It's been 4 years these days that my colleagues and myself have been working as full-time freelancers. When we started doing this, we hoped that with our quality and expertize in 4-year time we will have found a client who will open a branch of his company in our country hiring us full time and providing us with the work he finds in his own country.
So far, we have worked with literally more than 70 clients ranging from a individuals to companies of 40-100 employees. Do I have to say that none of them has ever offered or asked anyone of us if we are willing to work for them solely and taking care on their projects and hiring additional help. So we gathered and asked ourselves, what the problem may be. I know, if I live in the UK or USA and have access to multitude of clients, I would have a great time overseas.
Does anyone have experience with this? Is there anyone here who started as a freelancer and ended as CEO/CTO of the company who opened branch in his country letting him take care of all those boring things (project management, staffing, etc. )?
Is it realistic to find such client via services like odesk/elance/freelancer/guru and similar large websites?
What should we do on our site to recognize such clients? Shall we ask each client about his vision to open a remote company and letting him know that we seek such clients? Should we do this after the first project ended?
Should we advertise our intention that we are willing to become someone's branch? If yes, what services shall we use?
To shorten up, I need a good advise on how to approach to the problem I described here. Ideally, someone with experience will reply and we can even continue discussion in chat.