OK, so you’re really good with Microsoft Excel.  You can write bi-conditional nested if statements and vlookups that make peoples head spin.  You’re the only person in your tri-county area that can make a dynamic pivot chart with multiple vertical axes that retains its formatting.  Maybe you’ve even created user-defined functions that have replaced your entire secretarial staff, or written VBA subroutines that made your co-workers shed tears of joy.  Well, this post is for you; the lonesome few that have mastered the tools and are solving complex problems at work, but are looking for a way to tie it all together in a way that takes your career to the next level.

I see two distinct paths you can take as an Excel Guru:  The first is you quit your job, become an independent contractor spending 8 hours a day solving complex issues with various implementations of Excel and Business Automation.  Excel consultants such as these are in demand and making enormous hourly rates. The other path is for those who love the challenge of climbing the corporate ladder, taking on more and more responsibility, and eventually leading other Excel gurus .  Both of these routes have one major thing in common: you have to be able to connect your technological savvy with the business needs of your client or boss.

So how exactly do you translate those skills into value-added business skills?  Here’s an example to get you started:

“The Holy Trinity” -  Raw Data Tab / Static Formula Columns / Pivot

Here’s a framework in three steps that works when you are given a weekly raw data feed and asked to make a report.

1) The Raw Data

First make a “Raw Data” tab on your Workbook and paste that data in exactly as it is in the weekly report.  Don’t delete unneeded columns, or filter out erroneous records, we’ll let Excel do that for us later on.  Any steps you take to pre-process the data now are steps that you’ll have to take each week, which means more work and more potential for making “human” mistakes.  “Paste in the new data, hit refresh, and you’re done” should be your new mantra as you design the report.

2) Static Formula Columns

Next you’ll want to make static formula columns on the raw data tab.

You have data like this:

The first thing you want to do is add calculated fields for values that you’ll need to pivot on later.  The trick here is that the Raw Data coming in each week must always have the same number of columns, say A through H, so that you can add your formulas to I, J, K, etc and know that when you paste your new data in next week they won’t be written over.  The most common formulas here are breaking the “Date” field into “Month”, “Data”, and “Year” (as outlined below) but the possibilities are endless.

Once you’ve added the new columns, enter the formulas

Once you’ve entered all of your formulas, “fill” them down to the bottom of the data.  To more easily identify these calculated fields columns later on, I always make them a different color.

Some other examples of useful columns here are:

• City or State using a vlookup with some unique identifier on another sheet
• Actually constructing your unique identifier key by concatenating several other values together, e.g. =A1&A2&A3 (this one can be really useful in certain situations)

Remember that if you’re dealing with a dataset that has a varying number of rows each week, you’ll have to make sure to drag the formulas down to the end of the new data once you paste it in over the previous weeks data.  That’s a heck of a lot less painful that re-creating the report from scratch each week.  If you wanted to really get fancy you could even do a:

=if(iserror(your_formula_here)=true,”",your_formula_here)

Which would make the formulas blank on rows that didn’t contain data.  Then you could pull the formulas down “to infinity” and never have to worry about it again.  Just watch out for bloated file sizes.

3. Putting it All Together
Here’s is the fun part: Now we’re going to take the data, along with its static formula fields, and translate it into something readable and useful by businesspeople. Data-wise, focus on using pivot tables or pivot charts when possible to automate the report.  Also, ask the client if they are interested in a dynamic report (where the user can interact with the data via pulldown menus, etc.) and design accordingly. 

• W.I.F.M.
  • The one question on a person’s mind when they look at your report is going to be “What’s in it for me?” Think about the needs of the person looking at your report, and cater your deign to those needs.  Try to keep out extranous or non-essential information and get right to the point.
• K.I.S.S.
  • “Keep it simple, stupid!” You’ll want to keep the design of your report elegant and simple, yet rich with useful information.  Here are some experts’ take on report design to help you discover the process yourself:
    • Check out Edward Tufte, who is the quintessential master on the topic of data visualization.
    • Check Out John Peltier’s Site for great tutorials on how to build elegant charts and other visualizations in Excel
    • Get some great design ideas from FlowingData.com
    • The Infosthetics Blog
    • Some great ideas for the advanced user can be found on this blog post, over at Smashing Magazine

Here are some other Excel topics we’re considering writing on next… cast your vote in the comments below for which one you like best, or suggest your own idea:

• Upgrading to Excel 2007: Navigating the Minefield
• Statistical Analysis for Excel: The Missing Guide

Over the next month or two, we will be releasing a number of enhancements to make hiring on oDesk easier than ever. Tonight was the first release, a redesign of the hire confirmation page.

The page is now crisper and cleaner, highlighting the most important parameters for buyers. It also turns a three-page process into one page plus a confirmation box. Plus, if we say so ourselves, we think it just looks better!

There is one new field: “Title/Role”. Buyers can now give their providers a title, different than the one listed in job opening. As a result, the unwieldy “Michael Levinson, Looking for top-noch web designer for e-commerce site” can be replaced by the more natural “Michael Levinson, Senior Web Designer.”

Stay tuned for more meaningful improvements over the next few months, but in the meantime, please share your feedback in the comments, or submit a feature request or suggestion in our feedback forum.

We needed some design help for a couple projects that we knew would be short and simple for someone familiar with Photoshop and had a graphical eye, and turned to oDesk for help. Through our experiences, we wanted to give buyers some advice on how to find a graphic designer to help improve a website, create a logo, or even develop a Twitter background, and pinpoint the one that can deliver the results that you’re looking for when it comes to graphic design for the web.

* Communicate your needs.
What exactly do you want? Be as specific as possible: Provide dimensions of the final product, desired file types and sizes, and give some creative direction. Sometimes even sketches or Powerpoint mockups can help. After all, a picture’s worth a thousand words!
* Provide examples of websites or graphics that you like.
Even if you don’t have a vision of the final product, provide 3-5 examples of websites or logos that have design elements that you like or really don’t like. A brief sentence about why you like or don’t like something (maybe the fonts are fine but you hate the colors) will help the provider get a better sense of what direction to take the job. It’s even better if you can identify 1-2 websites with designs that you want the provider to emulate in style.

* Review the provider’s profile carefully.
Look for a work history of completed projects with similar themes or deliverables to your project. If you’ll be incorporating text into your graphics, make sure providers are from an English-speaking country or have passed the U.S. English language tests with high marks. Review the combination of the provider’s minimum number of hours worked, their total positive feedbacks AND read the reviews. Sometimes you can learn a lot from what is suggested about a provider in their feedback than what is in print.

* Comb the provider’s portfolio.
To make sure you’re working with a pro, see if the graphics used incorporate good optimization practices, so that the images can load quickly without compromising the sharpness of the image. Usually this will take the form of smaller images to help make the page load quickly. Make sure the images aren’t of degraded quality (ex. fuzzy, or grainy imagery), which can happen if a picture is over-optimized. Look at the variety of artwork across the portfolio. Note if the provider uses a variety of standard techniques such as gradients, shading, stock imagery, and incorporation of different fonts.

Those are just a few suggestions on how to find a graphic designer on oDesk to help with your projects. We hope you have as much success with your provider as we had with ours!

DealBase.com is a hotel deals review site, evaluating over 5000 sources to find the best hotel deals and discounts. This article was written by Liz Kao, DealBase.com Director of Marketing.

In a previous blog post we spoke about the growth and performance of the oDesk Customer Success Team, and the progress we have made this year.

As we experienced a doubling of our case load to nearly 10,000 tickets and chats submitted per month, we also recognized the need for improved internal tools to help us achieve operational efficiency, and meet to overarching goal of better serving our customers. After an exhaustive search of more than 15 help desk software solutions, we have selected the one that we feel best meets our needs, as well as the needs of many of our users.

We are pleased to announce the selection of Zendesk as our internal case management solution. Zendesk’s open architecture and rich APIs were a key factor in our decision. We find the SaaS solution elegant, easy to use and learn, and very robust. We look forward to an early 2010 launch of a new customer support portal, which will make use of the Zendesk platform and enhance the experience for all users.

We believe so much in the strength of the winning team of oDesk and Zendesk that we are also thrilled to announce a deeper partnership that includes a new Zendesk Group on oDesk. Within this new group, oDesk buyers will find tried and tested customer service agents, admins and integrators who are experienced with Zendesk. These approved professionals can help transform your help desk and, more importantly, your business. The strong pool of customer service experts available on oDesk combined with the increasing demand for this type of work ensures the ongoing success of this group – we look forward to great things to come from our partnership with Zendesk!

The needs and lifestyle of a freelancer are unique, and we know it’s hard to find advice that deals specifically with your world. So, we’ve gathered up ten websites and blogs we think every freelancer should know about to help make the most of the freelance lifestyle:

	JUNE WALKER: Tax and Financial Advisor to the Self-Employed … From - June Walker, tax consultant Asset - Tax advice for freelancers in the US Read - “Get an EIN for Security Reasons” by June Walker
	CONSULTANT JOURNAL From - Andrea Coutu, founder, marketing consultant Asset - Scam warnings, tax and financial planning info, marketing info Read - “How Commenting on Blogs Markets Your Business” by Andrea Coutu
	FREELANCE LIVING From - Chris King, author, freelancer; various contributors Asset - Inspiration, guidance, advice Read - “What’s Your Business Model” by C.J. Hayden, MCC
	ZEN HABITS: Simple Productivity From - Leo Babauta, Zen master, author Asset - Productivity advice, work/life balance Read - “The Slow Secret: How to Make Lasting Changes in Your Life” by Leo Babauta
	THE SELF-EMPLOYMENT BLOG: Practical Tips for Success From - Karen Greenstreet, small business consultant; various contributors Asset - Thoughts on marketing yourself and your business, inspirational video clips Read – “It’s So Important to Take Time Off” by K. Greenstreet
	FREELANCERS UNION From - Freelancers Union (Exec. Director Sara Horowitz) Asset - Insurance, legal advice, retirement and political advocacy Read - “Unpaid Wages: How to Collect” by Gabrielle
	THE ANTI 9 to 5 GUIDE: Practical Career Advice for Women Who Think Outside the Cube From - Michelle Goodman, freelancer and author Asset - Wisdom targeted to women, but good for all Read - “Recession Ethics for Freelancers” by M. Goodman
	UNDRESS FOR SUCCESS: Work From Home Resources and Advice From - Kate Lister and Tom Harnish Asset - Advice, scam awareness, resources Read - “2008 Telecommuting Stats”
	BRAZEN CAREERIST: Advice at the Intersection of Work and Life From - Penelope Trunk, entrepreneur Asset - Solid career advice for those at home or at work Read – “Focus on Learning in the Face of Recession” by P. Trunk
	EXPIREMENTS IN LIFESTYLE DESIGN From - Timothy Ferriss, author Asset - Inspiration, motivation Read - “How to Respond to Criticism” by T. Ferriss

Working from home can either liberate you or weigh you down — it’s all about how you do it. Having worked from home for over a decade, I’ve learned what works and what just creates more work. Here at oDesk, you’ll find the tips and tools to do it right.

- Tamara

We are pleased to announce our best Providers for October 2009! We have over 350,000 Providers on oDesk, but these ones stood out as the cream of the crop this month, as they performed the most hours of work with the highest feedback rating. They have been given special badges recognizing their achievement.

oDesk Buyers, you might want to get in touch with these Providers soon…they just completed assignments and are available now, but probably won’t be for long. Click on their profile to check out their work and contact them for an interview!

	Top 25 Freelance Designers for October 2009 were:
1	Arvind T.	PHP/IIS/MS SQL, joomla, PHP, Drupal, MySQL, Ajax, XHTML
2	Susan B.	Silver Cat Studios – Audio/Video/CBT Production; Script/Copy Writing;
3	M Paul	3D artist/animator -3DSmax, Zbrush, After Effects, Flash…
4	Vivek Acharya	Programmer in Iphone/VB.Net/ASP/C#/PHP/Joomla
5	Kim M.	Senior Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop, Flash, Dreamweaver, and InDesign
6	Abdullah Al-Baki	Ultimate 3D Modeler and Architectural visualizer
7	Anna P.	Graphic Designer
8	Mick D.	Web Expert, Photoshop,Flash Animation, HTML/CSS, Web2.0, Logo Designer
9	Xenia S.	Search Engine Optimization, Blogging, Social Media Marketing
10	Herbert M.	Fine Artist, Over 600 oDesk Hours, Perfect Rating, Great Portfolio
11	Guillaume Le Taeron	3D for game & Illustration, Iphone game development, Android
12	Bill Whitney	Illustration, animation art, for corporate presentation and law cases
13	Stanimir S.	<+> Creative Freelancer 2D & 3D Designer (Architecture) <+>
14	Anait Sagoyan	►► PROFESSIONAL LOGO & WEBSITE MOCKUP DESIGNER WITH HIGH-END PORTFOLIO
15	Agnes B.	creative logo designer always in time/strong in marketing & branding
16	Daniela C.	ARCHITECT – 2d and 3d- DESIGNER
17	Jonathan Antonio	ODESK TOP DESIGNER / ILLUSTRATOR
18	Nikolay Atanasov	3D Generalist / Post prduction
19	Johlett Van Der Merwe	Unique & Noticeable Print Design & Fine Art
20	Srujith Kudikala	Microsoft Certified .NET programmer, PHP/MYSQL, ORACLE,JOOMLA
21	Joanna C.	Listed #1 Best Freelance Designer Sept 2009/Joomla/Zencart/Graphics
22	Wajeeha Hussain	3 years experienced and professional Graphic Designer+editing expert
23	Alexey Medvedev	○●○●3D MODELING║VISUALIZATION║ARCHITECT║GRAPHIC║CAD specialist○●○●
24	Michelle Gamboa	MICHELLE@WORK
25	Jashan K.	Web2.0, Mockups, Logos, Prints, Illustrations, HTML, DHTML, CSS, Flash

	Top 25 Freelance Software Developers for October 2009 were:
1	Vikas S.	4yr Exp. Sharepoint,C#.Net,VB.Net,SQLServer,AJAX,WebServices
2	Alexander M.	Microsoft Certified C#.NET/ASP.NET/J2SE/J2EE Senior Developer
3	Ivan T.	Sr. .NET Developer / Technical Architect, 6+ years of experience
4	Gurpal M.	ASP.NET/Ajax and DotNetNuke Professional
5	Ravi K.	ASP.NET+VB+VB.NET+AJAX+RSS
6	Luis Gomez	Sr. Developer in C#, C++, MS SQL, Website Development & Administration
7	Alex Bowling	Wide Array of Experience
8	Yuriy E.	4000+ oDesk hours, Senior C#/.Net Developer
9	Anatoly Mikhailov	RubyOnRails/Ruby, jQuery/Prototype Developer | xHTML, CSS Designer
10	Shrish T.	Silverlight and ASP.NET 3.5 expert
11	Denis S.	.NET and java Developer
12	Amit Agrawal	Programmer / Developer
13	Pankaj Singh	Java Developer
14	Vlad I.	.NET 3.5 (C#, ASP.NET), C++(STL,Boost, ATL,MFC,WinAPI), Java
15	Cantor Fan	7+ years experience/J2EE/EJB/Java/Oracle/PHP/ERP/Twitter
16	Budugu N.	Top 10% in Testing – QA, iseb Trainer, Online Research, Admin Support
17	Amrik Singh	ASP.Net/VB.Net/C#.Net/VBA programmer
18	Meteonic Innovation	PMP/Sys-Engg/Architects/Designers/System Test ::C,C++/Games/Android
19	Rodion Bykov	Adobe Air/Flex/Coldfusion/MSSQL/PHP/MySQL development & management
20	Jan K.	❶ Experienced Flash / Web / Joomla developer ★★US Based★★
21	Ross C.	Senior iPhone/C/C++/Web/Python Developer
22	Ajit J.	Expert DNN Programmer
23	Alexey Verenikin	Web design & development, 10+ years of experience
24	Sandra Qiu	oDesk certified iPhone expert (1st!)
25	Nelson T.	Flash, Photoshop, Illustrator, HTML, CSS

