How difficult will it be?

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koen.h
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How difficult will it be?

Post by koen.h »

I'm thinking about taking the plunge and going freelance. The dollar is against me but I'm not doing it to get rich. My question is: what am I to expect? There are some site listed here where I can compete for contracts. I see the competition is hard. Are there people making a living from those sites alone? Don't you get the feeling that tomorrow better someone chooses your offer or you're without work?
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califdon
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by califdon »

That's a very tough decision to make. You must realize that it is a decision that carries substantial risk. It also carries the possibility of significant gains in the longer term, and often greater satisfaction and freedom, compared with being just another employee in a company.

Most sources of advice to those considering such a move recommend that, first, you have something like a 6-month reserve of cash before you make the plunge. That is, in the worst case scenario, you and your family could survive if you received no income for 6 months. If you don't have such a reserve, you might consider starting as a side-job while continuing to keep your day job. Of course, that's hard work, but there can be many advantages, including contacts to help you locate potential work and technical advice from colleagues. What you have to be careful of is that you don't neglect or abuse your employer's interests.

Then, as a freelancer, there are several paths you can follow. One is to solicit and bid on advertised jobs. Personally, I don't think this is the best way. It's not just that you are competing with many others, thus you'll probably only win the low-bid jobs, but this is dangerously close to becoming just a "hired gun", part-time worker--cheap labor, without a benefits package. The path that I think offers more opportunity, at least in a reasonably high-tech geographic region, is to lean heavily on your network of colleagues and friends, to find companies or managers who have a technical problem but haven't advertised for someone to solve it for them. This is definitely not easy, but the rewards can be very high. It's hard at the beginning and for some time, but as you bring successful solutions to more and more people, they talk to others in their company or other companies, and if you are as good as you think you are (and we all think we're really good, don't we?), you will gradually build up a reputation and will find it easier and easier to keep busy. You can try to widen your contacts and even make phone calls to local business owners who are large enough to need or want web or information solutions, but don't have an IT staff. You can advertise locally or on Craig's List, etc.

Good luck to you, whatever you decide.
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Eran
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by Eran »

My advice is in addition to getting freelance projects, try to get some recurring contract work for development firms. PHP developers are in hot demand, and some firms are willing to agree to less committing terms (say per project or per flow) and could be a source of constant work. Augment that with constantly bidding for opportunity projects and you could make a very nice living out of it.

A big part of your success will be in how you represent yourself and deal with clients. Think hard about to showcase your talents and expertise to make you stand above the crowd, maybe start a blog or create a representational website. A good CV and portfolio will go a long way.
koen.h
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by koen.h »

One of the reasons those job boards appeal to me is that, *I think*, I will be less annoyed with phone calls and pre-job meetings. I don't have any problems with dealing with emails a couple of times a day. But getting people on the phone, or meetings, annoy the hell out of me. I'm ready to sacrifice income for that (on top of the euro-dollar conversion loss I'm facing). I'm not a networking kind of guy and too introvert to become one. A blog that would draw people into contacting me in addition to board-hunting would be great.
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onion2k
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by onion2k »

I honestly believe that making a living from freelancing is impossible if you don't have local contacts that you can get work from. If you're going to rely on the internet to get work you should try it for six months while working in a normal job first - if you make enough to survive without the job then go for it, but I doubt you will.

Regarding being an introvert ... it's highly unlikely you'll get enough work if you can't sell things to people.

Have you considered building a product that you could sell to people? Chris Corbyn here is going that way with Swiftmailer, the guy who wrote JPGraph sells licenses for that, there are a bunch of companies that write and sell forum software, CMSs etc. There's definitely a market for PHP products. You would have to be damn good at coding though because a lot of people would see what you produce.
koen.h
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by koen.h »

onion2k wrote:I honestly believe that making a living from freelancing is impossible if you don't have local contacts that you can get work from. If you're going to rely on the internet to get work you should try it for six months while working in a normal job first - if you make enough to survive without the job then go for it, but I doubt you will.

Regarding being an introvert ... it's highly unlikely you'll get enough work if you can't sell things to people.

Have you considered building a product that you could sell to people? Chris Corbyn here is going that way with Swiftmailer, the guy who wrote JPGraph sells licenses for that, there are a bunch of companies that write and sell forum software, CMSs etc. There's definitely a market for PHP products. You would have to be damn good at coding though because a lot of people would see what you produce.
Swiftmailer is opensource so I guess he must be selling his services regarding the product. I've thought about selling some product but competition seems even harder there. I've also thought about releasing some opensource cms and selling services like customisation/support. That's probably something I should aim for on a longer timeframe.
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califdon
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by califdon »

onion2k wrote:I honestly believe that making a living from freelancing is impossible if you don't have local contacts that you can get work from. If you're going to rely on the internet to get work you should try it for six months while working in a normal job first - if you make enough to survive without the job then go for it, but I doubt you will.

