

Ask HN: How do I get started freelancing? - grasshoper

I know that there are a lot of freelancers on this site. I am interested in doing freelance web development but am wondering how to get started.   How did you land your initial contracts? If you were just starting out again, how would you go about doing so? How much should you charge starting out?
======
patio11
Instant success took only four years to accomplish: I've been blogging for
quite some time now about my business and the kind of things I've done to
improve it. For example, Rails programming, SEO, A/B testing, what have you.
These are valuable to a broad spectrum of businesses which have rather more
money than I do.

When I wanted to do some consulting work, I contacted folks I knew from
blogging (and other forms of participation on the Internet) and said "Hey, are
you interested in buying my time? I know you need X, you know I can do X very
well, how's about I X for you?" (Both of them said "X is kind of meh but if
you could Y we'd be thrilled", and happily I could Y, too.)

How much you charge starting out is entirely a market question. I'll give you
my typical pricing advice for anything: "Charge more." You will have better
clients, because cheapskates are disproportionately pathological clients, and
your clients will be happier with your work. Price communicates an expectation
of value, and that framing is _shockingly_ durable. Incidentally, if they're
hiring _you_ rather than an undifferentiated freelancer in X, then the global
market clearing price is _whatever you say it is_.

You can also get inbound offers in a similar fashion. (If I were more
interested in them, I'd have a page on my site advertising my availability and
making a focused case for hiring me, and I'd optimize that page with all the
tricks I use for product pages. And detail exactly how I did it on the page,
because that is, after all, a visible indication that I'm good at what I claim
to be good at.)

~~~
mootothemax
_cheapskates are disproportionately pathological clients_

^^^ This! One of my first clients got me at a ridiculously low rate, and has
over history been the most demanding client I've ever had.

That said, I used to use this client as a tester to try out different wordings
when I've upped my rates, so it wasn't a total loss ;)

~~~
zalew
_cheapskates are disproportionately pathological clients ^^^ This! One of my
first clients got me at a ridiculously low rate, and has over history been the
most demanding client I've ever had._

"Work for full price or for free. Never for cheap." is the most useful advice
on this subject.

~~~
tptacek
"Free" is usually a bad deal for both the client and the consultant. The
client is automatically in last place on the consultant's list of priorities,
regardless of how important his work is. The consultant has established a $0
price floor for her work, making it that much less likely that she'll ever get
a good project from the client.

If you do stuff for free --- and we do --- make sure it's different stuff than
what you charge for. We are, for instance, happy to give free advice, or to
chat on the phone with you about problems. We are not going to be happy to
take a little time testing your app.

This isn't just me pontificating. More often than not, when I've tried to help
people out with free project work, things have gone badly with the project
itself.

~~~
patio11
Clients who get free work also treat it like it is worth nothing, too. My ex-
ex-day job decided to do some pro-bono work for academics in my prefecture,
and told them "Sure, Patrick will do technical translation for you. For
gratis."

This resulted in me getting a stack of journal articles about several
subjects. Most memorably, steel smelting and formation of microbubbles. I
don't really know much about microbubbles, so the professional thing to do was
say "When they said 'technical translation', they really meant 'regarding
software' because that's really what we do here". The client said "Who cares?
Its free. Just do your best." So I did my best and asked copious questions
about steel smelting. "I don't really have time to deal with you this week.
But hey, its free, just do your best. We'll be happy." So they got a _journal
article they wanted to submit for publication_ with grammatically correct
English which almost certainly contained numerous material errors of fact.

It was a tremendous waste of the time and professional reputation of everyone
involved.

------
qeorge
A few tips, in addition to Patrick's excellent advice.

1) Make a nice portfolio. That's the #1 thing people will look at on your
site. Do a free site for a charity if you have nothing to show (do your
homework too - there's a lot of local business people on the boards of
charities).

2) List what you do, explicitly. Don't be afraid of being verbose. You would
think most people would assume if you can do a Wordpress site you can probably
do Drupal, vanilla HTML, etc. They will not.

They also don't know industry terms, so speak plain English. For example,
don't say "I'm going to install a content management system", say "you'll be
able to change the text on your website any time you want."

3) Don't underestimate LinkedIn. Make sure everyone you know is aware of what
you do and that they can hire or recommend you. Leave recommendations for
others.

4) Following on 3, scratch people's backs online. When you order lunch, leave
a review on Google Local or Citysearch. Do this for every service you buy -
the vet, your doctor, etc. If they have Twitter, mention the great service you
just received at @joesplace.