	Top 25 Freelance Web Developers for October 2009 were:
1	Evgeny M.	PHP/MySQL/DHTML/Ajax Developer/Project Manager
2	Tatiana D.	PHP, MySQL, Drupal Developer, Team Leader
3	Alexander D.	Expert J2EE/JBoss, PHP/MySQL, AJAX, SMARTY Developer
4	Olexiy O.	Java/J2EE Architect / Senior Developer
5	Dmitry A.	ASP.net/Mobile – Professional Experience
6	Dora M.	Dora
7	Vladimir K.	ColdFusion/MSSQL/PHP/Smarty/mySQL developer
8	Denis S.
9	Fahmi A.	Full PHP Experience
10	Igor G.	Java Developer
11	Yaroslav O.	Senior (around 3000 oDesk hours) PHP/MySQL/Ajax, Project Manager
12	Alexander Aristov	Self-motivated software developer (j2ee, JSP, javascript, ASP, .NET)
13	Mircea C.	Senior Delphi Expert Software Developer, with JAVA, C# .NET and PHP
14	Misha B.	Drupal/PHP/MySQL/HTML/JS/CSS
15	Jane Durm	Sales & Marketing, Management, Admin. Assistant, Customer Service
16	V K.	Unmatched Silverlight and ASP.NET 3.5 Professional
17	Maninder S.	HTML/ XHTML/ CSS Developer, Certified Wordpress Professional
18	Gurdeep Dhillon	PHP/MySQL/Ajax Drupal Joomla Wordpress ECommerce Rails UberCart Expert
19	Denis Statsenko	Greatest PHP/MySQL/AJAX/Symfony/Smarty/osCommers/Joomla developer
20	Vladimir Fedorov	Flash & Flex developer
21	Andrey Z.	Experienced PHP/Python/Django/Coldfusion/Flex web-developer
22	Yogesh S.	Certified ASP.net|C#.Net|VB.Net Developer|SQL Server 2005|VB 6|VBA
23	Alexei Shulga	PM & Zend certified PHP,MySQL,Ajax,CakePHP, CI, ZF senior developer
24	Durrab Khan	Sr.Software Lead & Architect | Flex/AIR/Spring/Java/J2EE/J2ME/Android
25	Sri Vardhan Gogineni	Developer

	Top 25 Freelance Writers for October 2009 were:
1	Deborah Hemstreet	Specialist in Online Help, Manuals, Presentations, and More!
2	Chitra Raghavan	Business Research Analyst
3	Christopher Subijano	TOP 10%! Superb SEO Writer/Link Builder/Business Consultant/Engineer
4	Deepa Ashith	TOP ODesk Writer/Business Analyst/CopyWriter
5	David Tong	Senior Technical Writer, Photography Instructor
6	Manal Sh	Accountant , Bookkeeper ,E-learning , English>Arabic Translator,Moo
7	Cc M.	Professional – Project Management, Design, Content, Data Entry
8	Georges D.	Forex trader / MQL coder / English – French – Arabic translator
9	Jayne W.	♣♣♣ Microsoft Office Expert ♣♣ Researcher ♣♣ Teacher ♣♣♣
10	Jamie M.	Data Entry, Data Mining, Copy and Paste Work Expert
11	Graham Land	Creative/Copywriter, research, travel, branding, SEO, Swe-Eng trans.
12	Michelle Grace	Data Entry/Researcher/VA/Social Bookmarking/DocumentEditing/WebContent
13	Ramon B.	Excellent WRITER, resourceful ADMIN ASST, first-rate TRANSCRIPTIONIST
14	Ray Kirstein	Voice and Production Pro
15	Jason Spidle	Professional Writer, Web Programmer and Certified Project Manager
16	Bryan D.	Experienced Email support, Research/Writer, Graphic Designer, CSR
17	Sally R.	On the ball administration, research, writing, editing and data entry
18	Betsy Pickering	Creative/Technical Writer | Native English Speaker
19	Ed Q.	۞ Data Entry Expert/Autocad Capable/Virtual Assistant/Video Editor ۞
20	Maria Revillo	English to Spanish translator
21	Susan Campbell	Trusted Content Writer – Articles,Sales Pages, eBooks, Website Content
22	Geefe A.	efficient and committed business writer/researcher/virtual assistant
23	Faith M.	Multi-Skilled eBook Writer/Blogger/Spinner/SEO/LinkBuilder/Top Tests
24	Ronald Uy	Result Oriented/ Hard Working/ Professional/WordPress Writer-Blogger
25	Roselyn M.	Data Entry/Research/Social Bookmark/Article Submission

	Top 25 Virtual Assistants for October 2009 were:
1	Roshni K.	Kashwork :Writer, VA, Data Entry, CRM, Project Manager, Admin Support
2	A R.	Virtual Assistant/Data Entry/Data Mining/Research/VA/PA/eCommerce
3	Suresh M.	Virtual Assistant,Data Entry,Data Mining,Excel,Web Research,PA&VA
4	Marc A.	Data Entry, Directory Admin, part-time Writer, and more…
5	Sujata John	Data Entry Specialist – Freelance Data Entry Professional, India
6	Hazel S.	Smart, versatile and capable native english speaker
7	Livia R.	Data Entry-Virtual/PersonalAssistant-Directory Submission-Researcher
8	Benedetta De Rose	Professional Translator
9	Angela S.	I am your Experienced and Professional Administrative Assistant
10	Desiree L.	Expert Fr/Sp Translator, Social Media Marketer and Content Manager
11	Lizza M.	***Virtual Assistant, Researcher & Data Entry Professional***
12	Abigail Paladin	Admin. Assistant, 6Yrs as Call Center Agent, ESL Tutor for Japanese
13	Kaye A.	Accounting/Bookkeeping/MSOffice/Data_Entry/Craigslist Proficient
14	Kevin Ochoco	FREELANCE I.T. Technician / Data Entry / Customer Support
15	Manolito Sulit	Online Media Strategist, Project Manager, ITO/BPO Provider
16	Marcela N.	Data Entry, Social Bookmarking, Researcher
17	Minhaz P.	oDesk 5000+ hrs, Data entry specialist, Link builder, Banner designer
18	Rachel L.	Reseacher, Data Entry, Social Bookmarking,Facebook
19	Abraham Jozsef	Experienced oDesk Provider – Data Entry, Research, MS Office, Admin S.
20	Nouman K.	VA,Web-research,HTML,CSS,Craigslist and Data Entry Expert
21	Michael B.	Expert in Data Entry, Article Writing, SEM, SMM, SEO, Tech Support
22	Daizy Raisinghani	Data Entry Expert
23	Travis B.	American! 5 Star Rating! Highly proficient with broad set of skills!
24	Simolyn S.	~Virtual Assistant/Customer Service/Telemarketer/Researcher/Recruiter~
25	Lily Roy	Legal, Administrative Support, Reserching, Writing & Data Entry

These rankings will be generated each month, and stored in the oConomy under “Rankings”. October Rankings will be published on December 1st. Congratulations again!

The demand for iPhone developers on oDesk has only increased over the past year. If you are currently developing for the iPhone and looking for some more resources to keep your skills sharp, or you’re wanting to get started developing, the links below should be helpful.

	The Mobile Orchard – Top notch tutorials, news and a weekly post on “This Week in iPhone News” that can be helpful if you want to stay up to date up in a condensed format.
	Maniac Dev - Offers news updates and commentary on iPhone features, tutorials, and even has an excellent top ten list of their own.
	The Apple Blog – Includes a few helpful tutorials, but mostly focuses on keeping you apprised of happenings in the world of Apple. Check out their walkthrough on Adding Analytics to your App.
	iCode Blog – iPhone Tutorials, and excellent commentary including this reaction to Adobe announcing that Flash CS5 will be able to export iPhone Apps.
	iPhone SDK Articles – As the name suggest, no frills, just straight up tutorials. Case in point, a helpful article on dynamically adjusting your apps to local currency, language, and timezone.
	Cocoa with Love – Cocoa and Objective-C Programming Tutorials for both Mac and iPhone. In depth analysis, like this article on optimizing loading of large tables on the iphone.
	iPhone Development – Offers excellent iPhone commentary, Jeff Lamarche is the Author of “Beginning iPhone Development: Exploring the iPhone SDK”. Read this article where he praises, tears down, and rebuilds a snippet of code on device detection.
	iPhone Incubator – Solid news, commentary and tutorials. An interstesting counterpart to oDesk’s Top 10 Banned iPhone Apps, is iPhone Incubators’s Top 57 ways to get your app rejected from the App Store.
	Mac Create – iPhone news and interviews with developers. Read Toki Torri App creators talk about how they hatched this well recieved game.
	App Every Day – The anonymous author “Matt”, created 25 apps in 25 days in the month of August 2009, all the code is available for download. An ambitious, and interesting project.

Helpful Non-Blog Links

The following, while not traditional blogs, might be very helpful links if you are interested in developing for the iPhone.

	Apple’s iPhone Developer Portal – It’s tough to beat the documentation that apple provides.
	iPhone Dev Central- Offers a database of user submitted tutorials.
	iPhone Dev SDK – Unnoffical iPhone development forums.
	iPhone Dev Camp – The iPhone Dev Camp is a non-profit organization that meets regularly to present iPhone apps and select winners of their “Hackathon” contest, many of the entries are open-source.

Congratulations to “Stylish and Dry When it Rains”, the winner of oDesk’s October Design of the Month Contest. This project was for a skilled designer to create a postcard that demonstrated his or her best creativity and skill sets while also representing the products and message of www.AmeRain.com. They actively promoted their contest submission, bringing in an impressive number of votes and helping them win a $1,000 oDesk credit and an Apple iPhone 3GS.

Runners-Up:

• “iPOV Corporate Website Design” This project was a complete overhaul of the design of the buyer’s corporate website. The purpose was to clearly communicate their instructional design approach to visitors and potential clients. The new design has a new look and feel, layout, and diagrams to help get the buyer’s message across within a clean, professional design.
• “LingQ Redesign” This was an update to the design and functionality of the buyer’s website at LingQ.com. The talented providers hired for this job made significant changes to the site’s core functionality and design to provide a cleaner and more user friendly appearance.
• “HelperHire Website” This was a design of a database driven website similar to a dating site in functionality. The buyer wanted a simple design with the least amount of pages and text as possible but also user friendly with a friendly, outdoors, happy theme.

This month’s contest served as a reminder of the amazing design talent we have in our oDesk community of providers. All oDesk buyers who completed any type of design job through oDesk were eligible to submit their designs to the contest. Winners were determined entirely by oDesk community voting. We’d like to thank all of the participants in this month’s contest and helping to make it yet another success. Stay tuned for our next contest which we anticipate will be bigger and better than any we’ve done in the past. As always, we’d love your feedback so feel free to submit your suggestions within the comment section below for future consideration. And please join us in congratulating our winners for October! Nice work folks!

Piggybacking off our recent post on the Top 10 Must-Read Affiliate Marketing Blogs, today we’re happy to bring you our list of the Top 5 Affiliate Marketing Events.

These events bring together some of the smartest, most-experienced minds in affiliate marketing.  The industry is all about relationship-building and networking, so these events are a must for advertisers & publishers alike.

	Affiliate Summit Focus: Provides educational sessions on the latest affiliate marketing industry issues. Next event: January 17-19, 2010 in Las Vegas, NV
	Commission Junction University Focus: Brings industry experts, advertisers and publishers together to share knowledge and experiences. Next event: TBA 2010
	PubCon Focus: Educational conference for those involved in all phases of internet marketing. Next event: November 10-13, 2009 in Las Vegas, NV
	A4U Expo Focus: Affiliate marketing experts from around the world come together to discuss the industry. Next event: May 18-19, 2010 in Munich, Germany
	PPC Summit Focus: Aimed primarily at pay-per-click marketers, though many affiliates do use PPC in their strategies. Next event: November 4-5, 2009 in Chicago, IL

Of course, we’d be remiss we didn’t mention our own recently launched Affiliate Program.  We’re excited to partner with affiliate marketers, but we are even more excited to introduce the world of affiliate marketing to oDesk. Publishers can use oDesk for all of their day-to-day needs, since oDesk is a great place to find web developers, graphic designers, blog writers, virtual assistants, and online marketers (SEO, PPC, and social media experts).

Once you sign up for our program, we will:

• Pay you $10 for each new business you send us that signs up & verifies a payment method.
• Pay you 10% of all of the money we make from those businesses for the first year after they sign up. (our average job size is $5,000!)

We look forward to a long-term, fruitful relationship working together.

If you think you’re the office ”excel ninja” – with your fancy vlookups and your pivot table prowess – think again, powder-puff.  These guys will smack you all the way back to Lotus 1-2-3 with their Excel skills.

1) Pac-Man
Are you kidding me?  If you’re an Excel Geek like me, this one will make your heart skip a beat.  This guy from Japan made the entire Pac-Man video game by using the cells as “pixels”.  He set the zoom at 10%, and then automated the changing of fill colors within the cells using VBA to animate the game.  If lovin’ games in excel is wrong, then I don’t wanna be right!

2) 3D Game Engine
Defining true ostentatiousness and technical supremacy, this guy created a full-blown 3D-rendering gaming engine inside Excel.  If you’ve never seen a three-dimensional spinning cube inside Excel, you’re missing out…big time.

3) AC/DC Video
Take an old-school ASCII-Art Nerd from the 80’s, a die hard AC/DC fan, and an Excel Geek: mix them all together and this is what you get: An AC/DC video in the lowest fidelity imaginable.  But hey, you’re watching the video inside an Excel spreadsheet, so get over it. You have to see it to believe it.

4) Music Synthesizer
Offered on the Microsoft Website as a free download, this Excel program is a fully functional music synthesizer complete with musical staff notation.  Use it to control your favorite MIDI device, or jam out through your computer’s sound card.

5) Anything by This Guy
Jon Peltier is the man. If Excel skills could kill, this guy would be a Japanese Naginata.  His section on charting is unbelievable, especially for an advanced user that wants to kick it up to the next level.  And don’t even get me started on his online tutorials.

What is the craziest thing you’ve ever seen in Excel?

The oDesk team recently pulled together our thoughts on the ways business, technology and the working world intersect. The result of our brainstorm? The Future of Work: An educational presentation that explores how technology is changing how the world works.

Check it out, share it, discuss it – We’re excited about the future of work, and we hope that you will be too!

Recently I’ve seen some tweets from those curious about the presence of extremely low bids on oDesk.

My response is that it doesn’t matter. Or at least, it shouldn’t.

Face it, if the only thing that makes you a viable canidate for a project is your price, then you’ll need to have the lowest bid. But is that the kind of freelance or contract work you want?

This isn’t a groundbreaking thought, but perhaps I can offer the perspective of an active contractor and bring some of the philosophical arguments into the real world. I’m self-employed and manage the technology needs of small businesses, consult on various projects, and write software. I use oDesk to manage all of my contract web development work. In that field, you’ll find some jobs with hourly rates of $10, $5, and even $3, yet I have active and ongoing projects at much higher rates.

Last November, in an interview with the BBC, I expressed that I was satisfied with the amount of work I had through oDesk, but was confident I could get more if I wanted. A little less than a year later, things have slowed down and I decided it was time to start bidding on work again. A few weeks ago I started actively bidding for new oDesk jobs. Here’s how I view the process – in some admittedly broad strokes:

Understand that you’re not going to get – or even be considered for – some jobs. Some buyers are looking for the lowest bid – and for some jobs that is fine. Other buyers won’t be able to meet your rates, which may very well mean they can’t afford what they say they want. Don’t let a candidacy that ends with ‘rate too high’ shake you. Just as the buyer limits their potential providers by the constraints of their budget, your rate limits your potential jobs – and that’s a good thing. It helps you weed out the jobs that aren’t as valuable as the service you provide.

Don’t let a low average bid affect your rate. oDesk recently changed how much information you are able to see about other candidates when you visit a job posting, but you’ll still see how many people have applied to that job and the average bid. Don’t use that to set your rate, though. Your rate should be determined by the value of your work, your skillset, your experience, and many other factors. It shouldn’t determine the way others value their work, their skillset, or their experience. In the same way, remember that the kind of provider a buyer is looking for – and the budget they have – isn’t tied to the average bid amount.

Forget where you live. If the only justification for your rate being higher than other providers is that “it’s more expensive where I live”, then you need to find a job in an office near your house. It doesn’t matter what you think of tariffs and protectionism, oDesk is a global marketplace. You’re competing with providers in different countries, as well as different economic areas in a single country. Your rate shouldn’t be determined by the cost of your mortgage, or the price of your dinner, it should be determined by what your work is worth.

There’s nothing wrong with starting slow. When you’re starting out, it may take some time to figure out what your work is worth. To get your first few jobs, you may need to bid lower than what you want to be making in the long term. Then, once you gain experience and reputation on oDesk, you can increase your rates. While you shouldn’t let the rates of others affect what you set as your own rate, you do have to be aware of what the market will accept. Keep in mind that you don’t have to be competitive to the entire oDesk market, just enough to provide the amount of work you want. If you have a few jobs in progress, it may be a good time to increase your rates, start bidding jobs, and see if you can be successful with a higher rate.

