11 ms·

Freelancing: How I found clients, part 1

418 points by lzr_mihnea 2y ago

deleted 2y ago
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gus_massa 2y ago
Somewhat related, from 11 "Getting Your First Consulting Client" https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/09/17/ramit-sethi-and-patrick-mckenzie-on-getting-your-first-consulting-client/ https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/09/17/ramit-sethi-and-patrick...
- deleted 2y ago
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alexgotoi 2y ago
Curious to read the Marketing part, that’s the magic everyone wants to know
- lzr_mihnea 2y ago
  I'm not sure it's that spicy, from my perspective, hope to deliver on it.
aquariusDue 2y ago
As per the post roughly: Step 1. Polish your resume Step 2. Avoid the holidays Step 3. Set up Calendly Step 4. Be able to answer what it is that you do It is truly "how" instead of "where" like I first expected. The author provided some good tips that most people omit because at first they might seem like common sense but what makes this actually good is the fact that most tips provided come with an actionable suggestion rather than an empty "do this and nevermind how". Also the gotcha about Calendly importing Facebook birthdays and booking the whole day was great. Looking forward to part two.
- lzr_mihnea 2y ago
  Yep, a decent summary. Haha, my wife told me to avoid writing that part with Facebook birthdays, because no one would probably care. Thanks for this comment!
itake 2y ago
I wish they would reveal the compensation numbers. Like its really easy to get a freelancing job if you charge $7.25/hr. But finding a freelancing opportunities that match the rates of dev shops ($200+ / hr) is much more challenging.
- lzr_mihnea 2y ago
  Hey @itake! I plan on writing about that too, around part 3.
- Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
  I don't want to sound rude but essentially $7.25 freelancing job is really great for developing countries like india , its like 5,056.97 per day , which is crazy nuts. My brother did freelancing before he got his job , in fact he made more money freelancing than with his job , but he personally feels a little saddened I suppose because either he doesn't feel its justified , like a company would generally ask him for work , he would build it and then they would ship it and it would crazy. In fact one of the times , IIRC (I may be wrong) but he said that he made the whole project himself and the client is making 25$ everyday for that project by literally doing nothing , I know you might think 25$ per day are cheap but in India , its the salary that people would go for a great deal at. Othertimes he felt the hectic schedule / sometimes got clients / sometimes didn't , he hated that upwork took a lot of his money the first time a client came. He is enjoying his newly gotten job (he has just graduated) and for now , they aren't making him do any meaningful work except settling in. I don't know , could you even tell me how I can get a freelancing job online for 7.25$ per hour ?
  - sponnath 2y ago
    [dead]
  - itake 2y ago
    I've hired people part and full time in developing countries (Malaysia, India, and Vietnam). Westerners will be very skeptical of your skills, so its very important to have a strong portfolio. Random advice: - Talented people tend to select other talented people to work with. So if your portfolio is ugly, because the designer was bad, then that will reflect poorly on you. - Focus on Frontend skills (web and mobile). I think western clients prefer building backend locally, but are more comfortable outsource the frontend. - Have a day job and be busy. I have had much better luck hiring talented devs that already have jobs than devs that are unemployed. - If there is a mobile app in your portfolio, check the mobile app ratings in the client's app store before sharing it. Multiple people shared with me a 2-star finance app, because the very few American users gave it bad reviews due to the poor support for foreign passports or phone numbers. Its a bad look. - Cold out reach to dev shops or other western freelancers. If you're a freelancer or dev shop, when it rains, it pours. Be on their short list when they are drowning in work, but no time to interview/hire, etc. - Don't be too cheap. That's a red flag that you don't understand the industry or are low-skill and desperate for work. I'd ask at least $15/hr, even in lower cost countries.
__mharrison__ 2y ago
How I find clients: Write a book. Speak (at conferences) about what you want to consult on. Augment above on social.
- zerr 2y ago
  I believe that targets more or less technical clients, CTOs, etc... How do you target completely non-technical prospects?
  - withinboredom 2y ago
    It's social proof that you're an expert. You'll often get work just by being at these places in the role of a speaker, if you're looking for it. There are many people who have clients they either don't like the work from the client, or want to get help with a thing -- so they can handoff clients/work to you.
    - lzr_mihnea 2y ago
      I agree with what he's saying, it helps!
  - __mharrison__ 2y ago
    We are talking about consulting right? You want to pitch technical topics to non-technical (owners presumably)? Find a way to meet them and literally tell them that "you wrote the book on that (said subject that will... Fill in the blank)". Then hand them a copy of the book . Folks like to work with experts (or people who are passionate enough to write a book).
