Weekly discussion by freelancers and professionals about running a business, finding clients, marketing, and lifestyle related to being a freelancer.
Episode 166: The Freelancers' Show: LIVE Q&A #7 - April 28, 2015
07:06 - Finding Work on Sites Like Elance and Upwork (formerly oDesk)
- Danny Margulies The Non-Scuzzy and Totally True Story of How I Earned 6 Figures in 12 Months by Mastering the “Hidden Elance Economy”
- Danny Margulies: How to Make Money On Elance – My $100,000 Year
- Fiverr
14:24 - What sort of project/scope documentation do you generate for clients to supply time/budget estimates?
23:26 - How much time do you spend with the client defining the scope of the work before you sign a contract?
27:20 - Do you have a timeline to review deliverables (weekly) or is it ad-hoc based on when the work is finished?
33:12 - You have mentioned, at least in the early podcasts, that you do about 20-30 hours of billable work per week, and you also have multiple simultaneous clients/contracts. I'm currently working a W2, 40+ hour week with a large product backlog that has me busy all week, so I'm struggling to visualize what a week in the life of a freelancer looks like.
If you only work 20-30 hours per week, and have at a minimum of 2 clients, does that mean you only dedicate 10 or so hours per client?
42:50 - What sort of non-development tasks do you bill for that fill up some of the extra time?
46:12 - How much development time per week do your clients expect you to dedicate to the project?
49:58 - Have you ever had a client specify a maximum number of hours per week in your contract?
50:27 - Is the feedback loop so slow that you always have time to work on another contract while you're waiting?
53:54 - Do your clients ever feel like you're not putting in enough time per week? How do you respond that?
Picks
Danny Margulies The Non-Scuzzy and Totally True Story of How I Earned 6 Figures in 12 Months by Mastering the “Hidden Elance Economy” (Eric)
MicroConf (Chuck)
Mini Habits: Smaller Habits, Bigger Results by Stephen Guise (Chuck)
Habit Stacking: 97 Small Life Changes That Take Five Minutes or Less by S.J. Scott (Chuck)
How to Win Friends & Influence People by Dale Carnegie (Chuck)
Slate's Whistlestop Podcast (Reuven)