Author Topic: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!  (Read 3949 times)

ahartzog

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MMM is of course my inspiration to start building a freelance network and earn supplemental income...so I finally finished up my website, started looking for clients, and am very excited to start pulling in more revenue!

http://HireAlek.com/

If anyone needs a personal website built or has any recommendations I'd LOVE to hear them.

Also, is the name of the site too vain? I personally like the possibilities of an anagram/palindrome logo since my initials are AH and I the "company" could be HA.

Togoshiman

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #1 on: January 28, 2013, 08:31:37 AM »
Nice site, good work.  The blog format should keep hits coming too.

matt_g

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #2 on: January 28, 2013, 08:35:06 AM »
Alek,  I've been doing computer consulting for over 10 years.  There is TONS of business out there for this type of work.

1. Your could start your rates at $80/hr.  I don't know where you live, but I think you'll find your competition is charging $100-$250/hr.
2.  Once you figure out what people want/need, you might consider trimming down your services and focusing on a few things that you are really good at and you can make a profit.
3.  I like the name, it's short and to the point.

kkbmustang

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #3 on: January 28, 2013, 03:46:30 PM »
I agree. I think you are undervaluing yourself.

Ottawa

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #4 on: January 28, 2013, 05:05:08 PM »
totally cool!  check out the sp. under "Services Offered" should be "Purchasing Consultation"

burly

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #5 on: January 28, 2013, 05:52:11 PM »
I charge $60-75 an hr, or sometimes I'll get a flat fee for a website.. Usually about 1k. Most websites do not take me more than 10 hours so it encourages me to be more efficient! I usually do about 3-5k a year and do not look for work, it comes to me.

Rangifer

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #6 on: January 30, 2013, 12:46:22 AM »
You've got several blocks of text that are unappealing.

Also, your font choice is backwards. You typically use serif fonts in the body and sans-serif on the headings. Alternatively, increase the kerning in your headings.

ahartzog

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #7 on: January 30, 2013, 06:07:20 PM »
Thanks for the feedback and spellcheck everybody haha. As far as undervaluing- my current plan is to build up a customer base to the point where I have as much business as I want, then look at increasing prices and keeping references coming.

ahartzog

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #8 on: January 30, 2013, 06:10:44 PM »
You've got several blocks of text that are unappealing.

Also, your font choice is backwards. You typically use serif fonts in the body and sans-serif on the headings. Alternatively, increase the kerning in your headings.

To be honest, I didn't choose the fonts, the theme did. I will investigate what kerning is and how I could increase it ;)

Thanks!
-Alek

BlueMR2

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #9 on: February 02, 2013, 10:52:26 AM »
Make sure you value your time appropriately.

I'm in a relatively low cost of living area and $125/hr is not unreasonable here.  By the time all the licenses are pulled, insurance paid, accounting arrangements made (either outsourced or software licensed), and all the local, state, and fed taxes are paid, spend time/money marketing, etc, you're making about what you would doing the same work for somebody else as a single person operation.  Differences are you have more freedom, but at the cost of higher stress.  :-)

Even at that planned rate, I cancelled my plans to start a part-time/side work business in 2013 after studying the laws.  At the few spare hours I have available to dedicate to it, it would be a money losing proposition by the time all the government overhead was handled.  May not be so bad elsewhere, but Ohio is relatively hostile towards low-hours/part-time businesses (friendly to big corporations though).  So, if you can scale up into a multi-person operation things get a lot better, but I'm not in a good position to do that right now.

matt_g

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Re: Finally built my side-gig computer consultant and web services website!
« Reply #10 on: February 03, 2013, 11:46:52 AM »
I don't understand when people say it's expensive to run a small business, I find quite the opposite.

1. Insurance ($1k/yr), This is pre-tax money.
2. You can do your accounting in a google spreadsheet or on a piece of paper when you are small, after that you can get Quickbooks. a 1 time fee of $199.
3.Taxes - 

A) Where I live, New York State, I work out of my house (tax deduction),  Can write off mileage (55cents/mile)
B) The first $17k you make can go directly into an individual 401k pre-tax, after that it's like 25% of your income, pre-tax into retirement up to $50k
C) You have to pay sales tax, but that's just passed along to your customers, 8%, you even get 3% of that back for collecting it.
D)  For the rest of the money you make, I'll admit the tax rate is higher since you have to pay both sides of SS, so that's like 10-12% higher, with all these tax breaks, I don't sweat it too much.

4. Advertising - all my advertising is word of mouth ($0),  the rest of it can be done cheaply using your creativity