5) Scratch people's backs in the real world. Want to know the secret to
networking? Send other people business. If something comes in that's out of
your range (e.g., logo design), send it to another firm. You'll absolutely get
their attention, and they'll probably reciprocate the favor.

Following on this: other firms are an _excellent_ source of business. There's
a ton of print and graphic designers who can't code, and need someone good to
pair with. So get good at PSD -> Wordpress, Drupal, etc, and you can always
find work.

6) Pricing. As Patrick said, "charge more." If you need a number, start with
$50 or $75/hr and go up as you gain experience. Make sure to offer firm
estimates when needed (but not without detail! Mockups is worth the $100).

Good luck!

------
Ixiaus
patio11 has solid advice. I do B2B contract work (I don't interact with the
end client) and have noticed, however, that many of the small web shops that
need "help" have a hard time paying you anything good because they've already
charged the client 25k for a website and that gets diluted as they take a cut
to pay for their expenses.

I've found my niche contracting for other freelancers (particularly designers)
who are willing to pay more because they don't have four other employees and
related business expenses to care for with that income.

What has been said about "charge more" holds true as well, I heard it a lot
before I started but couldn't figure out "how" to charge more (confidence
thing). One fine day I had a fellow approach me and said his budget was x, I
told him if he doubled it he would have my minimum rate. He said it was a bit
high for him and that we would stay in touch; two weeks later he came calling
and met my rate.

He was also one of the many "good" clients I've had. High-quality and fairly
priced (for you) work just _tastes_ better...

Oh, and as a rule whatever your initial time "estimate" is, double it and you
will get a more accurate number (works consistently for me). Avoid any clients
that want "a Groupon website built using Joomla but with a custom shopping
cart done in three weeks with a budget of four grand. Oh, we also want to be
making money the day of launch in three weeks." (true story)

If you build it well and test it well, the project won't nag you long into the
future. It will be _done_ when you are _done_ ; I can't stress that enough
either. Kind of goes hand-in-hand with the high-quality thing.

Be sure you handle taxes properly too, since I'm a sole-proprietorship I just
have a business savings account that I stuff what I withhold. I also keep
track of all the things that I can claim as an expense.

(this is the end, I promise) You should also have a way of organizing and
tracking your projects; I use heavily customized templates for projects in
Emacs org-mode. I write up quotes using it and I also write up the
requirements, sprints, payment schedule, backlog, notes, etc... using a
project template. I can track my time with it, how much they've paid to-date,
and invoice them.

Whatever you use, have a system for tracking and organizing the non-code
related material of a project.

Good luck!

~~~
oscarduignan
Have you written up any notes about your conventions/system in org-mode? I'd
be really interested to read more from you about this, as I'm using org-mode
as well, and it's really helpful reading about how other people are putting it
to work for them (I'm fairly new to org-mode myself, and at the moment my
conventions are fairly loose.)

~~~
Ixiaus
I haven't written anything up, specifically. I have been thinking about it
though. I did do a lot of research on other's org-mode habits and
configurations, spent countless hours constructing my own setup, and also
getting used to it.

It would be a worthwhile exercise to write about it, it would give me a chance
to refine some loose ends as well.

------
chewbranca
There are plenty of good suggestions in this thread about acquiring contacts,
so I wanted to mention there is a lot of administration work with freelancing
that the sooner you get started on the better. Remember, as a freelancer,
you're in charge of taking care of taxes, health care, vacation days, sick
days, work related costs, and unemployment time.

I would try save at least half of everything you make. First, 1/3rd should be
saved for taxes. Second, save at least 1/6th for misc expenses and everything
else. Second, look into tax deductions, there is a lot of associated costs
with running a freelance business that you can deduct and save a lot of money.
So get a system together for keeping track of expenses, ie gas mileage
traveling to a client, cost of new computer hardware, if you work from home
then you can deduct the percentage of space your office takes up from your
rent (not quite that simple), and electricity and internet, etc etc.

Invoicing is another thing that is a hassle. Keep track of hours everyday and
stay on top of it.

The best advice I can give is to really treat freelancing like a business and
get a system setup that works for you. Doing business/administrative stuff is
not as fun as programming by any means, but the headaches of not doing it up
front will be much bigger.

Best of luck to you.

------
mootothemax
I'm a freelancer and get work from two main sources: friends and former
colleagues; and RentACoder.

