Is freelance web development dying?

[bigbob2112]

I have been a freelance web developer for over 10 years. Specialising in php development (wordpress etc) as well as front end skills, i also specialise in large bespoke applications.

The past 2 years have been awful. Quality enquiries drying up, being under cut to the point of having to accept projects on or near minimum wage. Companies wanting you to work on site which largely tend to be london based.

I have re branded, changed my focus, worked hard in making contacts yet the leads that come in are poor. Small wordpress tweaks that cost low hundreds.

I have lost all my confidence in my ability to turn things around, with a mortgage and kids is hitting me hard.

Jobs in this industry tend to be relatively low paid, ~20-25k. For what we have to do to stay up to date with technologies, platforms and languages. i.e. my average working day is 12-14 hours. Thats a combination of client work and improving on skills.

What is the state of freelance developers outside of london? is it dying?

 

[Faevilangel]

depends on what work you do, I went through a lean spell last year with little work for 6 months but I worked on my contacts and built new ones, added a new service and just generally made people aware who I am, I have always aimed to get the "big jobs", but not monetary value but number of jobs, e.g. I work with a lot of marketing agencies who outsource the development for their client sites so I may get 15-30 jobs a year, not big payers (around the £1k mark) but every so often a nice earner does come along. I then fill that with single jobs from other clients.

Find agencies in your area, introduce yourself and be the go to person, most will give you on job to test you but then introduce you to other clients. All of my work comes from recommendations and word of mouth, you only get that by being visible.

 

[bigbob2112]

I do network a lot, but local agencies are actively employing graduates. They are willing to give them time to get up to speed rather than use someone like me.

 

[Paul Murray]

I think the problem, like much of the creative industry, is that what a developer does is often underplayed and undersold. There are many people who can hack together a HTML site and throw in some JQuery for effect, but you need a developer who really knows what they're doing, especially when you're striving for web standards and security.

Fire me over a PM with your rates, expertise, and a link to your portfolio if you have one as I'm always looking for developers I can call on. There's so many cowboys out there that I'm finding it hard to find someone who can actually deliver without having to be chased constantly.

 

[bigbob2112]

Sent you a PM.

 

[AllUpHere]

I've mentioned this before on the forum, but I still maintain that of all the business types I help with marketing, self employed web designers and developers are one of the easiest (whilst at the same time being the service that is most frequently marketed poorly). I specialise in marketing service based businesses so tend to work with an awful lot of self employed service providers such as the above. One common theme among a good 90 % of those I speak to is that they really have very little understanding of marketing.

My advice would be to research in detail how to formulate a strategic marketing plan. If you do that you already have an advantage over 90% of your competition.

 

[Faevilangel]

I do network a lot, but local agencies are actively employing graduates. They are willing to give them time to get up to speed rather than use someone like me.

what sort of networking? Are you meeting the right people? I go to a lot of the big networking events (the business show London etc) as the big marketers are always there looking for new clients. I then will talk to people at stands and in the coffee / networking areas to introduce myself. Getting out there is good but it has to be for a purpose, meet the people you want to meet and don't let them forget you, keep bumping into them as it will let them know subbtlly that you are there. One of my clients I met 4 years ago and only became a client a year ago due to their needs changing, but I kept meeting them and was there at the time they needed me.

 

[bigbob2112]

My advice would be to research in detail how to formulate a strategic marketing plan. If you do that you already have an advantage over 90% of your competition.

I have read a huge amount on marketing and did see where i was going wrong. I totally agree, my passion for web development cant plug the gap that my lack of marketing creates.

Realistically though, what size projects and outcome do you promise your clients? I see many "do x,y and z" and you will own your own island in a year. OR, what is a realistic goal when self marketing.

 

[bigbob2112]

what sort of networking? Are you meeting the right people? I go to a lot of the big networking events (the business show London etc) as the big marketers are always there looking for new clients.

That maybe where my networking is failing. I tend to network at local events where meeting decision makers are few and far between, yet if i am in need of a financial advisor... form a queue!
I never thought of networking at shows, they have always in my mind been about bigger businesses, and less about the one man bands.

 

[GOSW]

My best mate is (was) involved in web design and development (wordpress mainly) he has now only recently got out the game and gone to work for a big sport retailer, he is now managing the entire site (so they are not hiring outside developers, its all in house) also as a crafter/ interior designer i learnt how to use wordpress to develop my own site. I get what i want, went i want it (and i have a good mate to help when and if) but mainly i learnt it myself over the years!

I have met so many small business, and i say small business because i would imagine that the smaller guy were earning you more money? was my friend anyway, and they are all learning themselves... WHY? because sad to say it but a lot of web developers charge through the roof prices!! I was quoted £10,000 yes TEN thousand pounds for a website that cost me a theme of less than 60quid, my spare time of an evening to play with, an old photoshop (i have a new one now) and some hosting, and of course hours of youtube. Bottom line i spent what 100 quid out of my pocket and less hours spent watching emmerdale or corination street but more time to good use.

Now im not saying you are one of the robbers, but so many people have been bitten.

