Feb 21, 2015 02:43 AM
42759 Views
After about a year of freelancing on this site I have to say my experience there overall is horrid.
You spend hours on proposal after proposal, giving an honest stab at something just to see 90% of your effort just goes totally unanswered. One job posting I'm thinking of has 74 proposals and still sits there today with an open status. When you do get lucky and manage a reply, sadly most of those reply's are fishing expeditions by someone without a project or a plan trying to dig up free information or guidance without paying a cent. A second level of time waste, this is super frustrating if you dare call yourself a professional. After a few of those it becomes clear when you're being fished on, but what is the deal with some of these outfits, do they really sit there trying to get you to work for free? Is that a living career for someone? Really? What a screwed up life this is when all you can be is cynical as hell towards anyone that answers your emails.
When you actually land a job and feel like you have finally run the gauntlet and won because a job is finally'awarded' to you, the reality is usually anything but an award. Often times getting landed by most of these people results in a graduate level of blood(eating) leech like activity. I had one guy hire me for a week and proceeded to work me for a month before threatening to escalate things to a legal problem. Looking back he was a d-bag from the start, but what did I know, the customer is always right and being new to that site definitely, you have to be a little bit of a(rear end) kisser to get any attention. I suppose that aptitude has its drawbacks but that's how sales and most of the world works. You have to kiss some babies and shake some hands if you want to be mayor, that's just how it works.
Well freelancing on eLance also has its routines, and that is getting leeched by some snake who knows how to scam you more than you know how to not get scammed is one of them. After effectively cutting my desired rate to a 1/4 of what I thought was already a bargain, I cut off the flow of free information and found shots across my bow less than a day later. What is with some people, has the planet always been full of these clowns? A weeks pay for a months work, that sums up the average winning side of eLance. In other words, when you win, you really lose. Way to go guys.
All in all I have two customers from that place who are actual decent people with real work and aren't out to screw me, but I'm here to tell you that sadly they are a huge exception to the rule. I suppose I'm lucky I managed to find them, then again just from the simple math of it all, they might be the 2% of posters who aren't Jedi level scam artists and as such, we have managed a good business relationship.
tl;dr. eLance s* and if you don't believe me, well have fun s**, you've been warned