Regarding being an introvert ... it's highly unlikely you'll get enough work if you can't sell things to people.
I heartily agree with onion2k. Being an entrepreneur absolutely requires social skills. Being an introvert is nothing to be ashamed of, but I think it would be folly to try to succeed on your own if you're shy.
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Eran
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by Eran »

Swiftmailer is opensource so I guess he must be selling his services regarding the product. I've thought about selling some product but competition seems even harder there. I've also thought about releasing some opensource cms and selling services like customisation/support. That's probably something I should aim for on a longer timeframe.
Up till now it was open-source, unfortunately some future features will be in the paid license only.
koen.h
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by koen.h »

califdon wrote:
onion2k wrote:I honestly believe that making a living from freelancing is impossible if you don't have local contacts that you can get work from. If you're going to rely on the internet to get work you should try it for six months while working in a normal job first - if you make enough to survive without the job then go for it, but I doubt you will.

Regarding being an introvert ... it's highly unlikely you'll get enough work if you can't sell things to people.
I heartily agree with onion2k. Being an entrepreneur absolutely requires social skills. Being an introvert is nothing to be ashamed of, but I think it would be folly to try to succeed on your own if you're shy.

I'm far from being an ashamed introvert and I think it's a misunderstanding that introverts have little social skill. I do think I can sell my services. But I prefer to sell by print rather than IRL. Bidding for jobs on the boards would be ideal for me. A nice code portfolio and website, optionally with blog, would be my main selling point (together with satisfying customers of course). But it seems the consensus is that to survive this combo (job board/portfolio) is only a part of the business.
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califdon
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by califdon »

You began this thread with the question, "What am I to expect?" I think we are all telling you our versions of what you might expect. Whatever you decide to do is up to you, of course. I would certainly agree that there is much more to operating as an independent contractor than having a great website/blog and making bids on advertised jobs at arms-length. And I would add that everyone makes their own adaptations, so no single experience is going to be likely to predict the success of any other person. But relations with clients is a major--let me repeat, major--factor in the success of any business. If you choose to limit your relations to certain modes of contact, what you are doing is limiting your opportunities. It doesn't mean that you won't get any work, but it certainly means there will be opportunities that will never reach you. It makes no sense to me to plan a business venture by starting out limiting your sources of work. That leads to the importance of telephoning (I dislike it, too, by the way) and "schmoozing" and interacting with colleagues and others who might be of value to you in locating projects. Again, just like in job hunting, the best jobs are practically always the ones that are not advertised!
koen.h
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by koen.h »

califdon wrote:You began this thread with the question, "What am I to expect?" I think we are all telling you our versions of what you might expect. Whatever you decide to do is up to you, of course. I would certainly agree that there is much more to operating as an independent contractor than having a great website/blog and making bids on advertised jobs at arms-length. And I would add that everyone makes their own adaptations, so no single experience is going to be likely to predict the success of any other person. But relations with clients is a major--let me repeat, major--factor in the success of any business. If you choose to limit your relations to certain modes of contact, what you are doing is limiting your opportunities. It doesn't mean that you won't get any work, but it certainly means there will be opportunities that will never reach you. It makes no sense to me to plan a business venture by starting out limiting your sources of work. That leads to the importance of telephoning (I dislike it, too, by the way) and "schmoozing" and interacting with colleagues and others who might be of value to you in locating projects. Again, just like in job hunting, the best jobs are practically always the ones that are not advertised!
I'm here to hear your versions and appreciate the feedback. Even though no two paths are the same, if everyone tells similar things, I need to think twice about going the same direction if I don't like some things.
What I wonder is, if some modes of communication are that important, how do all these Indian companies and freelancers it? The boards seem to be filled with them and I don't think they'll have to take much phone calls and do shmoozing. Life's probably cheaper there so maybe they can afford to be less successful in getting contracts.
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califdon
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by califdon »

koen.h wrote:What I wonder is, if some modes of communication are that important, how do all these Indian companies and freelancers it? The boards seem to be filled with them and I don't think they'll have to take much phone calls and do shmoozing. Life's probably cheaper there so maybe they can afford to be less successful in getting contracts.
I don't know where you live or what your style of living is, but I doubt that you would be happy making the income those folks make. :(

The other thing is that they are not working independently! They are employees working for large companies. Big difference! :)
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Eran
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by Eran »

koen.h wrote: What I wonder is, if some modes of communication are that important, how do all these Indian companies and freelancers it? The boards seem to be filled with them and I don't think they'll have to take much phone calls and do shmoozing.
I don't consider client-relations to be schmoozing. Meeting clients in person to discuss requirements and provide a face behind the developer is essential in my opinion.
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califdon
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Re: How difficult will it be?

Post by califdon »

pytrin wrote:I don't consider client-relations to be schmoozing. Meeting clients in person to discuss requirements and provide a face behind the developer is essential in my opinion.
Oh, I couldn't agree more. But schmoozing can be useful when you're trying to identify potential clients and projects. Before even looking at requirements. What I'm referring to is what I've taken advantage of numerous times: I'll be talking casually to a friend or a colleague at a monthly developer User Group meeting and either they may mention an acquaintance who wants to establish a web presence, or they'll hear me mention some project I've recently worked on and it reminds them of a job they turned down because they didn't have the time to do it, etc. Or while I'm working on one project (or even much later, after completion), and my client just happens to mention that their counterpart in a different organization could sure benefit from a similar solution, I am not bashful about suggesting that they put in a good word for me, if I'm interested in taking it on. (Actually, this is honestly rather theoretical, at this point in my life; I have been fully retired for some years and would not undertake a new project anymore, although I occasionally help someone out on some small part of a project.)
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