    - zerr 2y ago
      I mean how should non-technical prospects find you? They don't go to such tech talks/conferences, don't read tech books. Such clients usually go to software agencies but not to individuals.
      - 2y ago
seanwilson 2y ago
I've always done contracting without a resume at all, with just a few example projects, a list of services offered, and some testimonials. I've never had a client ask for a resume, they often aren't experts in the field, they appreciate being spared technical details/jargon, and just want to know that you can take care of their problem within their budget. It's very different compared to being interviewed and hired as an employee. Maybe depends on what kind of clients you're looking for but not having to worry about a resume is great.
- throwing_away 2y ago
  How do you actually find people to prospect? I've been trying to help a friend get started freelance coding who has super technical skills but not a lot of formal experience and education. It's really a challenge when everything is AI and everyone assumes everything is a scam.
  - stevoski 2y ago
    > How do you actually find people to prospect? 1) Start with your personal network: Friends in similar line of work, former colleagues. Contact them and tell them what you are doing “just in case you encounter someone who I can help”. 2) Go to relevant meetups in your city (or nearest city if need be). Be ready with a pithy description of what you do. “So what do you do?”, a conversation might go. “I’m a freelance consultant who helps X do Y”, you’ll answer. Usually, that’ll be followed with polite but disinterested conversation. But one critical time, it’ll be “hey we might need someone who can help with that. Can I connect on LinkedIn? Send me a message tomorrow.” 3) Be persistent. Follow up and do it regularly. Accept that time from first contact to paid work might take many months. 4) Don’t waste your time with the cold pitching. It’s hard to do well, it’s annoying to the recipients, and you’ll just be lost in the tons of cold emails that decision makers get EVERY GOD DAMN DAY. (Sorry about shouting, can you tell I get a lot of this stuff?) One day when I have time and motivation, I’ll write up all the chance encounters, etc that led to me getting a freelance business off the ground a long time ago.
    - 2y ago
fud101 2y ago
So a job with extra steps - why bother?
- lzr_mihnea 2y ago
  I prefer the more entrepreneurial route and learning more about this. It also pays better in my area, as the taxes are lower.
- cbluth 2y ago
  One advantage the extra steps bring you is the ability to negotiate a price.
- mythrwy 2y ago
  No mid level managers. No HR. No juniors trying to backstab you with clueless management. No TPS reports. No offshore team. All meetings have a point or you don't go. You set your own hours. You only work at work and you are "at work" less hours generally. At least that's how it is for me. Lack of the above is worth 10's of K extra per year. But it's not for everyone. If you lack the ability or discipline to achieve actual results for which you are 100% responsible, at a speed and scale that makes economic sense (or at least the ability to convince people of this), if you lack the ability to keep from being eaten by the world, you are better off with a job.
  - scarface_74 2y ago
    On the other hand, I wake up , I open my computer, I do 8 hours of work and I shut down in the evening and I leave my home office. I don’t have to worry about trying to chase clients for work or payment. I get paid when I’m sick or on vacation or holidays. There is a sales team that brings work in and an accounting and legal team to collect payments.
    - mythrwy 2y ago
      For sure 100%. People are saying "you can charge more" and that's true but over the long haul with dry spells, re-work because you were stupid or a client outclevered you, trouble collecting, vacations, insurance and the fact you can skate by for a bit just showing up if you aren't feeling it for a few days at work, a good job probably does pay better and for certain types of people (I'm not one of those types of people) it is less stressful overall. Like I said it's not for everyone.
higeorge13 2y ago
> 1.1.2. And use NUMBERS when describing these sections. I can't emphasize it enough. Quantify what you've done as much as possible. I have a couple of those in my CV and they are easily justifiable, but I sometimes feel they are not valuable at all. And they also seem a bad side effect of the AI-generated resumes and AI-driven ATS filtering algorithms which almost demand you have bullets with numbers. Does anyone feel the same?
- lzr_mihnea 2y ago
  That's an interesting point of view, you might be on to something. I hadn't considered that it might sound AI-generated. I guess the point is to make it quantifiable. If that can be achieved in other ways, then why not? I thought this would be an easy way of showing that.
  - higeorge13 2y ago
