Elance, one of the freelance job boards, has established a partnership with eHealth to health insurance for small businesses and freelance professionals who work online. Is a retirement plan next?
The partnership will provide the U.S. based Elance community with “free health insurance quotes, the ability to compare over 10,000 health insurance products from carriers nationwide and the option to purchase quality health insurance products through an online, paperless process. Members of the Elance community will also have access to a call center staffed with licensed health insurance agents for personal assistance.”
A recent survey conducted by Elance revealed that a majority (51%) of respondents didn’t know how healthcare reform was going to affect them, and 24% expressed concern that healthcare reform would have a negative impact on independent workers. Although cost was cited as the largest barrier for obtaining health insurance, the majority of survey respondents (85%) identified lack of quality information as a major challenge in selecting health insurance as an independent worker.
To visit Elance’s healthcare resource, go to: http://www.elance.com/p/healthcare.html
In case you don’t know, Elance is one of the largest online freelance job boards in the world. $25,000 new projects are posted every month. You can submit your own video to the Elance Cloud Commute contest through November 17th.. The Grand Prize winner gets a trip to the world capital of their choice. Second place gets you an iPad! And there are more prizes too.
As for Ted Bendixson, the snowboarding freelance copywriter who did this video, he works from home whenever he’s not out enjoying the sunshine and trying gnarly new tricks. If the weather isn’t so great, he just stays inside and puts in a few extra hours. Mother Nature determines his schedule—he says she’s the friendliest boss you’ll ever meet!
In his own words:
A lot of people ask me how I got started, and I only have one answer - in the trenches. I used lower-paying writing gigs to build up a portfolio, and once I had a big enough reputation, I used it to get more of the better paying jobs. Freelance writing started off as part-time work to supplement my job waiting tables out in Mt. Hood Oregon, and in less than one year, I took the business full-time.
Because my clients come from all around the world, and I meet them on sites like Elance, Odesk, and Vworker, it doesn’t really matter where I live. Last spring, I decided to take the plunge and fly out to New Zealand for a southern hemisphere winter. I worked from my home the entire time I was there, and my business didn’t suffer in the slightest.
If I have a tip for anyone, it’s this. When you deliver quality work, and you are always striving to learn more about the fundamentals of your business, you will do well no matter where you are. You can even grow out your hair, wear baggy clothes, and snowboard in the summer.
If you need some gnarly copy, you can reach Ted at his Elance site. We may use him ourselves thanks to his video intro.
If you have an insanely great app you’re developing for the ipad or the iPhone, venture capital may be available to fund your efforts.
Venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB) announced it’s increasing the size of its “iFund” to $200 million. They’ve already commited all $100 million from the fund estabished two years ago.
Fourteen companies, including ngmoco and Shazam, with 20 apps under development, convinced the venture capitalists they were going somewhere special, and even attracted an additional $330 million from other sources. It takes an esxtraordinary team, a strong market and decent product (in that order) to convince VCs to invest, but it can be done. See FindingMoneyAdvice.com for more information, if you think you might be a candidate.
“Kleiner Perkins has done a terrific job at finding, funding and supporting great iPhone app developers,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We are thrilled that they are doubling the size of their fund, along with expanding it to now include iPad developers too,” according to KPCB.
According to the KPCB announcement, the companies have had over 100 million of their mobile applications downloaded and, in 2010 alone, generated over $100 million in revenue .
