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This is my 3rd year on Elance as a fullstack developer with a main focus on backend, and last year I made around 80k. In the beginning, it was very hard to comp

This is my 3rd year on Elance as a fullstack developer with a main focus on backend, and last year I made around 80k. In the beginning, it was very hard to compete with established users and 10$/h developers. In Elance, having a track a record with high ratings is pretty important, so my first few jobs were some easy scripts that were guaranteed to be 5 stars (I made sure on the proposal that I don't care much about the price but that I need a good review) After establishing a bit of credit, you should be picky on the projects you choose and make sure that you are not throwing a generic proposal. Treat each one uniquely. Have a resume/portfolio ready. Ask questions about the project and more importantly, give suggestions about pain points.

lifeisstillgood 13y ago
Fascinating - I have a dozen questions for you ! I will stick to three, but really desperate for high quality info on elance and the like 1. Roughly how many jobs a year do you take on? 2. What's the median price - and roughly how long does it take you to do (ie what's your daily rate?) 3. Are the projects / buyers high or low quality (I get the impression it's a lot of unrealistic projects or simple projects at 10dollars total I assume you live in the Isle of Man ? This does not strike me as Vietnam-cheap-lifestyle so I am surprised to say least - is that 80k USD (for non UK folks, Isle of Man is an island just off UK mainland near Scotland. It's basically same as living in UK For lifestyle purposes but technically it's its own independant region)
- necrodome 13y ago
  Ah, it's just happened to be my domain, I don't live in Isle of Man. Yes, it is 80k USD. My rate usually revolves between 50/75$ hour, but I generally try to charge by week. Last year, I think i worked on 3-4 relatively full-size projects including: - Backend for an iphone app - Backend/web frontend for a continuous event processor, a commercial offering in par with http://riemann.io/ http://riemann.io/ - Backend/web app for a job board in restaurant industry It is actually pretty easy to filter out low quality buyers: They will mass advertise the project for nickels and pennies. They will always try to negotiate the rate along the way. They won't answer your questions about the project details or simply have no clue.
  - lifeisstillgood 13y ago
    What is the balance between filtering out and actual paid work? Most "normal" consultants expand to a point where full time bizdev is needed - what do you see as the equivalent here? Would you and two or three others with good reputations pay someone to filter elance for you? What about expanding into more traditional bizdev? Have you started to see word of mouth recommendations and repeat business, or is everything start-from-scratch? I must say I am surprised - I have only ever browsed elance and the jobs you describe seem like hens teeth. Are you afraid of the work not being there (ie exists really just not on elance) or is there a great deal of good quality work if you can find it? Might have to sign up and see of course :-)

lifeisstillgood 13y ago

Fascinating - I have a dozen questions for you ! I will stick to three, but really desperate for high quality info on elance and the like 1. Roughly how many jobs a year do you take on? 2. What's the median price - and roughly how long does it take you to do (ie what's your daily rate?) 3. Are the projects / buyers high or low quality (I get the impression it's a lot of unrealistic projects or simple projects at 10dollars total I assume you live in the Isle of Man ? This does not strike me as Vietnam-cheap-lifestyle so I am surprised to say least - is that 80k USD (for non UK folks, Isle of Man is an island just off UK mainland near Scotland. It's basically same as living in UK For lifestyle purposes but technically it's its own independant region)

necrodome 13y ago
Ah, it's just happened to be my domain, I don't live in Isle of Man. Yes, it is 80k USD. My rate usually revolves between 50/75$ hour, but I generally try to charge by week. Last year, I think i worked on 3-4 relatively full-size projects including: - Backend for an iphone app - Backend/web frontend for a continuous event processor, a commercial offering in par with http://riemann.io/ http://riemann.io/ - Backend/web app for a job board in restaurant industry It is actually pretty easy to filter out low quality buyers: They will mass advertise the project for nickels and pennies. They will always try to negotiate the rate along the way. They won't answer your questions about the project details or simply have no clue.
- lifeisstillgood 13y ago
  What is the balance between filtering out and actual paid work? Most "normal" consultants expand to a point where full time bizdev is needed - what do you see as the equivalent here? Would you and two or three others with good reputations pay someone to filter elance for you? What about expanding into more traditional bizdev? Have you started to see word of mouth recommendations and repeat business, or is everything start-from-scratch? I must say I am surprised - I have only ever browsed elance and the jobs you describe seem like hens teeth. Are you afraid of the work not being there (ie exists really just not on elance) or is there a great deal of good quality work if you can find it? Might have to sign up and see of course :-)