Projection and Timeline

We’ve talked about project scope in the previous post but we didn’t mention the timeline to make sure this thing gets done smoothly and on time. I personally don’t create a timeline until the client has accepted the project because of these reasons:

1. It may take them a month to accept it, then you have to rework all the dates
2. It takes up too much time to invest before you know you have the project
3. If they choose to not go with you, it’s all wasted time

So I tend to veer away from doing a formal timeline until I know I have the project. Then I’ll provide them with something that will show them how long each phase will take, specify dates, specify their involvement, and tell them what is expected of them throughout the process. Something similar to the below.

• Week 1 – Analysis, Wireframes, Sitemaps – I will need your assistance thoroughly this week to insure we are nailing down the correct links and structure for your site. It’s important that I get feedback from you within 24 hours.
• Week 2-3 – Design – This will be where the actual design takes place. I’ll be using what we completed in the first week to help us through this process. I need feedback within 48 hours, sooner if possible.
• Week 4-5 – Development – This process will be a break for you where backend development will be completed before we move into the content implementation phase. Little communication will be needed during this time.
• Week 6-7 – Content Implementation – This will be a very hands-on phase. I will be providing training during this phase and much of the work will fall on you to be putting content in and learning the system we’ve built it on. I do this because it’s much easier for you to learn the site and system while we are still in development instead of working on a live site and making changes.
• Week 8 – Testing and Launch – This final week will be for testing, tweaks, final content input, and project launch. I’ll be working closely with you this week as well.

Something like the above provides the client with a very specific outline and information for each section without taking up too much of your time. I usually also put in there that the timeline is not set in stone and will vary depending on client communication and/or if the project scope changes at all. I then also ask them to note any days or weeks they will not be available so we can allow for that.

NOTE: The timelines never look the same. It depends on the project scope as to what can be accomplished in 6 weeks or 3 months. The complexity of the project and availability of resources can and will change this.

Analysis

by karola riegler photography

As for the analysis, I mostly just take what the client wants to push about their company and help them to make that idea a reality. Every client has an image or a message they want to promote on the site so you can almost center the site around communicating that message. Make sure that you’re focused on what the end user will get, how they will navigate it, and remind the client that their users are the ones that need to find the information. Since I work with mostly small companies, it’s very common for me to end up working directly with the owner. The owner could very well have some great ideas, and you must listen to them if nothing else, but remind them that they need to target their audience above themselves. They know their product, their potential customer may not. I like to use the illustration of how I am with computers to help them understand what I mean. I do something like the following:

“I understand what you’re going for here, but lets remember that the users may not understand your product like you do. For instance, I understand how to navigate websites like the back of my hand. I know what should be on one, and mostly what should not. I also quickly recognize if a site is going to be worth my time or not. And, since I’m on a computer so much, I often forget that others may not understand how something works when it’s second nature for me. The same is true with your business. Remember that your customers may be as foreign to your products as you are to mine.”

Most of the time, it’s a variation of that and I say it very light-hearted so they know I’m not coming down on them. It’s important to get your message across without making them feel stupid…that’s no way to run a project. Well, that’s all for this section.

Sketching/Wireframes/Sitemap

by ajleon

There’s a lot of thoughts on whether sketching is necessary, if wireframes are worth the time it takes to make one, and if sitemaps are truly needed. I’m still fine-tuning this section of my work but I’ll give you what works for me at this point.

Sketch

Do it. Sketch everything out. I often take a sketch pad and marker to meetings…helps to make them realize I can work without a computer. I’m not just a robot they can tell exactly what to do in Photoshop or whatever. It simply helps to establish that I know what I’m doing and I’m serious about it. For the most part, the sketch is my wireframe…and no, you don’t have to know how to draw to be able to sketch. Sketching also removes the constraints of  “perfection” that many of us designers fall prey to when using a computer. There is no need for details, just keep it simple and map out how things should basically look and flow.

Wireframes

Like I said, my sketch is a wireframe. I don’t use some fancy program to do this, I simply lay out where I feel the links need to be and where the content is going, 1, 2, or 3 column, all those sort of things. I typically sketch out a few pages of thumbnail layouts (4 to a page or so) and then I’ll go from there to make one “final” wireframe. Just send it to them as a PDF or jpg for review. Be sure to go over it with them so they know what they’re looking at. Just sending them a sketch with no explanation will make them question what the heck they hired you for. Seriously though, don’t waste much time on this unless it’s a huge project and then you’ll probably need to get some outside help to understand what level of effort is required to complete the project.

