

Ask HN: How can one make money with Wordpress and the like - quietthrow

I see a lot of people in this community indicating Wordpress  as one of the sources of making some amount of passive side income (1K+). My question is word press is a relatively mature platform what are the gaps that people can make plugins for to make money.<p>Can you identify some specific items&#x2F;tasks that one can do to generate some passive income.<p>If your answer is tied to a different &#x27;ecosystem&#x27; besides wordpress please indicate that too.
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thomasreggi
I see it as a divide between either having a client / designer relationship
and making a custom theme or website, alternatively you could make a theme and
sell it on something like Theme
Forest([http://themeforest.net/](http://themeforest.net/)).

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t0
There's huge demand for packaged themes and code. You can go with Envato or
one of the smaller stores like CreativeMarket or Binpress.

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zachlatta
I've had a lot of luck setting up a Wordpress installation for clients and
putting a modified relatively inexpensive theme on it. I make it very clear to
clients that they're getting a (slightly) modified theme and not a custom
design.

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quietthrow
How do you find these clients ? Also do you do this on the side or is this
kind of work your full time job ?

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zachlatta
I do this on the side. I currently work full-time at Run Games, a small indie
game studio.

I started out doing freelance web development for people I knew personally.
I'd set a price, usually ~$300 because I'd feel guilty if I took any more, and
spend the time to make a custom website for them. They'd recommend me to a
friend and I'd do the same thing over again.

I quickly realized this wasn't sustainable, so I experimented with raising my
rate substantially and doing Wordpress sites with a theme for people. As it
turns out, my clients didn't notice a different in the quality of my work and
liked having a CMS they could use (over a Jekyll-esque thing I had set up for
myself).

So, to sum it up, I recommend starting small with doing themed Wordpress sites
for local businesses and offering low rates. You're going for recommendations
at this stage. Once you have clients approaching you, you can start to raise
your rate.

