When you freelance, you have one of life's most important assets - time, at your disposal.
For this reason, you should always try to utilize every working moment you have towards maximizing your revenues [Note - I say, "working moment", which is the time you allocate towards "work", not your leisure or family time].
Now, sites like Upwork or Fiverr are just one of your avenues for making money online.
Instead of focusing solely on them for your earnings, you should look to affiliate marketing as a great source of income augment.
As you become good at it and manage to reap good rewards from your affiliate marketing efforts, you may soon find it to be sufficient enough to replace all the time, effort, and money you were investing into freelance sites like Upwork, especially given the way the latter has started bleeding freelancers dry for their token ("connects") money.
Among affiliate platforms, you should definitely consider Amazon. While it is by no means easy to make money quickly as an "Amazon Associate", it is not that hard either.
TradeTracker is another affiliate marketing platform I highly recommend to freelancers, especially for those dabbling in the travel niche since there are excellent travel segment clients such as Air France that you can promote on TradeTracker.
While there are people who seem to believe that when it comes to prices quoted on freelance sites, they should be independent of any statutes or limitations as posed by the sites themselves, I refuse to toe that line at all.
After all, most freelance sites work on a percentage commission fee basis, apart from membership fees which they take from freelancers. Clearly when they do so, it is in their own interest to ensure that prices remain as high as possible so that they in turn can earn higher commissions.
As an instance, Elance charges a flat 8.75% commission on every single payment which is made by clients to contractors, irrespective of the amount which is paid out. So if say I have a $100 project which involved writing 10 500-word articles at $10 a piece, Elance would earn $8.75 out of that $100 which the client pays me to eventually hand me $91.25. In the same situation if I were to work at $20 an article or $200 for the exact same project, Elance would earn $17.50 without doing anything extra or different.
Elance charges 8.75% commission on every dollar which is earned by freelancers on the site. Therefore, it is in their own interest to ensure that every project maximizes revenue for them, which can only happen when they themselves work on stipulating higher minimum payouts for each project.
So who's the loser working at low rates, besides the freelancer in question of course? Yes, the freelance site too!
And if you ask me, this whole argument that large volumes of work can easily make up for small payouts on each project simply does not cut any ice whatsoever with me. After all, time and effort required on all such small projects is often similar to the larger projects, sometimes even greater, since freelancers are willing to work at really low rates. In such a scenario, the freelance sites lose out as well since they have to put in greater administrative and operational effort (and of course costs) towards small returns per project.
Instead if they mandated higher prices - or worked on a model which at least encouraged higher prices very strongly, I am sure the freelance sites themselves would have so much to gain from maintaining such a setup.
These are thoughts which I shared in a video on my YouTube Channel on Freelancing - Vikram Luvs 2 Freelance, where I have emphatically stressed on the need for freelance sites themselves to have higher prices being quoted on them, which can ultimately very clearly work in their own favor:
Please feel free to share your thoughts on this matter in the comments section below - I always love to hear from my readers!
I know a lot of you who simply disdain your day jobs but at the same time, in the absence of viable alternatives, are compelled to grudgingly go through the grind.
At the same time, I also know of a lot of individuals who have successfully made the transition from being in a full time job scenario, to working freelance and still managing to make as much or more than what they made in their full time job.
So what is it about this subset of individuals that actually manage to quit their day jobs and successfully freelance full time, free of all the perils that typically came with their full time job?
Well, if I am to take my own example, I did not quit my day job till the time I saw some REAL potential, REAL earnings in working freelance. And this would undoubtedly be my foremost advise to you, in case you are an individual who is seeking out freelance opportunities that would allow you to mirror the lifestyle that your full time day job proffers you.
Remember that things are a lot rosier than they appear from the outset. People will give you these larger than life impressions of working from just about anywhere, especially those images of working by the poolside or seaside, but trust me, things are really not as easy as they might seem.
Don't let these rosy images FOOL you!
Essentially, freelancing is also a lot of hard work..it is really NOT an easy way of working as opposed to working full time in a day job but rather a DIFFERENT way of working, where you have no boss and no office politics to deal with, nor do you need to contend with rush hour traffic, or follow the same regimen day in and day out which would easily bore you to death (at least to me it did).