Focus on the right jobs. Things like a good cover letter, examples of work, certifications, and oDesk groups can make you stand out from other providers. But after a while you get a feel for what jobs best fit your profile of skills and experience. Some jobs don’t require the amount of experience you have, some jobs aren’t the kind of work you find yourself getting hired to do. If you really want to stand out as the right provider for a job – focus on the type of job that consistently results in positive feedback.

Is it possible to get work on oDesk with a rate far above the average provider rate in your field, or for a specific job? Yes. It just may take some time, and a bit of determination.

When I started bidding for jobs on oDesk my rate was about a quarter of what it is today. Close to a thousand hours on oDesk means something – but it doesn’t mean everything. Honestly, the biggest change in my rate came not because I felt I’d established a track record on oDesk, but because I realized that I didn’t need to worry about what others were charging. I know what my time is worth outside oDesk and – since I’ve proven I can work just as effectively through oDesk – there is no reason for my time on oDesk to be worth any less.

Was my claim to BBC still accurate, as I started actively bidding on oDesk jobs? For the past month or so I reviewed each job that matched my (rather broad) search terms. I know that the jobs I get tend to be single-developer, long-term jobs, with a buyer who has some familiarity with web development, yet needs high-level requests to be understood and implemented. Those were the jobs I focused on. Even still, for most of the jobs I received no response. But one job – on which I bid my usual rate, even though the average bid was lower than the rate I started on oDesk with – has panned out. Now I have another ongoing contract job, at the rate I set, and feel is acceptable for the services I provide.

And yes, I’m confident that in the future, if I want the work, I can go to oDesk and find it.

Tim Lytle is a Technology Consultant & oDesk Contract Web Developer. Owner of timlytle.net ltd since 2003, his oDesk adventures have been mentioned on the BBC’s Click and in Forbes Magazine.

Call it “Twittiquette,” call it what you will, but there are unspoken rules of the Twitterverse that everyone diving (or just slipping toes) into this social media pool should know. The water may look shallow and unintimidating from the deck, but if you don’t know what you’re doing, you’re likely to drown.

Check out these TOP 10 WAYS TO LOSE TWITTER FOLLOWERS for tips on how you can stay afloat:

10. Passing off someone else’s fabulous tweet as your own. Here’s how this one goes down: Your friend makes a supremely witty observation about Balloon Boy. You laugh and tweet his words yourself, without taking the time to note it’s a re-tweet. This may seem like no big deal, but it is a major breech of  Twitter etiquette.

9. Twittering your love life. It’s a fine line. We know. It’s nice to know when a friend is having a nice date. It’s  not nice to know they have “moved things into the hot tub.” Really … if you wouldn’t do it in front of your mother, don’t tweet it.

8. Twittering other people’s private lives. A juicy tweet can be hard to resist. You meet a client for lunch, afterward they leave with someone young and pretty who is not the wife you met last time. Seems innocent enough to make a funny tweet about it, right? Well you’re treading on thin ice. Social media has brought everyone a little closer than you think, and there is a chance — no matter how small — that this could be damaging. Is it worth it?

7. Writing one-word tweets. This. Gets. Old. You have 140 characters. Use them. Creative people use words. Plural. Use your words, people.

6. Twittering arguments. Fighting with Internet acquaintances is tempting. You’re having a bad day, they say something that offends you, and — wham! — you engage in a Twitter  feud. Don’t do it. If famous people who write books can’t get away with it, neither can you.

5. Twittering rumors that later turn out to be false. Raise your hand if you have sent out a premature “RIP” tweet about a celebrity who later turned out to be very much alive. Please tell us you’ve learned your lesson. Don’t tweet major news unless you really know it’s true. And we mean really know it’s true.

4. Twittering spoilers. Prefacing your tweet with “SPOILER ALERT” doesn’t quite cut it when we’re talking about 140 characters screaming boldly across your friend’s phone or laptop. Even movie stars aren’t allowed to do that anymore. Don’t tell us the end of a movie, the end of this week’s LOST, but seriously (seriously) don’t tell us who got the boot on American Idol.

3. Twittering your bodily functions. This should be a given, but it’s not. This happens all the time, and it is one of the fastest ways to get acquaintances, business contacts and distant relatives to stop following you. In fact, you’ll be lucky if your college roommate wants to keep reading your tweets if you head down this road.

2. Twittering incessantly. No one wants to scroll through tweets from you to get to the rest of their friends’ updates. Limit yourself to one or two an hour, and send direct messages if you are having a conversation. Is this rule written in stone? No. But it should be.

And the number one way to lose followers …

1. Bitterly slamming cities, people, businesses, etc. It’s so easy to become a Twitterverse legend, and not in a good way — just ask the guy who famously insulted a client’s city! You feel safe when you can see all the faces of your followers, but it’s an illusion. This is the World Wide Web, and you’d do well to remember that.

Working from home can either liberate you or weigh you down — it’s all about how you do it. Having worked from home for over a decade, I’ve learned what works and what just creates more work. Here at oDesk, you’ll find the tips and tools to do it right.

- Tamara

We’re excited about taking part in today’s FailCon event being put on by the folks at Snap Summit.  It will be a great venue for entrepreneurs to share ideas about the most common startup mistakes, and take away practical and actionable advice to help keep each other from the dreaded #fail.

In an effort to do our part to help startups succeed, we’re extending the oDesk Challenge to all of the companies demoing at FailCon.  We’re going to roll up our sleeves and find the very best talent on oDesk for these companies, so they can build online workteams to save money and stay flexible.

Here are the companies showcased at FailCon – we’ll be personally extending our offer to them during the event today.

	Webvanta Webvanta is a new kind of hosted content management system (CMS) that allows designers to easily build content-rich sites with structured data, without having to mess with back-end code.
	YourVersion YourVersion is a revolutionary real-time discovery engine that lets you easily discover, share and bookmark new, relevant web content tailored to your interests.
	WeMakeItSafer Statistically, you have at least 5 products with safety defects in your home right now and don’t know about it. WeMakeItSafer has the only recall search tool with advanced filtering and image gallery to help you quickly identify potential hazards.
	MyJobReferrals With MyJobReferrals.com, it’s easy for individuals to browse through open job opportunities and identify positions that a friend or colleague might be interested in hearing about.
	Klout Klout measures influence on topics across the social web to find the people the world listens to.
	Freshout We’ve had clients from every continent and deeply enjoy the intersection of different verticals and cultures. We view your distance as an opportunity to innovate rather than a challenge.
	Fido Factor The Ultimate guide to dog-friendly locations.
	Creative.ly Creative.ly is a fun place to find and collect the best images from all over web. Catalog your favorite photos from flickr or other great websites. Show off the images you love and discover new images from people who share your taste.
	BackBlaze The no fuss solution to getting all your data backed up securely. Online backup for only $5/month per computer for unlimited storage.
	MoApps The first real estate app you need. Before you purchase a home, or move to a new location, you need to know the local economy.
	ScrumNinja Plan and estimate projects with ease. Keep your team focused and productive. Track progress and who’s working on what. Deliver high-level business value to your product owners. Manage feature delivery and acceptance.
	MeeHive Specify your interests, and we deliver the news. Get the latest from around the world Take MeeHive with you via iPhone, RSS, email and more Discover new interests Share and discuss with friends and family
	TribeVibe Tribevibe will change the way you think about measuring and curating content. We’re not quite ready to let the world hear the beat yet. But you can register now to request an invitation to the initial alpha program. More than 3000 people have already signed up!
	Envolve With Envolve you’ll be able to discuss websites in real-time with other readers, share your thoughts with a global audience, and network with other like-minded individuals.
	Econetix We build residential energy efficiency systems that are focused on providing rich end-user experiences. Our products are affordable, easy to use, and are designed to introduce long-term energy efficient behaviors into the home.

Moments ago, the odometer at oDesk’s oConomy rolled over. Our providers have earned over $100 million dollars on oDesk – a fantastic feat that has all of us here in Menlo Park cheering.

This rate grows every day, and there will be more work done on oDesk this month than on any other online work marketplace. Period.

In addition to passing this tremendous milestone, oDesk continues to grow 3-5 times faster than any other online work marketplace.

So congratulations to our incredible providers, and to the buyers who have hired them. You guys are changing how the world works!

My faith in professional online etiquette was called into question last week, when I spotted a rather unflattering eBay auction—posted by a professional dealer no less—advertising a car. In a single run-on sentence devoid of capital letters, the auction promised heightened sexual attraction for anyone in the driver’s seat, contained several obvious spelling mistakes, and concluded with no less than 18 exclamation points. If ever there was an example of how not to conduct business online, this auction was it.

Acting professional in online communications, whether through email, online postings, or profiles, should be a matter of common sense for oDesk providers and buyers alike. Unfortunately, the comfortable anonymity that stems from communicating through a computer keyboard can be quite deceptive. As a result, the automatic etiquette-check in our brain that separates professional communications from informal situations may never get tripped. Should this happen, lucky individuals will just eat a crow sandwich and move on. Those less fortunate could miss key employment opportunities or even lose clients.

Blogs and guides for more detailed “netiquette” are everywhere, but Netmanners.com should be a prerequisite for anyone venturing into a professional online career. Carol Bory’s daily blog on business etiquette and Marcia Pledger’s suggestions are also worthy reads. If you don’t have hours to study the finer points however, these six etiquette tips can help ensure you don’t commit a professional faux pas.

• Don’t use smiles or emoticons. These are fun, cute ways to convey emotions in an informal email or forum post, but they don’t belong in a professional communication. Good rule of thumb: if you’re not sure a particular passage will be taken correctly without a smiley or emoticon, don’t use that passage.

• Don’t get fancy on fonts or formatting. Formatting can change between computers, fancy fonts or multi-colored formatting can sometimes be difficult to read, and frankly, it also looks like a cheap attempt to get attention.

• Keep email attachments small. Under 256 Kilobytes (Kb) is a good rule of thumb. If you’re unsure what kind of connection your recipient is using, contact them first to ask permission on larger attachments.

• Don’t use internet lingo or abbreviations. Everyone likes to LOL, but AFAIC, such lingo is far too informal—and potentially confusing—for anything but basic chatting between friends.

• Include your email address in your closing signature. Aside from being convenient, some mail readers don’t display email addresses. Sure, one could just hit reply, but what if your message was forwarded to someone else?

• Don’t type angry. You will type things when you’re angry that you’d never, ever say to someone in person, and if you send it, you will regret it.

To celebrate the recent launch of the new oDesk Affiliate Program, we’ve gathered a list of the Top 10 Must-Read Affiliate Marketing blogs on the web.  For each one of these awesome blogs, we’ve given you some information about who writes the content and why we think their blog is great.  We’ve also linked to one of their must-read articles.

If you’re looking to get involved with affiliate marketing, why not learn from the best?

	Shoemoney: Skills to Pay the Bills Who writes it? – Jeremy Schoemaker, internet marketer, founder of Shoemoney Media Group Why it’s great - Jeremy’s informative posts, the Marketplace Must-read article - “How To Avoid Obvious Failure As An Affiliate” by Jeremy Schoemaker
	Zac Johnson: Inside the Secret Life of a Super Affiliate Who writes it? – Zac Johnson; affiliate marketer Why it’s great – Nice roundup of internet marketing tools, solid content Must-read article - “5 Simple Ways to Increase Click Through Rates” by Zac Johnson
	Murray Newlands: Affiliate Marketing Blog & Social Media Marketing Blog Who writes it? – Murray Newlands; internet marketer, blogger, ebook author Why it’s great - Useful news updates relevant to internet marketers, interesting interviews Must-read article - “Affiliate Marketing for Merchants” by Murray Newlands
	John Chow: The Miscellaneous Ramblings of a Dot Com Mogul Who writes it? - John Chow; internet marketer, founder of The TechZone and TTZ Media Network Why it’s great – John’s marketing wisdom & his sense of humor Must-read article - “5 Strategies to Make Money as an Affiliate Marketer” by John Chow
	Affiliate Tip: An Affiliate Marketing Blog Who writes it? - Shawn Collins; internet marketer, co-Editor-in-Chief of FeedFront Magazine, Founder of GeekCast.fm Why it’s great - Shawn’s section for Affiliate Newbies, video posts Must-read article - “Step-by-Step Process to be an Affiliate” by Shawn Collins
	John Cow: Making Money Online Who writes it? - Jason Katzenback; internet entrepreneur Why it’s great - The name (a play on John Chow), Jason’s conversational writing style Must-read article - “Don’t be a Shy Affiliate Marketer” by “John Cow”
	Finch Sells: Affiliate Marketing & Creative Thinking Who writes it? – Finch; internet marketer, affiliate, blog artist Why it’s great – Finch’s no-bs style, the Affiliate Toolbox Must-read article - “Investing For The Future With Affiliate Marketing” by Finch
	Affiliate X Files: How Does Affiliate Marketing Work Who writes it? – Ron Cripps; marketing copywriter Why it’s great - Great introductory articles for those new to affiliate marketing, tutorials Must-read article - “How To Become An Affiliate Marketer” by AffiliateX
	Affiliate Marketing Blog: from UK Offer Media Who writes it? – Kieron Donoghue; internet marketer, founder of UK Offer Media Why it’s great - Top-notch insight into the world of internet marketing Must-read article - “The benefits of working full time in Affiliate Marketing” by Kieron Donoghue
	MoreNiche Affiliate Marketing Blog Who writes it? – The MoreNiche Team Why it’s great – Useful material, insider knowledge Must-read article - “How To Increase Affiliate Marketing Sales”

As we mentioned in yesterday’s post, we’re excited to partner with affiliate marketers, but we are even more excited to introduce the world of affiliate marketing to oDesk. Publishers can use oDesk for all of their day-to-day needs, since oDesk is a great place to find web developers, graphic designers, blog writers, virtual assistants, and online marketers (SEO, PPC, and social media experts).

Click here to apply to oDesk’s Affiliate Program on Commission Junction today!

We’re excited to announce the new oDesk Affiliate Program via Commission Junction!

We look forward to working with affiliate marketers to grow the oDesk community.  We are even more excited to introduce the world of affiliate marketing to oDesk.  Publishers can use oDesk for all of their day-to-day needs, since oDesk is a great place to find web developers, graphic designers, blog writers, virtual assistants, and online marketers (SEO, PPC, and social media experts).

Why should you enroll in our new program?

• We will pay affiliates $10 for each new buyer they send to oDesk that signs up & verifies a payment method.
• We will pay affiliates 10% of all of the money we make from those buyers for the first year after they sign up.

We’ve provided a variety of banner, text link, and flash options for affiliates to choose from. We’ve also provided a list of recommended keywords for them to use in their online marketing campaigns.  We’ve even created some APIs so affiliates can create custom sites using our job feeds - http://developers.odesk.com.

Affiliate marketers and users of our user-user referral system are welcome to apply to the new program. Click here to get started now!

We’re excited about our program and hope you will be, too.  We want to work closely with our affiliates and help them succeed, so if you have any ideas about how we can make our program better, let us know!  Email affiliate-team@odesk.com.

In an effort to make the job post page easier on the eye we removed the candidate list last week. The feedback of our community was loud and clear, and we decided to reverse the decision and bring the candidate list back to public job posts. We thank you for not being shy with your comments.

In the near future, we’re planning to make some changes to the candidate list on job openings to display it in a better format and provide only the most critical information. Based on your feedback, we’re also working to add a label to the job post that will mark jobs to which you’ve already applied.

As an organization oDesk firmly believes in incorporating user input and testing everything we develop. If you felt that we did not gather enough opinions on this change before rolling it out, we apologize. As we grow together it’s important to constantly improve our processes and we’d like to do a better job of capturing your voice. To that end, we launched our feedback forum and we welcome your suggestions, feedback, and votes.

We’ve lately added quite a few new methods to the oDesk API Center and today there’s a new member of the family — Time Reports.
So how can users leverage the Time Reports API?

* Buyers can generate detailed hourly reports for their oDesk team, agency and company.
* Providers can generate detailed reports for their personal oDesk accounts.
* Users can control what the reports display and how they are formatted — the reports are very versatile.
* This API and its variants deliver a quick way to plug into an large library of existing Google display widgets and formats.

To learn more about the Time Reports API click here.

Please share your feedback and suggestions for ongoing improvement in the comments.

The job search results page has undergone a major redesign that makes it easier to find the quality jobs you’re looking for.

So what’s all the fuss about?