I now know some medium (im saying medium as 500,000 pa turnover) paying young students after doing a web course to build a functional website and spend all day every day on social media and link building, and front end tarting up for less than 8pound and hour. I know this because i have a part time job doing just that, and i know may more.

Sadly, the likes of youtube, pinterest, facebook sharing etc etc is showing people how to do stuff and become braver to try. The more the small person succeeds and become bigger, the more the bigger companies do it.

I went to a rather large conference last year for artisans in business and they had courses for people to learn web building for the DIY.

My advice.... start evening classes for the business your loosing, they may be doing a DIY but would pay to learn how to manage their website themselves. As an owner you get more control, less communication and exactly what you want when you want.

Well thats my pennies worth But i could be wrong

 

[bigbob2112]

Agencies charging many thousands is a problem that exists in many industries, and as a result, we are all tarred with the same brush. I agree that it is easier than it has ever been to create a small brochure site, it's when the business outgrows wordpress and it's plugins that they come looking for people like me, BUT they expect my rates to be the same as the person who originally set the site up. There is a difference between setting up a wordpress site with a theme and actually developing a site using the wordpress api.

 

[GOSW]

Oh i totally understand that and agree, but a lot of people (especially with time like they are) are tending to wear a websites threadbare before spending a penny. I know some folk that slowly progress the ladder from wordpress to either opencart or magenta, then maybe ekm shopping cart. I dont know, maybe what i think are small businesses you think are tiny ? so our prospectives are different, and of course im not really in the market. But i have, like you and many others, seen a big change. Good luck tho

 

[fisicx]

my average working day is 12-14 hours.

So change what you do. Stop doing the clever development stuff and start working smarter. I do pretty much what you do and average about 4 hours day grafting and the rest messing about on UKBF.

 

[Paul Murray]

I was quoted £10,000 yes TEN thousand pounds for a website that cost me a theme of less than 60quid, my spare time of an evening to play with, an old photoshop (i have a new one now) and some hosting, and of course hours of youtube.

This proves my point perfectly about how developers and designers are seen as 'robbers' because we dare to charge a business rate for a professional bespoke service. Bare in mind agencies have overheads and and salaries to pay, on top of making a profit.

Buying a Wordpress theme and installing it yourself is NOT the same as hiring a designer and developer or agency to produce a site for you from the ground up. Themes serve a purpose and suit a particular market, which is fine. In this instance you obviously didn't need a site that cost £10k and were therefore able to make do with a pre-designed template and the DIY approach, but there are many companies out there that require expertise and experience, and THAT is what you're paying thousands of pounds for.

 

[silentjay]

I keep an eye on what the local web agencies are doing, some of which are very successful yet looking at some of their porfolios are churning out complete turds of websites.

They all seem to have the same thing in common: they are all sales machines and have far more account managers/sales reps than developers. Alot of the development work is also being offshored. Most clients won't be able to tell the difference between a good site built by a skilled professional and something hacked together with Wordpress or Drupal. Also they seem to suck up all the lucrative work: NHS, councils, quangos etc.

No doubt there's room at the top end of the market for independent talented freelancers, but there's no way in hell I'd try and compete with these "digital agencies" for the bottom and middle of the market.

 

[Kixo]

i'll echo silentjay i know businesses charging silly money for turds of sites and its all about the sales machine. One part of me says that with hatred the other with jealousy.... trying to walk a line of good product/service combined with a sales machines prob equals a VERY successful business!

 

[Christine Hough]

I have spent days searching for freelance developers (asp classic) and end up having to use an agency because all search results come up with are big outfits wanting to write a whole site, not maintain an existing one.

When searching it often brings up only job vacancies!

I have had a look at pph but it is scary to try to work out if someone can do the job or not.

The agency I used recently (having used them before) have been truly dreadful this time and I am sure the 'programmer' was at best a student who knew very little and had no commercial acumen.

 

[bigbob2112]

I am not surprised you were struggling to find classic asp developers, it's a language that hasn't been used for quite some time, and developers/agencies go where the demand is.

As for PHP and when you say scarier, how do you mean?

 

[Kixo]

i'm not a dev but i wrote a php page that looped..... it killed a 1and1 server, it was shared hosting so my bad php caused load of random peoples sites to go down... oops! i got a call from 1and1 saying they had killed the process due to it causing them a problem! this was 10 years ago so prob not possible now but since then we hired a coder

 

[Paul Murray]

As for PHP and when you say scarier, how do you mean?

I believe she was referring to People Per Hour (PPH), a freelance job site. It's a bit of a minefield as you never really know if the people on their can do what they claim they can. It's also a haven for undercutting and low quality amateur work, though there are plenty of actual professionals using the site, they just don't always stand out.

 

[bigbob2112]

Infinite loops are possible in any language, and strictly speaking testing on a server is never wise, local first!

Ah yes, PPH, odesk, etc... i would describe such sites as a holding pen for everything that is wrong in the industry. And the good guys on there, like you say, charge the "correct" rate yet don't get a look in.

 

[Christine Hough]

As Cosmos/ Paul said.

I know classic asp is old, but there are still a lot of sites out there with it. And that is another problem. I have thought about migrating the site to ASP.net bit by bit as the database supports either, but then I need a programmer with both skill sets!