At the same time, you do need to manage workflow very well, which can be tricky, especially since there are periods of lull and boom, crests and troughs, all too often. What I imply is that while there might be times when you would be simply besieged with work, there would be other times when work would simply not come by at all.
Unpredictable Schedules
A major resultant of the unpredictable nature of freelance work is the fact that your own schedule can in turn get rather unpredictable. So while one day you could take it easy and relax the whole day without doing anything much, there could be another day wherein you may very well end up working the whole day!
For me personally, this kind of disorder works very well, but honestly, this may not work for you or at least for a lot of others whom I know. So if you are a person who likes way too much order and predictability in life, a full time job may suit you better.
Your Current Cash Flow & Debt Position
While determining suitability for quitting your day job and pursuing a full time freelance career, a major consideration is that of your current cash flow as well as your overall debt position, or perhaps hopefully, the lack of the latter. The better cash flow your day job offers, as well as the maximal debt repayment that it allows you to make, the more I would advise you to stick to your day job. On the contrary, if you are like me with a decent cash flow from freelancing, zero debt liability, then taking the plunge towards a full time freelance career would be that much more viable and feasible.
Running Expenses
Another important consideration before taking the plunge towards full time freelancing would be that of running expenses; if you have a lot of them, on an ongoing basis, I would recommend that you stick to your day job, while perhaps moonlighting as a freelancer. In this context, remember that my assertion is different from debt like mortgage or car loan. Rather, I mean expenses which are not mandatory per se but yet you end up incurring them, say as a result of the lifestyle that you lead or the kind of family that you have. An excellent instance would be when you have kids; there are regular expenses which need to be incurred, whether you like it or not, and yet, that is NOT what can be referred to as debt.
Passion for Traveling
If in case like me, you share a major, deeply ingrained passion for traveling, then I would certainly suggest that you run from your day job as fast as you can and take up full time freelancing immediately! Trust me, and take my word on this, a full time job will never really allow you to travel passionately, unless your job happens to be that of a travel show host! Essentially, there are limitations galore, even if your job happens to be one where you get to travel a lot. Often, you will be pushed and shoved to places you would not want to go at all in the first place!
With freelancing, you can choose where to go and when to go, so this is a power which most day jobs rarely offer, not to talk about jobs that offer ZERO travel options!
My own scenario is that I have seen a lot of the world around me, only AFTER I started freelancing full time. Prior to that, I had barely stepped out of my own country, though I had traveled extensively within it. Now, after having traveled abroad substantially, I feel much less like the 'frog in the well' which I clearly was in those days, when I had hardly stepped out and seen the world from so many different perspectives.
Summary
Summarizing my thoughts, I would essentially assert that you take a well thought out call with regard to quitting your day job and beginning to freelance full time. The following video I posted on my freelancing specific YouTube channel that answers the question - Should I Quit My Day Job And Freelance Full Time?will I am sure give you a very good perspective on the thoughts I have shared in this post:
Overall, remember that things often seem rosier from the other side - it is not for nothing that they say, the grass is always greener on the other side, yet I would emphatically state that the grass on the freelancing side sure is a LOT greener than on the full time job side....take my word for it!
When it comes to long term relationships with freelance clients, I am always of the opinion that one should continuously evaluate that relationship and not take it for granted.
And this evaluation needs to take place, not only from the point of view of ensuring the sustenance of that freelance relationship, it also needs to take into consideration the possibility of severing such relationships, as and when the need arises.
Yes, you read that correct.
After all, there are opportune times when many freelance clients simply take freelance contractors for granted and look to "milk them" as much as they can. Essentially, they have a notion that since they have managed to find a freelance contractor who is willing to work on their terms, at their (very low) pay scales, they might as well extract as much work out of that contractor as possible.
Any freelance clients reading this should realize that when it comes to freelance contractors, while quite a few maybe outright dumb, not all are so. After a while, they can easily see through the exploitation tactic of freelance clients in question and accordingly look to move on or severe all ties that client.
While in most cases, this parting of ways may take place on very amicable terms, I have myself had situations where while there was no unpleasantness as such, I however chose to simply stop responding to the client in question. I agree that this is certainly not the most desirable strategy to follow but somehow under the given circumstances, that seemed like the best - maybe the only way ahead in terms of giving up on that client.
No doubt, this is something I would strongly advise you against - yes, you can very well learn from my mistakes.
