May 16, 2012 

How Laziness Can Help You as a Freelancer

Laziness Doesn’t Have to Be Bad

She may be lazy, but she's also being more productive than you

She may be lazy, but she's also being more productive than you

“Lazy” is probably one of the last words a typical freelancer might use to describe him or herself. Indeed, it’s unlikely you’ll be successful as a freelancer if laziness is your motto. However, laziness isn’t all bad. In fact, laziness – if used properly – can lead to higher efficiency, better productivity, more free time, and less overall frustration.

Work Smart, Not Hard

You’ve probably heard the phrase, “work smart, not hard”. This is a key idea. People who are lazy generally want results by doing as little work as possible. Unfortunately, laziness often leads to poorer quality work, however this does not have to be the case. Laziness can be a great motivation to do less work in less time while still accomplishing the same results.

Stop Being Unproductive, Allow Laziness to Motivate You

I find myself being lazy most often when I’m being the least productive. For instance, I might be trying to fix a stupid little bug in HTML, CSS, or JavaScript due to browser incompatibilities/inconsistencies (screw you, Internet Explorer). I might spend an hour and not accomplish anything, being inefficient, unproductive, and leaving me frustrated. This is the worst case scenario for the lazy freelancer.

Read More…

May 4, 2012 

Free, Effective Advertising: How to Create a Kick-ass, Professional, Visually Interesting Craigslist Ad

My successful advertising strategy budget: $0

Craigslist Ad

My website-like Craigslist ad for web design & development

That’s right: zero. Yet, I have so many potential clients contacting me that I simply don’t have enough time or energy to help them all, so I end up turning down business. How is this possible?

My largest only 2 sources of clients are referrals from existing clients and Craigslist – both free, but very powerful, advertising techniques. In the past, I’ve advertised in local publications such as newsletters and newspapers but ended up wasting my money paying for those ads because I didn’t get any leads. These days, most people go to Craigslist – not the classifieds in the newspaper – to find what they’re looking for, including freelancers. I’ve been advertising exclusively on Craigslist for years now, and I’ve been very happy with the results.

As you probably know, posting an ad on Craigslist is free in nearly every situation. This is great. However, Craigslist is also absolutely littered with boring, mediocre posts for very average and subpar web designers & developers and other types of freelancers. The challenge for you as the freelancer will be “standing out” of the crowd. Luckily, this actually isn’t very difficult – at least on Craigslist – provided you have some design skills and an understanding of basic HTML.

Prerequisites: Basic understanding of HTML and web design & layout. Photoshop or GIMP experience is also recommended, but not required. (If you don’t know HTML, or want a quick refresher, take a look at this basic HTML tutorial.)

First, do this: look at your competition

Bad Craigslist Ad Example

An example of a typical "bad" Craigslist ad -- plain, uninteresting, non-visual, uninformative

Go to Craigslist for your location and choose computer services or creative services (or the service category in which you’ll be advertising). Take a look at 10 or so ads. I think you will find that the vast majority of posts are plain text, or perhaps a single, large image. I think you will agree that most of these Craigslist ads look unprofessional and are not at all engaging. Use this fact to your advantage by creating a visually stunning and highly professional Craigslist post advertising your freelance services so you can stand out of the crowd in the popular Craigslist marketplace! Here’s how…

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May 4, 2012 

Mike Monteiro: “F*ck You. Pay Me.” (Protect Yourself as a Freelancer Legally & Financially)

Watch this fantastically useful and entertaining lecture about preventing yourself from being screwed by clients by creating bulletproof contracts so you can focus on actual freelancing instead of legal stuff!

May 2, 2012 

How I Started My Freelance Business at 14 and How It’s Grown

The Beginning (ca. 2004-2006)

PowerBook G4

This is the kind of thing that initially motivated me... (a PowerBook G4 at the time)

I’ve always been a techno nerd, gadget geek, and somewhat of an Apple fanboy (less so now than when I was younger). Unfortunately, for a 14 year old kid with no job, I didn’t have a means of affording and playing with cool new computer equipment or electronics. A small allowance, birthday gifts, and Christmas gifts were my only “income” generators.

