I was wondering how could I go about making 10k in 7 months solely through web designing, how would I accomplish this goal? Thanks, pr0xy.
This will solely depend on your abilities. Have you got an existing portfolio? Have you a website showing your portfolio? Have you a broad range of skills capable of designing to many different requirements? If you answered yes to all 3 of these questions then you are ready to look to get direct work. I could advise you to check locally and see if any companies could use some website design... if you know some local companies that have a tired old web design approach them about a 'web makeover' (in otherwords a new web design to revamp their online image as money invested into good design will gain further business if professionally done etc) - it will depend on how much of their trade is online dependent. On top of that I would suggest you register with freelance websites and bid for smaller projects. As a sideline you can also put up a gallery of 'exlusive' or 'semi-exlusive' templates as well as some 'free templates' that contain a link back to your homepage, free template page or other related page to boost your website position and gain more visitors. If you dont have a website - then why not build one up and follow some of these steps and hopefully you will get attracting some web visitors that could help generate cash via PPC programmes - but your main focus would be on gaining new clients to do more web design work. Good luck. ps. check webmaster forums for design requests as some of the jobs offered can lead to long term deals and repeat work for quick bits of design.
Freelance websites isn't the best idea, since projects there pays low . Indians and others are competing. It might be possible to earn 2k$ monthly though web design, why don't you search for a job at monster.com, jobpilot.com or whatever? Or you can create some website, pay some link package and hope you will be able to earn something. We and you cannot know how much you would earn, depends of niche, quality of your website, quality of SEO done (acquired links to your site) and luck . But, that's what entrepreneurship is . Anyway, seems to be more difficult these days than before...
I'm doing web design, too. Over the past three months I managed to earn a kitten (don't laugh, I made a website for a cattery and they paid me in nature). You can reach your goal, but the challenge is to find clients. I would say that you could do the following: - first build your own site - make some nice sites (even for free, just for portfolio) - register yourself with LinkedIn and complete your profile - watch the job boards on some well-known blogs, maybe you can find something suitable for you (problogger.net and Guy Kawasaky have such job boards on their blogs) - do a bit of research: look for sites which look bad and which are not updated since one-two years ago, then contact those companies with an offer. This is how I got three clients. - another idea: develop a bunch of templates on a theme: let's say you aim to dentists - you develop themes for dentist cabinets, then you promote your business amongst dentists (you can send them a direct mailing letter, you can show up at their congress or conferences and spread the word around, or you may simply pay somebody to leave a promo material in those cabinets).
Get onto the freelance websites and offer your services. Places like RentACoder, Guru, ScriptLance, eLance and so on. There's plenty of work for decent, well priced web designers on there. Also, it's worth offering services specifically to individual niches. For example, there are tons of graphic designers aimed at us Internet Marketers. They charge anywhere from $97 to $297 for a standard sales letter layout including graphics.
Working for a corporation or a small firm that need web designers is one way to easily make the amount you are seeking, but as a freelancer, your best will be to start working on some larger projects, but as someone else said earlier, you will need a good portfolio demonstrating your capabilities. I know some of the more succesful web designers on RAC, Project4Hire, etc making that amount or at least close to that amount a month.
Create a great portfolio and stick to your prices. I run a site for freelancers artist, web designers and more... it just started about 4 days ago but I have used others for years..... Those of us who are more experienced are not looking for the cheapest. We look for the best results at a fair price. That being said it is often easy to find someone in another country who does great work at a fair price... The problem becomes communication. It is just plain hard to say ... a darker red... wait to the next day... no a bit lighter... wait... change the font to this.... People will always chose local talent (same time zone or willing to be online when you are). At when time is the limiting factor. Me.. I'm cheap enough I've just managed to be online and work with my guys in India in the middle of the night when they are working... but most people like to sleep... Good luck..
It depends who you know. I have always had a lot more success locally than through the internet. Clients are annoying though.
