What? You wanna be a freelance Web designer?

What? You wanna be a freelance Web designer?

<this is from my experiences> for beginners!

So you've sat through months and months browsing tutorial sites such as Good-Tutorials.com and Tutorialized.com and now you think that you're ready to step into the world of freelance Web design. Before we go into that, you must realize that doing work for other people is HARD WORK. You're expected to deliver on time and be responsive to your clients. There'll be plenty of times when you have no inspiration at all and just sign off or don't respond whenever your clients IM you. Things can get stressful at times and you'll probably feel like quitting when it gets to that point. Think it through, if you think you're ready, let's continue!

Domain Name
The domain name is usually the name of your company so go to domain registrars like GoDaddy.com, eNom.com, or NameCheap.com and register a domain name.

Web Hosting
You won't need a dedicated server for your portfolio so just a shared account will do just fine for now. Your site will need to be up all the time so be sure to pick a host that is reliable, stable, and responsive to your calls. I recommend going with me for Web hosting

Portfolio
This is the most important thing. If you don't have one, you will most likely never land a job. Start off by gathering up your work, save it as .gifs or .jpgs and upload them to a folder on your Web space. Go to Web design communities such as talkfreelance, neverside, yaxay, sitepoint, etc and get reviews on your work. Remember, critisicm is critiscm. If people don't like your work, don't flip out on them. That'll give you a bad image and that's not what you want! If the majority of the people like your work; thumbs up for you.

Now that the people like your work, it's time to build your actual site instead of having it in a directory on your Web space. Your portfolio Website should (usually) include the following: Your contact details, a short biography, and of course, your work. Remember, this is YOUR portfolio that YOUR potential clients will be viewing. You need to make sure that it's user friendly so don't put the navigation bar where people aren't likely to see it or something stupid like that Make sure your text is easily read and that it doesn't hurt your eyes. Once you've done all that basic stuff and finished up the site, check it on all browsers and if you can, check it on your friend's computer or any other computer. You have to make sure it looks perfect.

Does it look good now? You think so? Alright, let's post it up for review at the Web design communities I mentioned above awhile ago. This is also great promotion for your services so remember to be polite when replying to other people's criticism. After that, fix anything that the users suggested if you think it's for the best.

Contracts, payment agreements, huh?
These are all important paperwork so that you don't get screwed over in the business. A good example of a Web design contract can be found here http://talkfreelance.com/thread2745.html written by Julian.

Getting the clients, eeek!
This is the hard part. Don't expect instant results because it will take some time before you actually get someone interested in your work. Like all things in life, this is gonna be hard.

Forum Promotion
This is where you put your company information in your signature and just basically post a lot in the forums. Remember, if you post insightful things, members that are like "Wow, this guy is really smart" will probably check out the stuff in your signature. Another way is by posting your recent work everytime you get a job done in the Review sections of those forums. Potential clients are always checking that section out for designers that they wanna contact to get a job done.

Word of Mouth
You know the guy that you designed a free site for last month? Yeah, well, he's telling all his friends about what a great job you did. Also, a big rich guy asked him about you and is interested in hiring you for a design job. Sounds cool huh? It did to me too when it first happened. Word of mouth is probably the best way your company gets heard because sometimes,your friends and such likes to stretch the truth (i.e. Yes! He's the greatest designer on the face of the Earth!).

Your Proposal
If no clients are crawling to you, you'll have to crawl to them. This means, you will need to write a proposal. A pretty good guide is written by Anthony here http://talkfreelance.com/thread2729.html.

First Client
You're nervous now because you're speaking with your very first client. Keep it cool though because you wanna sound like you know what you're talking about or else they might as well make the site theirselves instead of oursourcing it to this idiot. Be sure to have a list of important questions ready to ask the client so that you can make the perfect Website.

To be continued.. I'm tired and will finish this later along with proofreading it.