Ask HN: Freelancers,What are your biggest painpoints? - PrakashBhatta
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jstewartmobile
Interruptions from calls, administrative overhead, self-employment tax, and
health insurance costs.

If at all possible, bill out jobs instead of hours. If you absolutely have to
bill per-unit-time, choose as large a unit as you can get away with. Per-hour
may work for attorneys, but when you have to watch the clock on every little
thing as a developer, everyone loses.

Unless you are old, do whatever you can do to minimize self-employment tax.
It's currently over 15%, and it's for a retirement system most of us will
never get a dime out of.

If you have trustworthy people you can lean on for things like advertising,
accounting, sales, etc., hold on to them for dear life and pay them fairly.
The more you are able to double-down on your strengths, the better.

~~~
rajeshp1986
Let me ask you a question. would you pay someone to manage this hassle for
you?

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sheraz
Keeping the pipeline full for when projects end or go on hiatus.

The dumbest mistake I've made has been this.

That slack time in between paying gigs can really kill financial momentum.
Also, If I'm idle for more than two weeks that wastes not only money but also
mental bandwidth. I go from thinking about work to thinking about how to get
work, and that is stressful.

Always be networking. Always take meetings even if you are fully booked. Stay
visible.

~~~
chatmasta
Conversely, keeping the pipeline full while engaged on other projects. This
applies especially if you are booking in one-month blocks. How do you keep
incoming leads hot when you won't be available for at least 60 days?

~~~
sheraz
I'm very upfront about my availability. I also let people know weeks in
advance when I will be available. And in between that time I stay visible at
my favorite events/meetups and in social media (publishing little open source
things), asking questions, etc.

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BjoernKW
About a year ago I conducted a small-scale survey on how freelancers approach
marketing and sales and what their biggest problems in these areas (and in
general) are:

[https://bjoernkw.com/2016/01/15/survey-for-it-freelancers-
ho...](https://bjoernkw.com/2016/01/15/survey-for-it-freelancers-how-do-you-
approach-marketing-and-sales-the-results/)

~~~
myroon5
Heads up, this was impossible to read on mobile for me.

~~~
BjoernKW
Sorry for that. Google Charts apparently can cause layout problems on mobile
devices. The static image version linked in the article should work fine,
though.

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wayn3
Getting access to jobs that are remote and do not require me to do any kind of
UI nonsense. The cross section here can be fickle.

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philippz
Germany here - bureaucracy.

