My First Elance Job

Elance.com is one of the many avenues that you can earn money via the internet. It provides freelancers a place where they can showcase and sell their expertise.

Registering at Elance is easy and, most of all, it's free. You just need to provide the necessary information and you're on to start submitting bidding proposals to posted projects. I just used the "Basic" registration and selected "Web and Programming" since I consider it as a closer category to my skills.

Upon registration using the "Basic" registration, Elance gave me 3 "Connect" points that I can use to bid for proposals. You should note that for projects "below $500", one "Connect" point will be used when bidding. On the other hand, projects within the $500-$1000 range requires 2 "Connect" points in order to bid. As you can see, 3 "Connect" points can only give you a maximum of 2-3 bidding proposals. Projects with higher amount requires more "Connect" points. Three "Connect" points will be awarded to a "Basic" registration every month.

When my registration was approved at Elance, I immediately tried bidding on some projects. I found a project in the range of "$500-$1000" and submitted my bid. I was surprised that there was only one "Connect" point left after submitting my bid (I was not yet aware that the number of "Connect" points needed to bid varies according to the price range of the project).

With one "Connect" points left, I used it to bid on another project. I choose one in the "below $500" range which only needs one "Connect" point. Hence, I have maxed-up all my "Connect" points intended for the month in these two projects.

All I need to do next was to wait for the bidding to end and look at the results. Of course, I wished that at least one of the projects be awarded to me.

Luckily, the project on the "$500-$1000" price range was awarded to ME!

And as what the title of this blog implies, I got my first Elance job! And best of all, I got it within my first two bids!

What did I do? you might ask. First of all, I'm not from US (my Buyer is), I have no credentials yet at elance.com, and I have no positive feedback reviews whatsoever that are under my belt. In short I'm what elance calls a "New Provider."

The problem with elance is that "New Providers" are not taken too seriously by Buyers (those people or companies looking for professionals at Elance), "New Providers" might not even be noticed by these Buyers.

Elance even advises Buyers at elance to choose Providers with credibility, proven track record, and those with high positive feedbacks.

It seems unfair to newbies like me since it automatically discriminates us from those who entered Elance way earlier and already gained their way up.

But of course we need to start somewhere. If you don't bid, you won't get any projects. If you bid and the project is not awarded to you, you risk on decreasing your "Award Ratio." This would mean that you have higher number of bids with little or no awards. Award Ratio is one of the factors that providers can look into when choosing freelancers/providers.

Anyway, as I've mentioned earlier, the "$500-$1000" project was awarded to ME! I was ecstatic, since this is my first time to join Elance and one of my first bids was considered.

I don't have any secrets on how to write proposals, but here are what I considered as major factors that the Buyer used to evaluate my bid proposal (in no particular order, I just based the list on what comes first on my mind):

• what are my "outside elance" credentials, since I don't have any from elance
  
• how sincere am I on accomplishing the project
• how I assessed the project posted
• what I plan to do with the project
• what possible improvements can I make on the projects
• how I "educated" my provider with what needs to be done on the project
  

Lucky me, my Buyer was impressed by my proposal. He was also impressed by my "outside elance" credentials and on what I plan to do with the project. I may emphasize that it pays to do all your jobs well, it is of great help when marketing your services in the future - it will serve as your "ticket" for other projects.

I'm no guru, but here are some of my personal pointers on how I make my proposal on elance:

• read the Job Description thoroughly, study it carefully, see if you can deliver it
  
• fit the proposal on the project, don't spare the details but refrain from telling the technicalities, they might use your idea even if the project is not awarded to you
• don't write very seriously, write as if you are talking to your client (max 4000 characters only)
  
• provide all the projects that you have accomplished that are related to the job description, this will boost your credibility even if you have no track record yet at Elance
  
• suggest ways that can help improve the project based on your skills and abilities

I will add additional pointers as I see fit while learning the ropes on Elance.

I hope that this article would help other newbies like me get awards for jobs in Elance.

Have a great day.