• Looks: The page is now easily scanned from top-to-bottom highlighting the important details about a job. Focusing on only the most necessary information it lets you quickly identify the jobs that are the best fit.
• Search criteria: A clear and detailed display of the selected search criteria  The controls to modify your search are kept out of the way until needed so you can focus on the jobs themselves.
• Modify Search: Job posts are now searchable by specific skills as well as generic keywords.
• Buyer details: Easy-to-read icons denote buyer activity and feedback scores at a glance. Full details are found by mousing-over the icons.
• Filter sidebar: An adjustable criteria display that narrows down search results by category, sub-category and Groups.

This is just a first step and we will continue making improvements to the job search pages in the next few months.
Please share your feedback and suggestions for ongoing improvement in the comments.

If you have any enhancement ideas please share them with us in our new feedback forum.

As sales of smartphones rises so does the demand for talented developers to exploit these new platforms. The two most popular mobile platforms in the oDesk marketplace are Apple’s iPhone OS, and Google’s Android OS. Below is a run down of how the demand for these skills has fared over the last 12 months, and where developers can get started developing on these platforms.

iPhone
The Apple iTunes App Store for the iPhone and iPod Touch has been open for just over 15 months, with Apple reporting over 2 billion App downloads. The gold rush to develop iPhone apps, fueled by Apple’s marketing efforts and ambitious entrepreneurs, has led many buyers to the expert developers in the oDesk marketplace and fueled steady growth in demand for skilled iPhone developers. The iPhone’s addictive multi-touch screen and sleek design offer an attractive platform for potentially viral Apps.

iPhone and iPod Touch development requires that you have an Intel-based Mac running Mac OS X Leopard, X-code, the iPhone SDK, and some knowledge of Objective-C language. Owning an iPhone or iPod touch would be necessary for proper testing, but isn’t required for writing and running programs in the included iPhone Simulator. Apple also offers a $99 iPhone Developer Program, but this is only necessary if you plan on releasing an app to the app store directly.

Android
Google’s Android mobile phone OS, without the fuel of Apple’s App Store has not garnered the same popularity on oDesk, but still employs a significant number of Android developers, outpacing demand for developers of any other mobile OS on oDesk aside from the iPhone.

Android is an Open Source, Linux-based OS running on phones from HTC, Motorola, Samsung and LG, with rumored devices appearing soon on devices from Sony Ericsson, BenQ, and Dell. The number of Android devices on the horizon makes it poised to be a dominant mobile OS. The Android Market also offers a free service for developers to sell their apps.

The Android SDK will run on Mac, Windows, or Linux, and requires Java JDK 5 or 6. Eclipse 3.5 is the recommended IDE for development. Android’s Developers site has everything you need to get started, except for a handset which can be any Android Device, or the official Android Dev Phone 1, a special unlocked HTC Dream.

The Market
While programming for the iPhone and Android OS are the most in demand mobile phone development skills on oDesk, they aren’t the only mobile operating systems. Admob’s August 2009 Mobile Metrics report shows that of phones using their ad network globally, iPhone OS claiming the majority, and Nokia’s Symbian OS, and RIM’s Blackberry OS both beating out Android. However, Android is rising from last year, and Symbian and Blackberry are both falling. This breakdown speaks volumes for the confidence in Android’s future, and to the brilliantly standardized outlet that the Apple App Store and Android Market provide as both a service to end users and developers.

Feeling a little broke? Coming up with an empty wallet a little more often than you used to? Well your own personal stimulus plan might solve your problem. What’s the plan? Raise your rates.

We’ve asked three popular bloggers who specialize in the freelance realm — and ooze the wisdom of experience – what tips they would offer consultants / providers / freelancers who are looking to bring in more money by raising their rates. Our three bloggers? Freelance financial writer and author of You’ve Found Your Specialty — Now What?, Yolander Prinzel of Freelance Writerville; freelance graphic designer Ben Gribbin of Podcast for Freelancers; and self-proclaimed “gear head geek” and creator of the peer code review tool Code Collaborator,  Jason Cohen of Freelance Switch.

Thankfully, their advice is free!

TIPS FOR RAISING YOUR HOURLY RATE

EARN IT. “If you are going to up your rates, you really need to have a reason for doing so. If you’ve gotten better at design, for example, you’ve earned it. You must communicate why you are now charging your clients more,” says Ben Gribbin.

BE REALISTIC. “Be brutally honest with yourself,” Gribbin adds. “Everyone would like to charge $200 per hour. Are you worth it?”

SPECIALIZE. “The easiest way to command higher rates is to specialize in a subject that you have a lot of experience with. People pay more for expertise,” says Yolander Prinzel.

TIER SERVICES. Prinzel continues, “You can raise your rates, while still making your services available to all budgets. Create tiered services that allow for full-service to those who can afford it and modified services for those who can’t.”

TRACK TIME CAREFULLY. “Record your time accurately,” Jason Cohen tells us. “Don’t round up to the nearest hour. Then you can charge more.”

INCREASE SLOWLY. “Try increasing your rates incrementally,” says Gribbin. ”For example, don’t go from $10 per hour to $50. That’s a big jump. But increasing $10 or $20 per year is more gradual, and you’ll see clients change from smaller businesses to larger ones.”

GUARANTEE RESULTS. “Offer money back if such-and-such isn’t delivered,” Cohen suggests. ”Of course, be careful with this one, but if you set the boundaries correctly it proves you’re willing to put your money where your mouth is.”

Working from home can either liberate you or weigh you down — it’s all about how you do it. Having worked from home for over a decade, I’ve learned what works and what just creates more work. Here at oDesk, you’ll find the tips and tools to do it right.

- Tamara

On October 22-23, oDesk CEO Gary Swart will be joining Silicon Valley business leaders at BiztechDay. If you’re attending, make sure to grab a moment with Gary and ask for his insights on the Future of Work – his answer will give entrepreneurs, investors and executives fuel to rethink, retarget and change how their business works.

With tonight’s release we made several tweaks that affect job posts on oDesk:

Minimum Rates on Job Posts:
Starting today, we will no longer accept fixed price job posts with a budget less than $5. For hourly jobs, the maximum rate preference must now be at least $3 per hour. These changes only affect the job posting, so that candidacies and assignments may still occur at whatever rates and amounts are agreed upon by the buyer and providers.

We’ve noticed that job posts with budgets or rate preferences below these thresholds tend not to fill and when they do fill, it is often at greater amounts. By introducing these limits we are hoping to dissuade non-serious buyers and set more accurate expectations from the start.

Candidate List:
Users have been telling us that the candidate list in the Job Facts page is disconcerting and very few people found true value in it — we are therefore removing the candidate list from job opening pages. We will continue displaying the total number of candidates and interviewees at the top of the page in the Job Facts so that providers can gain an idea of the competition for a job before applying. The name of the provider who was hired will also continue to be displayed.

We’re committed to providing a high quality experience for all of our users. If you have ideas (or would like to vote on ideas) that you think will contribute to a quality experience, please share them with us at http://feedback.odesk.com.

Microsoft Silverlight is a browser plugin that allows the delivery of rich media experiences over the web. If you’ve ever watched a movie on Netflix using “Watch Instantly” then you are familiar with the power of Silverlight’s video streaming capabilities when coupled with Microsoft’s IIS Media Services Server. While streaming video was Silverlight 1.0’s main focus, iteration 2.0 expanded upon that, offering the ability to run programs written using any .NET language. Version 3.0 has been out since July (notice the spike on the trend chart for Silverlight developers below) and boasts the ability to stream 1080p HD video, as well as a slew of upgrades that speed up performance and improve the development process.

Silverlight on oDesk
There are currently 520 programmers on oDesk with Silverlight experience. oDesk’s data on the trends for Silverlight developers shows a significant increase in demand over the past six months. While this isn’t as impressive as oDesk’s data on recent Flash developers trends, Silverlight 3 offers some fantastic new features that should keep the demand for talented Silverlight developers on the rise.

Key Features
Highlighted below are some of the key features that Silverlight offers. See Scott Gu’s article on Silverlight 3 for more in depth reading.

GPU accelration – Processing of video and graphics can be offloaded to the client’s graphics card, making streaming of 1080p and rendering of 2D and 3d graphics less CPU intensive.

Smooth Streaming – Microsoft’s IIS Media Services Server can vary video streaming bit rates on the fly to insure smooth playback, regardless of client’s CPU load or network congestion.

Codec Support – H.264, MPEG-4, and AAC formats are now supported, as well as the ability to write custom decoders.

Offline Support – Silverlight applications can be configured for local installation and offline use.

Expression Blend 3 – A developer’s tool for Expression Studio that offers a whole other blog post’s worth of tools, including: importing photoshop layers, Sketchflow application prototyping, support for behavior components that encapsulate complex design interactions, and much more.

How To Get Started Developing
Microsoft is offering all of the tools needed to get started for free. Download Microsoft’s Web Platform, which includes Visual Web Developer, SQL Server Express, Silverlight Tools and IIS and ASP.NET Extensions.

Silverlight.net is a great place to read tutorials, and view example projects, and Shawn Wildermuth’s Blog has some great examples and screencasts as well.

Considerations
When choosing to use a new technology, it can be tough to justify being one of the early adopters. Some statistics are showing that Silverlight 3 is currently installed on nearly 20% of all computers. While this is great – especially considering it has only been available for just under 3 months – it is no where near Flash’s 80-90% installation representation. However, Silverlight does tackle some media applications, particularly streaming video, that Flash and Java just can’t handle as well.

The oDesk Manifesto is a declaration to both freelance service providers and the companies that hire them. A while back, we asked oDesk providers to submit videos of themselves reading our oDesk Manifesto.

We received responses from across the globe, from providers proud to lend their voices, faces and home towns to bring the oDesk Manifesto to life.

The response:

We really can’t say it any better than they have!
oDesk. Changing How the World Works.

Due to the popularity of our Stay Employed – Jobs with the Least Competition and Greatest Opportunity post (and the ongoing requests we’ve received for updated information), we thought we would follow up with recent information from the oDesk Trends vaults to help you develop your resume and determine what skills to focus on to stay employed or forge a new career path. We will take an updated look at various skills and technologies and the competition – or lack thereof – for positions needing those skills.

In viewing these numbers, keep in mind this is for oDesk, which is primarily concerned with placements for freelance and contract positions. This may vary with respect to full time placement numbers, though the data can be a useful indicator of overall trends.

In looking at the table below, there are three columns: one with the skill or technology, the second with the total jobs posted and the last with the Fill Ratio, which shows the competition for these postings – a low percentage in this column indicates great job opportunities, whereas a higher percentage score indicates that jobs requiring those skills get filled at or above our usual rate.  Anything not on this list is getting filled at a higher rate, which indicates high competition for the skill or technology.

First up, C++ programmers are recently experiencing the lowest fill rate – which means competition for jobs with this skill is fairly low. Additional good news: after an early summer slump, the field is growing again, as the number of positions requiring C++ programming skills are steadily climbing.

Java developers are growing in demand with 263 jobs posted per month and a 20% fill rate – moving Java skills up our list from #4 last quarter to #2 this time aroung. iPhone developers, the previous leaders in our opportunity rankings, have fallen halfway down the list. Not because the demand for skilled iPhone development has decreased (it has actually risen by almost 40% over the last 6 months), but because the number of skilled developers filling those jobs has pushed the fill ratio beyond the realm to be considered an area for current opportunity. As demand seems to be on a rising arc for iPhone development, you may see it reappear here in future months.

Continuing the ever-present PostgreSQL vs. MySQL debate, MySQL programmers have another quarter of strong showing on our chart, with by far the highest average number of jobs posted per month and a respectable fill rate at 28.54%. With the second highest number of available jobs, SEO consultants made a big leap in available opportunity by more than tripling the number of available jobs while maintaining a roughly 30% fill rate.

Bloggers make their first appearance on the opportunity scale, joining freelance writers in enjoying an average of over 160 job opportunities per month with a combined average fill rate of 28%.

This information derived from the thousands of jobs posted on oDesk every day. More information can be found on the skills and languages above, as well as many other desirable skills, on the oDesk Trends page.

We look forward to helping these companies do more with less on oDesk!

oDesk has retired the WorkAnalyze report in favor of the newly upgraded TimeAnalyze report.

We’ve combined the best of both reports and added some of the top-requested new features. Users can now:

• Easily get a snapshot of cost and productivity of their workteams
• Drill deep into line items per individual providers, timeframes, and tasks
• Enjoy a better than ever reporting on offline time:
  • Determine which tasks were done online or offline
  • Display percentage of charges for offline time

You may notice that TimeAnalyze is still in beta testing. This is because we’re still working on improvements, so please share your feedback and let us know what other features you’d like to see in the TimeAnalyze report. We expect to complete all improvements to this report in the next few months.

oDesk is adding to its API Center two new APIs:

oTasks API
Buyers can now integrate oDesk with their in house or third party project management systems by leveraging the oTasks API to:

WordPress is one of the top skills requested by buyers in the oDesk marketplace. CMS-based development, and specifically blog development, is at the heart of the Internet economy. Not only are blog developers important, but so are writers. It has bee said that “Content is king.” Regardless of what role your work falls into, it’s important to have some level of understanding of how WordPress, the current leading blog platform, operates.

Getting Your Hands Dirty

If you’re a writer or buyer, and don’t care too much for the nitty gritty, it’s okay! Wordpress.com is an easy way to get started blogging. There you can sign up for an account, get a free blog (i.e.- YourBlogTitle.Wordpress.com). Follow the directions in Wordpress.com’s Getting Started Guide and you’ll be blogging in no time.

For developers there is Wordpress.ORG (sorry to use caps, but it’s an important distinction). Wordpress.org is where you can find information on downloading and installing Wordpress. The Wordpress.org Installation Guide will walk you through downloading the package, uploading it to your own server, creating a mySQL database, and running the WordPress installer.

Also, ProBlogger has a great screencast on the whole process.

Developing Locally

Okay, maybe you’re thinking, “but I just want to tinker around, and I don’t have a dedicated server for development.” Yes, you do (hint: you’re looking at it) and if you aren’t developing on your own local server, then you are missing out! Working this way allows you to develop offline, and it’s fast. However, I do not recommend using the software below to host your own website from home. Developing with minimal security can be dangerous online, and working locally reduces the hassle of securing the site during development. Just remember that these servers are designed for developing – not hosting.

If you’re working on Windows XP, XAMPP is a great package to help you get started running a local Apache, MySQL, and Php servers. Tamba2 has a great tutorial on running XAMPP.

If you’re on a Mac, MAMP is what you’ll want to be running. See WordPress.org’s guide to setting up MAMP.

If you’re on a Linux box, Supriyadi Slamet Widodo’s blog has an excellent guide to setting up a LAMP server on Ubuntu, and instructions on installing Wordpress on your LAMP server.

Theme Development

One of the most requested Wordpress related jobs is Theme Development. Wordpress’s Theme Development documentation is fortunately thorough and relatively easy to read.

There you can get started on learning how to develop a theme from scratch, or get resources on how to modify an existing theme. If you are modifying themes, be sure to appropriately credit the original designer, even if your theme looks completely different, the time spent developing the back end deserves credit, and it’s the right thing to do.

Patrick Schwerdtfeger, one of the Bay Area’s preeminent Social Media evangelists, will be hosting his next Entrepreneur and Small Business Academy event tonight at 6:00pm at the Hotel Shattuck Plaza, in Berkeley, CA.

At the event, special guests Kane Minkus & Jeff Slayter will share their wealth of Entrepreneurial experiences with their presentation, “Blatantly Unfair Sales Magic Sooo Powerful You Might Be Afraid To Use It.”

The presentation will cover:

• Stealth email tricks that boost client loyalty
• Linguistic tools that make you indispensable
• A precise system for creating a constant stream of clients and customers
• Three behaviors of top-producing Entrepreneurs that will change your perspective on how to do business in the current market place
• Advanced techniques for balancing multiple income streams

Patrick will also have copies of his book, “Webify Your Business: Internet Marketing Secrets for the Self-Employed“, and his new 6 DVD Set “Social Media Victories – Real Businesses, Real Campaigns, Real Results” available for purchase.  Patrick has agreed to offer oDesk users a $100 discount to the DVD set.

We’ll have a table at the event to chat with folks about oDesk, so make sure to stop by and say hello!

We’re excited about tonight’s sold-out Juice Pitcher event put on by TheFunded.com and Vator.TV.  This unique startup pitching and networking event democratizes access to exposure for promising early stage companies.  136 companies competed for the chance to present tonight to an audience of over 300 investors, founders, and members of the press.  Aaron Patzer, of Mint.com, and Munjal Shah, of Like.com – two leading Silicon Valley CEOs – will be speaking at the event to educate and motivate the participating startups.

