If you’ve recently been laid off from a position within a company, and you’ve been pounding the pavement with little or no success at landing an interview, let alone a new job, then listen up. There is hope.

If you have the drive and determination to succeed and work out of your own home, there is an alternative work arrangement that you might want to consider. Besides the flexibility of setting your own hours, there are many more benefits of becoming a virtual assistant, with the ultimate goal of being able to bring in extra money for the bills and to put food on the table, without paying out a lot in the way of equipment.

Now you may be wondering what kind of things a person could possibly do from home - especially if you are used to working in an office. And, just what is this freelancing that I mentioned in the title? You also might be wondering how to get into freelancing. Well, let’s take a look briefly at each question.

What is freelancing?

According to Wikipedia, “A freelancer, freelance worker, or freelance is a self-employed person who pursues a profession without a long-term commitment to any particular employer. The term was first used by Sir Walter Scott (1771-1832) in Ivanhoe to describe a “medieval mercenary warrior” or “free-lance”. Some additional synonyms you might hear tossed around are contractor and independent contractor.

How can you get into freelancing?

The easiest way to get into freelancing is through one of the multiple freelance marketplaces that abound on the Internet. The one that I use, in particular, is Elance. Elance has been around since 1998 when it was founded. Privately held and headquartered in Mountain View, California, this company is insistent that it be the most widely used application for Services and Contractor Management. According to their website, more than 200,000 employees are using Elance in all facets of finding, buying, managing and paying external services and contractors from more than 2,000 suppliers across 50+ services categories. You will register with them in the specific niche that you want to pursue. When you are paid, Elance, of course, will take their cut; but they are the one site that I feel has the highest quality standards.

What kind of things can you freelance in?

Elance offers a wide variety of categories that a virtual assistant can mix and match in to complement their abilities and expertise. The two categories that I’m personally signed up for are Admin. Support and Writing & Translation; these will cover a wide array of services that you can specialize in. The December Elance Work Index just recently published substantiated that PHP, HTML, and Article Writing were among the top skills in demand for the month.
I’m not saying you will get rich at freelancing, but I do attest to the fact that you can make money by freelancing. If you work hard, bid reasonably, and maintain high quality standards, you just might enjoy it so much while bringing in an extra income that you’ll want to continue.

Yes, indeed. There are several freelance marketing sites out there where you can post a project and have eager providers bid on the project in the hopes that you will choose them. It is definitely possible to get good help through outsourcing.

Overview

One of those sites is Elance. Elance has been around since 1998 when it was founded. Privately held and headquartered in Mountain View, California, this company had a vision that has allowed it to become the most widely used application for Services and Contractor Management. According to their website, More than 200,000 employees are using Elance in all facets of finding, buying, managing and paying external services and contractors from more than 2,000 suppliers across 50+ services categories.

Why

The Elance Work Index, ranks the hottest 100 skills in today’s online labor market. What they ranked as the number one spot on the Index for the third month in a row might suprise you. The November Elance Work Index highlights that PHP (Personal Home Page Tools) captures the number one spot on the Index, confirming the surmise that PHP-skilled professionals are the most highly demanded professionals in today’s workforce.

More than 28,000 jobs have been posted in Elance within the last 30 days in all sorts of categories. You need someone to write articles for you? No problem. Elance has a category for that. Need someone to do website design? Yup, Elance has a category for that, as well.

Just think; with over 100,000 experts active in Elance today, you have a wide variety of professionals that you can choose from. Just take a look at the major categories that you can post a job in:

* Web and Programming
* Design and Multimedia
* Writing and Translation
* Administrative Support
* Sales and Marketing
* Finance and Management
* Legal
* Engineering and Manufacturing

Within each major category, you have a wide array of skills for hire. Let’s look at just five examples in the Design and Multimedia as an example:

* Graphic Design
* Photography
* Animation
* Dreamweaver
* Videography

And this is just a sampling. There are 30 more skills within the Design and Multimedia major category. Are you beginning to see the wide field of opportunity for getting outsourced help easily?

How

It’s easy. With the Elance Work System, it’s a piece of cake to hire professionals with a standardized way to post jobs and receive proposals, hire, manage, and pay for results, and also enables collaboration, tracking progress and providing feedback. What could be easier?

Time is of the essence

Here you are with the Christmas holidays bearing down at you with breakneck speed. Perhaps you are behind on finalizing your marketing plan or just plain need extra help to fill in for someone that is sick. Well, don’t stress out about it. Now is your opportunity to Post your freelance jobs now! You won’t be sorry you did.