I think I did two jobs on Odesk but I always bid $10 or higher. Just minor little jobs though. Nothing that took to much time. I thought it was all I had back then.

You don't compete with the rates on these sites, you compete on value. I just wrote two blog posts on why clients should rethink hiring a VA from sites like this and have written several posts on virtual assistant rates and why you really don't have to worry about competing on price. I'm even doing a webinar next week on pricing vs value because it's been such an often asked concern when I coach other virtual assistants.
When you really understand your own value there are ways to communicate that to potential clients in such a way that they won't question your higher rates.
Sure, there will always be potential clients that are all about the price, but are they the type of client you really want?

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~Tina Marie Hilton of Clerical Advantage
& founder of VA Survival School

Sites such as oDesk and Elance aren't the business when you have a business. It takes so much to try and set up a high quality profile with samples and even more time to write all these custom cover letters and even more time to apply to all the potential jobs you can perform. Unfortunately a lot of what you see are people desperate and willing to belittle themselves by working for pennies. Knowing your worth, you shouldn't have to compete. Keep networking, keep educating yourself and keep grinding.

Thanks everyone. I posted a similar this question this morning not knowing this one was here. My first thought was how do you compete with those low fees. I am starting my own business because for the 3rd time I am with a company who is outsourcing overseas and I am losing my job. So seeing those sites riddled with people overseas who will work for pennies really disturbs me and was really discouraging me about starting my own. I don’t think I will be visiting those sites again.

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Angeline Williams
Williams DocuPrep Virtual Assistant Services

I started out homebased work through Odesk. Unfortunately, since it is a bidding game, often than not the lower the hourly rate, the better chances of getting hired. however, I find that most often than not, you do this when you're starting out but once you get hold of many projects you can increase your hourly rate and so on. However, since I live overseas, whatever I do, I wouldn't be able to get a much higher rate than $15/hour even working with direct clients as they know the cost of living here vis-a-vis those in the US.

"You get what you pay for" is never more true than for 'discount' services. When I started at my 9-5, the prior $15/hr 'bookkeeper', who had no experience, had set up QuickBooks wrong and I spent 8 months fixing it.

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Lily Chambers, The Virtual Office Goddess, LLC
Author "How to Do Your Own Small Business Bookkeeping"

Originally Posted by Office Goddess

"You get what you pay for" is never more true than for 'discount' services. When I started at my 9-5, the prior $15/hr 'bookkeeper', who had no experience, had set up QuickBooks wrong and I spent 8 months fixing it.

How true! I cannot tell you how many times I have worked in an office, where the person I replaced, messed up something. Sometimes she messed up the files, sometimes it was (legal) cases; and, no one knew that she wasn't doing her job right. So, I come in and have to fix it all! I started an office job last week (as a boost to get my VA business off the ground) and I found that the person that I replaced did not follow up on many of the cases. It's amazing that folks actually get away with slipshod work.

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Collaborative Business Support

It's really too bad that we can't bring the standard of living of third world countries where I'm assuming many of these workers reside to our standard. Sadly, it seems with the stagnate wages we're dealing with, what they earn now may be a moot point because we will eventually be living on the same kind of wages. Sorry this isn't the place to get political, but to me it's heart breaking that intelligent , hardworking people are abused in such a way. Those employers (and i use the term loosely--to me their more like slave drivers) should be ashamed of themselves.

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A L Camien
Manager Member

Originally Posted by eXPERT Business Support

It is really hard to compete with THAT. I am not an experienced user of sites such as Elance or Odesk, but a couple of weeks ago I went on Elance and really thumbed through a few listings. I, like many people, was really curious about it. And to be honest, I really wanted to "spread my wings" and find clients who were not locally based (which is kind of what I have been doing). But the problem with these sites is that, as you said, they make it really hard to compete. Most of the "hiring" people do not want to pay descent rates. And way too many of the people looking to work are willing to accept, well, way too little by our standards. I did win a bid for a project, which I am totally loving. I have built the nicest relationship with this person. She is so professional, on top of things, understanding, respectful, and I could go on about her. The problem is that the rate I accepted nowhere near compares to the work I am putting into it. And it is really my own fault. I was -- and am not -- experienced enough at this type of thing AT ALL! So ... after all is said and done, if I ever go for another Elance type thing (not sure I will), I will be very realistic with MY OWN expectations and my own earnings. Now, it has not been all that bad. I do have a great connection now with a wonderful, hard-working lady such as myself. But "no can do" as far as working for these types of project-based rates. Oh dear, I rambled! ut:

I had a similar first experience on Freelancer. I finally got a break or so I thought. I made a bid on what I thought was going to be one job for $100 but it turned into a series of bitsy work like writing articles for $1.5 a piece until the $100 was used up. She was nice enough but as everyone has been saying, my services are worth much more than that so believe me I was a lot more aware the next time. A really nice client did contact me directly via Elance and so far so good. I think it's a matter of choosing wisely.

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Sabrina L. Williams
For a bird's eye view of your business

I thought I would try odesk and got a response on my first bid. The problem was, the response was definitely a scam! The job sounded good on odesk but the response had no signature, words were repeated, he said they would pay for programs that would need used - but he wanted way too much information before finding out my references. All of the other ads I've looked at, the bids are so low, it's ridiculous!

Sorry, small rant Can't believe the prices over there and I know I won't go back

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Stacy Larmore
https://sites.google.com/site/stacylarmore/