In fact, we’re so excited about Juice Pitcher, we’ve extended our oDesk Challenge offer to the 10 finalists (who haven’t yet been announced).  These early-stage companies are under constant pressure to do more with less, and a great way to do that is enlist the help of teams of online contractors.  Through participation in the oDesk Challenge, we’re going to help them find the very best talent on oDesk, so they can begin reaping the benefits of having an online workteam on their side.

Our CEO, Gary Swart, and several members of our team will be attending tonight’s event – if you’ll be attending, we look forward to seeing you there!

Sometimes working from home can get a little routine, and you might lose your focus. Check out these ten different takes on staying motivated from bloggers around the Web.

Working from home can either weigh you down or liberate you — it’s all about how you do it. Having worked from home for over a decade, I’ve learned what works and what just creates more work. Here at oDesk you’ll find the tips and tools to do it right.

- Tamara

Contracts are most likely not your favorite part of freelance work. Hammering out a watertight, legally binding agreement can be a bit of a distraction when what you really need to do is get some work done for your clients. So your choices are: operate on a handshake, purchase an off-the-shelf contract, or employ a lawyer to draft a custom one.

While we aren’t lawyers, and wouldn’t presume to tell you how to write your own work contracts, there are a few items that may be worth considering. Below are some of the terms that can cause heartburn when drafting a contract, and how we address them in the oDesk Marketplace User Agreement.

Don’t Stiff Me (Services and Fees) – Determining what work is to be done, and how much to be paid is most likely the crux of your contract.
oDesk’s take: oDesk encourages you to be upfront about your rates, and guarantees payment for hourly work. Providers should act in good faith to complete the desired work, and buyers are obligated to pay for hours spent (within the agreed upon weekly hours) or the agreed fixed price.

I won’t be back. (Termination) – An escape clause can be a touchy subject. Addressing the possibility that the project or working relationship won’t work out can cast a dark cloud over an agreement, but it’s necessary that both parties be protected.
oDesk’s take: Hourly assignments may be terminated by buyer or provider at any time, and the Buyer is obligated to pay for hours worked prior to termination. Fixed Price Assignments may only be terminated by mutual agreement.

Who owns what? (Work Product and Buyer Deliverable) – Assigning ownership of Intellectual Property is important. Who own the source code? What happens if your client hires a third party to modify it?
oDesk’s take: Providers do not retain Intellectual Property rights. Any copyrightable works prepared by Provider in connection with an Assignment for Buyer shall be “works for hire.” Any materials that the buyer provides along with an assignment remain property of the buyer. The provider is obligated to destroy any copies of that material after an assignment is completed.

Don’t borrow without asking. (Pre-existing Intellectual Property in Work Product) – Reinventing the wheel isn’t necessary, but being upfront about what work you are building upon, is. Sure, you can build an e-commerce website at breakneck pace if you develop it based upon an off the shelf CMS, but does your client know about the licensing fee? What about the payment module for their merchant account, are you going to purchase it, or roll your own?
oDesk’s take: If providers wish to use 3rd party software (or other IP) to complete an assignment, then they need written consent of the buyer. This includes open source software. It is assumed that providers will delivered unique IP that then becomes property of the buyer.

Including the Details? (Entire Agreement) - Using your proposal as the basis for, or as an exhibit in your contract can be great for insuring that all the details of project are included, and that your obligations are clearly outlined. Any agreements made through oDesk are considered part of the service contract for that particular assignment, so it’s important to be clear about expectations with buyers/providers, but rest assured that clear effective communication will translate to your assignment’s Service Contract.
oDesk’s take: The Service Contract outlined above, plus any agreements made between buyer/provider inside the oDesk Marketplace are the full terms of the Service Contract for that assignment.

Be sure to also check out the oDesk Policies Page, it provides detail of the information given above, as well as some useful insights in to how to make the most of the oDesk Marketplace.

We are pleased to announce our best Providers for September 2009! We have over 250,000 Providers on oDesk, but these ones stood out as the cream of the crop this month, as they performed the most hours of work with the highest feedback rating. They have been given special badges recognizing their achievement.

oDesk Buyers, you might want to get in touch with these Providers soon…they just completed assignments and are available now, but probably won’t be for long. Click on their profile to check out their work and contact them for an interview!

	Top 25 Freelance Designers for September 2009 were:
1	Joanna C.	Web Design, Logo, Collaterals, Brochure, Joomla
2	Nikolay Atanasov	3D Generalist / Post prduction
3	David Moehle	Voice Talent/Start to Finish Digital Audio Creation and Editing/Writer
4	Francis M.	►► Photoshop | Illustrator | Indesign Cr8TiVE @rtist™
5	Salman N.	Senior Ruby on Rails/ PHP/J EE/ Flex/ Flash/HTML/CSS Developer
6	Evgeniy Ognarev	Illustrations, character design, flash animations, storyboards
7	Allen Kerry	â–º 3D Artist Character Modeler, 12 yrs Game dev exp, Fulltime biz, US â—„
8	Kamal Garg	Photoshop, Flash, HTML/DHTML/XHTML, Versatile Website & Logo Designer
9	John Basile	Scraster Professional Screencasting
10	Peter Safwat	Flash Designer & Developer + Web & Graphic Designer
11	Cheryl B.	Graphic designer, 18 years building better brands
12	Kamal Pahuja	3D Modeling, Texturing, Lighiting – Freelance Website/Flash Designer
13	Tania I.	Logo Design, Brochure, Website, Stationary, & Illustration Expert
14	Dexter B.	Dedicated Illustrator • Professional Artist • oDesk Recognized
15	Nitya S.	Web & Graphics Expert, Flash Animator, Web2.0, HTML/CSS, Logo Designer
16	Anna P.	Graphic Designer
17	Sm R.	web research, video creator, adobe cs3, ms office expert.
18	Nikola Sudarevic	Desktop Publishing and Design
19	Jorge Puntriano	Senior Graphic Designer, Illustrator, Pixel Artist and 2D animator
20	Jeff W.	*Creative* Video Editing / Camtasia / Flash / Audio / Graphic Design
21	Talec H.	Expert in web designing,CSS, Div based sites & html
22	Victor Novak	Web/Print Design. Brand Identity/Logo/Stationery. IA/UX consultant.
23	Kamal Pahuja	3D Modeling, Texturing, Lighiting – Freelance Website/Flash Designer
24	Allen S.	ILLUSTRATION/WEB/GRAPHIC DESIGN/ **LOVES WORKING WITH ILLUSTRATOR**
25	Abhinav B.	â–‘â–’â–“â–ˆ Superlative Php/MySql, Web2.0, Ajax — Developer █▓▒░

	Top 25 Freelance Software Developers for September 2009 were:
1	Gabriel V.	Programmer / Developer
2	Dmitriy L.	C++ / Python developer
3	Christine Hui	BVG
4	Vinod Podar	Senior Program Manager
5	Dharminder S	.Net C# VB ASP.net .Net2.0 .Net3.5, healthcare, dontnetnuke
6	Roman Kudiyarov	C++/Python Developer
7	Harry R.	.Net/MVC/LINQ/MS SQL/T-SQL/jQuery/JSON
8	Ranjana S.	Experieced OsCommerce,Ajax,Smarty,Wordpress,Cakephp,Magento Programmer
9	Ross C.	Senior iPhone/C/C++/Web/Python Developer
10	Chinmay Das	Senior Software Engineer
11	Andrew Kramarew	Senior developer: ASP.NET/C#/MSSQL/MySQL/AJAX/JQuery/Prototype/Magento
12	Supriya B.	4+Years experienced PHP/MYSQL Web Developer
13	Paresh D.	Sun Certified Java Prof, Java,J2EE,Struts,Ajax,Hibernate Developer
14	Daniel G.	Experienced PHP/Perl/ActionScript(2,3)/C/C++/JavaScript developer
15	Tejinder A.	Web 2.0, CSS, xHTML, Flash Actionscripting Programmer
16	Dmitry Papusha	MS SQL, ASP.NET, C#, SSIS, Crystal, SSRS, DWH High-Skilled Developer
17	Goran P.	Experienced Programmer, Mobile Phones Programmer and Web Programmer
18	Gilbert E.	*PHP+mySQL*,Flex,C#.Net+MSSQL,AJax, RUBY,XHTML/XML,J2ME,VB/C/C++
19	Veer Singh	PHP Developer
20	Alexey Z.	C/C++ Technical Lead
21	Dmitry S.	C++/C# software developer
22	Andrei Mamitchev	Senior Java/JSP/Struts/Spring Developer
23	Denis Borisenko	Flex/ActionScript/AIR/Flash Developer
24	Rajan Kulkarni	Sun Certified Java Developer – Java/J2EE, Struts, AJAX SQL, HIbernate
25	V K.	Unmatched Silverlight and ASP.NET 3.5 Professional

	Top 25 Freelance Web Developers for September 2009 were:
1	Evgeny M.	PHP/MySQL/DHTML/Ajax Developer/Project Manager
2	Tatiana D.	PHP, MySQL, Drupal Developer, Team Leader
3	Alexander D.	Expert J2EE/JBoss, PHP/MySQL, AJAX, SMARTY Developer
4	Olexiy O.	Java/J2EE Architect / Senior Developer
5	Dmitry A.	ASP.net/Mobile – Professional Experience
6	Dora M.	Dora
7	Vladimir K.	ColdFusion/MSSQL/PHP/Smarty/mySQL developer
8	Fahmi A.	Professional PHP/MySQL/XHTML/CSS/ Developer
9	Igor G.	Java Developer
10	Mircea C.	Senior Delphi Expert Software Developer, with JAVA, C# .NET and PHP
11	Misha B.	Drupal/PHP/MySQL/HTML/JS/CSS
12	Jane Durm	Sales & Marketing, Management, Admin. Assistant, Customer Service
13	V K.	Unmatched Silverlight and ASP.NET 3.5 Professional
14	Maninder S.	HTML/ XHTML/ CSS Developer, Certified Wordpress Professional
15	Gurdeep Dhillon	PHP/MySQL/Ajax Drupal Joomla Wordpress ECommerce Rails UberCart Expert
16	Amit C.	.Net Professional
17	Denis Statsenko	Greatest PHP/MySQL/AJAX/Symfony/Smarty/osCommers/Joomla developer
18	Vladimir Fedorov	Flash & Flex developer
19	Andrey Z.	Experienced PHP/Python/Django/Coldfusion/Flex web-developer
20	Yogesh S.	Certified ASP.net/C#.Net,VB.Net Developer,sqlserver2005,vb 6, VBA
21	Alexei Shulga	Zend certified ZCE,PHP,MySQL,Ajax,Frameworks (CakePHP, Zend Framework)
22	Durrab Khan	Sr.Software Lead & Architect | Flex/AIR/Spring/Java/J2EE/J2ME/Android
23	Sri Vardhan Gogineni	Developer
24	Uday S	PHP, AJAX, Joomla, MySQL, CakePHP, Drupal, PHP/IIS/MS SQL
25	Ashish Singh	Microsoft Certified ASP.NET 3.5,C#,LINQ,SQL server,AJAX,JS,Sharepoint

	Top 25 Freelance Writers for September 2009 were:
1	Nelson Manning	High Quality Writer: Technical, Dev Spec, Business, Creative, Copy
2	Aashita S.	Experienced Tech Writer, Project Manager, ID, Editor, PR, Copywriter
3	Jery Esparas	7.5YRS Exp.PROJECT MANAGER/EXCEL/VIRTUAL ASST (FULLTIME Provider)
4	Oliver N.	Versatile Writer++
5	Carlo Gabriel Simbajon	TOP oDesk Writer for July 2009; ECONOMIST: Economics, Business, Mngmt.
6	Rosanne L.	Professional Writing Services – Copywriting, Web Content, SEO, eBooks
7	Sally R.	On the ball administration, research, writing, editing and data entry
8	Susan Campbell	Trusted Content Writer – Articles,Sales Pages, eBooks, Website Content
9	Nitima S.	Highly reliable Writer and SEO expert
10	Candan Kayaguney	Data Entry/Research/Personal Assistant/Translation/Administrative Supp
11	Marilyn M.	Top 15 Provider on oDesk~ PROFESSIONAL~SEO NINJA~AFFORDABLE~QUALITY~
12	Shaira B.	All-around Data Entry~Research Assistant+Graphics Editor
13	Yigit S.	Turkish native – (Tur-Eng) Translation, Proofreading, Localization
14	Houda A.	Translator French /Spanish/English-Proofreader-transcriber
15	Elvis S.	GraphicDesign/SEO/DataEntry/QA/A+cert/AudioEditor
16	Donna M.	Experienced and Published Writer
17	Deepa Ashith	Experienced Technical Writer/Business Analyst/CopyWriter
18	Faith M.	☼Multi-Skilled☼—eBook Writer—Blogger—Spinner—SEO—LinkBuilder—Top Tests
19	Susan Campbell	Trusted Content Writer – Articles,Sales Pages, eBooks, Website Content
20	Melissa Lind	Pharmacist Writer/Research/Editor in Medicine/Health/Lifestyle/SEO
21	Teresa Schultz	HTML/photoshop/writer
22	Faith Anne Hurley	Writing for you – mathematics, humanities, and education
23	Daphany Dixon	Data Entry Expert and Office Assistant
24	Mark Aragona	A Wizard with Words: Creative Writer, SQA Specialist and Voice-over
25	Kamran Mehmood	MBA IN FINANCE (DATA ENTRY EXPERT IN MS. WORD, EXCELL, POWERPOINT)

	Top 25 Virtual Assistants for September 2009 were:
1	Marie C.	Graphic Design Print & Web, Photo manipulation, correction and other
2	Marie C.	Data Encoder Specialist, Internet Researcher, Data Mining.
3	Janice Alcantara	☼ ♥ TOP SEM, SEO, Link Building, Web Content & Article Writing ♥ ☼
4	Philippa E.	British certified SEO Practitioner and Copy Writer Extraordinaire
5	L Maher	Virtual Assistant – Highly experienced
6	Ariel Pichersky	Native Spanish speaker| Writer| Discourse worker| Letters student @UBA
7	Rostyslav K.	â–ºDATA ENTRY, RESEARCH, FRENCH TRANSLATION, ADMINISTRATION, EXCELâ–º
8	Mia B.	Highly Reliable Project Coordinator, Writer,Researcher
9	Bobby L.	BlackSheepUK|Graphic/Web Designer+CSS+Photoshop+Video Traffic Expert
10	Bobbi D.	Executive Virtual Assistant
11	Jessica H.	★★★ Design/Data Entry/Writing/Research ★★★
12	Renee B.	Information Professional/Business Researcher/Librarian
13	Vinayachandran Gopalakrishna Panicker	Admin. Professional/Data Entry Professional
14	Candy W.	Joomla/Wordpress/Ecommerce /Senior Virtual Assistant from China
15	Arpan K.	Excel/Word/Powerpoint/HTML/Virtual Assistant/Data Entry
16	Deepika Tiwari	Web Researcher/Marketing and Sales/Data Entry/Recruitment professional
17	Pradeep Chandru	MySQL certified DBA who provide support in any MYSQL activity
18	Charmaine G.	~~Customer & Tech Support,Virtual Assistant,Research Specialist~~
19	Mark Walusimbi	Dedicated To Client Service, Accurate Data & Timely Delivery
20	Sanjeev Chauhan	Certified System Administrator/Link builder/ SEO Expert/Sharepoint
21	Arlene Santillan	~ 10 YRS. EXP VA ♥ RESEARCHER ♥ ARTICLE SUBMITTER ♥ WEB CONTENT EDITOR
22	April Toucheque	Multi-Tasking Admin. Asst. with Bookkeeping Experience
23	Christine B.	Experienced researcher/ Data Entry-Virtual Assistant
24	Liza Roy	Legal, Administrative Support, Research, Writing & Data entry
25	Arvin S.	Highly motivated virtual assistant, data enterer, and web developer.

These rankings will be generated each month, and stored in the oConomy under “Rankings”. October Rankings will be published on November 1st. Congratulations again!

We’re excited to announce that voting has officially begun in our oDesk Design of the Month contest! This time around we have 57 submissions, each of which was built by oDesk providers, and we must say we’re quite impressed with the entries.

Here at oDesk we have the privilege of bringing businesses and individuals together with remote workers to collaborate on oDesk, and seeing amazing results come out of it. Our buyers are proud of their products and likewise ourrebeccaturner providers are proud of their hard work. This month’s contest is rather unique because it was open to all types of design work. It allows buyers a chance to show off their masterpieces, from logo and illustration, to video, to web design and everything in between! We’re also excited to showcase the incredible design talent of our community and honor some of the best work done through oDesk.

