include any contact information you could be banned. It is up to the client to message the contractor applying first, and then they can trade contact information. Elance believes it’s a way to limit the spam people receive which I can also see their point with that. However it does make things a bit difficult at the beginning unless the client is willing to message the contractor first.
I work on Elance. You have wonderful tips, but it doesn’t work that way in the category I’m in (Admin). It seems like the Writing category is the best one to be in if you’re skilled in those types of jobs. Design is next followed by Web site.
Everyone one on every forum claims that you have to sell yourself, to submit proposals that describe what you can and will do for a client. All said and good, but the majority of the jobs in the Admin section (using Elance as an example) are repetitive jobs requiring no skill. One job that was posted, as an example was… I would like an Excel spreadsheet created with the name, address, city, state, zip, phone number, fax, email, of every nightclub in the U.S. Another job said the same thing but for every vacant lot in the U.S.
Someone tell me what skill you would need to be typing in thousands of rows of data like that. That’s what 90% of the jobs posted in the Admin section are like. The other 10% are creative jobs, And the clients posting those are not looking for “newbies” They are looking for providers/freelancers who have a solid reputation and LONG list of jobs completed. In the thousands of freelancers on sites such as Elance, 100 give or take have those credentials. Newbies can not compete with them, even if their skills and qualifications are the same. What they have is the solid reputation and jobs. To get that, is to luck out with a client and have that client as a repeat client.
That has been proven… I am also a freelancer on Guru. I lucked out with a client that turned into a repeat client. Because of that, I build my jobs up, and my feedback. The proposal I write on there gets me 80% of the jobs I apply for. On Elance, I’m a newbie, even though I’ve been on there for about a year now. During that time, I did get a grand total of 3 jobs, with the same proposal that I use in Guru. Because I do not have the number of jobs yet on elance, my award rate is non existent.
I am a new elance but I have got several jobs in odesk. Your bid proposal is good but two things we have to avoid.
1. “Expert technical writer whose written for Microsoft and eBay”
2. “100% money back guarantee if not satisfied for any reason”
Thanks for sharing knowledge with us.
You can check out http://howtostartfreelance.com for information. The guy has got some awesome tips, especially he has covered oDesk quite comprehensively.
In fact, he is also giving away first jobs for people with the promise of a good feedback. You can utilize this if you are finding it hard to get your first job on odesk. Here is the URL to that page: http://www.howtostartfreelance.com/get-first-job-now/
Have you checked out http://www.Staff.com this is another site for work from home job,
it is similar to oDesk and Elance but for full time work only.They have lots of position for freelancer workers.
Been with staff.com also. Great site for online jobs. I got my first online job on that site. It really helps a lot.
This is a very good point especially if you are outsourcing your work. Another outsourced provider is Staff.com which is good for full time work that works like Odesk and Elance but I think is much better since they can do the recruitment work for you.
Thanks for the tips.
Can you help me to find me how to get derect clients?
Great advice.. I think this can be applied to any job you are applying for
Hello,
I,m a new eLance bidder and very very thankful to you for this article that helped me a lot. I wanna ask a foolish question from point no. 3
que: eLance dosn’t allow contect info.. so can you tell me the other way or any idea to tell that “I am a real Contractor”.
please suggest me, waiting for your guideline……
thanking you
Great Article about odesk, elance and guru jobs. Surely this will help me to get more jobs on odesk. Thanks for share.
Very good advice, Hope get good project on Odesk. Thanks
I read the post but still I need help to write a good proposal for first time at Elance. I need to know what a good proposal look like, what would be the start and end and what information should incorporate in the body of the proposal. Thank you.
Thank you. Excellent tips!.
for a regular jobs yes,but for a below minimum wage jobs………you’re asking too much for it
I read this article this a.m. Afterwards, i was browsing elance and submitted a proposal for a job, with this article tactic – - and was FINALLY awarded my FIRST job on elance. Seems like it works! I will be using this method from here on out. thanks!!
Hello and thanks for the tips
I am a new freelancer in fact I just graduated with my BS in Information Technology/Web developer and I don’t have much experience.
How would I break into freelancer?
Guys, you can use odkeeper.com from monitoring odesk.com.
This is good advice. But putting your personal contact information in the proposal is a violation of terms on both oDesk and eLance.
Hello everyone,
Is it against TOS if an employer ask you for your skype username before winning the job?
Thanks in advance.
Great Tips shared by the author. I hope it will help thousands like me. Thanks
Thanks Mitchell
I am new at elance and trying to win my first job. As i have years of experience but don’t have any idea regarding frelance websites and their terms. So I googled how to get work from elance. I got your post through google and seems useful for me.
Thanks
Sites like odesk are very hot tropics in the world. I have read your article. This article is really very informative. Thank you very much for sharing this post.
I am newly joined to this field…..I can say this is the great tips which will help me in my future…thanks
How on earth can you advise people to write their phone numbers? This will be against the website ToS, at least on oDesk.
Oh! And oDesk doesn’t give you anywhere to write a subject line.