Moreover, under no circumstances am I saying that you completely give up on any long term relationships with freelance clients. I myself have had some of the most fruitful freelance associations, both monetary and otherwise, with clients whom I worked with long term.
So don't get me wrong; I am not saying that you do not work long term with freelance clients. I am simply saying that you must evaluate the relevance as well as the importance of long term relationships with freelance clients, at all times. Bear in mind that while most such long term freelance relationships may prove really very beneficial, there are instances where such relationships do not prove beneficial. On the contrary, they end up proving detrimental since they keep you away from working with other clients who may well have yielded higher and better quality monetary rewards for you.
Therefore in conclusion all I would say is that do not get mesmerized by the fact that you have freelance clients whom you have built long term relationships with. Instead, always look at the value which these clients are offering you. Ask yourself:
1. Are these clients paying me well, commensurate to my qualification, my experience, and indeed my expectations?
2. Are they friendly and courteous?
3. Do they pay promptly or do you have to chase them for payments which arrive with excruciating delay?
Responses to these questions will give you a very good idea in terms of the viability of working with freelance clients on a long term basis. Wherever you notice a questionable association, I would advise you to forgo that relationship for another one that may well prove far more conducive.
The more I read about Freelancer.com from various freelancers as well as project owners, greater the impression which I get with regard to the site being nothing but a sham and a scam.
Freelancer.com - Scam or Legit?
But is that really true? Have you ever worked on or worked through Freelancer.com, as a freelancer and project owner respectively?
If so, how has your experience been?
If I talk about myself, I have not worked on the site (as a freelancer or a contractor) for a very long time, in fact from the time it got rechristened as Freelancer.com, from its previous avatar of GetAFreelancer.com.
And if you ask me, the experience on GetAFreelancer.com, at least till the time I worked on it, was fairly good. Not once did I get a feeling that the whole site is nothing but a scam.
Over time though, I drifted onto Elance which is where I do bulk of my content writing projects today, for clients from around the world.
Pay on Elance is definitely many notches above what it used to be on GetAFreelancer.com to the extent that I can easily state with confidence, one CAN actually make a decent living, working full time on Elance, even as an individual freelancer. I specifically say individual because there are MANY businesses or small companies which are working aggressively on Elance and actually making as much or more money than what many other comparable businesses in the "real world" make.
As an instance, take a look at the No. 1 Elance contractor, across all project categories - SynapseIndia, a New Delhi, India based offshore custom development solutions provider which in the last 12 months alone has earned in excess of 2 Million Dollars and over its lifetime presence on Elance, has made more than 10 Million Dollars.
Clearly, these are very large sums of money in the context of a freelance platform and they clearly showcase the potential that a site like Elance holds for the entire freelance community.
Vis-a-vis that, I would very highly doubt if there is even a single freelance business on Freelancer.com that has earned a Million Dollars or above, forget about individual freelancers. On Elance I can assure you that there are many businesses which have, including some in the extremely competitive and not-so-well-paying 'Writing and Translation' category such as Words You Want.
It is against such a backdrop that the whole Freelancer.com saga comes across to me as such a BIG surprise.
After all, while on one hand, if you look up the Freelancer.com Wikipedia page, you will get an impression that all is hunky dory with this business and is clearly a frontrunner for being one of the biggest players in this space, especially after having acquired other businesses such as LimeExchange, Scriptlance, and vWorker, among others.
The Founder of Freelancer.com as it exists today, is an individual named Matt Barrie. Again, things seem more or alright with this person, at least as some really rudimentary Google searching reveals.
Matt Barrie, Freelancer.com Founder -
A Savvy Tech Entrepreneur OR A Scam Artist?
But ironically, the same Wikipedia page which lists out numerous awards won by Freelancer.com also lists out plentiful scams originating from the company...scroll down the page and you will see those links for yourself.
I have myself provided you with some links here, here, here and here.
So my question is, have you worked, or are still working on or through Freelancer.com, in any capacity? If so, how is your experience going?
Like I mentioned, after having begun the entire saga of bidding on online freelance sites, on GetAFreelancer.com, I graduated to Elance.com and there has really been no looking back on my part.
For me, the biggest impediment with regard to all other sites barring Elance.com is that they do not charge freelancers to place proposals (individually, for each proposal) unlike the way Elance does.