Winners will be chosen entirely by community voting which will continue through October 31st. The grand prize winner, or Design of the Month will officially be announced on November 1st. So what are you waiting for? Click here to cast your votes – you are allowed to vote for up to 3 apps per day. Facebook guru? You can also vote via our Facebook App. That way, your votes will show up on your walls, and your friends will be encouraged to vote as well.

The grand prize winner will get $1,000 oDesk credit, an iPhone, possible press opportunities, and of course, ever-coveted bragging rights! The three runners-up will each get an oDesk t-shirt.

So what are you waiting for? Check out the competition (we think you’ll be as impressed as we are) and cast your vote today! Good luck to the contestants – may the best design win!

We’ve redesigned our assignment detail page and think it will be useful for all users — buyers and providers alike.

To access the new page, visit My Jobs > Assignments and click on any assignment, active or ended.

For buyers:

The assignment detail page is your central screen for each provider. It shows key information, statistics, and actions all on one screen. Everything you need will be one-click away…

• see the provider’s local time
• link to the provider’s work diary
• see how much time (and money) was spent last week, this week, and for the entire assignment
• send a message to the provider or staffing manager
• change rate or weekly limit
• make bonus or fixed-price payments
• end an assignment
• manage feedback for ended assignments

For providers:

The assignment detail page is your central screen for each of your assignments…

• view your own work diary for that assignment
• see how much was earned last week, this week, and for the entire assignment
• send a message to the buyer
• end an assignment
• give refunds

Let us know what you think!

Last week, we listed out some of the most useful iPhone apps for business use. We intentionally left one off that list, so we could share it with you in more detail today:

Your oDesk team room is a great place for staying abreast of all the things your teammates are working on, but sometimes you’re not in front of your computer and you’d like to keep up to date with what’s going on back in the virtual office.  With the new oDesk iPhone app, now there’s an app for that.

The oDesk iPhone app gives you literal visibility of your online workteam no matter where you are:

• See all providers in your team room grouped by current work status – Working Now, Worked in the Last 24 Hours, Other
• View each team member’s latest work memo, local time, 24-hour work sparkline, and latest snapshot
• Check complete work diaries including memos, full-size snapshots, activity indicator, billing status, timestamp, and active window for any date

The app is designed for both buyers and providers.

Watch Brain Goler, oDesk’s VP of Marketing, give a quick demo of the app in action:

Ready to download? If you have an iPhone (or iPod Touch), follow this link to install the app.  Or, search the App Store for “oDesk” to find it.

If you have any suggestions, we’d love to hear them at iphone-app@odesk.com, or in the comments section below.  And, if you like what you see, please rate the oDesk iPhone Application it in the App Store!

____

If you’re a blogger or member of the press looking for more information, please contact press@odesk.com.

“Work is no longer tied to a single location -
it happens anywhere on the Web, anywhere in the world.” – Gary Swart, oDesk CEO

The oDesk iPhone App announced today was built by leveraging oDesk APIs, which are now publicly available in the oDesk API Center. In releasing access to our APIs, we’d like to encourage developers and managers to create custom workspaces that shape existing oDesk tools to fit their own specific needs.

The APIs currently available:
* Authentication – Allows for login/logout functionality to be implemented from outside the oDesk site.
* Provider Search – Facilitates the searching of oDesk provider data.
* Provider Profile – Returns detailed profile information about a provider or list of providers.
* Team – Provides multi-directional interaction capabilities with the oDesk Team and its members.
* Work Diary – This method retrieves all screenshots captured from a user account within a single day.
* Get Snapshot – Retrieves one or more snapshots of activity from a user account in a company’s team at defined points in time.

Visit the oDesk API Center at: http://developers.odesk.com/

At oDesk headquarters in Menlo Park, California, every Tuesday is a WFHT, and technology is the key ingredient that makes this system work. So we thought it was time to address the various modes of modern communication, creation and collaboration.

Which of these tech gadgets are your tech gadgets?

From largest to smallest …

COPY MACHINE: An Oldie But a Goodie
Best - If used sparingly and combined with a printer or fax.
Worst - If you have an old dinosaur that needs upkeep.
Needed - If you consistently need massive amounts of copies.

FAX MACHINE: It’s Come a Long Way
Best – If you aren’t paying for an extra phone line.
Worst – If you are still using rolls of paper (say it ain’t so).
Needed - When a potential client says: “Can I fax you this?”

PRINTER: A Necessary Evil
Best – If you can hit “print” from any room in the house.
Worst - If your ink costs as much as your electric bill.
Needed - For contracts, tax papers, etc.

COMPUTER: The Crucial Ingredient
Best – If you still have it under warranty (or are a tech wiz).
Worst – If it has a virus or takes 15 minutes to boot.
Needed - Are you kidding?

LAPTOP: Priceless
Best – When it’s light, fast and new.
Worst – If it weighs as much as your microwave.
Needed - When you have to be able to work from various locations.

MINI: A Tiny Luxury
Best – If you work on the go … really on the go.
Worst – If you blog, work on large pdf files or have carpel tunnel syndrome.
Needed - When you can’t lug around a laptop (or can’t afford one).

PDA: Palmtop Computer
Best – Maybe not.
Worst – If it’s the size of a Dan Brown novel.
Needed - In 1999.

SMARTPHONE / iPHONE: All the Rage
Best – If you know how to use it.
Worst – If you don’t.
Needed - For those who need Internet access at all times.

HEADSET: Hands Free Talking
Best – If it’s comfortable and gets good reception.
Worst – If it’s so small you can’t find it when you need it.
Needed - If the telephone takes up more than 20% of your work day.

WFHT Recommended Reading
“Home Office Essentials” from About.com
“Tips for Home Office Technology” from Fast Company Blog
“The Technology Every Freelancer Needs” from Freelance Directory
“Choosing a PC Pt. 1” from Freelance: UK

Much like a divorced marriage counselor, my ability to dish out advice is not an indicator of my ability to implement it. However, having worked from home for over a decade, I’ve learned what works and what just creates more work.

- Tamara

Jasmine with oDesk friends, April 2008

“Things change when you love your work,” says Jasmine Sison, who has been with the team for two years. “I am always looking to find new ways of making my work easier and faster without sacrificing quality.”

Jasmine quit her in-house job and has worked full-time for the oDesk team since January ‘08. She notes that the posting that led to this great fit seemed perfectly suited to her from the start — it wasn’t just work she could do, it was work she wanted to do. “The position was something that interested me and I am very good at doing,” she says. “A nice combination of my education, acquired skills and experiences that I have gained from other work and work environments.”

As director of customer service, Shannon Adkins makes sure the job stays interesting, and that her providers continue to feel engaged, with brief weekly training sessions in which they troubleshoot a recent difficult case. She also uses oDesk’s transparency to keep everyone involved. “All metrics are published to the entire team, and all team members know how they are doing relative to their peers, as well as how oDesk as a whole is doing.” And those who are doing well receive bonuses.

But Shannon looks not just to the present, but the future: “We provide a clear guideline of how to move up in the organization, from entry level to team lead or specialist.”

“My potential is being discovered and my existing skills are honed and challenged,” Jasmine says. “I love learning, and I get my daily dose from this team.”

For more on how oDesk makes remote work work, read our full case study.

Telephones didn’t always come with tiny pop-out keyboards and message screens. Once upon a time, people would actually speak into phones to talk directly with other people. No text messages, no email, no internet browsing, just actual conversations with folks who listen and respond with phones of their own.

There are many freelancers and providers out there who believe business can be handled through emails and text messaging alone, but the truly successful entrepreneurs know this simply isn’t true. There’s a time and a place for both written and verbal communications, but nearly 20 years of email, the rapid rise of text messaging, and other social networking mediums have erroneously de-emphasized the importance of telephone conversations. The fact is a single telephone conversation carries a far greater impression than the best email ever could. That may frighten many of those used to online communication here in oDesk-land, but the advice offered from Gotta Know Online and Associated Content—not to mention our tips below—will show you there’s absolutely no reason to fear the speaker.

Smile when you make a call or answer the phone.
Smiling has the unconscious effect of giving your voice a very friendly, upbeat tone, and that’s how every business conversation should begin.

Always identify yourself on incoming and outgoing calls.
If you’re a freelancer, this can be as simple as answering calls with “Hello, this is Chris,” or “Hi, this is Sandy, how can I help you?” If you’re working for a company, include their name as well. On outgoing calls, always identify yourself to the person that answers, even if you need to speak to someone else. A good example would be “Hello, this is John Doe calling, may I speak to Richard?”

Be an active listener.
Active listening is a fancy way of saying “pay attention!” Turn off music, close the office door, or if necessary, go to a different room where you can offer your complete, undivided attention to the person you’re talking to. Active listening also means you’re not just a silent partner. As the other person speaks, let them know you’re paying attention (or in the cell phone age, that the call didn’t drop) by offering simple acknowledgements such as “sure” or “I see” to the things they say.

Leave short messages.
If you have to leave a message, make it short and to the point. Offer your name and number both at the beginning and end of the message, with a sentence or two in the middle explaining your call. A 20-second message is usually sufficient to get the point across; anything longer should be addressed in the callback.

Resist the urge to take a business call while on personal errands.
Cell phones allow us to talk shop anywhere, but taking a business call while you’re eating dinner with the family or standing in line at the grocery store is not a good idea. Let it go to voice mail and call back as soon as you’re in a more suitable location, even if it means making a quick trip to your car. It may appear as though you’re showing dedication to your clients or customers, but choosing to take a call while rapped up in a personal activity almost always makes the caller uncomfortable, and if you’re in a public setting, you risk blaring out potentially sensitive information.

While these tips provide a good foundation for telephone etiquette, remember that the best phone jockeys develop their own unique style over time. Have any other suggestions to maximize professional telephone conversations? Feel free to share your tricks of the trade in the comments section below.

Each month we like to highlight 4 providers who’ve received exemplary feedback. Great job Alexey, Beverly, Misha and Tamara — you’ve earned this!

	Alexey Z C/C++ Technical Lead Total oDesk Hours: 217 Overall Feedback: 5.00 (Based on 1 feedbacks) Comments: I would like to stress his ability to deliver work right on time, as you dont see this too often. His communication skills were excellent, and he could quickly understand my needs.
	Beverly B MarCom and Administrative Assistance by Seasoned Professional Total oDesk Hours: 101 Overall Feedback: 5.00 (Based on 1 feedbacks) Comments: Beverly was a great provider. She had all the right tools and helped us on our webinars, PowerPoints, and content creation projects. Thanks!
	Misha B (Affiliated with UACoders) Drupal/PHP/MySQL/HTML/JS/CSS Total oDesk Hours: 1,289 Overall Feedback: 4.62 (Based on 14 feedbacks) Comments: Misha is a talented and capable developer with an in-depth knowledge of Drupal. He is a pleasure to work with and a valuable part of our development team.
	Tamara B 2400+ oDesk HRS-90WPM Transcribe, Transcription (audio/video) Total oDesk Hours: 2,440 Overall Feedback: 5.00 (Based on 41 feedbacks) Comments: I have been working with Tamara for over 1 year now. I have never been so happy with a service provider! She gets the job done fast, accurate, and loves what she does.

The Message Center is one of the most heavily used screens in all of oDesk. It is used primarily to interview candidates and potential employers, and to communicate with your team.

We’ve gotten a lot of requests for the ability to attach files to oDesk messages. Now you can! Anywhere you send a message to another user, whether from the candidate list, the team room, or replying to a message in your Inbox, you can attach a file. You can attach files to tickets, too. Keep that feedback coming! Occasionally, we listen…

Should your next website or software app use PHP, ASP, AJAX, JavaScript, Flash, or another technology that you’ve just heard about? Should it be hosted on your LAMP or Windows server, or reside in “The Cloud?”

I recently had a friend pursuing his entrepreneurial spirit who wanted advice on how to create a new interactive website. He has a fantastic idea and some basic understanding about current Internet technologies and asked if he should use a wiki, blog, HTML, custom PHP, or an out-of-the-box solution to run his website.

Over the years I have had many clients come to me with technology questions. Some people read an article and get very excited about the “Technology Du Jour” when their time would be better spent focusing on the user experience and scope of the project lifespan. Others get very involved in the technical details, when defining the big picture would address their concerns.

As a rule, I steer clear of potential clients who know that they want to use Flash, or AJAX. The success of the project rarely depends on the type of tools but rather on the expertise of the person using them. I learned this from my father – he was a successful auto mechanic who guaranteed his work and would be cautious of a customer that brings his car in and asks for a new brake master cylinder to fix the squeak in the front end. It is always best to fully evaluate the best outcome and then look for the best solution, rather than try to make the solution fit the desired outcome.

When approaching a new technology application, as developers, we always keep the user experience in mind. We first focus on what the project is trying to accomplish and determine about how to get it done later.

As he eloquently explains in this video from the Business of Software conference, Jason Fried uses a similar approach to develop and manage 37Signals.

I use this same approach when developing new software such as a shopping cart, CMS, or online registration system [link to RegistrarSuport.com]. We build it in stages and add features as we go. I encourage this approach for any project that does not require a big rollout or specific launch date for a “finished” product. We systematically build momentum by achieving small milestones without getting bogged down with the details.

As for my friend, since he doesn’t have much of a budget and will be working on the project outside of his “day job” – I recommended doing as much as he can himself, so that when it is time to pass off the project to a professional firm, he will have a good understanding of what is needed. A clear vision written on a cocktail napkin can be more effective for jump-starting a project then hours of researching what features a particular technology can achieve. To coin a phrase–Just do it.

In 1998, Frank founded a small web design company in Port Townsend, Washington which has grown to include four distinct service divisions including Totera Web Systems. Today, Totera provides web development, creative design, domain acquisition, web hosting, site management, email services, and complete marketing solutions to clients worldwide. Frank enjoys combining creativity with state-of-the-art technology by building strong relationships with other industry experts. In addition to business consulting, Frank also spends his time playing music, exploring the adventures of fatherhood, and sailing with his family.

I was on the road last Thursday, after a Client meeting, and I had an oDesk conference call in 3 minutes. I pulled over at the nearest strip mall, parked, pulled out my iPhone and dialed into the meeting just as someone on the call said:

“OK, I just e-mailed out the agenda. Everyone please let me know when you have it open”

So I muted the call, and pressed the home button on the iPhone, which switched me back to the main menu (the call remained connected).

Cool…

Then I launched the E-mail app, and found the e-mail containing the meeting agenda. I was able to open the MS Word Document and view the agenda while still on the call.

Very cool….

About two minutes in, someone on the call asked me a question:

“Henry, are you available next Tuesday at 2:00? “

So I tapped the yellow bar at the top to switch back to the call, unmuted it, then pressed the home button, launched my Google Mobile app (review, review) and pulled up my Google Calendar.

“Yeah, I’m free. Want me to go ahead and send out the meeting invite?”

I created a new event, invited attendees, and sent the request out with just a few swipes of the finger. No sooner than I did that, I got an incoming call from a Friend, so I switched back to the phone, and with one click was able to put the conference call on hold while I took the new inbound call.

“Hey, I’m on a conference call, can you text me?”

I hung up the phone, and switched back to the MS Word Document, and a few seconds later I got a pop-up window with a text message:

“Hey want to meet for drinks later?”

So I responded affirmatively, wrapped up the conference call, and then:

• Made a few oDesk Blog updates in the WordPress app (review, review)
• Did a few Client Twitter updates with Tweetie (review, review),
• Logged my hours for the day in Minibooks (review, review) and in my oDesk Work Diary (in the Safari Browser App)
• Logged my To Do items in Remember the Milk (review, review)and EnCamp (review, review), the best third-party Basecamp app)
• Put Slacker Radio (review, review) on the headphones (near-flawless free streaming radio)
• Sent IM’s to all of my clients with the Skype app (review, review)and Bejive app (review, review), a multi-client IM tool, to see if anything else was needed for the day
• Plugged the address for the restaurant into the TomTom GPS app (review, review), and headed for the Bar
• Well, I actually might have gotten in a quick game of Tap Tap Revenge 2 (review, review) first (the most addicting game ever created)

All in a days work, and in the palm of my hand!
What are your favorite apps for working on the go? Please let us know by leaving a comment below!

At oDesk headquarters in Menlo Park, California, every Tuesday is a WFHT, so we know that working from home can be a liberating experience. However, for some, the time at home may create habits that lead to an unhealthy way of life. Here are some tips to keep yourself sane, social and successful!

