[lqet]

My 2 cents: I do a bit of freelancing on the side, with a yearly income in the lower 5 digits. I have a (very) basic website and a limited, but free data service, and I have created 2-3 opensource tools that are relatively well-known in the field. My impression is that I get most of my clients either via word-of-mouth, because they need some extension to a tool I wrote, because they want to get rid of the limits of my free data service, or because they found one of my papers by chance and need something similar. If they want a quick call, be prepared to quickly answer who you are, what you have done in the past, what you offer, how much it costs, and how long you have been doing this (large customers in particular don't like to take the risk that your business will disappear in 6 months). Write these answers down or memorize them in advance if you are not the social type. I charge flat rates for certain services, and around 110 EUR / hour for anything else. Be punctual for meetings, professional with you invoices, and answer emails quickly and to the point. Don't gossip about previous clients.

[TIPSIO]

I don't think there's a perfect recipe, but we have done quite well by marketing ourselves not as freelancers.

Aka, you are a small business. Aka, never do hourly and fixed cost projects only.

Too many people get caught up contract and deliverables and hour counting.

It sucks but you are a service worker essentially in a very high referral industry. Every project should be above and beyond with little push back. If it's unreasonable, everyone will know.

Know how to sell different processes to different people. Small ma and pa businesses are PITA but are also customers. Give them a different process than your big budget customers who always tend to be more easy going.

[skizm]

One of my favorite Matt Levine quotes is:

> Yeah I mean a general lesson here is that you want to be in the sort of business that sends one-line invoices, not the sort of business that bills by the sixth of the hour.

[pinkmuffinere]

Sorry for the dumb question, but can you clarify this?

> Aka, you are a small business. Aka, never do hourly and fixed cost projects only.

My reading is “never charge hourly, and never charge fixed cost”. Am I misunderstanding? What is the third alternative? Retainer + hourly? Something else?

[zoogeny]

I'm pretty sure the parent comment meant "never charge hourly, instead do fixed cost projects only" but the grammar is ambiguous.

One strategy I've seen used is a fixed cost for the project (delivered to spec) combined with an hourly retainer for support and changes. Sometimes there is even an explicit carve out for changes during the development so you can avoid scope creep derailing the project (and the relationship with the client).

You don't want to get into nickel and diming the client: "why did it take X hours to set up a DNS? and what is a DNS? Do we even need a DNS?" etc.

[iancmceachern]

Exactly, I often do this as well. Fixed cost for the things that are easy to scope and predict, hourly for the stuff that's not.

[TIPSIO]

exactly!

[laurencerowe]

It really depends on how much you want to do sales vs increasing your rates because you have a reputation for solving difficult problems.

[3abiton]

I am curious about how you go for time estimate when you say a flat rate. I assume if a problem is difficult, this might become tough to guage right?

[lqet]

I write all my tools myself, so I know exactly what I can do without any actual coding, and I know what additional features are easy to implement. I try to avoid projects which require a lot of additional new code. Then I estimate the hours and multiply by two. The risk of additional work is on me, and I was once off by a factor of around 3, but I try to only accept projects where any newly developed code will either be useful for a long-term contract with the client (which then basically consists of me running a cronjob for money), or where I know that the internal tools I have to develop will be useful for future jobs. Examples of such tools are data converters, data analysis tools, etc.

[johnnyanmac]

well that explains a lot. I feel like all my freelancing is making it up as I go along. But I guess I'm more of a generalist than someone you come to when you know wxactly what you want and cost isn't a barrier.

In personal respects, I'm also not sure if I can stomach that kind of pipeline myself where I'm doing more plumbing than problem solving.

[fjjjrjj]

I never thought of crontabs as revenue drivers until I read this.

How do you manage the crons and monitor for uptime?

[gav]

To paraphrase a previous employer's strategy: fixed fee projects are for ones you plan to do over and over where it makes sense to invest at getting good at them.

The first one you lose a bunch of money, the second you might break even if you are lucky, and the tenth onward you make a bunch of money.