I feel that is a very good policy to follow since it restricts the sheer number of proposals which are placed on these job sites. Otherwise, on sites like oDesk and Freelancer.com in particular, I have noted jobs that pay really very poorly getting a phenomenal number of bids. As an instance, you might have a job on oDesk or Freelancer.com which seeks out 10, 500 word articles for $10 viz. a $ an article and yet there could well be as many as 50 freelancers bidding on that job!!
Really, all this seems just so crazy and funny to me!
I mean my raison d'etre of being on Elance or working freelance this way is ONLY & ONLY to make money, not to kill time!!
But the rates at which these jokers work, I really get a feeling that they have motives other than to make a living or even to make some decent money, up their sleeves!
So my assertion to freelancers as well as project owners working (or have worked) on Freelancer.com to please share your experiences.
Let's hear some real stories so that we are reassured about the authenticity (or otherwise) of both Freelancer.com as well as the scam allegations which are made so often against the site.
In case these allegations are true, Freelancer.com should ideally be reported to the ACCC or Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (since Freelancer.com is Sydney, Australia based) which can take necessary action and ideally close the site and its entire business altogether.
But if these allegations are baseless, then action should contrarily be taken against all those parties who have made those allegations in the first place, which I wouldn't be surprised, if they turn out to be competitors of the site.
As far as my own assertions with regard to very poor pay on the site, accompanied by numerous charges and fees at practically every stage (even in those GetAFreelancer.com days, though clearly not as much as the ones that complainants have cited for Freelancer.com), I stand by them and they will remain sacrosanct.
But whether Freelancer.com is a scam outright or not...let's just have that very clearly established please.
This is a question which is often on the minds of a lot of freelancers in the 'Writing & Translation' category, on freelance sites like Elance, oDesk, Freelancer, etc. wherein they really wonder as to what exactly those articles are really needed for...that too by the droves?
SEO or Search Engine Optimization
One of the major reasons for which articles are needed is because they help with SEO or Search Engine Optimization. Essentially, when these articles have relevant keywords intuitively blended into them, they allow websites to rank better on search engines for the given search terms.
So for instance, if I have a website on RC radio controlled vehicles, I might want to have articles on my website as well as my blog in which I will include search terms such as "RC Airplane" or "RC Boat" and so on, which will help my website to rank better and appear in the first few search results when users search using those same (or similar) search terms.
So SEO undoubtedly plays a major part - or a major reason for which articles are sought on these freelance sites.
Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate Marketing has in turn proven to be a major reason for which articles are sought on these freelance sites. Typically, the SEO aspect remains sacrosanct with regard to these articles but at the same time, the emphasis on quality in this case is even higher.
After all, the endeavor with affiliate marketing goes beyond pleasing web spiders to convincing human readers to actually BUY products and services they are affiliates for. This is an end objective which is achieved with far greater success when there is high quality content backing the claims or assertions made on affiliate sites.
So affiliate marketing, combined with SEO endeavors, forms an integral part of the entire scheme of things as far as article writing jobs on freelance sites is concerned.
Article Directories
Writing for article directories like EzineArticles or ArticlesBase also forms an integral part of article writing assignments on freelance sites.
Once again, I would repeat that while the platform in this case is different, viz. an Article Directory, the end objective remains similar as already mentioned above, viz. SEO (largely). This in turn is achieved (especially) with the help of the back link(s) which these directories offer, within the Resource box, at the end of each article.
But besides SEO alone, these article directories - EzineArticles in particular, have an additional objective of establishing credibility. After all, when readers see a lot of articles published by you within a niche or set of niches, they perceive you as an expert of sorts within that niche.
So remember that articles published on these directories have a major 'credibility' aspect attached to them as well.
Having wondered about these aspects myself - in my initial days of freelancing, when I would churn out articles by the gazillions, applying little thought to WHAT those articles were really meant for, I gathered all my thoughts together in the video below, also featured on my freelancing specific YouTube channel. An amalgamation of all the experience and learning that I have had over the years, in article writing in particular, this video will give you a very good perspective in terms of the uses to which articles sought on freelance sites are typically deployed.
Google Panda Update, in the context of the above
Talking about article writing and the various uses to which these articles are put, it is pertinent that I touch upon Google Panda updates and their relevance to the entire article writing realm. Essentially, what has happened is that article directories like EzineArticles, Articlesbase as well as many others have significantly lost a lot of their value, post the Google Panda update.
