how to be a freelancer

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devendra-m
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Post by devendra-m »

Do you have a portfolio? Any open-source projects? Any sort of resume/web-presence? How are you trying to find work?
project link: http://www.hotandco.com (hotel reservation system)

I led this project all alone. And I was partially involved in another projects


education : B.E. Software Engineering

work experience: 1-2 years

high skills: javascript,php,ajax,sql,pl/sql
devendra-m
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Post by devendra-m »

For me, 99% of the work I get is through referrals
The main problem is I don't have any referrals. I am only known to the company that I am working for.
matthijs
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Post by matthijs »

But you do know people, don't you? That's a start. And those people know other people. So it's a matter of promoting yourself any way you can. Letting people know you're in for business. And promoting yourself can be done in many ways. On meetings, conferences, party's, family meetings, online with your blog, in forums, by responding to other people, etc. Networking is not the primary purpose of those activities, but often it's a beneficial side-effect.

A difficulty is that it's a slow process. At least, it can be. For example, you will have an email conversation with some developer about something. Then, 6 months later, you get an email from him/her asking if you could help with some job. So those connections can be found in unexpected places. It has happened that I got in touch with someone because I needed him to do something for me (say a financial adviser) and then in the end I ended up doing work for him..

But I'm sure there are many more "official" channels, like specific networking groups and agencies which can help you getting in touch with others/other businesses.
devendra-m
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Post by devendra-m »

But you do know people, don't you? That's a start. And those people know other people.
The situation here is bit different, people don't want other people to rise.
Last edited by devendra-m on Wed Jan 09, 2008 3:32 am, edited 1 time in total.
matthijs
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Post by matthijs »

devendra-m wrote:The situation here is bit different, people don't want other people to rise. So even if they think I am capable they will never refer me.
I'm sorry to hear that. Is everyone in your surrounding like that?

And what if someone in your surrounding does need a developer for something he can't do himself? Does he prefer to go to an unknown agency picked from the telephone book instead of talking to you about the job? That sounds very illogical to me.
devendra-m
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Post by devendra-m »

thats a rare case
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Kieran Huggins
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Post by Kieran Huggins »

Get out there, meet cool people. Go to a BarCamp. If there isn't one in your area, start one!
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RobertGonzalez
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Post by RobertGonzalez »

Oh yeah, and never stop coding. Put up your own project sites. Be creative so when you do meet people you can promote yourself appropriately with all the cool work you have done for yourself.
deleet
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Re: how to be a freelancer

Post by deleet »

Not stopping code is a very good idea indeed Everah but I suck terribly at attempting to design anything and most clients will look for a 'nice' looking portfolio.

That kind of limits me somehow and I end up doing just code, no design at all (I can do front end though, XHTML / CSS).

So whenever you're showing your blog / website, can you still make a good impression if your site looks like something made in '92 ?
matthijs
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Re: how to be a freelancer

Post by matthijs »

deleet wrote:So whenever you're showing your blog / website, can you still make a good impression if your site looks like something made in '92 ?
Then you've two options. Either tell them retro is THE thing again, or hire me to redesign your site :)
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Benjamin
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Re: how to be a freelancer

Post by Benjamin »

deleet wrote:I suck terribly at attempting to design anything and most clients will look for a 'nice' looking portfolio.

That kind of limits me somehow and I end up doing just code
I stopped designing a few years ago. If someone wants a nice artistic design they aren't going to get it from me. PHP only here.
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Benjamin
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Re: how to be a freelancer

Post by Benjamin »

Fair warning if you get really good; You'll have customers trying to lock you into doing work for them by sending you money without even asking. I've got a few clients that will send me money and then ask me when the work will be done lol.
deleet
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Re: how to be a freelancer

Post by deleet »

Well, hiring someone to redesign my personal website doesn't seem like a good investment, it should be simply a place to list my experience, latest work and maybe even a blog.

Also because when I'm paying for something I'm really picky (just like my clients are) and I'd end up having to pay you a lot extra :P
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Ambush Commander
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Re: how to be a freelancer

Post by Ambush Commander »

This thread is very interesting for me. As a high school student, I'd like to start capitalizing on my skills and make a little money, but I'm not exactly sure what to do. As far as I can see, my options are:

1. Get an internship: Probably not until the summer (Chris Shiflett offered me an internship at OmniTI last summer, but it sort of fell through because of scheduling conflicts... hmm, I wonder if they're still interested...)
2. Make a business: Then I have to muck around with tax returns and capital and investment (<-- that list is random. I honestly have no clue what setting up a business would entail. Supposedly it's quite easy these days.),
3. Freelance.

I have made approximately $200 (wow, an extremely large sum! </sarcasm>) doing odd freelancing jobs; someone made an unsolicited request for two features in HTML Purifier and offered to pay me for implementing it (I got to release it, subsequently, as open-source. W00t!) I suspect this sort of client is few and far between, although I think that there may be a market for paid consulting for HTML Purifier (although, I don't know why anyone would want to pay me, since I give free consulting on the forums! (<-- in response to that, it'd probably be writing custom code and doing quotes based on application code)).

Unfortunately, I don't know how much to charge, I don't know how to attract clients, and I don't think my experiences are very representative of the freelancing market (as noted by other comments). Any comments?
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Benjamin
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Re: how to be a freelancer

Post by Benjamin »

I first started taking whatever someone would pay me. As my skills increased I started increasing my prices not because my skills were getting better, but because it wasn't worth the time and headaches to do cheap jobs or work for people who want a clone of ebay but are only willing to spend $1,000. When I started charging more the quality of my client base started to increase as well. I have one client who is a well known black hat who has his accountant overnight cash via a carrier. Cash has no memory.

I hear you talking about taxes, business licenses etc. I have studied business quite a bit and ran quite a few. Some successful some not. My advice to anyone starting one is not to worry about all the details until you know it's going to work. In other words don't go spending all sorts of time on the little details until you know you have a winner. If you spend weeks talking to people about accounting, pay money to get a DBA and order company checks, letterhead, spend a month building a website ---- and then your business fails, how likely is it that you'll start another one? All that work for nothing?

The important thing and the harsh reality is that the driving force is money. I'd even go so far as to say in some cases you should start selling a product before you even have one. If no one buys it no biggie. If you sell a bunch, then you'll have plenty of motivation to obtain or make the product. This isn't possible in all cases of course but my point is that you gotta do what brings in the money. Once you start bringing in money you can hammer out the details and oil the machine.

Business school doesn't teach you how to start a fortune 50 company out of your garage, but that's where quite a few of them have come from.
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