Don’t let your laptop become your best friend. Let’s face it, you don’t have to work from home to be a laptop addict, but with this line of work, the risks are greater than normal. To keep yourself out of laptop-abuse rehab, watch TV with nothing on your lap, don’t take your laptop to bed with you, pick up the phone next time you need someone instead of e-mailing them (especially if they are a friend), and give yourself at least one completely computer-free day a week. You’ll be surprised how much you miss your little piece of plastic, with it’s cute little keyboard and shiny screen, but trust us, this is for your own good. (We promise.)

Don’t spend too much time alone. Of course, we all have different needs for social interaction, but no one should be alone all or even most of the time. So, if you haven’t spoken out loud in the last 24 hours, you need to pick up the phone or run to your nearest coffee shop and strike up a conversation with someone. If you live with family or roommates, you may think you’re immune to loneliness, but you’re not. Make sure you’re talking to and meeting with other people (who don’t live with you) on a regular basis. It’s important to have real people in your life. (Sorry, Facebook doesn’t count!)  Make sure your community extends past your front door.

Don’t spend too much time at home. Speaking of your front door, make sure you are getting out of it. Often. Get outside once a day, drive somewhere every other day. Go to the park, walk around a mall, eat dinner out, work at a library — just spend time away from your four walls, preferably in the sunlight. If you can begin to think of sunlight and fresh air as health supplements (because they are!), you might be more likely to get your daily dose. (If you are a stay-at-home parent with little ones and freelancing or consulting, this can be especially hard to do, because you are probably exhausted. But it’s as important for your kids to get out of the house as it is for you.)
 

WFHT Recommended Reading
“Even Lone Wolves Need a Pack” from Bizzia
“How to Overcomee Loneliness When You Work From Home” from Spark Plugging
“7 Tips for Freelance Writers” (hint: these aren’t just for writers) from Hub Pages
“Overcoming Loneliness” from Freelance Folder
“Tips for Dealing With Home-Office Isolation” from Consultant Journal

Much like a divorced marriage counselor, my ability to dish out advice is not an indicator of my ability to implement it. However, having worked from home for over a decade, I’ve learned what works and what just creates more work.

- Tamara

So, you’re one of the lucky ones who has weathered the economic downturn and has held on to your full-time gig. Unfortunately, thanks to mandatory furloughs and benefit cutbacks, that full-time work may now have part-time pay. Here’s some areas we’ve seen that offer opportunities for non-technical professionals to boost their income with online work:

Say “Hire Me” in multiple tongues. For the multi-lingual among us, translation jobs are a great way to keep your language skills sharp while feeding your piggybank. With nearly 500 active translation jobs in a variety of languages – and more openings getting listed every day – you know translators are in demand!

Do you speak legalease? Congrats are in order if you do – legal jobs are one area where business is booming and there are plenty of opportunities to earn some extra money writing contracts, doing legal research, or providing advice to young businesses.

Pitch us! As companies tighten their belts, the budget for PR jobs gets tight. But there are opportunities for folks with the right skills to save the day by providing freelance press release writing, event coordination or strategy consultation.

Content is STILL king… There’s opportunities for people in a wide range of fields to write articles for print and web use. If you have free time, mad writing “skillz” (and know enough not to use the word “skillz” in your professional writing), you should check out some of the blog & article writing jobs.

Got other ideas for part-time freelance work? What are you doing to make extra money this fall?

Here’s a continuation of yesterday’s post, showcasing some more of the types of providers available for hire here on oDesk. These are the rockstars we’ll help you find when your venture-backed startup signs up to take the oDesk Challenge.

	Alexander Bondarenko, Web Developer Alexander Bondarenko is a developer based in Kiev, Ukraine. With a master’s degree in computer engineering from the National University of Ukraine, Alexander has the skills that many businesses look for on oDesk. With expertise in PHP, Javascript, HTML, Smarty, Jquery, and the Zend Framework, Alexander has been a successful provider on oDesk for more than 3 years.
	Vadim Kravchuk, QA Engineer Vadim Kravchuk is a QA Engineer based in Zhitomir, Ukraine. He has a master’s degree in computer engineering from Engineering and Technology University of Zhitomir. His skillset includes LAMP, PHP, Perl, Delphi as well as administration of ISP, Postgres and Deputy Director. His testing expertise includes manual and automation, black and white-box testing. He is proficient in requirements/architecture/code analysis. Vadim has been testing oDesk projects for the last 3 years.
	Suzanne Davis, Customer Support Rep Suzanne is a customer support representative based in Burns Flat, Oklahoma. She has a background in administration and customer service beginning with companies such as Convergys and Duke Energy. Along the way she transitioned from working in physical call centers and executive offices to working from home answering customer calls while still providing executive level service. She has held roles as HR Manager, Customer Service Trainer and Head of a Customer Service department for several firms, and is now part of the oDesk Customer Support team.

The speed of innovation means new technologies are being introduced every day. What you may not realize is that some of the “older” tech knowledge is still in demand today, and with an abundance of new-generation programmers flooding the digital realm, programmers with some old-school knowledge can be worth a pretty penny.  Here are five savvy skills from yesteryear that can still prove themselves valuable, even if they don’t pop up in every day conversation.

LOTUS NOTES

Lotus Notes has a history spanning more than 20 years, causing some industry analysts and mainstream business press writers to make predictions of its impending demise, but the numbers don’t lie: IBM reported an increase of 100 million seats over the last decade. While the market for jobs requiring Lotus Notes skills has been up and down, there are a few folks out there consistently looking for those with the knowledge to handle any Lotus-related curveball that may come their way.

UNIX SHELL

The Unix shell was unusual when it was first created in 1977. On systems using a windowing system (as many do these days) some users may never use the shell directly. On Unix systems, the shell is still the implementation language of system startup scripts, including the program that starts the windowing system, the programs that facilitate access to the Internet, and many other essential functions. Due to the recent movement in favor of open source software, most Unix shells have at least one version that is distributed under an open source license, which may further explain why this “old school” technology is still a desirable job skill.

COLDFUSION

ColdFusion was anything but cold when it hit the digital realm in the mid 1990s. As the internet exploded in popularity, CF and its legions of programmers rode the dot-com wave to great success thanks to a winning combination of functionality and simplicity. Stiff competition over the years has left  ColdFusion overshadowed by other offerings such as Rails and PHP, though the language does maintain a devout following that actively seeks out other CF aficionados.

COBOL

No, we’re not talking about the ancient planet that served as the cradle of humanity in SyFy Channel’s Battlestar Galactica (besides, that’s spelled with a K), but it is nearly as old. With roots dating back to the late 1950s, COBOL is one of the industry’s oldest programming languages, and according to Stephen Kelly of Micro Focus, still “equates to 80% of the world’s actively used code.” It may not be cutting edge, but there’s no denying the benefits of being able to work with, modify, and update a language that remains so prevalent in modern society. It may not lead to an exclusive contract, but in a world where few institutions even teach COBOL, knowing this language can be a valuable asset indeed.

FORTRAN

If COBOL is ancient, FORTRAN is prehistoric, at least in the technological timeline. 1953 marks the birth of this particular programming language, and what it lacks in sophistication, it makes up for in speed and simplicity. Versions of FORTRAN code still serve front line duty in numerous applications, especially in the engineering and scientific realm, where FORTRAN’s ability to efficiently crunch numbers with little fanfare make it an ideal language for complex calculations.

The hot jobs aren’t necessarily the “hip” programming gigs. Rather, they exist at the point where demand outweighs supply, and that’s not always at the crest of the wave. Programmers know just how fast this industry moves. Today’s in-demand language could well be tomorrow’s history lesson, but having a diverse background can easily mean the difference between scrapping for work with millions of fresh programmers, or showcasing yourself to an under-served niche segment where knowledge of older languages reign supreme—and gets you the job.

This Monday, we announced the oDesk Challenge – and we’ll continue to post more details over the next few days. We’ve been asked about the types of providers available to hire on oDesk. Below are a few examples of the stellar providers venture-backed startups may be interested in hiring through participation in the oDesk Challenge (and there are 320,000+ others, as well!):

	David Kadavy, Graphic Designer Although David bills himself as a graphic designer, he’s more like a Marketing and Product department all in one. Based in Chicago, he is experienced in branding, product management, user experience design, graphic desgin, front-end XHTML/CSS coding, SEO, and Google Analytics. David has Silicon Valley startup experience, and has several endeavors of his own, including Flatmate Meetup, nom.ms, and the Through a Friend Facebook Application.
	Thea Go, Customer Service Rep Thea Go was a Quality Analyst in an American multi-national company the Philippines. When she got pregnant she started thinking of a alternative ways to make a living and at the same time be with her baby. She started with small projects, building her career expertise in several fields of work. She built her reputation through feedback scores and work history, and has recently joined oDesk’s very own customer support team.
	John Kim, SEO Consultant John Kim is a Search Engine Optimization lover with the track record of a VC-funded startup behind him. As Five9.com’s founding CEO & principal lead generator, John grew the company from his apartment in Alameda, California, to a business that generated $10M annually through the web. John has helped half a dozen VC funded startups achieve their online marketing goals. He has a reputation for frankness with clients and passion for lead generation.

We have launched our first integration with Twitter.

In addition to sharing on Facebook, Buyers can share their job openings on Twitter to get more candidates from their network. Providers can share test results and promote their profile, letting the world know they are ready to work on oDesk.

With the oDesk ‘Share on Twitter’ you’re in full control – you decide what you want to showcase on Twitter, and we will not share your oDesk information without your approval.

Activate Twitter now!

Got feedback? Please let us know what you think in this thread.

Here’s the scenario: You just got a callback on a job interview for a big league position, and you have a meeting with the hiring manager tomorrow afternoon. The ironing board immediately comes out to press your suit into a flawless statement of power. A quick visit to the hair salon turns the mop on your head into an executive-level style. That evening you review your resume and portfolio, making sure both are updated with your latest and greatest accomplishments. You make every conceivable effort to absolutely knock the socks off the interviewer, because everyone knows the cliché: You never get a second chance to make a first impression.

And yet, when it comes to written communications online—be it for freelance work, full-time positions, or even general inquiries—folks haphazardly shoot out emails or post profiles with nary a proofread. The fact is, sloppy online first impressions are the equivalent of showing up to an interview—or conducting the interview—wearing ripped jeans, a dirty T-shirt, and a baseball cap advertising beer. And yes, these E-impressions matter just as much as the real thing.

Like it or not, the text you type isn’t just your flawless business suit, it’s also your perfect haircut, friendly smile, attentive posture, and firm handshake all rolled into one.

If that sounds a little frightening, well, it should. If anything, text-based first impressions are even more important than their in-person counterparts, simply because so much rides on so little. On the flip side, introductions though an email or online posting can be immensely advantageous, in that text-based impressions can be endlessly reviewed, revised, and polished beforehand. As such, there’s no real excuse for a poorly-worded first impression, and if you send just such a communication to someone like Jerry over at PSPrint.com, don’t expect to hear anything back because your efforts will go straight to the recycle bin. Jerry’s blog offers some good tips for catching common grammatical goofs, Jesse’s piece at Robust Writing is a good primer for why proper grammar is important, and as your resident oDesk blogger, I offer these bits to help ensure your text-based first impressions are top notch:

• Make sure you have a grown-up email address. Even the very best E-communications lose credibility when they come from a person calling themselves PaRTy4liFE@kegstand.gig. If you’re just trying to be creative, find another way.

• Have someone else proofread your work. Having a second set of unbiased eyes reviewing your work is the absolute best way to catch mistakes.

• Read your work out loud, slowly and methodically. This is a common trick among professional writers to help make sure errors are caught when a proofreader isn’t available.

• Don’t be lazy. Not correcting basic spelling/grammar mistakes says you’re either too stupid to know better, or too lazy to care.

• Don’t be intimidated. You don’t have to be a good writer to write well.  Not every person is a natural born writer, and most people understand this. A mediocre message that’s properly structured is far more professional than a clever paragraph full of dumb mistakes.

Yesterday we announced the oDesk Challenge at TechCrunch50 – and we’ve already received some great questions about what exactly we’re doing for venture-backed startups. Today’s post introduces the process and the oDesk team who will be by your side throughout it.

Once a venture-backed company signs up as an oDesk buyer and posts its first job, our team takes over. Just let us know you want to take part in the oDesk Challenge, and we’ll get to work – starting with a brief phone call with you to understand what skills you’re looking for. We’ll then handle sourcing & interviewing candidates for you, and serve up the top 3 candidates for your job within a week.

Please visit www.odesk.com/oDeskChallenge for more details!

One of these ‘oDesk Challenge’ account managers will find the top 3 candidates for your job Amit Bakshi amitbakshi@odesk.com donot deleate Rebecca Daneault rdaneault@odesk.com donot deleate Josh Breinlinger josh@odesk.com donot deleate

Customer Service 22,000 oDesk providers Interact with your customers via phone, email, and chat Hourly Rates $4-15 Graphic Designers 87,000 oDesk providers Do your HTML, CSS, and offline graphic design Average Hourly Rates $10-30 SEO/SMM Experts 43,000 oDesk providers Blog writers, social media account managers, and SEO linkbuilders Average Hourly Rates: $8-30

Yesterday, at 4:30pm, after a long day of demoing oDesk in the TechCrunch50 DemoPit, Michael Arrington dropped by our table to inform us we won an Audience Choice Award and a chance to demo on stage to all 2,000 conference attendees.  We were already thrilled at the warm the reception our product had been getting all day, but this was a truly spectacular opportunity and a great way to end the day.

Here’s the demo our CEO, Gary Swart, gave.  The panel of experts consisted of Marc Andreessen, Roelof Botha, Paul Graham, Tony Hsieh, and Marissa Mayer.

Thanks to everyone who stopped by our demo table and gave us the chance to earn your vote.  And thanks for everyone who blogged, and facebooked, and especially tweeted on our behalf.  The twitter activity was amazing.  We love these events, as they give us the chance to get in front of users, old and new, and remind us that we’re playing a small part in Changing How the World Works!

At oDesk headquarters in Menlo Park, California, every Tuesday is a WFHT. This Tuesday, we want to welcome those of you who are new to working from home and new to this wonderful — though sometimes unusual — business of freelancing, consulting and providing the world with your talent and skills!

FIFTEEN TIPS FOR YOUR NEW LINE OF WORK:

1. Motivation and dedication will be your best friends. Learn to have them.

2. Caffeine will be your second best friend. Stock your house with it.

3. Have a business plan and write it down. Even if it’s as simple as: Find clients on the internet and provide excellent service.

4. When you are working, imagine there is a “closed” sign on your front door. No friends, no census takers or religious zealots allowed — you aren’t home. You’re at work.

5. Beware watching TV while you work. Unless, of course, you are okay with subconsciously inserting bizarre phrases like “that walk is fierce,” “we’ve lost contact with the sub,” or “he’s at the 30-yard-line” into e-mail correspondence with your clients.

6. Network, network, network.

7. Just because you can enjoy a cocktail while working, doesn’t mean you should. Reasons? Impaired work skills and bizarre phrases in e-mails. (See #5.)

8. Find out how being self-employed will affect your taxes.

9. Get a work e-mail account. Separating your e-mail accounts will help you tune out fun when you are working, and it will help you tune out work when you are just having fun.

10. Seek more than one client at a time, even if you don’t need to. In this economy you don’t want to be dependent on one company for your income.

11. Create an online portfolio with a web site or blog.

12. Don’t take your laptop into the kitchen to work while cooking. Bad things happen to laptops in there.

13. No, seriously, find out about your taxes.

14. Be patient. Don’t expect to be busy right away. It may take time to build your business.

15. Enjoy your new-found freedom. Work at the park. Walk your dog on your lunch break. Spend a day at the beach and work at night. You are your own boss now!

WELCOME TO  OUR WORLD!

Much like a divorced marriage counselor, my ability to dish out advice is not an indicator of my ability to implement it. However, having worked from home for over a decade, I’ve learned what works and what just creates more work.

- Tamara

As we mentioned in our earlier post, we’re thrilled to be in the TechCrunch50 DemoPit this morning.  Here at the conference, every attendee is given a poker chip, which counts as a vote for the DemoPit company the attendee is most excited about.  The company with the most votes gets to present on stage as the “Audience Choice Award.”

So, our job is to get you to visit our demo booth, blow you away with our demo, and get you to give us your poker chip!  Please stop by and give us a chance to earn your vote!  (Voting closes at 2:30pm)

We’re excited to be in the TechCrunch50 Demopit this morning, and announce a special offer for venture-backed startups called the “oDesk Challenge“!

Visit www.odesk.com/oDeskChallenge for more details!

Okay, so you’re hip to the World Wide Web and all the techno-programming required to build the coolest virtual environments in E-town. You’ve got game, you’ve got the software, but you’re missing the most vital ingredient of all: Clients. Even the best web-design mojo is merely untapped potential unless you have an A-list of clientele eager for your efforts, and since you’re eager to earn a few greenbacks for your skills, simply showcasing your talent isn’t enough.