Further, poor quality articles which do not read well, have copied content (an Internet SIN!), are structured poorly or simply do not offer value to readers ultimately rank poorly on search engines.
Therefore, the emphasis very clearly has to be on creating TOP QUALITY content which not only draws in visitors but actually KEEPS THEM ENGAGED as well as provides REAL VALUE to them.
This would be as true for articles meant for article directories as would be for other platforms, including own website content, content for affiliate marketing (especially) and so on.
The Overlapping Nature of the Enlisted Purposes to which Articles are Deployed
Remember that a lot of the end objectives of article writing, as enlisted above, do tend to overlap. For instance, when you create articles for affiliate marketing, SEO still has to be a primary objective. The same is true for just about any other platform; even if you are looking to establish your credentials or credibility, you do want people to actually find your content with ease and would therefore want to invest on SEO.
Articles for Miscellaneous Other Purposes
Article writing assignments on freelance sites can ultimately be meant for other end objectives as well. Ones that I can think of are being printed in digital publications like online or electronic magazines (where the SEO value of your article could possibly be minimal and emphasis would almost entirely be on VERY high quality content), sales pages (maybe series of articles put together), articles made from audio/video transcripts and so on.
Have I missed any other purpose for which articles (specifically) are put to use, with regard to article writing assignments on freelance sites? Please feel free to drop in your comments below!
It is astonishing that there are many newbie freelancers out there who bid completely ridiculous rates, simply to land that first freelance job on freelance job sites like Elance, oDesk, Freelancer, etc.
Mind you, this includes professionals who come into the freelance arena with years of experience behind them.
Somehow, somewhere along the way, they have been told that they need to place very low bids in order for clients to give them that much needed break, which will effectively pave the way for their entry into the coveted world of online freelancing.
Honestly, reality could not have been further from the truth.
I as an Indian freelancer, without any high flying Ivy League college degrees or work experience in any of the Fortune 500 companies, never really felt the need to bid so low, so if you are an individual who is entering the freelance space with years of professional experience behind you, or a college degree from one of the most reputed institutes around, and so on, you need to be all the more realistic with regard to the budgets you quote.
Additionally, you need to bear in mind the fact that while these freelance job sites are filled to the brim with very low paying jobs, there are some good quality jobs with realistic pay scales as well. Those are precisely the kind of jobs that you need to target. An excellent instance would be eBook / Book projects where I have observed the pay scales to be particularly realistic, in line with the kind of compensation that one could expect in the "real world".
Also, there are many companies or businesses working with freelancers directly, and they are more than happy to pay realistically. In most cases, price erosion on the better quality freelance sites (only Elance really, remaining are pretty much run of the mill) takes place primarily because of sub-contracting. So if X lands a job, whether on the same freelance site, some other site, or in the "real world", he or she in turn sub-contracts it on any of the common freelance sites, for much lower, pocketing the margin in between.
As a novice in the realm of online freelancing via these freelance job sites, it is imperative that you remain alert to these dynamics. You do not want your professional credence, your reputation as an individual or business that has always functioned with incredible integrity, to be compromised in anyway.
Keeping these aspects in mind, I would reiterate my assertion about not bidding low, even if you do not have any prior feedback or work history on any of these freelance sites. Remember that sooner or later, you will get a job which respects your professional background and pays you commensurately, in spite of not having any prior feedback or experience on these sites.
Anyone advising you otherwise, especially with regard to bidding very low just to bag that first job or two, is really giving you WRONG advise.
On freelance sites like Elance as well as others, I have very often noticed that even when clients state budgets which are completely ridiculous to say the least, freelancers actually go ahead and bid on such jobs, at the budget quoted by these clients.
This is in spite of the fact that heart of hearts, the freelancers know very well that the budget they are quoting is in no way commensurate to the time and effort that they would be expending on the said task.
As a hypothetical example, let us consider a job which seeks 5 different iterations for a corporate logo that a new business in town is seeking for itself. Now, this business has specified a budget of $100 at $20 for each iteration of the logo - this may seem audacious, ridiculous and laughable to you but fact of the matter is that such job postings also see a lot of bids being placed from freelance contractors, including ones from developed markets like the US or the UK!
