rocknbil - 8:18 pm on Mar 10, 2010 (gmt 0)

I'll only add . . . it's now a global marketplace, and many of us compete against providers to whom $50 will feed their family for a week. It's not uncommon to see a project that for most of us would be a $500 project given to a provider for $50-$100.

"Internet Gurus" out there (and I mean this extremely tongue in cheek, marketers who are more versed on exploitation than anything) are using these resources to produce eBooks for pennies on the dollar teaching you how to screw providers out of an honest living by exploiting them in this way. Outsourcing providers are now our competition, it has changed pretty much everything in terms of even corporate design as well as web work.

A provider today will not survive by competing against them on price. You can only survive by presenting compelling proposals that justify your costs with experience.

The other option is to go local, stay local, and hope your clients never hear about the degree of exploitation that is going on with "outsourcing."

As always, you get what you pay for, and I regularly come into new projects that are a product of "outsourcing." The client is wiser and willing to listen now. :-P