Engaging Assistance

Feb 23, 2009 Excerpts

This is an excerpt from the book, The Principles of Successful Freelancing. Sample chapters are available for downloading from this page.

Early on in starting out on your own, you’ll want to make alliances and choose suppliers for those services or products that you don’t offer yourself.

A word from the wise: be very careful when choosing a supplier. Using a third-party product or service for a client project is akin to offering a raving endorsement about them, so it’s important to consider your options before making your decision.

As your freelance business grows, you will find yourself using a multitude of suppliers. You’ll find that whole areas of your business rely on them, and they in turn will benefit from the business that you bring them.

You’ll need a domain name registrar, a hosting company, an office stationery supplier, a printer for business cards or other printed matter, and possibly an accountant or lawyer—or both. There will no doubt be other suppliers along the way. And then, of course, there’s the large question of outsourcing—as we’ll see, it’s a false economy to spend time struggling to fulfil the complex requirements of thorough bookkeeping, to use a common example. There are experts to do it quickly and easily while you devote your time to the work at which you excel and that makes you money.

Spend any amount of time on web-based forums frequented by freelancers and you’ll inevitably find discussion threads regarding freelance tales of woe—freelancers losing all of their data as a result of using the cheapest hosting company they could find, or having suppliers directly contact all of their clients, offering to undercut their best deals.

Note: Lessons Learned
Don’t leave backups to your hosting provider. Regularly back up client sites, just in case—this may save you in the future!

If you’re going to resell third-party services or products, ensure that you have a written contract stating what is acceptable and what isn’t. The last thing you want is for your hosting company to go directly to your client base and offer them a great deal to cut you out of the picture.

Do some online research, and read up on the experiences other freelancers have had with the suppliers you have under consideration. Forums such as Web Hosting Talk (see the Reseller Forum) and the SitePoint Forums (see the Web Hosting Forums) have plenty of posts pertaining to which hosting companies treat their resellers well, and which don’t.

The same approach applies to most suppliers you’ll require—there are domain name registrar reviews, printing company reviews, and plenty of other sites and forums to be found.

Once you have chosen a supplier, I encourage you to build a real rapport with them—a great relationship with a supplier can be worth a fortune in a time of crisis, or when you need something done absolutely drop-everything now.

Asking for Advice

One of the disadvantages of a freelance life is working in isolation. You won’t have a team around you, and at times you may feel as though you’re the last person on earth.

This is even more obvious when you realize you probably don’t have someone to give advice. Sure, your partner or family can help to a degree, but they can’t answer questions about your chosen profession in any great detail, unless web expertise runs in the family.

Look through your contacts, and see if you know someone who would be able or willing to play an informal mentoring role. You may be surprised as you look through your contacts on social networking sites or in your address book as to who could give you a hand; it’s often even more surprising how willing people are to be helpful.

Look for freelance or web industry groups that have meet-ups. There are groups like Refresh, Port80, BarCamp, web design meetups, and more, where you can mingle with like-minded freelancers to share stories and ask for advice.

If there are no obvious candidates among your contacts and no local groups, make contacts through discussion forums and your extended networks, or even consider starting your own group. A buddy system between other freelancers, or with a mentor who’s been doing the freelance or small business gig for a couple of years, can provide an invaluable sounding board and information source.

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Tags: freelance book, freelance success, freelancer tips, successful freelancing

Considering Your Business Structure

Feb 16, 2009 Excerpts

This is an excerpt from the book, The Principles of Successful Freelancing. Sample chapters are available for downloading from this page.

When setting yourself up as a business, you should consider the implications of different business structures. If you intend to take on staff within the first few years, you may wish to set up a corporation. If you plan to remain a solo worker, having everything set up as a sole proprietorship may be the best solution.

Having said this, consider speaking to an accountant and possibly a lawyer to seek advice about your particular scenario. You could also speak to local business bureaux (such as SCORE) or associations. They’ll take into account your current personal and financial situation, as well as your legal jurisdiction. Requirements for different business and company registrations will vary depending upon your location.

Each different structure can have a considerable impact on your taxation benefits, your licensing and governmental costs, and your ability to grow the business in the future.

The main differences between a limited liability company (an LLC) and a sole proprietor arrangement reside in the varying levels of possible taxation benefits, legal protection, ability to obtain finance, and your legal requirements.

Setting up an LLC structure has both advantages and disadvantages. The advantages include:

• greater legal protection—If a client sues the company, only company assets can be seized to pay any judgement, not your own car or house.
• greater ability to obtain credit—Many financial institutions and lenders have a preference for a company, rather than an individual, for business finance.
• tax benefits—In some states and locations, a company receives more taxation benefits than a person.

This option isn’t entirely free of disadvantages, of course. An LLC costs money to set up, and there are ongoing company-related fees. Also, financial reporting is usually more involved than for an individual.

Being in a sole proprietor structure has its fair share of benefits, mostly to do with cost. When compared with an LLC, there’s less financial reporting for most situations, fewer start-up administration costs, and not as many licensing or business costs.

