What is Freelancing? | Online Earning | Academic Beat

An Online Way to Earn Money- Freelancing

Freelancing is a contract-based job where instead of recruitment in an organization or company, the person uses his skills and expertise to provide services to several clients on any online platform. In other words, freelancing is when you use your skills, knowledge, and experience to work with clients and take on different assignments without committing to a single employer. It usually involves jobs that allow you to work-from-home at your ease.

According to recent statistics, about 57% Americans do freelance work. An eye-opening fact about freelancing in Pakistan is that Pakistan has about 47% of freelancers and stands at 4^th place in the list.

Who is freelancer?

Freelancer is a self-employed person who offers services to different clients. He is not committed to a person for long term. He works from ease of home in flexible money, completes jobs assigned by employer and gets paid.

Popular Freelance Market Places:

There are different marketplaces that offer jobs related to almost every skill set. Few of those sites are listed below;

1. UpWork:

It was formerly known as Elance-oDesk. It has about 12 Million registered freelancers and  It is almost largest freelance marketplace with over 1.5 Million clients. It accommodates both long- term and short-term projects, expert level and entry level engagements. Jobs of worth US$1 billion are posted annually which are approximately 3 million overall. This freelance market place offers various useful features and facilities to its freelancers such as time tracking sheet. This sheet keeps track of the actual time spent on the specified project. Upwork offers its mobile app for freelancers that helps them to keep track of the projects and easy way to communicate to clients.

2. Fiverr:

Fiverr was found in 2007, in Israel. It has over 14 million registered users. This marketplace is dominated mostly by young ones as it has only two percent users above the age of 55. Fiverr is called so because every project on it starts at $5. The services offered by freelancers are called as gigs.You can also offer additional services to earn more. If you are beginner and want to build portfolio in freelancing, there is nothing better than to start on Fiverr. You have opportunity to bid on every project posted on Fiverr related to your skill set. Fiverr offers its mobile app which is helpful for freelancers to manage and keep track of their projects in a beautiful manner.

3. Freelancer:

Freelancer is an Australian freelance marketplace. It was founded in 2009 with its headquarter located in Sydney. This site has huge variety of projects like hourly projects and some contests. This site offers you only 8 bids free then, you must update your membership plan. It has 32 million registered users.

This marketplace offers its mobile app for freelancers. This app helps freelancers to get more projects and communicate effectively to their clients.

4. Guru.com:

It was founded in 1998 in Pittsburgh and still has its headquarters located there. This freelance site has about 3 million registered users. This marketplace is completely free for freelancers while it costs 10% fee of a project from its clients. This is quiet benefit feature for freelancers. It also offers number of projects related to every skill set on daily basis. It offers projects related to almost every skill set. It is easy to make profile here. After you make profile here, it offers handsome number of free bids. This marketplace has no mobile app for its users.

5. 99Designs:

 If you are a designer and looking for employment, this would be a better place for you. It provides platform to showcase your work and improve your knowledge.  Here, it i easy even for an ordinary graphic designer to catch the attention of potential clients. This is best place for beginner graphic designers.

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