    I know, I guess my comment is driven by all the AI-resume generators. Try a random resume and the first suggestion you get from them is "Add numbers". You add numbers and you still leave some bullet points without any, and the next suggestion is "Add missing numbers to these bullet points". So as a hiring manager I see resumes with numbers and my instant guess is that resume is generated by any of these services. :D In general I feel the numbers are _more_ relevant if you (a) hold a senior/manager position and (b) had some actual business impact, e.g. "increased ARR from 1m to 100m as a revops manager", "grew the engineering team from 5 to 100 people as a head of engineering" and so on. Numbers like "made the api 10 times faster", "reduced ETL pipeline runtime from hours to minutes" feel almost arbitrary. You can justify them just fine, but still. But perhaps I am just biased by the AI-generated stuff, that's all.
- hnthrow90348765 2y ago
  >Does anyone feel the same? Before the AI era, I never really got any feedback on quantifying things. I feel like they request it but never really let it inform their decision making too deeply. It's there for an initial impression and that's it. A recruiter that is only looking for quantified data will not reach out or explain a rejection though, so it's difficult to be objective about this. I do C#/.NET too, which a lot of places seem to be behind on job hiring requirements compared to other ecosystems. Most wouldn't care if you had a https://codersrank.io/# https://codersrank.io/# resume or a Word resume.
thibaultamartin 2y ago
I've found cal.com to be a more pleasant experience than calendly. The interface looks more polished, it has a ton of integrations and it works really well. I could in theory self-host it but I'd rather use a service with a proper team to maintain it. The free tier does everything I need. I'd be more than willing to pay ~€5/month for it to contribute to its sustainability, but there is no paying tier that makes sense to me as an individual an occasional contractor.
- lzr_mihnea 2y ago
  Didn't know about this. Thank you!
- Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
  was looking for such type of comment.
- garrickvanburen 2y ago
  I'm also very big fan of cal.com. Their URL design is great, the flexibility of their free plan is great. And my no-show rate went from >50% to maybe 1 a month compared Calendly.
- deleted 2y ago
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- abound 2y ago
  I self-host Cal.com and broadly agree: it works great, has a clean look, and is super customizable. That said, getting it running was kind of a nightmare. I forget the details, but I had to edit a few different codebases and Docker images. And just the `docker build` required a database running and the frontend build kept OOMing my computer and failing with esoteric errors when I tried Podman.
dwedge 2y ago
I don't know if this just me but I always struggle to read articles or posts that use emojis as bullet points
- lzr_mihnea 2y ago
  I enjoy some extra colour from emojis but to each his own.
brokegrammer 2y ago
Love it! Getting clients is tough if you don't have a solid network already. But you end up learning a lot about non-technical stuff in the process. Looking forward to part 2!
lqet 2y ago
My 2 cents: I do a bit of freelancing on the side, with a yearly income in the lower 5 digits. I have a (very) basic website and a limited, but free data service, and I have created 2-3 opensource tools that are relatively well-known in the field. My impression is that I get most of my clients either via word-of-mouth, because they need some extension to a tool I wrote, because they want to get rid of the limits of my free data service, or because they found one of my papers by chance and need something similar. If they want a quick call, be prepared to quickly answer who you are, what you have done in the past, what you offer, how much it costs, and how long you have been doing this (large customers in particular don't like to take the risk that your business will disappear in 6 months). Write these answers down or memorize them in advance if you are not the social type. I charge flat rates for certain services, and around 110 EUR / hour for anything else. Be punctual for meetings, professional with you invoices, and answer emails quickly and to the point. Don't gossip about previous clients.
- nasmorn 2y ago
  Sorry but charging 110/hr for work where you are the most recognized expert in the world is hardly a business achievement. That is a third less than a random handyman will charge where I live. If your tools and data are at all business critical to a real company you are vastly undercharging
  - amazingamazing 2y ago
    seriously. even for EU that's pretty low. would need to see how much of that lower 5 digits is from the flat rate services, and how much effort and time that takes.
    - n4r9 2y ago
      A 5-figure income from side gigs is pretty substantial anywhere.
      - amazingamazing 2y ago
        not without knowing how much you worked, it's not. in america it's pretty trivial to work 20 hours a week and make 5 figures. heck, if you work at costco you can work for just several months and make 5 figures, part time.
intelVISA 2y ago
Is fractional CTO worth it? The rare times I've been free enough to look into freelance prospects they seemed mostly IC oriented.
- zerr 2y ago
  Usually, a client is the one who wants to be in the role of [fractional] CTO.
baobabKoodaa 2y ago
Disappointing. "How I found clients", but it's part 1, and part 1 actually doesn't explain how the person finds clients. That will be in part 2. Which is not published yet.
