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Freelancing: The truth about bidding websites
When first starting off freelancing you feel excited and anxious about being your own boss. You start off and things are going your way. You’ve taken on a couple of projects and now see that freelancing is right for you. A month later and a pocket full of lint you are now wondering how are others freelancers doing so well and how can you can make a stable income as a freelancer. In this article I will discuss how you can keep your income rolling in month to month with bidding websites.
Bidding Sites
Many of you may have already heard or have not heard about bidding sites such as Elance, Freelancer, and Odesk. Those are bidding type of websites where you would go and bid on a project with other designers or developers. Many freelancers claim they never or will never used a service of such because they want you to work for peanuts. My personal opinion is these sites are great if you know what you’re doing. When first starting these sites might be great for you. As a designer/developer you often do not need as much as you think. In the design world people charge what they think they should be charging when they really should be charging clients prices that will get them by. If you’re just starting off do not expect to take on large projects because most likely you will not get any considering you have nothing to show.
Winning Bids
It’s very easy to send proposal to a client on these sites but can be very difficult to win if you do not think out your plan. Many times clients want to hear words from the designer that sound more realistic to them. Like if you send the same proposal to every client there going to ignore your email. Make yourself stand out and approach the client as if you were talking to them via phone. Make them feel comfortable with you. After winning a bid try to meet your deadline so clients can give you a good review.
Building your Reputation
Building your reputation on a bidding site can be very hard if you do not have the correct mindset. When first approaching these sites try to think how you can build your profile from 0$ to $1,000 projects. Starting off small and working your way up to the top is the way to go. Yes you might have to work for small amounts but in the long run it is very worth it considering the more reviews you have the larger projects you can take on. Once you have a couple of reviews projects should continue to come your way and it goes up hill from there.
Conclusion
What I am basically saying in this article is that you can actually make good money from bidding websites. Many designers deny the fact that this is where they get some of their work and major leads from. I myself have tried out Scriptlance, Elance, and Freelancer and have gotten a project on there before. I now do not bid for projects but when I was in need of money I did what I had to do to get by. If you’re starting off freelancing or feel your income is not stable take time to join a freelance site and try to keep your income rolling in. Everyone
experience is different so giving it a try won’t hurt.
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Marcell Purham
Marcell is the founder of Webdevtuts. He is also a web designer & developer who loves to design and develop websites. If you're looking for him you can find him via @webdevtuts
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