LebGeeks

rolf

Member

Sustainable freelance software development model...

Hello,

I've been "freelancing" for 2-3 years now. Initially, I was wildly understimating the amount of time needed for project, and on top of that slashing my prices (to be "competitive"), and ended up working for peanuts. Sure it made some persons very happy, and did work to some extent in getting the word around.

I can still remember when the designer I worked with wanted to make my share $400 for the develpment of a small website with a back-end. I thought that was a lot, and was kinda timid to accept the money... I was sometimes even working for less then that.

Over time, I naturally slowly raised my estimates, as I realized that it often demanded more work than what it looked like, and my time estimates were just visions that never materialized.

In parallel, quality grew and the libraries and code used became more mature.

But as I pushed the prices up, I had encouters with another situation: One customer who paid well for a project that took actually less time than expected. At the same time, on the other end, there was a customer who was making sure he got twice or three time every one of his dollar's worth. He was always inserting new modifications, finding minor imperfections, sending emails and IMs anytime (even in the middle of the night), expecting me to be always available to him, and setting deadlines while at the same time making it difficult to meet them by constantly inserting new tasks. This situation was lowering my morale, and it was unfair for the customers, that the annoying one would get all the attention and the "nice" one would be paying much more...

So now I am trying to move any new work towards billing by the hour, the customer gets reports with minute precision if he wants, as well as samples of previous work with the time it took to complete so that he can get an idea of how much time it takes.

At the same time, I've also started billing time spent read emails, as some customers send cryptic emails that are barely intellegibile. Previously, I was not even billing that, and only billing time spent on development.

I am being strict about billing by the hour - if someone really wants to agree on a lump sump before hand, he will be quoted an amount that contains a huge margin of security, and it will be in his best interest to be billed by the hour. I am also much less forthcoming about giving dates and time estimates, as this is also something that is 50% under control of the customer.

What I think I have achieved is a much more sustainable model, and I was wondering about the experiences of other freelancers here on that topic.

m0ei

Member

Re: Sustainable freelance software development model...

At the same time, on the other end, there was a customer who was making sure he got twice or three time every one of his dollar's worth. He was always inserting new modifications, finding minor imperfections, sending emails and IMs anytime (even in the middle of the night), expecting me to be always available to him, and setting deadlines while at the same time making it difficult to meet them by constantly inserting new tasks.

It's like you're dealing with the same customer I'm currently working for.

Anyway, I learned something last time that I should always set the rules before we start. Let him know what he's expecting from the start in details and make sure that once the rules are set he doesn't have the rights to add anything unless he pays extra and so so...

About the work per hour, I doubt it'll work as you're expecting.

samer

Admin

Re: Sustainable freelance software development model...

Over time, I naturally slowly raised my estimates, as I realized that it often demanded more work than what it looked like, and my time estimates were just visions that never materialized.

Hofstadter's Law: It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take into account Hofstadter's Law.

• • •

I think you should be framing things differently. If the software you are building is saving or making $5,000 a month for a company, there is no reason why you shouldn't charge that amount times a multiplier. The key here is to present yourself as someone providing them with a business solution that will cut down on their costs via software, or generate new leads (resulting in more profit for them).

You have to talk with them in terms that they understand, they don't care if you spent 15 hours optimizing a database, they want to understand how your software impacts their business, how you pull it off technically will become secondary. This will also reduce their tendency to micro-manage you, as they will be more focused on the business goals you set in your proposal.

Naturally, this approach won't work for all kinds of software, but it is a good heuristic to keep in mind.