stevage 2y ago
What area are they in? I've been freelancing for 7 years, as a primarily JS developer specialising in maps, and the landscape looks nothing like that to me. I don't have a resume, nor has anyone ever asked for one. Also, there wasn't really a "setup" phase and certainly no "marketing". Recruiters? Is he sure he's a freelancer?
- senordevnyc 2y ago
  I was a freelancer for more than a decade and I got my income to nearly a half million a year via “marketing”. YMMV.
- FearNotDaniel 2y ago
  > Recruiters? Is he sure he's a freelancer? My experience in both UK and EU is that a heck a lot of "freelance" aka "B2B contract" style work does indeed come via recruiters. Either they charge the client an upfront "finders fee", or the invoicing goes via the recruiter who adds their margin to the monthly bill before passing it on to the end client. So yeah, perfectly valid for a freelancer to work via recruiters even if that's not your personal experience.
  - tonyedgecombe 2y ago
    Hasn’t IR35 killed that market in the UK?
    - FearNotDaniel 2y ago
      I'm no longer UK based, but from what I can observe at a distance, it's transformed the market rather than killed it. Listings for contract roles seem to be labelled either "inside" or "outside" IR35 depending on the requirements and conditions. So yes, whatever contracts are available are probably on average much less tax-favourable to the contractor than before the changeover, but whether that's affected the overall market volume I couldn't say.
- staticautomatic 2y ago
  US recruiters will sometimes do C2C depending on the industry and client.
initramfs 2y ago
Author appears to have added an index on the left side of the webpage to allow skipping to sections of the page while removing the scroll bar on the right, making the desktop version more or less mobile-like. Sigh.
ankit219 2y ago
One thing i have seen while freelancing (on mostly marketing tasks) is how people are willing to pay a lot if you own the outcomes. The typical model is work per hour, but if you can own some outcomes you control aka drive value, many businesses would be happy to pay higher than hourly rate too. That also separates you from all the other candidates when it comes to proposals.
- toldyouso2022 2y ago
  The problem is that the outcome, what clients want, it's often mot clear, changes, sometimes depends on other people in the client's org, etc and it's a mess to have a fixed price contract in these cases
  - ankit219 2y ago
    You can control this. You could opt for the part where the dependence on rest of the team is minimal. Or you could structure it in a tiered manner. With different pricing at different levels of outcomes.
- pooya72 2y ago
  By own outcomes, do you me something like a percentage of sales or something?
  - garrickvanburen 2y ago
    it can be as simple as, the messiness of figuring out what to do is completely taken care of - I'll deliver you the recommendations next week.
  - ankit219 2y ago
    Not really. It could be that "I would orient my marketing efforts to get you 1000 leads in 2 months. If I hit the target, i get x amount, else y based on the final result. You dont need the percentages. The key is to position yourself in a manner that whoever is hiring you can depend on you for results regardless of the circumstances. This way you get more recommendations, and better pay.
uladzislau 2y ago
So misleading, nothing about actually finding clients.
johanneskanybal 2y ago
Been freelancing full time for about 8 years. Linkedin and some experience in my field and not much else.
- LikeAnElephant 2y ago
  Can you say more about your LinkedIn approach? Are you posting content or cold outreach? Something else?
msadowski 2y ago
I’ve been consulting for close to 7 years in robotics now, robotics being a niche field I guess it has been a bit easier for me to find clients. I never had a period without a client and never had to do cold outreach. Here are some things I learned: * You can usually charge way more per project basis instead of charging by the hour but it’s crazy difficult to get it right for R&D projects * Most of my clients came to me through my blog * 2 years ago UpWork was surprisingly good for finding projects, these days there is lots of AI stuff coming from freelancers when they apply and I’m not so sure anymore * Discuss price as early as possible to not waste time I wrote a series of blog posts on my journey in case anyone is interested (I’m quite sure you will find the above points there): https://msadowski.github.io/5-years-remote-robotics-consulting/ https://msadowski.github.io/5-years-remote-robotics-consulti... This year I might write another update to share a painful lesson on having all your eggs in one basket and not spending time on working your blog.
- billy99k 2y ago
  "2 years ago UpWork was surprisingly good for finding projects, these days there is lots of AI stuff coming from freelancers when they apply and I’m not so sure anymore " I get one good client on Upwork a year. 99% of the clients I've found are either unwilling to pay market rates, are subcontracting out before they actually landed the project (had lots of initial meetings and then suddenly they didn't get the project, final meeting fell through), or are trying to build up a team first, with no clients (I had 2 of these already this year).
benluna0991 2y ago
[dead]