[nasmorn]

Sorry but charging 110/hr for work where you are the most recognized expert in the world is hardly a business achievement. That is a third less than a random handyman will charge where I live. If your tools and data are at all business critical to a real company you are vastly undercharging

[hermannj314]

One of the best handyman in my area charges very little. He does a lot of volunteer work in disaster areas (after a flood or hurricane, he will travel and help rebuild communities). He told me he didn't care that much about the money. He wanted to make a modest living and he performed his trade with excellence. He wasn't a pauper, but he also wasn't running a multi-million dollar construction company.

He has a lot of friends and is well loved in his community.

What a chump.

[zoogeny]

This description matched one of my neighbor so closely I wondered if you were talking about him. My neighbor literally chooses to work mostly with elderly folks who are at the point of not being able to manage on their own, completely out of principle. There is enough work that he turns down 3 out of 4 requests and yet he still does these low paying odd jobs for disadvantaged people. He gleefully showed me checks that people wrote him because he thinks it is funny that people still use them instead of online payments. He told me just a couple of days ago that someone gave him a $200 tip after the work he did at their place, because he charges them under what other people quote and shows up on time and gets it done. Same thing with the volunteer work - I helped him dig trenches around an old ladies house after a flood. He does work at her place, stopped by after the flood just to check on her and then called up a bunch of people to help her out, all for free.

He's a very humble guy, almost to a fault. He could easily make a killing if he hired some guys and took on traditional clients but he refuses. It's nice to know there are many people like him out there.

[nasmorn]

As a principle I never give charity to businesses only to actual people.

Maybe as a handyman I could see the good I am doing in people’s lives and that would make me happy. But as a developer I mostly do tasks to make companies more money and thus I feel some of that money is the only relevant compensation.

[pinkmuffinere]

This blanket statement makes me sad, hopefully it’s not what you intended. Businesses are made of people, and many are improving the world by their operation. One of my friends is helping a business that provides insurance to newly-released-prisoners (apparently it’s very hard for them to get insurance). The business makes money, but also improves the world — if you’re in a financial position to help these kinds of businesses, I think it’s great.

[wahnfrieden]

When the business is not owned by the worker, the owner who receives the charity isn't the one doing the operating

[pinkmuffinere]

I’m not trying to help the owner of the business, I’m trying to help the customers the business serves — in this case, people released from prisons. In other cases, potentially could be single parents, medical students, homeless people, somebody who wants to be healthier, etc.

[wahnfrieden]

When the business is owned by the worker, it's the same thing

[lqet]

> most recognized expert in the world

I am certainly not the most recognized expert in the world.

> If your tools and data are at all business critical to a real company you are vastly undercharging

I make around 90% of my revenue from flat rate prices. The hourly rates are an additional service. The majority of my clients pay quarterly flat rates. For the typical client, I only have to set up a generation script once, which takes around 30 minutes. I usually never touch that script again for years.

> [...] hardly a business achievement [...] That is a third less than a random handyman will charge where I live.

Sorry, but I really couldn't care less. I never actively planned to do this side gig. I got into it because people cold-contacted me and asked me for it. I very much enjoy doing it, I like the industry contacts it generates, it's only a few hours work each month, and it pays off my mortgage. It's mostly a paid fun hobby project.

[stewarts]

Some people get caught up in "maximization". Everything must be efficient, and use every moment of your time, and be commensurately compensated so as to profit maximally.

Your approach flies in the face of that, but you don't care! I happen to love that stance and applaud your ability to recognize the enjoyment/comfort in it. You enjoy what you do, but don't seek to attempt to make it more than it currently is.

[fjjjrjj]

I'd take that income for side gigs in a heartbeat. Pluse OP said hourly work is not their go-to anyway. Not sure why this deserves such harsh criticism.

The body shops that spam me for data software contract work quote well below that.

[listenallyall]

Probably 1/5 of a random attorney's hourly rate (even when the advice is generic, something you could research yourself easily, or perhaps even wrong) and 1/3 of an accountant's.

[amazingamazing]

seriously. even for EU that's pretty low. would need to see how much of that lower 5 digits is from the flat rate services, and how much effort and time that takes.

[n4r9]

A 5-figure income from side gigs is pretty substantial anywhere.

[amazingamazing]

not without knowing how much you worked, it's not. in america it's pretty trivial to work 20 hours a week and make 5 figures. heck, if you work at costco you can work for just several months and make 5 figures, part time.