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1. Find a popular thread on the HN front page. 2. Click on the usernames. 3. Write down email address from their profile. 4. Send the following email to the

1. Find a popular thread on the HN front page. 2. Click on the usernames. 3. Write down email address from their profile. 4. Send the following email to the list of people you wrote down (at least a 100, because if you get a 2% response rate, you might get a gig out of half an hour of work): Hello, My name is $name, a freelance developer. Read your comment about $subject, and I think you make a good point. Anyhow, just dropping by to chat a bit about what you are currently up to. Hope you are having a great day. Take care. $name Then just get a conversation going and talk about what you do. Simple.

bjourne 14y ago
Do people appreciate unsolicited mails from freelance developers? Seems like spamming to me. Also, if you are looking for work why would you waste time with someone who probably does not have any to offer?
- stevejalim 14y ago
  I've been freelance for the best part of the decade, yet whenever I receive a cold-call email from a freelancer looking for work (like the one suggested above), I generally either politely decline or mark as spam (if the tone of the email sounds like I'm one of 200 who were sent the same message body), even if I really could do with someone to help spread my workload. One key thing, for me, is that giving someone work requires _my_ trust in _their_ abilities. Some people might choose to base trust on a track record of projects listed on a CV, others on viewing someone's source code in a public repo, others might value personal recommendations, others might only trust people who they actually know from a not-too-distant circle of their professional network. I'm mostly in that last two camps. A cold-call email from a stranger: you'd be lucky to get a 2% genuine real-paid-work conversion rate, in my mind. A warm-call (I know that sucks as a term) email from someone I know via work or a conference or some kind of tech situation: far more likely to lead to work. So, network. (And it's not the same as nepotism.)
  - stevejalim 14y ago
    PS: email me (see profile) and I'll sling you a discount code for http://leanpub.com/freelancedeveloperbook http://leanpub.com/freelancedeveloperbook
  - orangethirty 14y ago
    The point of the email is to network, not to land work at the first instance.

bjourne 14y ago

Do people appreciate unsolicited mails from freelance developers? Seems like spamming to me. Also, if you are looking for work why would you waste time with someone who probably does not have any to offer?

stevejalim 14y ago
I've been freelance for the best part of the decade, yet whenever I receive a cold-call email from a freelancer looking for work (like the one suggested above), I generally either politely decline or mark as spam (if the tone of the email sounds like I'm one of 200 who were sent the same message body), even if I really could do with someone to help spread my workload. One key thing, for me, is that giving someone work requires _my_ trust in _their_ abilities. Some people might choose to base trust on a track record of projects listed on a CV, others on viewing someone's source code in a public repo, others might value personal recommendations, others might only trust people who they actually know from a not-too-distant circle of their professional network. I'm mostly in that last two camps. A cold-call email from a stranger: you'd be lucky to get a 2% genuine real-paid-work conversion rate, in my mind. A warm-call (I know that sucks as a term) email from someone I know via work or a conference or some kind of tech situation: far more likely to lead to work. So, network. (And it's not the same as nepotism.)
- stevejalim 14y ago
  PS: email me (see profile) and I'll sling you a discount code for http://leanpub.com/freelancedeveloperbook http://leanpub.com/freelancedeveloperbook
- orangethirty 14y ago
  The point of the email is to network, not to land work at the first instance.