
Ask HN: College student looking for freelancing advice - chrisshroba
Thanks for reading! I&#x27;m looking for advice about how to get started freelancing. I&#x27;m a master&#x27;s CS  student in college looking to make some extra money, and I&#x27;m not sure where or how to look for freelancing work.  I have three years of experience with backend python web development, using several frameworks, and would like to find companies looking for that particular skill.<p>Does anyone know of a way to find such opportunities?  There are so many freelancing websites out there (Gigster, Toptal, Freelancer), and it&#x27;s so hard to tell which to try, and which I would have a shot at getting work from.<p>Thanks!!
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TechHawk
I started freelancing full-time 8 months ago. What I found really supportive
on my journey was the Creative Class from Paul Jarvis
([https://creativeclass.io](https://creativeclass.io)).

Remember that you have something valuable to bring to the table, namely
yourself and your unique experiences. I would not recommend freelancing
websites for one simple reason: race to the bottom. On those websites you will
often be competing with super low rates.

I think one of the most effective "techniques" for finding the opportunities
you are looking for is to connect with people. Spend time where other people
with work opportunities are spending their time, talk to people and help
others.

All the best!

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BjoernKW
Previous comment on this subject:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12744624](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12744624)

In general, avoid freelancing websites. Networking is key. Go to industry and
tech meetups. Talk to other freelancers.

If possible find a more specific niche. Freelancers offering generic web
development skills are ten a penny. Specialising in problems and industries is
preferable to specialising in technologies. If you're the "Python guy" you're
essentially positioning yourself as a fungible commodity. If you can for
instance be the guy who uses software to solve specific problems in supply
chain management that'd be a much more lucrative and sustainable niche.

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shiny
I'd say: network network network. Meet people that work at companies that
might want freelancers.

Or look on remote job boards and email those companies directly. If you're
just beginning, be willing to work for a bit less to get your foot in the
door.

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cweagans
I get a lot of leads going to local programming meetups. I would recommend
staying away from freelancer sites, though. The rate will be low and the
quality of client will be awful.

~~~
GFischer
Seconded. I've hired a freelance through the university network (though, if
others are like me, don't expect stellar rates :) ). You might want to ask at
a local accelerator or meetups, plenty of people need a helping hand.

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rpeden
Hi Chris,

Picking up freelance work will be more difficult (but certainly not
impossible!) if you're a student without a lot of professional experience.
Most of the freelancing websites are a bloodbath race to the bottom where
everyone wants work done as cheaply as possible. Toptal is a bit different, as
the barrier to entry is a lot higher, so you might find it more useful than
sites like Freelancer and Upwork.

You might also find the freelancer "Who's Hiring" posts here on HN useful.
They pop up on the first day of every month, and you can find them archived at
[http://hnhiring.me/](http://hnhiring.me/). Posting that you're available on
there could be a good way to pick up some work.

Having a good portfolio page of work you've done can help tremendously. I've
always liked Michael Fogleman's projects page:
[https://www.michaelfogleman.com/projects/](https://www.michaelfogleman.com/projects/)

To stand out from the crowd, you don't need nearly as many projects as he has.
3-5 would probably be enough. They don't have to be huge! I've always liked
downloading the GTFS schedules for a local transit agency and creating a site
that makes it easy to look up schedules and stop times. It usually isn't
difficult to make one that looks better and is easier to use than the actual
transit agency site!

You could also do something interesting and unusual like implementing a cat
detector using OpenCV and Python:
[http://www.pyimagesearch.com/2016/06/20/detecting-cats-in-
im...](http://www.pyimagesearch.com/2016/06/20/detecting-cats-in-images-with-
opencv/)

If you learned how to do that from the blog post, reimplemented it yourself,
and then put some of your own customizations in it, you'd have something good
to add to your projects page. Someone who had a project like that they could
show me and talk about would stand out (in a good way) from 100% of the
developers I've interviewed in my career. So maybe try getting a few projects
up and then post on the next HN 'Who's hiring freelancers' post. There are no
guarantees, but plenty of people have found good freelance gigs that way.

If there are any local developer meetups, those can be a great source of work,
too. My first ever paid programming work happened because I went to a meetup
and showed off a transit app I had created. I didn't have any professional
experience at the time, but showing that I could actually execute and ship
something convinced them to give me a chance. So having a projects page can
help you here too. Other devs that go to meetup often work for companies that
sometimes have extra work they need done. If they meet you and like you, _and_
can see that you're able to take on projects and complete them, you'll be at
the top of the list of people they'll contact to do work for them.

Hopefully that is helpful!

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sprobertson
If your school has a mailing list where people send out jobs, subscribe to
that and start replying. I had much more success with that than freelancing
sites, in fact the only other method that really worked was Craigslist.