Another instance would be a job posting which seeks out say 20 articles of 500 words each, and intends to pay a total of $50, which works out to a sub-slave wage $2.50 per article (if you think this is as bad as things can get, believe me you aren't seen nothing yet, since there are contractors actually bidding by the droves on "artical jobs" (article spelt that way on purpose) which pay a $ or less for each article as well!!
A lot of this undercutting and bargain basement pricing - as quoted by clients, is in fact the doing of contractors themselves. Essentially, somewhere they have come to this (outright false) misconception that the only way they can really win jobs is by quoting totally unrealistic bids which are farfetched from reality, from real world prices, which we pay for items around us.
Through this article, I wish to raise awareness about the fact that you NEED NOT & SHOULD NOT bid unrealistically, only to win jobs on freelance sites. Even as an Indian in the Writing & Translation category on Elance, who has to face a multitude of challenges along the way in trying to win jobs, especially but not limited to all kinds of biases against Indian and South Asian freelance writers about their presumed lack of nativity to the English language - which of course is yet another classic instance of complete misconception as I highlighted in this blog post, I have never resorted to this sort of despicable underbidding.
Remember that each dollar gets me 50 units of my local currency (Indian Rupee) - at least at currently prevailing exchange rates, and yet, since I pay hefty sums for every little thing I purchase here (after all things are not on face value parity terms here whereby I would pay a Rupee for what you would a Dollar in the US). Rather, it is very likely that I would pay 50 Rupees (or maybe even more; a classic instance being the price of petrol - or gasoline as it is referred to in the US, which is priced higher in India than in the US) for the same item which you would pay a solitary $.
So my point is, when an Indian freelancer, even with such highly favorable exchange rates, finds it totally despicable to be bidding very low on freelance sites, what compels you as a freelancer from say the US or the UK to be bidding so low?? What will those measly pennies really get you?? Don't you want to live in such a way that you have easy access to all the good things in life?
Think about these things, the next time you look to bid unrealistically low - amounts which you know are totally unrealistic and in no way commensurate to the time and effort you will be investing on the job at hand.
Way too often, we hear the term "native English speaker" and invariably the notion is seemingly towards nationals of countries like the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand or at the most South Africa.
So in a sense, the allusion seems towards the (presumed) "fact" that nationals of countries other than the ones mentioned above, cannot possibly be "native" to the English language.
This is really such a false notion! I cannot even imagine as to how on Earth did this presumption come along?!
After all, if I take my country, viz. India, there are millions of individuals like me who are very well versed with the English language, to an extent wherein they can read and write fluently in it, without any spelling and grammar issues. Yes, there are some idioms or phrases which a lot of Indians tend to use in a manner as though those phrases and idioms are global to the English language (which they are in fact NOT and purely an Indianized form of usage), but by and large I would say that a very large number of Indians use the English language just as well as nationals from countries I mentioned right in the beginning of this article.
Specific to freelancing, what annoys me to no end is the fact that there are bids on freelance sites which are often declined by clients purely because the freelancer in question happened to be from India, or some such perceived "non native country". This is simply outrageous as well as preposterous in my opinion.
Nationality and nativity are really TWO DIFFERENT THINGS - and one need not necessarily be correlated to the other. This is an aspect which I had emphatically pointed out in the following video on my freelancing specific YouTube channel, which you can see below:
As you will note, this whole (outright false) assumption around nationals from countries other than the ones I mentioned right at the outset NOT being native to the English language is one which annoys me to no end - and one which I am passionate about to an extent wherein I really would like to try and change the mentality of clients around this aspect.
I want them to realize that they should not write off writers from countries like India, Pakistan among others, simply because they happen to be from these countries. India in particular has a very long "English language legacy" which has come down from the British, over a period spanning centuries.
For instance, I would like to point out that:
Most official correspondence in India, say at a governmental or administrative level, invariably takes place in the English language.
Students, including myself (viz. back in the day when I was a "student" in the real sense, although the learning part is of course taking place even till date, and will continue till I am alive) study and learn in the English language, almost entirely. Naturally, by the time they reach college and beyond, they are in a commanding position as far as their comprehension of and comfort with the English language is concerned.
India has seen Booker Prize winners of the likes of Arundhati Roy, as well as a host of other prize winners in the realm of English language literature.
The largest circulated English language daily is in fact an Indian one, The Times of India.