Successful freelance web developers aren’t just outstanding programmers, they’re outstanding communicators as well. This part of the job can be easily overlooked, but it’s vital to landing a contract, establishing clear objectives, and following through to a successful conclusion. If communication makes you nervous, don’t sweat it. There’s no special method to making it happen, just be open, honest, ask questions when you need to, and don’t be afraid to speak up if something concerns you. If it all sounds a bit intimidating, here are some good tips to help you establish some good freelancing habits.

Getting the callback:

• Regardless who initiates first contact, remember that less is better. The biggest mistake people make when it comes to a first contact situation is going overboard trying to impress. Sending paragraphs of programming languages and software suites you’re familiar with usually just frustrates clients, especially in the current economic climate where your project inquiry is one of 600 billion sitting in a manager’s inbox. Consider what the client is looking for and answer that SPECIFIC need, keeping your inquiry to a paragraph and offering to discuss the project further at their convenience.
  



• A portfolio is good, but so is reputation. For developers just starting out, having some sort of portfolio will be the only way you can demonstrate your ability. Avoid filling your portfolio with the same type of projects; three creatively-different web sites are more impressive than nine cookie-cutter efforts. Nor should you develop portfolio tunnel vision, because word-of-mouth and positive feedback are absolutely worth their weight in gold. In fact, some experienced developers don’t even have a portfolio; they develop new business simply though their reputations, so garnering solid feedback and soliciting recommendations from past clients should be as important as archiving web sites for future display.
• Don’t sell yourself short! While low-paying gigs for fresh developers may be a necessity to help build your reputation, don’t just automatically offer up low bids in the hopes of landing a contract. Consider the scope of the project; many times, clients will associate a provider’s skill level to the rates they charge, so if you dish up a lowball price, the contract may go to a provider with a higher rate simply because they’re perceived to be a better candidate.

Sealing the deal:

• Be honest with yourself and your client. This seems like a no-brainer, and while most providers have nothing but the best intentions, being too eager can sometimes lead to inaccurate assessments and bad judgment. Don’t be afraid to say no; if there are aspects of a project that you’re not familiar with or qualified to handle, the client needs to know. If the project has a deadline that you’re even remotely concerned about meeting, speak up. If the project specifics are vague, don’t commit to the work until you know specifically what the client is looking for. Don’t get in over your head just because you’re eager for the work; your shortcomings will become apparent sooner or later, and the end result could wind up costing you in the long run.
• Respect your client’s intelligence. While some folks may have technical knowledge, there are plenty of clients out there who just know they need a web site. Tech-savvy clients may prefer to converse on a more technical level, while others just want to leave the details to you. Adjust your communications accordingly to suit the situation, but never assume what your client needs to know, even if their technical knowledge is on the lower end of the scale. Let them tell you what they need to know, or politely ask if they’d like you to explain something. Nine times out of ten they will concede to your best judgment, but giving them the option of learning something new shows a considerable amount of respect and consideration on your part.
• Hammer out specifics on the project. Don’t be afraid to ask questions to fully understand what your client is looking for, even if they ask you to handle all the details. While having creative freedom to work can be nice, that same freedom can also leave you holding the bag if the client isn’t happy with your decisions. Even the clients who say they have no preference in design usually have some sort of idea in their head of what they want, it’s just a matter of bridging the communication gap to find the specifics. Sometimes, simply asking what they don’t want is an effective way to garner some details.
• Be specific on contract details and expectations. Unattended variables on projects have the potential to backfire, so before enteringinto a new project, make every effort to establish specific details on things like deadlines (both for you and the client), payment schedules and methods, confidentiality agreements, and copyright information. Disclaimers and other legalese are also recommended, especially if the client decides to “tweak” your coding, or hires other developers after you’ve completed your work. Be wary of clients who seek guarantees of success and/or minimum web site traffic; the nature of web development and internet usage is entirely subjective, and the fact is there’s no way to guarantee any sort of usage results. Most importantly, if you’re uncomfortable with a pending arrangement or contract with a client, do not be afraid to turn the project down.

Following through:

• Don’t assume anything during the course of the project. NEVER automatically make significant decisions on a project unless the client has given you clear authority to do so ahead of time, regardless of the problem or how little the client may know about web development. Apprise the client of the situation and ask what they would like to do, even if it means asking their permission to use your best judgment. Keeping these decisions in the hands of the client shows a tremendous amount of respect, concern, and professionalism on your part, while also encouraging healthy communication during the various project stages.
  
• Deliver regular updates. Even if everything is rolling along like clockwork, silence over time has a way of eroding even the strongest bonds of trust and confidence. Offering brief progress updates—even if you’re working hourly—will go a long way in reassuring your client that the project is in good hands.
• Respect your client’s time. Be prepared to work for your client when the clock starts, maintain your productivity, offer regular updates (even if working hourly), but don’t abuse the time given to you. Inform your client of potential delays or setbacks as soon as they occur, and be prepared to offer “off the clock” time if personal matters cause the project to fall behind.
• Offer minor tweaks, edits, and tech support pro-bono at the close of the project. Don’t commit to hours of free work, but offering a little bit of bonus help at the end of a project goes a long way in cementing good relations, and it shows that you stand behind your work.
  
• You are the boss of you, but you also work for your client. Never forget that, as a freelancer, you’re in charge of the work you do. That’s not a license to be disrespectful, abusive, or ignorant of your client’s needs, but you know best how to do your job, so stand behind your actions, speak with confidence, and don’t be afraid to use the word ‘no’ if a request isn’t something you’re willing or able to do.

With freelancing and remote work, the ability to give a visual presentation adds a lot to the efficiency to handle the tasks at hand. While communication technology has come a long way, sometimes phone calls, emails, and screenshots just don’t cut it. When you need the feel of an in-person presentation, you not only have to think logistics and distance, but also the cost and the environmental impact on having someone “come in”. We’ve investigated some of the options for free web conferencing – an easy alternative to the in-person meeting.

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Yugma offers their application free for up to 20 attendees to your meeting and all the standard bells and whistles are provided. Yugma runs on Windows, Linux and Mac.

They even have a handy dandy Skype plugin:

DimDim has all the usual features too and also offers the first 20 attendees free. DimDim needs no install which is a nice feature. This one is interesting in that they offer their software as open source for anyone who wishes to build their own.

Here is a demo from the chief designer:

Vyew also does not require any installation as it is browser based. Vyew has a nice feature in that it is persistent so if you cannot get everyone together at once, the meeting lives on where others can come in later and edit/collaborate.

Here is an intro video to give you the details:

All are roughly similar on the basics but they emphasizing different features for more specific needs – try them all to find the one that’s the best fit for you!

Last week we were fortunate to be invited to the fbFund REV incubator program’s demo day.  For the past 12 weeks, 22 startups with facebook apps were educated, mentored, housed, and funded with up to $100,000 by fbFund (a joint venture by Facebook, Founder’s Fund, and Accel Partners).  We liked what we saw – these startups were innovative, scrappy, and entrepreneurial, and in fact reminded us a lot of oDesk buyers. We wanted to do our part to help out, so we decided to roll up our sleeves to help them find the very best talent on oDesk.

We’re pleased to announce that 7 of the 22 fbFund startups have agreed to take our offer, and we’re in the midst of helping them build online workteams on oDesk!  The teams (and newest oDesk buyers) are:

Funji is a mobile virtual community for the iPhone and iPod touch, satisfying users’ desire to express themselves and communicate with others in a fun, creative way in mobile devices. The team has more than five years of experience in the mobile market in both South Korea and the US.

Gameyola is a distribution and monetization platform for casual Flash games. Flash games currently monetize poorly, but Gameyola solves this problem by providing Flash developers tools to sell virtual goods and to acquire users through social channels.

From keeping track of your kids to protecting your identity and getting back your lost stuff, Life360 is the place you go to keep your family safe, secure, and prepared for daily life.

Churches create their own social networks on MyChurch.org. They extend their community between Sundays with tools to connect and engage their members. Over 30,000 church congregations are represented on MyChurch.org.

Simplify the way you manage Facebook and other social networks through your email inbox. NutshellMail consolidates activity from all your accounts into a single email digest delivered on your schedule. Don’t let email alerts clutter your inbox. NutshellMail keeps you connected and productive at the same time.

Combines the success of resident referral programs with the power of social networks. Residents refer their community to friends through social networks like Facebook, and email to earn rewards and live with friends.

RUNmyERRAND is a social networking inspired web and mobile marketplace that provides people and businesses an easy and trusted way to get everyday tasks done in their own hyperlocal community.

We think oDesk is a great fit for companies like these to access talent anywhere in the world, scale their teams up & down as needed, and save as much as 80% on labor costs. All of these companies need to remain lean and agile on their paths towards profitability, and using oDesk to hire, manage, and pay remote contractors is a great way to do just that.  We wish them all the best as they continue along their entrepreneurial journeys!

At oDesk headquarters in Menlo Park, California, every Tuesday is a WFHT. This Tuesday, let’s talk about that pesky but all-important issue of how you prove yourself worthy of that next freelance gig. How do you present yourself to your next client? How will they see your work?

Accept that paper resumes and leather portfolios are becoming dinosaurs in the freelance world. If you are a freelance writer — be it technical, copy or white papers — chances are, you’re accustomed to presenting your work on paper. Photographer or graphic designer? You may be used to glossy images couched in leather and clear plastic. The thing is, when your business moves to the online world, you — just like a web developer or software engineer — will need to  start showing your work online. The option of walking in for a sit-down interview is no longer on the table. All you have is e-mail and the internet. Get used to it.

Get your work online as soon as possible. Whether you choose to build a portfolio on a freelance site, like oDesk, or build your own web site, it’s important to put your previous work on the internet. If you are a web developer this will be easy. Create your own site, with links to sites you’ve made. Not so tech savvy? Enlist a friend or trade services with another freelancer. Find a way. But you can always utilize a blog. With free blog options like WordPress and Blogger, there’s no excuse. Anyone can create an online showcase for their skills or job history.

Protect your work and make your site simple. So, you want to put your work online, but you’re worried about idea theft and plagiarism? Be savvy. Writers, don’t include full articles (unless it was published on line, in which case, just link). Instead, offer half of each piece, with a note to e-mail you for the entire thing. Photographers, graphic designers, etc., always “watermark” your work. However, besides protection, the best thing you can do for yourself is to keep your site or blog reader-friendly. Nothing too fancy. Plenty of white space, no splashy fonts. It should be as easy to navigate as a physical portfolio is to flip through.

WFHT Recommended Reading
“Build a Killer Online Portfolio in 9 Easy Steps” from Freelance Switch
“Freelance Writer Online Portfolio” from About.com Freelance Writing
“How a Blog Can Help Your Photography Business” from Freelance Switch
“Redesign Your Portfolio Site: 4 Tips … ” from Freelance Folder
“Creating a Successful Online Portfolio” from Smashing Magazine

Much like a divorced marriage counselor, my ability to dish out advice is not an indicator of my ability to implement it. However, having worked from home for over a decade, I’ve learned what works and what just creates more work.

- Tamara

Here in the oDesk community we have a pretty impressive bunch of designers, if we do say so ourselves.  To celebrate some of the amazing design work being done through oDesk, we thought we’d try something a little different this time around and hold a “Design of the Month” contest for the month of October.

As with past contests, the competition is open to all oDesk buyers and will be used to showcase all types of graphic design, including web design, logo & icon design, 3D animation, video editing, illustration and more.

If you’ve hired a designer through oDesk, why not show off the results by entering?  The winner will receive $1,000 oDesk credit, a gift card for a new iPhone 3GS, press opportunities and, of course, bragging rights.

Voting for the “Design of the Month” will be based on visual aesthetics.  For example, if a web site is submitted, it will be judged on how it looks, not its functionality.

So what are you waiting for?  Enter today.  Submissions will be accepted through September 30^th with voting to take place throughout the month of October.

Let the competition begin!

The drowning starts with the conversation you never saw coming, and the conversation comes regardless of how long you’ve been with the publication or how valuable the publisher once considered you. One morning you get up and you have a job. By the time you get your cup of coffee, you’re unemployed.

Or at least that’s how it happened to me last year. When a certain national magazine pulled me out of the freelance ocean almost six years ago, slapped me with a name tag and brought me on board the ship, I thought my self-employed days were over. For more than half a decade I basked in the glow of a steady income, a snappy business card and a real title: Media Editor.

Never mind that the title itself was a constant bone of contention between me and my boss. I mean, really, I was the book and resource editor, so why not just call me that and spare me the constant clarifications at every introduction. What’s a media editor? It’s a book and resource editor. Oh. Insert quizzical expressions here, ad nauseum. (By the way, the answer “because it’s too long to fit in the masthead”, is not a good reason to keep a title so nondescript.)

Now, the squabble over the title seems silly. The editor with whom I waged this battle was laid off long ago, and now I have been too. The economy is rocky, the fear is on, and fancy titles are being lost every day. One friend took a pay cut to keep her job and title at a major publisher, but many haven’t been be that lucky. Companies are battening the hatches, plugging the leaks and tossing “dead weight” — publicists, writers, and editors — from the hold. I, myself, was mercifully walked off the plank by a friend who couldn’t help but cry. I mean, really, who wants the job of telling someone on their first day back from a medical leave to treat breast cancer that they no longer have a job?

So, post-layoff, I scrambled to update and add pizazz to my resume. (Does kicking cancer in the backside count as a relevant skill?) And, in the back of my mind, I couldn’t help but sense that it was a futile effort. Even today, publishers aren’t hiring and periodicals are sinking fast.

What makes a writer think they can get freelance work, let alone another job?

Does it matter that I sold a bunch of personal essays in 2003? Do you think perhaps that could get me a book deal? Does it mean anything to anyone that my cover story in 2005 was one of the magazine’s best-selling issues?

The answer right now, I believe, is no. None of those things helped me keep my job and none of them got me another. As it has always been in the world of publishing, it’s not what you know or what you’ve accomplished, it’s who you know. Know the captain and your ticket is a guarantee; only know the deckhand? You probably won’t make it to the galley.

What I didn’t know, during those first few months of resumes and cover letters, is that there is a whole new — and very different – world of publishing on the internet, where the old “shipping” rules are not as hard and fast. A writer can become part of the right community simply by logging in to the right forum or registering with the right freelancing site. Magic can happen overnight on the internet, publishing can happen overnight on the internet.

Still, I’m digging through the e-mail contacts, looking for the first time at the business cards stuffed in my laptop case (my apologies) and pulling up the cell phone numbers, signaling the shores and hoping against hope that the next time a group of happily employed editors are sitting around a conference table and the subject of a potential freelance gig comes up, my name springs instantly to mind.

Instead of yours.

We are pleased to announce our best Providers for August 2009! We have over 250,000 Providers on oDesk, but these ones stood out as the cream of the crop this month, as they performed the most hours of work with the highest feedback rating. They have been given special badges recognizing their achievement.

oDesk Buyers, you might want to get in touch with these Providers soon…they just completed assignments and are available now, but probably won’t be for long. Click on their profile to check out their work and contact them for an interview!

Top 25 Freelance Designers for August 2009 were: 1) Jason D. Sr. Graphic Designer | Creative Director 2) Enric I. Creative Graphic Designer for Print & Web, Image Masking Specialist 3) David Moehle Voice Talent/Start to Finish Digital Audio Creation and Editing/Writer 4) Lily W. Sr. designer for logo, banner ,website and business card(Photoshop & I 5) Athen Desautels 3d Artist, Character Animator, Digital Content Creator 6) Drupalchamp D. drupalchamp 7) Mike P. Branding, Logo Design, Templates & Full Websites – over 7 years exp. 8 ) Justine B. Bilingual Photojournalist, Blogger and Translator (Spanish+English) 9) Pavle Borovac | Logo – Branding – Corporate Identity | 10) Matthew G. Video Editor – Viral Video – On-Line Video – 12 Year Professional 11) Greg Williams Creative Voice Talent and Audio Production 12) Bohdan S. Highly skilled flash developer, Web Designer 13) Agnes B. creative logo designer always in time/strong in marketing & branding 14) Dexter B. Dedicated Illustrator • Professional Artist 15) Tyler Bartlett Corporate Identity, Illustrator, Graphic Designer 16) Mirza M. Architect, Designer, 3d & jewellery modeler, real estate consultant 17) Alexey Medvedev 3D MODELING • VISUALIZATION • ARCHITECT • GRAPHIC • CAD specialist