RentACoder has worked very well for me, I rarely use the site to get work and
instead get referrals from previous clients. It was painful working
essentially for free in my first two weeks, but you make up for it pretty
quickly.

One thing I would have done differently is to shout from the rooftops, right
from day 1. I only recently took advantage of the likes of LinkedIn to find
work, and this has also worked really, really well. Keep building your list of
contacts, shout out to _everyone_ you know that you're available and this is
the list of what you can do.

Charging is simple: when you don't have many clients, drop your prices. As you
get more and more work coming in, raise your prices. Keep doing so until your
work drops off, then drop your prices a bit, and keep doing so until you get
work. I was terrified the first time I told a few clients I was increasing my
rates, I thought they'd all desert me! Break through this psychological
barrier, the rewards are there for you if you do :)

Finally, get prepared for the fact that from time to time you're going to have
to wait longer than you want to get paid. I've yet to get properly burned, but
have definitely had to wait to get my cash from time to time.

~~~
tptacek
Bear in mind that one of the primary things freelancers are compensated for is
their ability to find clients and to accept the risk of dry spells. If you
outsource those things to a freelancer meat market site, you may end up
hurting your rate.

Using Rentacoder to build a referral network, which you end up mostly relying
on, seems like a fine strategy.

------
bendtheblock
Do you mean you want to be a freelancer for other agencies or to work directly
for clients?

When we set up our agency, here's what worked:

\- Get your own site set up so that you have a web presence and can start to
build a brand.

\- You need to build your portfolio, so do a bit of work for cheap/free if you
have to. You want to do this quickly, if you do a site for free the client
will be more willing to go ahead straight away as it requires little decision
making. We did a website for a primary school and a couple of photographers we
knew to start off with.

\- You're probably going to need to have low prices to start with, as smaller
businesses are more willing to give a new business a shot, but won't have as
much of a budget as bigger companies. Over time you can decide where you want
to take the business and start charging more as you build a reputation. Your
aim at this point is to build a portfolio, so you can charge more later on.

\- Classified ads on Gumtree or whatever the equivalent is in your area. We
met two of our biggest clients through classified ads (just be honest, link to
your site and try and get across your ethos).

\- Reach out to personal network, previous employers etc... they already trust
you (hopefully) and may have work that can keep you going.

\- Get involved with a co-working space, this has 3 main benefits: 1) regain
some of the social element of work, which you may have lost if you previously
worked in an office environment. 2) Meet other business owners and freelancers
that can offer advice and are a good sounding board, and interesting people
usually too. 3) You might even get work from other business working at the
same space. We've got a couple of clients as a result of using a co-working
space.

\- Cold calls! I could write a whole post on this, but basically, try and
figure out a niche and what your hook is; Why are you going to go after a
particular niche? Have you worked in this industry before? Can you offer a
service that will add value to them? Are you in their area (geographically)?

Remember this is one of the hardest bits of going it alone but once you gain
some momentum and build a portfolio it will get easier.

