jodegal, post: 10639 a écrit : I am a recent university graudate in Multimedia Technology. For the past 6 months I have been doing work experience. I have built a website for a company, and done work experience in a web design company where I built a website for a client. My experiecne in web design include phtoshop, dreamweaver, xhtml, css, javascript, php & mysql (building a cms/forms/logins) and using joomla.
I am interested in becoming a freelance web designer but need some advice on it all. If anyone could help it would be much appreciated.
With my skills would it be a good idea to do freelance? Should I do more work experience? Is freelance web designing better than working in a company, what are the pros and cons? How much should I charge, should I charge less because I am a new web designer? Where could I find clients (I have looked on sites like reed.co.uk and freelancers.net)? What sort of resources will I need (I have my own pc with the required software)? Would I need to use contracts? Would I need to set this up as a business (I already have an online portfolio) or could it be like temp jobs? How would I be taxed?
Thanks.
I just read your post, i would be happy to offer any useful advice, firstly, freelancing is not that lucrative anymore but there are still prospects in the future
Secondly, it would be beneficial to get a paid job and then mix it with freelancing, that's the best way to survive in the game.
Thirdly, your skills are solid enough to lead you through as a top designer but doing more freelancing jobs would develop those skills more and can make it compete in the industry. You would find that there are lots of people out there making big money as freelancers by just merely learning these skills online with no qaulifications, thats the good thing about the IT industry, you are judged by what you can do most of the time.
Fourthly, the best way to get clients according to my own experience is by word of mouth, let people know you are a web designer when ever you get the opportunity, get yourself a business card and leave it with freinds and families, offer them a percentage of the fee if the job is completed and paid for, also do not forget to browse the forums and freelancing sites regularly as you might be lucky to pick a project from time to time.
Fifthly, do not shy away from a $5 job as a starter because the same client would either refer you or give you a better project next time.
Finally try to register as a sole trader and then declare your taxes online at the end of every tax year , you can only pay taxes on your profits and not your capital, so no profit means no taxes but the good thing about it all is the fact that you can have a legal ground to operate your business and you can feel free to bid for any project as a recognised business.
I recently registered a web address with '123-reg' which was quite easy. It did not cost anything and I received an invoice stating the name of the new web address and confirmation of no charge.
My question is: do I now own this web address? and can I use it for the new website? I know this may seem like a silly question but it seemed a bit too easy.
Is there anything else I have to do?
hope somebody can shed light on this
Thanks:eyes
Normally you should recieve an access detail to the domain account which will enable you to configure your DNS and yes the the domain belongs to you once you are given access to manage it.
Stavros Patsalidis, post: 8835 a écrit : I will take your opininion under consideration and my research till came to the conclusion : i believe that it is not Flash’s fault. On the contrary, it’s the clients and users (and designers to some extent) that are not yet ready to accept Flash a modern alternative to classic web design methods/process.
Not really, from my experience with my clients, most of them prefer to have well coded css/xhtml sites and then with little flash integration. Most people visit websites to go straight to business and not to waste time on beautiful animations. Though we cannot divorce the beauty of flash from giving a site a good appeal, the fact remains that most websites would do well when the information it presents is straight to point and also presents easy navigation around the site.
I agree with SURREYWEB that flash is becoming less appealing to the design world and i would like to add that i think it might go a little down the same path like frames in the future.
MickeyFinn, post: 8776 a écrit : Cool. If those are your aims and you can already do the design stuff then learn CSS and XHTML. When you can build sites then would recommend PHP for advanced interaction and MySQL. Both are now very robust cost effective. If you get sites that require silly things like member areas or file upload etc then use the freelancers directory to find someone who would take that kind of work on. Get them to spec and quote for any work like this so you can then markup and add to your costs. Don't turn work away just because you don't know how to do part of it :D
Congratulations on the chosen subject. It's a great one to get into!
I have no qualifications in web design or that specialised field. I only have a college BTEC in ICT.
Has that stopped me?
Not at all! I'm self-taught in web design and development and have gained vast amounts of knowledge because of it.
I've been to University and dropped out twice (tut, tut in employers eyes!). I'm only 20 and I'm currently working for one of the leading design and marketing agencies in North Yorkshire. My life's just starting. This is my second official position within an agency.
Here's how to do it..
Find alot of tutorial websites to get you started within the subject and practice, practice, practice! Submit your work for review either on this forum or around the Internet. Some comments will be harsh and some will give you solid advice on how to improve. Some reviewers will give you advice and some will just simply say your work is either good or bad. The good and bad comments you need to ignore and concentrate on the advice given.
