You're selling a product (service.) You need to market the product. You also need to handle administration of the business or outsource those tasks. Regardles

You're selling a product (service.) You need to market the product. You also need to handle administration of the business or outsource those tasks. Regardless of who is putting in this effort, your business needs to pay for it (your time or the time someone else puts into it.) Add to that, self-employment taxes, insurance, sick leave, vacation leave, equipment, office, utilities, etc. Anything you aren't charging for, you're subsidizing. That's ABC stuff. I don't like the word freelancing, because people take the label with a bunch of assumptions, which may not be correct. The language "the most important thing" is also troublesome because it may put you in the wrong frame. The reality is that running a business is a common complex thing. It's like relationships, many people are in them, but being such a common part of life doesn't make them easier to figure out. Society gives you basic scaffolding, which you need to use or not use as basic building blocks. Come to the problem with an empty cup and start building from scratch. And then it still isn't easy, as many people get caught up in details which isn't necessarily giving back the same return on the end result. My heuristic is to start with the envisioned end-result, work backwards and then build a plan going forwards again. The entire time, you have an eye on that end-result and asking if what you are doing is serving that end-point. And then, as Tyson said, "everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth." But a plan is better than no plan. There's no "the most important thing." It's more complex than that. You have to approach a complex problem with agility to shift frames. Be creative. Be curious. Ask questions. Do research. Answer the questions. Every article about "this is how you do <insert complex thing> is missing massive amounts of detail. Also note, there is a goldmine of articles on making money on building software in HN. Do a search. If you stop at this thread, you're seriously missing out. And further reading on detail in life... http://johnsalvatier.org/blog/2017/reality-has-a-surprising-amount-of-detail http://johnsalvatier.org/blog/2017/reality-has-a-surprising-... ETA: This is more about the mindset than the nuts and bolts. There are tons of golden posts here on the nuts and bolts. Do a search and see what pops up with the most votes and comments.