~~~
tptacek
I have never had any luck with cold calls (we haven't pushed hard on this
though). Can you tell me more about what your experience was?

~~~
bendtheblock
Yeah sure. It needs perseverance and, well, a bit of luck. The main thing that
will help is SHREK:

 _Say who you are_ : "Hi I'm [name] calling from [company], we're a web agency
nearby that specialize in X."

 _Note you may have to repeat this step more than once as you will most likely
get through to a secretary. If this is a totally cold call (you've not spoken
to the person before, you don't know their name) you should make it sound
confident and like there shouldn't be any reason not to put you through to how
it is you need to speak to. If you don't know who you need to speak to, ask
for a generic title, don't be afraid of asking too high (e.g. "can I speak to
your CTO?")_

 _Hook_ : "I've just been looking at your site / I spoke with someone last
week / We met at a trade fair / I know X, who apparently is an ex-colleague of
yours / We've just done a website for [a key competitor of theirs] and
wondered if we could do something for you."

 _Reason statement_ : Why should they be interested? "We have a new web design
service we've aimed specifically at X"

 _Key questions_ : If they sound interested, figure out how important this
could be to them. "How do you update your website currently? / How much is X
costing you? Have you considered integrating your website with X?"

The above would be easier if you have a specific product, but if - like us -
you're a service-based agency, you'll have to play it by ear a bit, or maybe
create specific products for industry niches. I'm not a natural salesperson at
all, but one of the first things we did when we started our company was to
invest in a training day from an extremely good salesperson in our network.
It's paid for itself many times over.

One of the hardest things is to keep motivation when you have a list of phone
numbers in front of you. This is a game of numbers, sooner or later you'll
call someone who is currently after exactly what you're selling. In order to
do maintain enthusiasm, 'visualise success', such as what the potential new
business would do for your company, for you personally and professionally.

Obviously there is a lot more to this. Does anyone else have any other tips?

------
mcknz
One thing I did was check out members of local tech community groups --
googled the names and found something about them (say an article/post they
wrote). Then I would write a personal email with some comments directed to
that person specifically, with a quick note about me and how I might be able
to help them. It's time consuming but does get responses if you choose people
carefully, and don't spam.

I also did pro/low bono work for organizations with lots of members -- it's a
good way to get your name out b/c you're identified as a potential local
resource.

Most people/orgs that I work for want fixed pricing -- I handle that by
writing up an estimate that breaks down each task/feature, how long it takes
to implement that feature, and my hourly rate. That way you still give them a
set price, but you get the hourly rate in their heads, so you have a basis for
pricing changes/enhancements. You can also give first-time clients a "first
project" discount -- that way they are more inclined to hire you, but also
have an idea how much your "real" price is for future work. If you are really
good, they will hire you again.

For an hourly rate I think the advice already posted is good -- I started low
and bumped up my rate with each new client. I typically charge for-profit
companies more than individuals/non-profits. If you think your rate is too
high, it's probably right on target. :) You can always renegotiate down if the
rate is a dealbreaker, but you can't renegotiate up.

Scope creep can kill you -- in my estimate I write as specifically as possible
what I will do (based on requirements discussions), and more importantly what
I WILL NOT do. You can't catch everything, but that goes a long way toward
resolving conflicts. When there's a material change/addition, you can then
price that new task accordingly. People will take advantage of you if they can
get changes/additions for free.

A good web presence is important -- I get calls from out of the blue from
people who have seen my web site, and those have turned into long-term
relationships. Do some SEO to make sure you're visible to your local area.

------
iamdave
This is going to scare the pants off of you, and I'll get downvoted into
oblivion but:

Give your first client a free website.

~~~
twampss
Did you do this for your first client? If so, how did it all go?

I did something similar - I offered to build the foundation of their website
(a social networking site) for free as a trial. It only took a few nights and
they liked what they saw. Shortly after, we negotiated and agreed upon a rate
to continue development.

~~~
iamdave
My story went like this:

I left development to start consulting, and in the beginning I still had no
idea of a competitive but profitable price stack. However I was very business
minded, a week prior to leaving my field I just finished reading Dale
Carnegie's book "How to Win Friends and Influence People".

Before I go further, let's stop and take a pause: this is a book that everyone
needs to read, especially freelancers. I say especially these individuals
because your livelihood is predicated not on a parent company managing image
and taking a considerable chunk of the impact if you mess up. That being said,
it is vital that freelancers read this book page for page, front and back to
get a firm grasp of how to interact with people beyond "Do you need a website?
Here's your website. Here's an invoice, alright have a good one". I read this
book four times, and I'm reading it once more because in addition to being
incredibly insightful: Dale Carnegie has a very conversational way of writing
that makes this book an absolute joy to read.

Alright, ready for part two?

I had no idea of a profitable price stack, but after reading this book I had a
good idea of how to approach people, propose ideas, listen to their needs and
collaborate on a service that I could provide them. Still, I was stuck on what
to charge. An idea came into my head, an old one that I'm sure is all over the
web, debated from both sides, but an idea none the less. And this is what I
told my first client:

"Before I quote you on this project that we're working on, I want to know what
you think of the idea of free".

He was hooked, I had his attention. Free is an incredibly powerful word
provided your ulterior motive is just. We worked together for three weeks as I
helped him build his business, and as the time grew near for my involvement to
end I gave him another incentive.

I offered him 5% on the next sale if he recommended a client that signed a
contract to procure my services. By this point, I figured out that working on
a retainer after concluding a 'sale' and ending a contract with a very happy
client would be easier to secure than a rate structure that was predicated on
the idea that I might end up having to bill more hours than was anticipated.
The caveat was that he give no indication to whoever he would refer to me that
he got free services, that was up to his discretion. I did not give him a
line, a pitch or any sort of script. He ended up with $375 in his pocket, and
a new customer.

He ended up becoming my personal accountant.