To change this, I decided to start a small neighborhood business helping people with their Macs (naturally, because I was obsessed with Apple and knew a lot about Macs). I asked my parents if I could put a small advertisement in a small, local newsletter and they agreed to help me pay for that ad. My starting hourly rate was a very respectable $10.

Over the next year or two, I slowly and irregularly began acquiring clients, mostly friends and acquaintances of my parents. My legs, bike, and scooter were my modes of transportation. I troubleshooted and fixed computers, printers, and networking issues and taught clients how to perform tasks on their Macs, as well as answer any random tech-related questions they had.

Around this time, I also became very interested in web design and taught myself HTML, CSS, and Photoshop. This interest and these skills would become very useful later.

Opening Up Doors (ca. 2006-2008)

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May 2, 2012 

The 5 Biggest Mistakes I’ve Made as a Freelancer and How You Can Avoid Them

1. Underestimating time & project costs

Frustration

Skip the frustration by learning from my biggest mistakes as a freelancer

Underestimating time and project costs is easily the biggest mistake I’ve made, and also the biggest mistake freelancers make in general. Why? Because it’s extremely difficult to calculate how long a project will take when you haven’t completed a similar project in the past to use as a reference.

I’ve found that the largest “unknown” factor that consumes much more time than I expected is communication with clients and making countless revisions and minor changes to a project.

I believe the only truly effective way to produce more accurate estimates is to carefully track time on projects now so that in the future, when you have projects similar in scope, you have some real, hard data to use for calculating the estimates.

2. Accepting equity (shares) in startup companies as compensation instead of hourly compensation

Read More…

April 19, 2012 

An Overview of My Freelance Business, SimDex

Here’s a brief snapshot of my freelance business, SimDex LLC.

  • Services offered: IT consulting, training & support and
    website design, development & administration
  • Founded 2004, established as LLC in 2008
  • Client base in Minneapolis-Saint Paul (mostly)
  • 120+ clients, 20+ regulars, 15 clients = 75% revenue
  • Over 50 websites designed, developed & administered
  • 3  Apple Certifications (ACHDS / ACDT / ACPT)
  • Partnerships with two companies: Gogiro Minneapolis & The Nerd School – referrals & commissions
  • Subcontract / outsource web development (PHP & JavaScript) to India, Vietnam, Bangladesh, the Philippines, Russia, and others
  • Offered equity in 4 startup companies; declined all
  • Send invoices at end of each month
  • Payment policy: net 21, $50 late fee + 1.50% monthly interest

Learn More About SimDex

April 19, 2012 

Pros & Cons of Being a Freelancer

Advantages of Freelancing

  1. I’m my own boss – I can work when I want and with whom I want on projects I want
  2. I cannot “lose” my job or get fired – even if I lose a client, I still have work
  3. I can set my own rates/prices, adjusting them for particular clients as I see fit
  4. I can be fully independent, not relying on a single company for financial support
  5. I don’t have any company policies to follow besides my own
  6. I gain more and a larger variety of experiences associated with business ownership
  7. Pride and respect from other business owners, community, family, and friends

Disadvantages of Freelancing

  1. I do not have a reliable, constant supply of (predictable) work – not all the time
  2. I do not receive benefits (bonuses, stock, health care, retirement account, etc.)
  3. I have to spend time/energy running the “business” parts (bookkeeping, taxes, scheduling, advertising, etc.) – not actually bad though

April 19, 2012 

What I’ve Learned as a Freelancer

These are some of the most important lessons I have learned as a freelancer:

  • Understand the big picture and the little details (they’re both important)
  • Take risks, but have well-diversified income to limit risk
  • Customer service is key (communication skills = good)
  • Don’t be too specialized; have a broad knowledge base (you can always look up little details)
  • Be extremely resourceful (if you don’t know, find out)
  • Get good at creative problem solving (think outside the box)
  • Always overestimate time & costs (build in a buffer)
  • Sign a contract and/or require 50% upfront for ongoing projects with new clients
  • Get good at bullshitting*

* I will explain what I mean by this in an upcoming post…