There are instances galore...I could simply go on and on.
Fact of the matter is that freelance websites like Elance (to a relatively lesser extent), oDesk, Freelancer, Guru, etc. see job postings with some of the most pathetic pay scales, which in turn leads to freelancers on these sites being some of the most low grade in quality. That is the reason, while it may be (perhaps is) true that English language freelance writers on these sites are not really the best quality, it does not in anyway mean that Indians as a whole are not comfortable or well versed with the English language.
If I take my own instance, if you pay me well, I will gladly work for you and provide you with the best possible quality of output, comparable with the level of output which any other freelancer in any other part of the world could provide you. If you do not pay me well, not that I will NOT provide you good quality work; just that I will work for you grudgingly, or more likely, not work with you at all...
Over the years, especially in recent times, I have observed the payout rates for transcription work going below what can even be considered as bargain basement wages.
As an instance, I find a lot of contractors regularly putting in bids on freelance sites where they are willing to work on say an hour of audio at JUST $10, $20 or maybe even $30.
These are simply abysmal rates in my opinion.
After all, the whole notion that transcribing an hour of audio translates to an hour of effort is just SO WRONG...transcribing an hour's worth of audio takes way more than just an hour of effort.
In my personal and honest opinion, even when the audio is crystal clear and the accent is clearly comprehensible, it still takes 3 to 4 hours to actually do a thorough job on any transcription assignment. When there are challenges such as:
x poor quality of audio,
x incomprehensible accents,
x multiple speakers,
x time stamps to be put in at regular, specific/non-specific intervals
(example of specific = every minute ; example of non-specific = each time a particular person speaks),
the overall effort and time involved in doing a thorough job on such a transcription assignment increases significantly, sometimes going up to as much as 5 to 6 hours or even more for an hour of audio.
To be charging as little as $10 to say $30 for an hour of audio - as has become the norm on common freelance sites, is simply appalling and abysmal. And to see American freelancers working at such rates is well....I can only shake my head in disbelief!
I had gathered these thoughts of mine together and expressed them in a video which I posted to my freelance YouTube channel, which can be seen below:
As you will see in the video, my idea of what can possibly be considered as ideal payout for transcription work would be in the range of $50 for every effort hour. So if transcribing an hour of audio takes you 4 hours, you should ideally be paid at least $200, assuming that the audio is clear and there are no other issues.
Where there are issues in the audio, akin to the ones I mentioned in bullet points above, the payout should go up incrementally in the range of at least $250 to $300.
Some may say that these are very high wages, but I disagree; at the end of the day, $200 or $300 is NOT a lot of money; even here in India, that is in the range of 10,000 to 15,000 Rupees at current exchange rates, which I am honestly telling you, is NOT a lot of money in India. Therefore, under no circumstances should $200 or $300 be construed as a lot of money.
The reason payouts for transcription work have gone down so much is because the freelancers themselves have brought the rates down by willingly (and foolishly) working at sub-par wages. If contractors / freelancers would be willing to work at such trashy rates, obviously clients would be more than happy to exploit them!
To all freelancers out there, I fervently appeal - life is NOT about working relentlessly. Rather, it is about "working" as less as possible, deriving maximum value out of it (which can only happen with quality wages) and then utilizing the time that is available for all the beautiful things that life has given around us - our family, nature, traveling, cooking, going to the movies, eating out, going on long drives, etc. etc.
If you spend all your time typing away, typing away...frantically and obstinately, when will you actually get to LIVE LIFE?
Think about these things, the next time your fingers move towards those $10 / $20 / $30 figures, when quoting for an hour's worth of audio which needs to be transcribed...
An aspect which has anguished me to no end for a long time now, is to do with the low bids which are placed on freelance projects, particularly by newbie freelancers.
Remember - and just ingrain this in your mind somewhere...
You DO NOT compete on price, you compete on value...
Therefore, even if you are a complete novice as far as freelance sites like Elance, oDesk, Freelancer, etc. are concerned, it does not in anyway mean that you should resort to bottom feeding. Rather, you MUST compete on the (presumably) UNIQUE value which you are able to offer to clients.
Maybe you are blessed with a unique skill set of your own
Maybe you are uniquely placed to deliver on the said project within a time frame that others would find very hard to match up to
Maybe you have years and years of experience behind you
It can be any number of these factors...
