Freelancer goes after the on-demand economy with local services finder

Are you a family in Delhi looking for an electrician to fix the wiring in your bathroom? Or a business in London that needs a specialist to run your product launch? Or maybe a young professional in Sydney who wants to hire a removals team to help you move to your new home? That’s now possible on Freelancer.com after the company added in a new section for nearby services.

Freelancer, one of the world’s largest online freelancing marketplaces, has added location to its algorithm, which means it can now match local jobs to freelancers, it announced in a statement. This means the site is challenging on-demand startups such as Airtasker and TaskRabbit, which help people connect with cleaners, plumbers or professionals like event managers and caterers.

Jack of all trades

After selecting “hire” on the Freelancer homepage, users are prompted to choose if their job is location-specific or can be done anywhere online. If it’s location-specific, then they will be matched only with service providers in their area.

“When you have the largest and most liquid online services marketplace in the world with over 15 million users, it is natural for us to expand our business to encompass location-specific tasks,” said Freelancer CEO and chairman Matt Barrie.

The company says this new feature is expected to increase its total addressable market to hundreds of billions of dollars in gross payment volume per year from the current US$75 billion.