Forum Moderators: mack
Like a lot of newbies on these forums I have done a few personal pages and some pages for friends and family. Over the past few months I have been studying further so I can turn this into a full career.
What I really like about the whole process is sitting down with someone going through ideas producing designs and finally producing a finished product at the end that the client is happy with.
I see a few posts where people say to get work you need to speacilise in one field ie: databases, design etc. Am I just dreaming in todays industry to still be able to do the whole thing by myself as a freelance / contract worker or are those jobs generally reserved for the seasoned veteran?
I realise that answers will probably vary because of the international audience but I would be very interested in hearing everyone's point of view.
Sorry no more room in this business, go away ... ;-)
If you plan on working for someone else: specialise.
If you plan on working for yourself: be a generalist, be constantly learning/cross training.
There are lots of superb posts here at WebmasterWorld: take a weekend or ten and dive in. Then come back and do searches as necessary for questions that pop up.
If you plan on doing this as a business rule number one (and always neglected) is to learn business. Write a business plan, set up as a business, think like a business (lots of posts here on this too).
On the techie side you can never know enough about enough. The more capable you are the wider choice of contracts you can tackle.
On the marketing side you have to learn the best way for you to sell the value of the web, you, and your services.
You will suffer: you will work longer and harder than ever before, you will be highly under-appreciated, you will wonder why you think this is fun and you will find that it is. And of course you will hang out at places like this with fellow travellers because we understand.
Welcome and good luck.
I started out just like you about a year ago now.
What I have found is that making strategic alliances within your community will help you to grow your business enormously. For example, I am a "generalist" so I have partnered with graphic designers, programmers, and templated webdesign companies. We all cross refer and subcontract to one another. This means that I can take on more projects, and projects which may be beyond my personal expertise and still deliver a quality product.
I agree completely with Iamlost. Get a business and a marketing plan together and keep up to date with technical issues etc. here on WW. This is one of the best resources on the web, so dive into the libraries and learn as much as you can as it will help you in the long run.
Good Luck!
Sari