There are disadvantages though, which are easily recognizable as the other side of the LLC advantages:

• zero legal protection—If a client should sue you, the court can order that your assets be taken to pay any legal judgment.
• less access to credit—Business loans are likely to be harder to get for a sole proprietor than for an LLC.
• tax burdens—You may be taxed more than if you were a company.

Ideally, whatever structure you create now will mean that you aren’t paying more than you need to in fees and costs, yet allow you to be flexible enough to accommodate change as your business and your direction evolve.

It’s also a very good idea, regardless of your structure, to open a bank account for your freelance business that is separate from you as an individual. This way, you can pay yourself as if you were an employee, and allow a small nest egg to grow in the business account for those quieter months.

This account will also be used to pay all of your running costs, making the bookkeeping side of your new venture easier to manage.

Speak to as many other freelancers and small business owners as well, and ask them how they set up their own structure—people will soon tell you the pros and cons of their decisions, and this can save you a fortune in reorganization in the future.

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Tags: freelance blog, freelance book, freelancer help, freelancing, posf, successul freelancing

Cindy Prosser on Freelancing

Jan 28, 2009 50 Words

Cindy says…

Be unique!  Have that special something that will prompt your client talk about you to others. While you may be unable to compete with other freelancers or businesses on knowledge, price, etc., you need to have that special something that makes them want YOU. Even if your work isn’t spectacular, you’ll be spectacular to work with.

About Cindy
Cindy is visual designer & information architect who got into designing with web standards in Ottawa, Canada 8 years ago & currently has Attitude e-media in Mandurah, Western Australia. Our mantra is “build websites with the respect that the Web deserves”.

About this Post
This post is one of a series, written by various people within the web industry. They are responses to my request for a maximum of 50 words on the topic of tips for freelance success. You can use the 50 words category to see all the answers so far.

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Tags: freelance book, freelance guide, freelancer, freelancer tips

Creating a SWOT

Jan 19, 2009 Excerpts

This is an excerpt from the book, The Principles of Successful Freelancing. Sample chapters are available for downloading from this page.

The planning term SWOT first appeared in the 1960s. A SWOT analysis is really just a simple strategic planning method that helps evaluate projects and businesses. It’s based around a four-square grid, shown in Figure 1, “The SWOT grid explained”, which covers Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. I’ve used it a number of times to help me make decisions around new products or service offerings under consideration, and it works just as well for business models.

Example 1. Business Planning Questions

summary

* What is the initial concept?
* What is your current situation?
* What will your key success factors be?
* What are your longer-term vision and goals?

market analysis

* What does the current market look like?
* What is your target market?
* What are the characteristics of your perfect client?
* What do your target clients require?

competitive overview

* What does your industry look like?
* Are there many competitors?
* Who are your five closest competitors?
* What products or services do they offer?
* What opportunities do you have to be unique? (Can you fill a niche or be different from your competitors in some way?)
* What are the risks and threats?

sales and marketing

* How will you attract clients?
* How can potential clients find you?
* What marketing activities would you consider?

plan of action

* What do you need to do in order to kick things off?
* What should you do in the medium term?
* What are some longer-term plans?

Figure 1. The SWOT grid explained

To start your own SWOT analysis, list all of your strengths and weaknesses—these can be thought of as the internal elements, over which which you have some degree of control. Continue by identifying all of the opportunities and threats that you can—these are generally external forces, such as competitors and the industry at large. Then, look for ways to use your strengths, improve on your weaknesses, exploit the opportunities available to you, and fend off the threats.

A SWOT analysis certainly doesn’t need to be as long-winded as it may sound; I have found some of the most useful SWOT analyses are those that fit onto a single page. By way of example, let’s look at our very own Jacob and Emily.

Jacob has put together the beginnings of a SWOT, which looks like this:

Emily, on the other hand, has put together a SWOT that is more like this:

These examples are only a few lines long, but you can easily extend them to a page or more. The concept is really a succinct and useful method of establishing your pros and cons.

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Tags: freelance book, freelance business, freelance planning, freelancing guide

Drew Turney on Freelancing

Jan 14, 2009 50 Words

Drew says…

Doing the actual work once you get it is the easy part. Particularly in the early stages of your freelance career (the first few years, not the first month), every project you get is like going for a job interview and getting hired by a company over and over again. You¹ll be hired for who you are, not just what you can do, so sell yourself and be prepared to be ’switched on’ a lot of the time in order to do it.

About Drew
A graphic designer and web developer by trade, Drew capitalised on his knowledge of technology in the creative field to launch a freelance journalism career, also specialising in his other passions of movies and book publishing.

About this Post
This post is one of a series, written by various people within the web industry. They are responses to my request for a maximum of 50 words on the topic of tips for freelance success. You can use the 50 words category to see all the answers so far.

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Tags: 50words, freelance book, freelancer guide, freelancing tips