Earlier quoted context omitted.
I apologize in advance for how long this got :-/ At first I was signed up on freelancer.com as well and did several ~$150 contracts where I could bid/get picked/do the work/get paid practically the same day, which helped my psyche. I also did a relatively large project on elance.com but unfortunately didn't get paid for it due to disputes over milestones (the customer kept adding to the to do list), which is what led…
Wow, this is an awesome answer! A big thank you for taking time sharing your experience. There are many good points and I will definitely go over this again and again as I work on oDesk. Regarding my situation with the getting initial works, I think I will do what you said, like doing the tests and adding stuff to profile. May I ask that for the first few contracts, did you apply for them or did the clients discovere…
I don't recall trying to comfort them about my inexperience on oDesk. I mostly just focussed on similar work I had done in the past, even if it was just a concept I was interested in that they were trying. Most of this stuff is so esoteric to non-technical folks that authenticity goes a long way. To alleviate their fears, you could ask for less up front. On contracts that are 40 or so hours or less, I ask for 50%, but beyond that I tend to ask for 25%. Then I usually pitch about 3-5 milestones. Never settle for 0% upfront, because it takes several hours/days to get up to speed with a project before you begin. You can always give refunds too, so don’t stress too much about going over if you have the meter running on an hourly contract. It’s probably better to have an accurate accounting of your time and renegotiate after the next payment. This has never come up for me though, because I tend to be a lot harder on myself than the client is. Just be aware of it and add in some contingency time, maybe 10-20% of total when you are bidding. So bid 100 hours instead of 80, 50 instead of 40, etc, and don’t worry about round numbers because they sound suspicious anyway. You really can’t go wrong with an honest approach, and if you still aren’t getting contracts, perhaps message some of the people who declined and just ask if there’s something you could do better to land one next time. Short of that, I’ve been thinking of pasting a beard on my profile picture.