Dive into the archives.
- 3 Steps to Freelancing Success
Be professional. Freelancers often assume that they have to be exceptional at what they do in order to get noticed. Whilst being an awesome web designer might make it easier to break into the freelancing world, regardless of your abilty, if you exude professionalism and take pride in your work, people will take notice of you.
It’s not what you can do, but how you do it.
Be confident. As a new freelancer you will have many questions left unanswered. The most prominent unanswered question, and the most important in my opinion, is the simple matter of how much to charge for your work. You can charge a little - or you can charge a lot. In short - charge whatever you want! Whilst charging little might get you a lot of work, it’s likely that you’re worth quite a bit more.
If you are confident in how you lay out the costs of your services to your clients, it’s likely that they’ll pay whatever you ask. Within reason, of course.
Have aspirations. If you’re going to get somewhere in the freelance industry, you’re going to need to have a plan. Whether it’s just some basic goals or a detailed plan of attack, you’re going to get somewhere faster if you have an idea of where you want to be. In my case, I’ve been keeping an eye on Ashley Morgan, a professional blogger and jazz trumpet player. I admit he’s no lord of freelance web design, but the effort he puts into Upstart Blogger and his other projects make me aspire to be better at what I do. Then of course there’s Kwaku, one of my earlier web design heroes.
Remember: Always aspire to be better than you are - even if you’ve already reached and passed your original goal.
Ashleigh
x x x
- Emails Take The Backseat to Phone Calls - (Take notes, Sony!)
There is no doubt that the internet has well and truly integrated itself into our lives. We check our email daily, we send messages via social networking websites to keep in touch with friends and we discuss various aspects of the things that interest us with people we don’t even know using online forums. What was once a common errand that would have you out for an afternoon zipping around in your car has now become something you can do in five minutes using an internet connection and a computer; banking and shopping online. Many of us even sell old trinkets and things we have no use for anymore by setting up online auctions.
The internet is no longer just a virtual playground for the computer literate. The internet has become a reality.
With the majority of companies, businesses and the general population having their own online presence of some sort, be it a website or Facebook profile, why is it that some of us still treat the internet like the going ons don’t count? It’s well known that a person is more likely to send a nasty email to someone they’re having a tiff with than say the contents of the email to the persons face. What is it that they think to hide behind? The veil of cyberspace? You should not say in an email what you cannot say to someone in real life. After all, with a real person writing the email.. and a real person on the receiving end, how is it that people can forget that all of it is real? When the internet was new and the world was trying to find their footing - maybe then that could excuse their actions - but in the here and now there is no justification.
The main reason I am writing this post today is because I conducted a little experiment. As mentioned in a previous post you might be aware that I imported two Japanese PSPs. Well, Japanese PSPs don’t come with a Network Access Code which is something that allows you to play games online using European servers. In my case, to be able to download additional Lemmings levels, I needed to somehow obtain a Network Access Code. I sent an email outlining my situation to three seperate Sony Support email addresses. These addresses had been publicly posted on a number of Sony websites as being who to contact if you needed any sort of support. All I had to do was wait for a response and being the impatient person that I am, I ended up calling Sony Support to get the code I needed before I received a reply to any of the emails sent. This was a week ago.
READ MORE..
- The Web Designer is Back in the Building
After a brief hiatus, getting stuck in Final Fantasy: Crisis Core and a two week stint involving going “on tour” with my boyfriend and his band You And What Army, I am back to work and back to posting blogs that I hope you all find interesting in some way, shape or form.
After making the decision to take on more work than a casual freelance web designer, I’ve bumped up my work load to something more like being a part time freelance web designer. At the moment I have 5 different projects on the go and a couple more in the early stages of being possibilities. Here are some screens of some of these works in progress.
To other freelance web designers out there who are interested in increasing their work load, or even those just starting out and looking for work in the first place, here are three websites that I have found particularly useful. You may need to put a little effort into actively seeking work using these websites, but if you do, you should get a decent amount of traffic heading towards your portfolio and you’ll soon find that your work load will increase.
Freelance Alliance
Student Gems
oDesk
Ashleigh
x x x
