Forum Moderators: LifeinAsia
I'm a student at University in Computer Science. I have been interested in web design for a while but have only recently switched to commercial work.
Naturally, as a student, I'm tight on cash... I have completed my first commercial site for my boss(in the summer)but it is based on commission of the product sales. The product has potential but I have received few returns as of yet. I agreed on commision so I could add it to my budding portfolio.
Where did you look to find your first paying clients? Suggestions are greatly appreciated!
John Fraser
JAG Design
College town web design huh?
Being in a college town, I bet you have lots of cool college hangouts around. And I bet they don't ALL have websites already. My buddy mentioned to a Deli owner that he builds websites last week. The owner pretty quickly wanted him to work out some picing. I know it won't always go that easily, but hey, the more people you talk to the better.
Also, how about a "Whats going on this weekend" site where you get frats to pay for features, details, and directions to their keg party? If you can advertise the site with some cheap flyers posted around town. Just say "Find out where the party is at MYUniversityParties.com." If you can get some decent traffic to the site and a buzz going on around campus, I am sure you could get some promo money out of them.
..::lightbulb::.. In fact, I should do that one for my school. <running off to photoshop>
So, early on, a happy $200 customer networked me into a $5,000 client, and that ball kept rolling. Now I am very picky about what work I will do. My main focus today is maintaining a human quality of life for myself, not generating more business.
I also knew I needed to have a marketing message that helped me stand out from the crowd (even back in 1995 when I began, there was a crowd). So I leveraged my history in retail marketing -- I focused on defining and accomplishing the business purpose of the site, rather than just putting up pretty pages. My pages were never THAT pretty anyway, LOL!
More exactly, I helped clients to define precise metrics for the success of their site - and then set out to put those metrics over the top. This at a time when just HAVING a site was all that a lot of businesses had on their mind. ROI is a language that brings big smiles to the table and generates natural word of mouth advertising.
So my early clients were making money and happy with my work. At a time when self-proclaimed web designers were sprouting up like crabgrass, my focus was more like market consulting for the online business.
One other decision I made also helped a lot. Instead of going it alone, I joined forces with a few other designers, marketers, database developers, etc. We formed a virtual company -- a cooperative business where each member prospects, networks and feeds work to the others. We support each other in client meetings, and so on. Even though we each took on independent projects in addition to our cooperative work, nevertheless as a group we rapidly had a respectable body of happy clients for our portfolio.
Because this group touched on many disciplines, we could offer a number of value-added services that no one person could possibly master -- things like product photography, illustration, market and branding research, direct mail, print and broadcast advertising support, database development, back office systems development, and so on.
When I made the leap into web marketing, I was at a tough spot in my career and my chosen path was at a dead-end. I saw that I needed to re-invent the professional "me", and I set out to do exactly that. Your situation is similar to what mine was, except you are inventing the professional "you" for the first time.
Have a blast!
I realise thats not an option open to you directly, but it shows that being directly employed is a great way to start networking. I don't know about others, but a fair percentage of our work comes from extra work on those original 80 sites, and referrals from them.
A lot of our "new business" comes from networking activity too, membership of Chambers of Commerce, tapping contacts for anyone they know who might want work doing, etc. You need to get out there and make contacts. Build on your strengths, get flyers up around college, and build a rep there, find out which local companies deal with the college extensively, and get in contact with them.
I would also echo what tedster said about the "virtual company" concept. We too work closely with a number of external designers, a small hosting company, a network installation company etc, and we pass work between ourselves, so if a client of one needs services provided by another, they are pointed in the "right" direction.
The trick is to find (or start!) a group of people/companies you can trust to do a good job, and who trust you in return, and those relationships can take time and a few successful projects to develop. If you join one, or find some local web design companies willing to "sponsor" you by sending you work, start off cheap, and reliable. Once they come to trust you and the quality of your work, start raising your prices