418 points by lzr_mihnea 2y ago

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

Somewhat related, from 11 "Getting Your First Consulting Client" https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/09/17/ramit-sethi-and-patrick-mckenzie-on-getting-your-first-consulting-client/ https://www.kalzumeus.com/2012/09/17/ramit-sethi-and-patrick...

deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

alexgotoi 2y ago

Curious to read the Marketing part, that’s the magic everyone wants to know

lzr_mihnea 2y ago
I'm not sure it's that spicy, from my perspective, hope to deliver on it.

aquariusDue 2y ago

As per the post roughly: Step 1. Polish your resume Step 2. Avoid the holidays Step 3. Set up Calendly Step 4. Be able to answer what it is that you do It is truly "how" instead of "where" like I first expected. The author provided some good tips that most people omit because at first they might seem like common sense but what makes this actually good is the fact that most tips provided come with an actionable suggestion rather than an empty "do this and nevermind how". Also the gotcha about Calendly importing Facebook birthdays and booking the whole day was great. Looking forward to part two.

lzr_mihnea 2y ago
Yep, a decent summary. Haha, my wife told me to avoid writing that part with Facebook birthdays, because no one would probably care. Thanks for this comment!

itake 2y ago

I wish they would reveal the compensation numbers. Like its really easy to get a freelancing job if you charge $7.25/hr. But finding a freelancing opportunities that match the rates of dev shops ($200+ / hr) is much more challenging.

lzr_mihnea 2y ago
Hey @itake! I plan on writing about that too, around part 3.
Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
I don't want to sound rude but essentially $7.25 freelancing job is really great for developing countries like india , its like 5,056.97 per day , which is crazy nuts. My brother did freelancing before he got his job , in fact he made more money freelancing than with his job , but he personally feels a little saddened I suppose because either he doesn't feel its justified , like a company would generally ask him for work , he would build it and then they would ship it and it would crazy. In fact one of the times , IIRC (I may be wrong) but he said that he made the whole project himself and the client is making 25$ everyday for that project by literally doing nothing , I know you might think 25$ per day are cheap but in India , its the salary that people would go for a great deal at. Othertimes he felt the hectic schedule / sometimes got clients / sometimes didn't , he hated that upwork took a lot of his money the first time a client came. He is enjoying his newly gotten job (he has just graduated) and for now , they aren't making him do any meaningful work except settling in. I don't know , could you even tell me how I can get a freelancing job online for 7.25$ per hour ?
- sponnath 2y ago
  [dead]
- itake 2y ago
  I've hired people part and full time in developing countries (Malaysia, India, and Vietnam). Westerners will be very skeptical of your skills, so its very important to have a strong portfolio. Random advice: - Talented people tend to select other talented people to work with. So if your portfolio is ugly, because the designer was bad, then that will reflect poorly on you. - Focus on Frontend skills (web and mobile). I think western clients prefer building backend locally, but are more comfortable outsource the frontend. - Have a day job and be busy. I have had much better luck hiring talented devs that already have jobs than devs that are unemployed. - If there is a mobile app in your portfolio, check the mobile app ratings in the client's app store before sharing it. Multiple people shared with me a 2-star finance app, because the very few American users gave it bad reviews due to the poor support for foreign passports or phone numbers. Its a bad look. - Cold out reach to dev shops or other western freelancers. If you're a freelancer or dev shop, when it rains, it pours. Be on their short list when they are drowning in work, but no time to interview/hire, etc. - Don't be too cheap. That's a red flag that you don't understand the industry or are low-skill and desperate for work. I'd ask at least $15/hr, even in lower cost countries.

__mharrison__ 2y ago

How I find clients: Write a book. Speak (at conferences) about what you want to consult on. Augment above on social.

