I work as a django freelancer and have picked up over a dozen sites and built up quite the portfolio in less than a year on Elance. I've met some awesome clients there, and i think the kind of people you attract also reflect on the kind of person you are, and what you want out of it.
A lot of people expect a work of someone at 100$/hr but only want to pay 10-20$/hr.
- Price is a pretty good differentiating factor.
- Communication is another. If he can speak/communicate well then you can still work with him even if he's not a "rockstar"
- Portfolio of work. is he able to deliver a product by himself?
- Get references of past clients. Infact as a freelancer myself, they're my biggest selling point. I simply hand out references of 3-4 clients i've worked with.
- And to be honest, things like "I am real", actually put me and probably other professionals off from your post. You have to treat us like professionals, and not like cheap throw-away labour!
- Be as descriptive as possible, add mockups, add anything that might help a person to judge the effort/skillset needed for that job. Otherwise it indicates, you didn't do much homework and want us to fill in all the blanks. To outsource anything, you actually have to put in more time initially than the actual dev!
"things like "I am real", actually put me and probably other professionals off from your post."
I suspect the poster's goal was to easily identify those responders who didn't even bother to read the posting (or those posters who were machines!). Is there a less offensive way he could have obtained this information?
Well yeah sure, by asking pertinent questions about the project or how i "might" solve X. What technology might be good for X etc? In my opinion it gets a conversation going, which might be a better way of judging someones worth(goes both ways).
Posting "I am real" looks more like a test for "i'm smarter than a 5th grader"? But other freelancers might differ on this.
Think of it like a CAPTCHA. It's not a reflection on you as a person, and it's not much of an imposition — it's just a way to stave of an inevitable flood of illegitimate requests.
A lot of people expect a work of someone at 100$/hr but only want to pay 10-20$/hr.
- Price is a pretty good differentiating factor.
- Communication is another. If he can speak/communicate well then you can still work with him even if he's not a "rockstar"
- Portfolio of work. is he able to deliver a product by himself?
- Get references of past clients. Infact as a freelancer myself, they're my biggest selling point. I simply hand out references of 3-4 clients i've worked with.
- And to be honest, things like "I am real", actually put me and probably other professionals off from your post. You have to treat us like professionals, and not like cheap throw-away labour!
- Be as descriptive as possible, add mockups, add anything that might help a person to judge the effort/skillset needed for that job. Otherwise it indicates, you didn't do much homework and want us to fill in all the blanks. To outsource anything, you actually have to put in more time initially than the actual dev!