What matters is that you realize the importance of bidding realistically - and indeed the fact that you are NOT on any of the said freelance sites merely to win projects at any cost, but rather to make a living.
And this living CANNOT be made at bargain basement prices, when costs of things around us continue to zoom upwards at a scorching pace. If I look at the prices of everyday items around me here in India, they have simply skyrocketed within a relatively short span of time. The price of petrol (or gasoline as Americans refer to it) has more than doubled in India over what it used to sell at, just a few years ago. Ditto with housing prices; metros like Delhi and Mumbai have some of the highest real estate prices in the world and there is seemingly no abetment in their prices, round the corner anytime soon.
In such a scenario, to bid unrealistically low and then try and win projects on freelance sites is nothing short of a SIN in my opinion.
I sincerely hope that in the times to come, freelancers on these freelance sites will gradually realize their folly and bid realistically. That is when the entire freelancing experience will be a much more positive one for the entire freelance community.
Otherwise, we will only languish in this entire spectrum, feeding on crumbs which will not do good to any of us...
Its been a BIG mystery for me - for long, as to why on Earth do many contractors on freelance sites, persistently choose to bid below even what the client has stated is his or her budget?
Please understand my point here...I am not referring to project postings where say the client may have specified a budget range of "Less than $500" or something on those lines, where a $200 bid would as much be within the client specified budget range as would be $499.
Rather, I am alluding towards those projects where the client points out - in a prized little nugget of sorts within his or her project description, that the budget for the concerned project is $100 or say $250, or any other SPECIFIC figure.
In instances like the above, why even bid $99 or $249 respectively?
What makes you think that bidding below client budget - when the EXACT budgetary figure for the project has been specified, will help you bag that project?
Sure, for some of you, maybe the specified budgetary figure may be more than what you typically work at - or over and above what you think would be "good enough" a compensation for the time and effort involved in completing that job, but my point is - in such a scenario, does extra cash hurt?
I am very sure that it DOESN'T and that is exactly what drove me towards making a video on my freelancing channel on YouTube, where I "ranted" about precisely these aspects. You can check out the video below:
Remember that no matter where in the world you might be, prices of things around you are going only one way which is UP. If you reflect back on the prices of a certain set of items say 10 years ago, there is every likelihood that you are paying a significantly larger sum of money for those same items.
In such a scenario, where is the sense in bidding even below what the client has CLEARLY stated to be his or her budget?
DON'T DO THAT...EVER! YOUR SELF RESPECT IS AT STAKE HERE!
As a freelancer from India, working on freelance sites like Elance for a considerably long period of time now, I really can't help but wonder as to why on Earth do American freelancers in particular charge so low rates for the work that they deliver on these sites?
I mean working long hours, researching and then developing content...these are all activities or processes that take up so much time. Then to be paid what I can only refer to as absolute peanuts is something which is simply beyond my ability to fathom.
This is particularly true in light of what is presumably a very high cost of living in the US. As a freelancer from India, where each Dollar gets me about 50 units of local currency (the Indian Rupee), sometimes these projects seem fairly OK for a person in my part of the world, but the same project certainly DOES NOT seem OK for an American to be working on at the same rate, or worse, at a much lower rate!
These are some thoughts which I shared in a recent video I posted to my YouTube channel that you can see below:
My primary point of contention is that when these American freelancers charge so less, freelancers in my part of the world are compelled to charge even low rates!
Further, what is the sense in charging so less when prices around the world are only going one way, which is up?? In fact, I can say with complete assertion that this whole belief that India is very inexpensive on all fronts is very wrong. For instance, the same car makes and models end up costing twice as much in India as they do in the US. Real estate is another sector where prices are much, much higher in India than in the US.
Also, another important factor that a lot of people out there seem to forget completely has to do with lifestyle choices which we individually make in our respective lives. Yes, there are many people in my country who live on $100, $200, or maybe $300 a month, but that is either a choice which they have consciously made for themselves or because of a variety of factors, like lack of education in particular, or the absence of opportunities, they are compelled to live and "manage" in so less...that is something I am neither willing or able to do.
I hope that someday a sense of reality creeps in wherein people realize that it really does not make any sense at all for American freelancers (in particular) as well as other freelancers from the "Western" world to be working at so low rates.