zerr 2y ago
I believe that targets more or less technical clients, CTOs, etc... How do you target completely non-technical prospects?
- withinboredom 2y ago
  It's social proof that you're an expert. You'll often get work just by being at these places in the role of a speaker, if you're looking for it. There are many people who have clients they either don't like the work from the client, or want to get help with a thing -- so they can handoff clients/work to you.
  - lzr_mihnea 2y ago
    I agree with what he's saying, it helps!
- __mharrison__ 2y ago
  We are talking about consulting right? You want to pitch technical topics to non-technical (owners presumably)? Find a way to meet them and literally tell them that "you wrote the book on that (said subject that will... Fill in the blank)". Then hand them a copy of the book . Folks like to work with experts (or people who are passionate enough to write a book).
  - zerr 2y ago
    I mean how should non-technical prospects find you? They don't go to such tech talks/conferences, don't read tech books. Such clients usually go to software agencies but not to individuals.
    - 2y ago

seanwilson 2y ago

I've always done contracting without a resume at all, with just a few example projects, a list of services offered, and some testimonials. I've never had a client ask for a resume, they often aren't experts in the field, they appreciate being spared technical details/jargon, and just want to know that you can take care of their problem within their budget. It's very different compared to being interviewed and hired as an employee. Maybe depends on what kind of clients you're looking for but not having to worry about a resume is great.

throwing_away 2y ago
How do you actually find people to prospect? I've been trying to help a friend get started freelance coding who has super technical skills but not a lot of formal experience and education. It's really a challenge when everything is AI and everyone assumes everything is a scam.
- stevoski 2y ago
  > How do you actually find people to prospect? 1) Start with your personal network: Friends in similar line of work, former colleagues. Contact them and tell them what you are doing “just in case you encounter someone who I can help”. 2) Go to relevant meetups in your city (or nearest city if need be). Be ready with a pithy description of what you do. “So what do you do?”, a conversation might go. “I’m a freelance consultant who helps X do Y”, you’ll answer. Usually, that’ll be followed with polite but disinterested conversation. But one critical time, it’ll be “hey we might need someone who can help with that. Can I connect on LinkedIn? Send me a message tomorrow.” 3) Be persistent. Follow up and do it regularly. Accept that time from first contact to paid work might take many months. 4) Don’t waste your time with the cold pitching. It’s hard to do well, it’s annoying to the recipients, and you’ll just be lost in the tons of cold emails that decision makers get EVERY GOD DAMN DAY. (Sorry about shouting, can you tell I get a lot of this stuff?) One day when I have time and motivation, I’ll write up all the chance encounters, etc that led to me getting a freelance business off the ground a long time ago.
  - 2y ago

fud101 2y ago

So a job with extra steps - why bother?

lzr_mihnea 2y ago
I prefer the more entrepreneurial route and learning more about this. It also pays better in my area, as the taxes are lower.
cbluth 2y ago
One advantage the extra steps bring you is the ability to negotiate a price.
mythrwy 2y ago
No mid level managers. No HR. No juniors trying to backstab you with clueless management. No TPS reports. No offshore team. All meetings have a point or you don't go. You set your own hours. You only work at work and you are "at work" less hours generally. At least that's how it is for me. Lack of the above is worth 10's of K extra per year. But it's not for everyone. If you lack the ability or discipline to achieve actual results for which you are 100% responsible, at a speed and scale that makes economic sense (or at least the ability to convince people of this), if you lack the ability to keep from being eaten by the world, you are better off with a job.
- scarface_74 2y ago
  On the other hand, I wake up , I open my computer, I do 8 hours of work and I shut down in the evening and I leave my home office. I don’t have to worry about trying to chase clients for work or payment. I get paid when I’m sick or on vacation or holidays. There is a sales team that brings work in and an accounting and legal team to collect payments.
  - mythrwy 2y ago
    For sure 100%. People are saying "you can charge more" and that's true but over the long haul with dry spells, re-work because you were stupid or a client outclevered you, trouble collecting, vacations, insurance and the fact you can skate by for a bit just showing up if you aren't feeling it for a few days at work, a good job probably does pay better and for certain types of people (I'm not one of those types of people) it is less stressful overall. Like I said it's not for everyone.

higeorge13 2y ago

> 1.1.2. And use NUMBERS when describing these sections. I can't emphasize it enough. Quantify what you've done as much as possible. I have a couple of those in my CV and they are easily justifiable, but I sometimes feel they are not valuable at all. And they also seem a bad side effect of the AI-generated resumes and AI-driven ATS filtering algorithms which almost demand you have bullets with numbers. Does anyone feel the same?