~~~
twampss
Wow, your first client experience sounds ideal! Not only did he end up as your
personal accountant, but you had him working for YOU as he looked for
potential clients. That's a great use of resources and definitely sounds like
it was worth your time investment for those few weeks.

Thanks for sharing and for the Dale Carnegie recommendation!

------
nnash
In my opinion the main thing that you need to do is get out there, meet people
and make friends with them. All those conferences and lunches will pay off in
the long run, and probably give you a lot of opportunities for work down the
line. If you are really serious I also suggest that you go to the state
department's page, and register an LLC so that you can start getting tax
benefits for work related purchases. If you are interested in my story of how
I've started out freelancing as a college student myself you can read it after
the jump.

Here are some good resource websites: <http://freelanceswitch.com>
<http://workawesome.com>

I go to an art and design college so it is probably easier for me to get
connections for work, but here is what I've done as a student. Making friends
with staff and faculty has been of a huge benefit to me. I've gotten a couple
small jobs, a work study and an internship simply by being friendly to other
people in my major, and staff at the school. A teacher in my program who I
took a two classes with saw an art piece I did (web design related) at an
exhibition in the schools gallery space, and referred me for a flash job
similar in nature to another client of his that he didn't have time to
complete. I got a work study at my school's in house design firm as a referral
from a student in my program who knew my skill set. I also got an internship
this summer in NYC as a result of being casual friends with one of the study
abroad staff. In the spring I attended a Flash Developer's conference, and
made connections with several people there, and one of them whom I'm
communicating with now seems like a really promising opportunity for some
contract work.

------
gte910h
1> You need a portfolio. I don't know what sort of development you're looking
to do, but make 3-5 nice looking sites/programs/apps. Remember, you can't show
off snazzy technical stuff (as clients won't understand it), but you can make
it look pretty or do something that would interesting to a layman.

This should likely take you a couple months to finish, if you're putting the
quality in I'm talking about.

Now you can do these for free for someone else, but that makes the
relationship a hard one to transition to paid eventually.

2> Don't ever charge low amounts of money. The people who offer work for that
amount are often horrible to you. I'm not saying start out charging $150 an
hour, but get far north of $20 an hour for any sort of development.

3> Borrow or beg a standard contract from someone else. Include cancellation
clauses, so the manner in which a cancellation occurs is dictated by prior
agreement. Make sure you include what payments are still due, who gets what
rights to use code or already finished products, etc.

4> Just start! Seriously, you'll learn most of this by doing. Remember though,
these people _aren't your boss_ like at work, they're clients. If they say
jump, you need to make sure you _Really should be jumping that high_.
Oftentimes, they'll make outrageous demands and the first alternatives that
come to mind aren't the only ones.

5> If they ask for extra work: Attach price tags to it. If it matters to them,
they'll buy it. If it doesn't, they won't.

------
Alex63
Jerry Weinberg, in _The Secrets of Consulting_ , recommends charging about 4
times the hourly rate that you want to make. Thus, if you think you could live
on $40/hour (about $80,000 a year), you need to charge about $160 an hour.
This gives you the buffer that you need for unplanned downtime (illness, early
termination of contracts, lulls in business) and planned downtime (vacation,
training, business development activities). While you could argue the exact
proportion, I think this is good advice, based on my experience as a
consultant.

------
sidmitra
\- Make yourself visible, create your own webpage,portfolio page and link it
everywhere, starting with your HN profile. You don't have an email address
there right now. So you might've already lost 1-2 potentials that didn't
bother to signup/reply just to get your contact address.

\- Make some apps on your own, build a portfolio. Just 1-2 should do it.
There's google appengine for free hosting.

\- Try Elance.com, i've had better luck and more pay per effort on projects
there.

Also send me an email with your hourly rates.

------
euroclydon
I'm surprised that no-one has posted "So you want to be a consultant?" by
Steve Friedl. This article helped me to get started:

<http://unixwiz.net/techtips/be-consultant.html>

------
apike
I added myself to <http://hnhackers.com> yesterday and I got a contact from a
potential client today. Even if that's the only client I get from it, it was
worth it.

You should charge twice the hourly wage you'd make working for someone else.
Some more details about why: <http://antipode.ca/2009/what-your-time-is-
worth/>

------
dmn001
I landed my initial contracts through registering on get a freelancer (GAF),
getacoder, rentacoder (RAC), all the common freelance sites. It is very
competitive, and there are many bids posted on each contract/job listing. Most
of the bids are generic replies from Indian companies, offering web services.
They have a lower living cost compared to US/UK, so that is why they are
sucessful in this industry. Setup a keyword alert on your skill and bid often
and respond to exactly to the requirement, in order to 1-up on them.