I guess that for most of the freelancer, the main problem is to find buyers. My own experience is that selling is a brick and mortar job, and basically I never sold web-related things (websites or seo) on the internet. Everything was done by networking and phone, and also with a lot of lunch with potential buyers. And by the way, I charged $3250 for a full time week of developement, auditing etc... So 10k is not that hard, and after taxes, social insurance it's also almost nothing The only thing you need is to speak about your work to everybody, and also to work as a subworker for somebody that have too many clients !
If you got great portfolio, you got clients just about anywhere you advertise. Trust me on that one. And you don't have to work for a company or corporation to make 10k in 7 months, all you need is a portfolio of 5-10 very nicely designed websites.
My best advice is to target niches. You can have yourself up and running in a week strongly, imho. Choose 2-4 niches that you intend to begin targeting your marketing to locally and develop a basic template type page layout for each one in ONE day. The next day refine your previous 2-4 template layouts. The layouts can either be simple bitmap mock-ups or simple one pagers. Next, develop a marketing list. Out of your 2-4 niches collect AS MANY contacts as possible. Yellow pages, online directories, newspaper, anywhere.. just collect contacts. Spend your WHOLE 3rd day just trying to collect as many people as you can. Call friends, call family, call past business friends and try and find possible Word-of-mouth referrals in the niches you are targeting. On the 4th day of your project, get on the phone. ALL DAY. It sucks, but stay on the line. Don't get off. Talk to as many people as you possibly can. Refer them to your page, ask for their advice, ask if they would be interested in something like that, ask if they know of someone who might be interested, ask if you can send them more information by Fax or Email, ask if they might be interested in something like what you are doing in the future.. just build a list. Do some research, and develop some strong leads. By the 5th day you should have AT LEAST ONE potential client. Develop the template based on their niche deeper. Make a little functionality.. just a little. Write up a proposal for your prospect, get access to a catch-all Contract and modify it a bit. Within a few days you should be ready to call your Prospect back and set up a meeting in person to discuss their needs. When you meet with the client, be prepared. Have your proposal and contract ready. Don't go overboard, just be ready to get their name on paper before you leave the table. Go over the proposal, get approval that you understand their needs, and MOVE RIGHT TO THE CONTRACT. Get your first client with this process and you are well on your way to a successful business. Once you get a few more customers you can begin marketing on the sites like other people are talking about, because you will have a more solid portfolio (hopefully) that is built from the ground up logically. Target a few niches and you will do fine. Hope I have been decently helpful..
If I were you, I will go on my own and work this next 7 months on building website that generate money with Adsense and Affiliate programms... You could make $100-$200 a day with some good marketing. Good luck!
Not sure where you are located, but check these out. You can usually get $25-35/hr if you have the skills. And you just might meet some great people in the process. http://creativecircle.com/ http://aquent.com/ Unless you have a reliable catalog of contacts/clients, above or similar might be the ticket for you. Or you could just get a regular j-o-b
I think you should try an "old-fashioned" approach along with posting on websites. Freelance bidding and marketing your design skills on the internet is an efficient market with saavy buyers and skilled competitors. IMO, you can do much better building small websites for individuals and businesses (assuming you live somewhere like the US or UK where people and businesses have some cash to throw around). You can charge them $10 or $20 per month for host, and you have a nice revenue stream. People appreciate a local touch and someone who can sit down with them. A mentor of mine who founded the largest invesment management firm in Chile, and quite an established fellow, once told me: "You have to get out in front of people. If you sit behind your computer screen all day, crunching numbers and sending emails your wallet will never get fat --- only your ass will." This flies in the face of most of the discussions on this forum - not to mention the thousands of people with fat wallets who work behind their PC - but I believe it to be true at least to a certain extent. Give both ways a shot, and let us know how it goes. good luck!
If you are a US-based Web developer/designer you could make very good money marketing yourself to UK companies. The strong pound/weak dollar makes buying from America very attractive at this moment, and I don't think there is the stigma attacted to employing a US company that exists when companies consider outsourcing work to India etc.