lzr_mihnea 2y ago
That's an interesting point of view, you might be on to something. I hadn't considered that it might sound AI-generated. I guess the point is to make it quantifiable. If that can be achieved in other ways, then why not? I thought this would be an easy way of showing that.
- higeorge13 2y ago
  I know, I guess my comment is driven by all the AI-resume generators. Try a random resume and the first suggestion you get from them is "Add numbers". You add numbers and you still leave some bullet points without any, and the next suggestion is "Add missing numbers to these bullet points". So as a hiring manager I see resumes with numbers and my instant guess is that resume is generated by any of these services. :D In general I feel the numbers are _more_ relevant if you (a) hold a senior/manager position and (b) had some actual business impact, e.g. "increased ARR from 1m to 100m as a revops manager", "grew the engineering team from 5 to 100 people as a head of engineering" and so on. Numbers like "made the api 10 times faster", "reduced ETL pipeline runtime from hours to minutes" feel almost arbitrary. You can justify them just fine, but still. But perhaps I am just biased by the AI-generated stuff, that's all.
hnthrow90348765 2y ago
>Does anyone feel the same? Before the AI era, I never really got any feedback on quantifying things. I feel like they request it but never really let it inform their decision making too deeply. It's there for an initial impression and that's it. A recruiter that is only looking for quantified data will not reach out or explain a rejection though, so it's difficult to be objective about this. I do C#/.NET too, which a lot of places seem to be behind on job hiring requirements compared to other ecosystems. Most wouldn't care if you had a https://codersrank.io/# https://codersrank.io/# resume or a Word resume.

thibaultamartin 2y ago

I've found cal.com to be a more pleasant experience than calendly. The interface looks more polished, it has a ton of integrations and it works really well. I could in theory self-host it but I'd rather use a service with a proper team to maintain it. The free tier does everything I need. I'd be more than willing to pay ~€5/month for it to contribute to its sustainability, but there is no paying tier that makes sense to me as an individual an occasional contractor.

lzr_mihnea 2y ago
Didn't know about this. Thank you!
Imustaskforhelp 2y ago
was looking for such type of comment.
garrickvanburen 2y ago
I'm also very big fan of cal.com. Their URL design is great, the flexibility of their free plan is great. And my no-show rate went from >50% to maybe 1 a month compared Calendly.
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abound 2y ago
I self-host Cal.com and broadly agree: it works great, has a clean look, and is super customizable. That said, getting it running was kind of a nightmare. I forget the details, but I had to edit a few different codebases and Docker images. And just the `docker build` required a database running and the frontend build kept OOMing my computer and failing with esoteric errors when I tried Podman.

dwedge 2y ago

I don't know if this just me but I always struggle to read articles or posts that use emojis as bullet points

lzr_mihnea 2y ago
I enjoy some extra colour from emojis but to each his own.

brokegrammer 2y ago

Love it! Getting clients is tough if you don't have a solid network already. But you end up learning a lot about non-technical stuff in the process. Looking forward to part 2!

lqet 2y ago

My 2 cents: I do a bit of freelancing on the side, with a yearly income in the lower 5 digits. I have a (very) basic website and a limited, but free data service, and I have created 2-3 opensource tools that are relatively well-known in the field. My impression is that I get most of my clients either via word-of-mouth, because they need some extension to a tool I wrote, because they want to get rid of the limits of my free data service, or because they found one of my papers by chance and need something similar. If they want a quick call, be prepared to quickly answer who you are, what you have done in the past, what you offer, how much it costs, and how long you have been doing this (large customers in particular don't like to take the risk that your business will disappear in 6 months). Write these answers down or memorize them in advance if you are not the social type. I charge flat rates for certain services, and around 110 EUR / hour for anything else. Be punctual for meetings, professional with you invoices, and answer emails quickly and to the point. Don't gossip about previous clients.

nasmorn 2y ago
Sorry but charging 110/hr for work where you are the most recognized expert in the world is hardly a business achievement. That is a third less than a random handyman will charge where I live. If your tools and data are at all business critical to a real company you are vastly undercharging
- amazingamazing 2y ago
  seriously. even for EU that's pretty low. would need to see how much of that lower 5 digits is from the flat rate services, and how much effort and time that takes.
  - n4r9 2y ago
    A 5-figure income from side gigs is pretty substantial anywhere.
    - amazingamazing 2y ago
      not without knowing how much you worked, it's not. in america it's pretty trivial to work 20 hours a week and make 5 figures. heck, if you work at costco you can work for just several months and make 5 figures, part time.

intelVISA 2y ago

Is fractional CTO worth it? The rare times I've been free enough to look into freelance prospects they seemed mostly IC oriented.

zerr 2y ago
Usually, a client is the one who wants to be in the role of [fractional] CTO.

baobabKoodaa 2y ago

Disappointing. "How I found clients", but it's part 1, and part 1 actually doesn't explain how the person finds clients. That will be in part 2. Which is not published yet.