My advice is to find your niche. Do something different. When you bid on
something that has a perfect fit to your skills you will have an advantage.
Get in contact, build a rapport by responding fast, thoroughly and accurately.
If possible, send some sample work or ideas on how to solve a problem. Try and
bid on something you are likely to win, and always bid on a project that when
you look back, it will seem like a stepping stone in what you learnt or
experienced. Don't bid on dull jobs or those that require little skill. There
are plenty of people around for that already. Be smart.

If I started over, in hindsight, maybe I would have taken a different route,
by researching companies and building a network of contacts, e.g. through HN
or Linkedin. I would be more confident about my skills too.

One last tip: work hard and read a book on self-motivation. Good luck! :)

------
hkarthik
Start with building an app that you can be proud of. Others have mentioned
working for free, but if you're going to do that, you may as well build an app
for yourself.

Treat it as a client project and be willing to put some money into it to keep
yourself committed and ensure its success.

Once it launches, you have an instant portfolio and hopefully some Github
contributions that come out of it that you can point to.

This is the route that I am going with. I'm about 60% done with my app.

------
spking
My best freelancing success has always come from former colleagues and
managers already familiar with my quality of work. I'm not sure what your
professional experience is, but if you have an existing network to leverage it
will make your ability to secure projects a lot easier. I've also found that
as a general rule of thumb, you can usually charge your former hourly salary
+50% (and sometimes more) and nobody will bat an eye. If they do, you might
want to reconsider them as a client.

------
klous
When starting out freelancing you could attract clients by offering to
complete a project first and let the client pay what they think it is worth.

~~~
jcl
A discussion on "what you think it's worth" pricing from a couple months ago:

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1279660>

------
prateekdayal
I have found that having a good network helps. People who know you can
recommend you to their contacts. You should hang out at the local barcamps and
other events and let people know that you are available for freelance work.

Building a website and writing a blog helps too. Lots of time people have
contacted me through my blog for work.

Best of luck

------
dhyasama
I need some quick cash, so I'm thinking of taking area restaurant menus and
creating a quick iphone web version for each one, then walking in to the
restaurant, showing it to a manager, and asking if they want to pay a couple
hundred bucks for it. Hopefully a few will buy it and it will lead to more
work down the line.

------
joshu
This question comes up a lot (because it is important.)

I have the opposite question: How do I find good freelancers?

~~~
joshuarr
Network.

------
fortes
You could start by putting some contact info and a portfolio link in your
profile.

How much time do you have for freelance work? What are your rates like?

------
gruvinmin
There are freelance camps all over North America, each sessions info is stored
on wikis. One that just finished is Vancouver Freelance Camp
<http://www.thenetworkhub.ca/freelancecamp/> and the wiki is updated with info

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breck
Here are my best 5 tips that I can think of off the top of my head:

<http://togger.com/breck/tips_for_freelance_developers>

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trevorturk
I'd suggest doing open-source work, blogging, and presenting at meet-ups.
Sharing your knowledge with other people is a great way to make friendly
connections.

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icey
jacquesm has a pretty good guide: <http://jacquesmattheij.com/be-consultant>

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hotmind
Want to go freelance? Then you need one thing more than anything else:

Confidence.

If you don't have it, get it. You can't pick up women or clients without it.

~~~
stcredzero
Re: Confidence - fake it 'til you make it.

I started with getting phone numbers from women. Detach your self-presentation
from your inner self and look on this as an acting exercise. Mentally model
what you'd look like if you got phone numbers from attractive women all the
time. Look at scenes in movies with characters you like. Practice what you
come up with on attractive women. Change your presentation a bit and observe
the results.

Done correctly, this process results in a lot of phone numbers. By itself, it
won't get you laid a whole lot. However, it can give you a framework for
practicing a confident presentation in a context where you are faking it.
Also, this happens in front of somebody who already knows they have something
you want.

~~~
aharrison
As much as I hate to plug this movie, "Cruel Intentions" had some amazing
scenes where the main characters did just about every action correctly from
this perspective.

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ddemchuk
Do you already have the skills necessary? If so, beg everyone you know for a
cheap job, and then beg them more for referrals. In freelance, 95% of your
work will come from your network of clients and referrals.

You could also scrape craigslist and get your first initial gigs that way.