You can either get a qualification in this subject or go self-taught with none at all.
Employers
Employees are greedy and getting the right job is a stretch. Your portfolio is what they will be looking at. In the end, qualifications are nothing if you can prove you're creative through your portfolio. However, if you're trying to get a job with the top agencies, qualifications will be mandatory in some cases, however, in most cases experience in the sector with other agencies waives your qualifications. For smaller companies, your portfolio is all they'll be looking at.
Regarding the course description; you'll be an employers dream. However, unless you're creative and produce stunning (well.. attractive), valid websites the qualification and skills gained remain useless.
Good Advice there SPS, You will need a good portfolio and experience to excel in the industry rather than qualifications . You have more chance to excel in the sector if you are doing it for the love of it rather than the money. "For the love of it" would help build your determination.
Good luck in your studies i'm also training for my CIW (CERTIFIED INTERNET WEBMASTER) Certificate.
self taught designer, post: 8453 a écrit : Hi everyone,
I've got a meeting tomorrow night with a potential client in an attempt to secure a job with them. I just wondered if anyone has any tips, do's and don'ts etc.
My plan is to go with a presentation detailing my experience and portfolio and a questinnarie on what the client is looking for, thus gathering as much info as possible for me to then give a quote. I haven't done this before so any advice would be great!
Simply go there with your presentations, act proffessional and give the right quote to the client but be considerate about your price and also leave an open room for negotiations
I'm new to the forum and looking for a word of advice. I do some freelance web and graphic design and I was recently asked to come up with the layout idea for a website for a recruitment company that has currently their website refurbished by a marketing company.
I was asked, because:
1) The management weren't sure about the layout proposed to them by the (marketing) company's in-house designers and wanted to see some more approaches.
2) Somebody I know very well works for this company and suggested me to the manager...;)
At the same time another graphic designer was called to do the same job(sample drafts)
I created 4 different drafts which the management liked and decided to go with some of the ideas but merging it with ideas from he other designer and that to be done by the in-house designers from the marketing company.
Basically- supplying the rough idea was where my job ended.
I have just received an email from the management asking me to invoice them for my work.
I do not know how much of my initial ideas they've used in the final design yet. I would not mind not charging them at all for possible good future relations sake, that but I want to avoid falling(again) into situation where people start taking me for granted(I did spend good few hours doing it and to a rather tight deadline) cause it's a pain in the neck as you probably know yourselves.
Please, help me on this one with some good advice - should I, or shouldn't I charge anything and if yes, how much, roughly?
I really appreciate time spent reading this and your kind replies even more:)
Many thanks
Filip
Congratulations Filip on the project. From my experience both online and in life generally, people do not seem to value things that are free. i will suggest you charge them what you have been charging others and if you are sure you can do a good job which you have obviously proved to them then it's better you charge them just enough for everybody to be happy.
Think of it this way, they can lay you off anytime and then your effort and time would be wasted and because you wanted to do it free at first, then you wouldnt get any compensation. Make everything official with them and then get on with the job.
I have never seen any business man that became rich through being nice in business. Business is Business and no sentiments. After all they are going to make money with your work.
Liam Serrant, post: 5413 a écrit : Hi. I am looking for a web host that offers the best reseller packages. At the moment i have been looking at Fasthosts and HeartInternet. As anybody used these and have any comments.
Having looked at them both, to me HeartInternet looks the best, for price etc.
The sites i will be hosting are mixture of static, database and E commerce sites.
For a small personal e commerce site, is best to start with the secure shared hosting, rather than pay the full dedicated secure server.
I am doing regular contract web programming for a friend, and I would like to branch out and do more of the same for other small agencies. This would entail finding the agencies/one-man-bands who focus more on design and offering them programming with PHP, MySQL, JavaScript, AJAX etc etc. I also convert graphic designs into W3C-compliant XHTML strict.
I would like to find out more about the legal side of this, especially contracts, but despite trawling the internet and many many "template contract" sites, all I can find is contracts geared to full-on web development, ie design & hosting etc etc, which I don't want!
Does anyone know of any pure programming contracts, or even just advice on constructing my own?
Sure there are always a lot of programming contracts everywhere, infact there are more demand for programmers than web designing. Since you are good in php/mysql i would like to have your contact so may be we could be working together soon. What part of UK do you live?