stevage 2y ago

What area are they in? I've been freelancing for 7 years, as a primarily JS developer specialising in maps, and the landscape looks nothing like that to me. I don't have a resume, nor has anyone ever asked for one. Also, there wasn't really a "setup" phase and certainly no "marketing". Recruiters? Is he sure he's a freelancer?

senordevnyc 2y ago
I was a freelancer for more than a decade and I got my income to nearly a half million a year via “marketing”. YMMV.
FearNotDaniel 2y ago
> Recruiters? Is he sure he's a freelancer? My experience in both UK and EU is that a heck a lot of "freelance" aka "B2B contract" style work does indeed come via recruiters. Either they charge the client an upfront "finders fee", or the invoicing goes via the recruiter who adds their margin to the monthly bill before passing it on to the end client. So yeah, perfectly valid for a freelancer to work via recruiters even if that's not your personal experience.
- tonyedgecombe 2y ago
  Hasn’t IR35 killed that market in the UK?
  - FearNotDaniel 2y ago
    I'm no longer UK based, but from what I can observe at a distance, it's transformed the market rather than killed it. Listings for contract roles seem to be labelled either "inside" or "outside" IR35 depending on the requirements and conditions. So yes, whatever contracts are available are probably on average much less tax-favourable to the contractor than before the changeover, but whether that's affected the overall market volume I couldn't say.
staticautomatic 2y ago
US recruiters will sometimes do C2C depending on the industry and client.

initramfs 2y ago

Author appears to have added an index on the left side of the webpage to allow skipping to sections of the page while removing the scroll bar on the right, making the desktop version more or less mobile-like. Sigh.

ankit219 2y ago

One thing i have seen while freelancing (on mostly marketing tasks) is how people are willing to pay a lot if you own the outcomes. The typical model is work per hour, but if you can own some outcomes you control aka drive value, many businesses would be happy to pay higher than hourly rate too. That also separates you from all the other candidates when it comes to proposals.

toldyouso2022 2y ago
The problem is that the outcome, what clients want, it's often mot clear, changes, sometimes depends on other people in the client's org, etc and it's a mess to have a fixed price contract in these cases
- ankit219 2y ago
  You can control this. You could opt for the part where the dependence on rest of the team is minimal. Or you could structure it in a tiered manner. With different pricing at different levels of outcomes.
pooya72 2y ago
By own outcomes, do you me something like a percentage of sales or something?
- garrickvanburen 2y ago
  it can be as simple as, the messiness of figuring out what to do is completely taken care of - I'll deliver you the recommendations next week.
- ankit219 2y ago
  Not really. It could be that "I would orient my marketing efforts to get you 1000 leads in 2 months. If I hit the target, i get x amount, else y based on the final result. You dont need the percentages. The key is to position yourself in a manner that whoever is hiring you can depend on you for results regardless of the circumstances. This way you get more recommendations, and better pay.

uladzislau 2y ago

So misleading, nothing about actually finding clients.

johanneskanybal 2y ago

Been freelancing full time for about 8 years. Linkedin and some experience in my field and not much else.

LikeAnElephant 2y ago
Can you say more about your LinkedIn approach? Are you posting content or cold outreach? Something else?

msadowski 2y ago

I’ve been consulting for close to 7 years in robotics now, robotics being a niche field I guess it has been a bit easier for me to find clients. I never had a period without a client and never had to do cold outreach. Here are some things I learned: * You can usually charge way more per project basis instead of charging by the hour but it’s crazy difficult to get it right for R&D projects * Most of my clients came to me through my blog * 2 years ago UpWork was surprisingly good for finding projects, these days there is lots of AI stuff coming from freelancers when they apply and I’m not so sure anymore * Discuss price as early as possible to not waste time I wrote a series of blog posts on my journey in case anyone is interested (I’m quite sure you will find the above points there): https://msadowski.github.io/5-years-remote-robotics-consulting/ https://msadowski.github.io/5-years-remote-robotics-consulti... This year I might write another update to share a painful lesson on having all your eggs in one basket and not spending time on working your blog.

billy99k 2y ago
"2 years ago UpWork was surprisingly good for finding projects, these days there is lots of AI stuff coming from freelancers when they apply and I’m not so sure anymore " I get one good client on Upwork a year. 99% of the clients I've found are either unwilling to pay market rates, are subcontracting out before they actually landed the project (had lots of initial meetings and then suddenly they didn't get the project, final meeting fell through), or are trying to build up a team first, with no clients (I had 2 of these already this year).

benluna0991 2y ago

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