Posted in FreelanceLocalTech Chronicles at 10:36 pm by andy

Just a quick update: we added 35 more consultant listings last week and are maintaining our traffic numbers from last week (averaging 100+ visitors during the week and 100 for the weekend). 

We have also started to see an uptick in client postings now with 5 new client listings in the past 3 days.

Our goal is to maintain this level of interest and figure out ways to grow it organically (i.e., without increasing our ad budget).

What can we do to push those numbers even higher?  Got any suggestions for us?

Posted in FreelanceLocalTech Chronicles at 8:44 am by andy

We doubled!  It took nearly two months to get 28 consultants and now that our marketing efforts are in full swing, we doubled in two weeks!!  Our traffic has also doubled, we’re regularly seeing over 100 visitors per day now.

We’re not satisfied, though.  Our goal is 1000 consultants by May 2008.  We have a lot of work ahead of us.

Clients are still regular visitors as well.  Some post their needs, some just call consultants directly.  If you’re a consultant and you don’t have a listing, you’re invisible!

Let’s keep it going!  We currently offer a free 60-mile upgrade for 2 months for every new consultant listing.  That’s $20 worth of upgrades for free.  What else could we offer to get more freelance consultants to sign up?  Where could we be more visible to make sure consultants know how to find us?  Leave us a comment and let us know!

Posted in General Freelance Info at 1:18 pm by andy

Ok, there are likely more than 5 ways, but here are some really time-tested methods for screwing up as a freelancer.

1. Be disorganized.  Ever lose a timesheet with 50 billable hours on it?  Lose notes from a customer phone call or a design session?  Clients want you to be more organized than they are.  Don’t let your inner slob out. Read more…

Posted in Marketing Your Freelance Consultancy at 10:12 pm by andy

Here’s a tip that all really successful freelancers know: the price you set for your work is a marketing tool.

Some freelancers think the price they charge is about what they want to make. And, to them, it is.

Clients view the price they pay for something as what the work is worth.  (Sometimes that view is combined with how much will I grow my business by spending this money?)  In other words, if — to the client — the work is worth $1000 for what you perceive to be 10 hours of work, then you should be charging around $100/hr. 

If you charge the customer $400 for those 10 hours, then the customer is perceiving your work as being worth less than they think it should be worth and they will wonder why you are undercharging them so much. Read more…

Posted in Starting Out as a Freelance Consultant at 7:41 am by andy

I have work buddies who want to know what they need to do to get started freelancing.  Here’s what I usually tell them they need to know:

1. Create a corporation or limited liability company (if the LLC is available in your state, go with that, because the overhead and paperwork is less).  The reason for setting up an LLC or corporation is to limit your liability in case something goes horribly wrong; better to lose your one-person company than your home.

If you go with a corporation, talk with your accountant about the benefits for the different types of corporations available to you.  Don’t get your information about this from blogs, pay to get professional help setting up the company structure, since you’ll only need to do this once and you want to get it right for your situation.

Read more…

Posted in Marketing Your Freelance Consultancy at 10:26 pm by andy

I’ve read a lot of articles about how to grow my freelance consulting business, but my own experiences run counter to many of the recommendations in those articles.

For example, one of the most common recommendation for helping me to grow my business is to hit on friends and former co-workers for gigs.  Personally, that only works if you’re: (a) really into networking and staying in touch with people you might not have liked in the first place; (b) have friends and former co-workers who not only have a need for the services you provide but also have control over the checkbook so that you can get paid.  My real friends know what I do and I really don’t want to work for or with any of them; I prefer to keep work and play separate.

Another technique is to steer work to your clients and hope that they’ll return the favor someday and steer someone they know to you.  This generally works if you have clients that offer services/products that other people you know might need.  In general, I find that this technique works about once every two years or so.  You’ll likely go broke relying on this technique.

 So what have I found to work for getting more business?

Advertise like crazy in places where clients are going to see it.  For my clients, that’s online directories and search engines.  Your clients may hang out in other places, and you should know or find out where that is.

Read more…

Posted in Marketing Your Freelance Consultancy at 2:17 pm by jill

One of the toughest jobs Freelancers face is self-promotion. To advertise anywhere — whether it’s on your web site or in an online directory — you need to effectively communicate what you do and how great you are at it. If you’re not sure what to include, start with answering these questions:

1. What are the basic services you want to offer to clients? (e.g., software development, web design)
2. What types of clients do you want to work with? (e.g., small businesses, manufacturers, sales organizations)
3. What specific skills do you have that you think clients want? (e.g., PHP/mySQL, .NET, Linux)
4. Why should the client hire you instead of someone else? (e.g., exceptional customer service, fast turn-around for projects, business savvy)

Once you have the answers to these questions, you’re halfway to writing a great ad for your services that will entice clients to call you instead of another consultant. What comes next is how to structure what you write.

Read more…

Posted in FreelanceLocalTech Chronicles at 9:24 pm by andy

Ok, a quick brag: we added 5 more consultant listings today to bring the total to 28.  We’re starting to see 50+ visitors per day to the site now, about half are potential clients looking for consulting help.  We’re pleased with our progress in the past 2 months, but definitely NOT satisfied.  Our target is 1000 consultant listings in the first year.

Not a lot of clients are posting their needs yet, but that’s ok, because I know for a fact that consultants are still being contacted based on their FLT listing (how do I know for certain?  I got one of those calls!).  If you have an FLT success story, let us know!

And for those freelancers who are just trolling for clients to call but don’t want to post a listing about their services… you’re definitely missing out!

UPDATE [25 Jul 2007]: 28 More!

Posted in Starting Out as a Freelance Consultant at 3:02 pm by jill

If you are just getting started in the freelancing biz, you might want to check out some of these sites for much needed info for about starting a new business.

 Nationional Organization for the Self Employed can help you get health insurance and offers tax, legal and other resources targeted for the self employed.

 Freelancers Union - offers health insurance to freelancers in some states.

Small Business Administration - provides tons of information on everything from writing a business plan, naming and structuring your business, taxes and fun stuff like that.

IRS helps with details on tax issues specifically for new business owners.

 I will keep adding to this list.  Please share any that you find.

Posted in Starting Out as a Freelance Consultant at 9:58 pm by andy

I’ve been a freelance consultant for 12 of the past 17 years.  During those years, I’ve only been tempted once to stop looking for clients and start looking for a real job.  It was a bad six months in 2004 where I think I billed about 4 weeks of revenue during the first 6 months of the year.  And got married.  And bought a house.  My bank account shrank lots more than I liked, but it’s hard to see these things coming.

So I looked at the job boards — Monster, Dice, ComputerJobs, etc. — and even looked at doing a project via eLance or one of the other project boards.  Yeah, I was desperate to do something, anything, to get some cash flowing in.  What I found was that marketing myself on those forums was ridiculously impersonal.  I was turning over the client relationship to someone else: either it was going to be a “blind” one-shot project hire via eLance or I was dealing with a clueless HR person screening applicants by keywords they were told to look for on a résumé.

What I figured out was that I did a better job marketing myself via my own web site than I could ever hope a job/project board — with their standardized forms and layouts — ever could.

Yes, I failed to get hired by any of those efforts.  That’s ok, I would have sucked as a company employee.  I’m a consultant, not a contractor or a body for hire.

What I did instead: Read more…