Sitemap

Now the sitemap really goes hand in hand with the two above and, in all honesty, these 3 flow perfectly together for me. I will often end up doing a content flow in place of the sitemap to help them understand how I think the site needs to be setup. Remember to double check with them that you understand everything they offer and aren’t putting it in some random spot on the site where it doesn’t make sense. Working with them closely on this is important.

Design

by KillerBeeCreative

Well, we’re finally here. I bet you didn’t know there was so much to it before you actually get to be the designer. Well, you probably did actually. So, in the grand scheme of things, the designer in us actually plays a pretty small part if you’re talking about making things pretty. Being a designer encompasses much more than that though. We have the duty of making sure things work how they need to be for the end user. It’s our job to be user experience designers as well as visual designers. I won’t get into the whole user experience design definition but I do feel it’s thrown around a lot today. The gist of it is to make sure things work great and make sense.

So, back to the visual design. While it’s important to make it functional, it should make sense, and of course be beautiful. You also have to take into account that the client likely wants their personal spin on it. This is where you often have to stand up for yourself as a designer and explain to them that they hired you to do this because of your expertise. You are the expert in this field and you need to inform them of that. Unfortunately, some clients need to hear it more often than others. But make sure you’re not a jerk about it. Sometimes it is best to relate it back to their business. Just spin it to where it reminds them in a light-hearted way.

During this phase I usually end up doing the homepage design first, then some iterations of that. I’ve yet to go past 2-3 different designs but often have 4-5 revisions on the one they choose. Some people put this in their project scope to define it, and that’s not a bad idea at all. The second page I do is a style-guide for the site. I lay out how every type of content will look. It will be everything from basic paragraphs to images floated left and right to block quotes. Basically, if it’s something they will be using in the content, it needs to be designed out for approval. Then I finish up by applying those styles to some different inner pages to show them what they will look like with real content. And if there’s any special pages like for pricing packages or something along those lines, we’ll nail down the look of that.

Finally, I remind them that once we leave this phase, it makes changing the design of things much more difficult so we need to make sure they are happy with it. Once they’ve approved, we move onto the development phase.

Development

by schoschie

Development doesn’t really require much for me to write here. It’s basically a hands-off time for the client while I work through getting it built out. Sometimes, I will do the front-end development myself; others I’ll outsource it to local freelancers. If I’m going to need some back-end development done, I will have already setup the time frame with my developer and get the files they need to them during this time. Now, I mentioned in the timeline at the top that there are two weeks for development. This will vary, actually. If it’s just a WordPress theme or something simple, I can do it in a week. If it’s more complex, I’ll need a couple weeks up to a of couple months. So the timeline it self will vary depending on project and it complexity.

Content Implementation

About 95% of my projects are built on a CMS platform. It’s usually WordPress but I also have sites on Magento and CS-Cart. Since there is a way for clients to add, and manage, their own content, I have them put in their own content for the most part. I take this time to do some training, usually over the phone or Skype unless they are local, and I follow behind them to do some clean up and make things look prettier. This also usually involves me adding some more styles or changing a few things in the CSS that may or may not be to my liking after we actually get the real content in. This also varies greatly depending on how much time the client wants to dedicate to the project. They are often the deciding factor on how long a project will actually take.

Testing and Launch

by jurvetson

Now for the final phase of the project. The notorious and not so glorious testing phase. If you’re new to development, accept the fact that IE will display your information wrong, somewhere. I’ve yet to develop a site without an IE issue. They can be resolved, but they’re almost always the culprit. Also remember to test multiple versions of the browser and cross-platform as well.

Once you’ve gotten approval that everything is a “GO” from the client, it’s time to get that project launched! There are tons of ways to launch a site depending if it’s WordPress or Magento or some other platform. My advice here is to research how to take a site from development to production for whatever platform you are using.

Best of Luck!

I hope this series has encouraged you and helped you through this process. It’s been a real growing experience for me to write it all down and be able to share it with all of you. Keep up with me following this article as my next several articles are going to be much more related to design. Take care!

Go to Source

Just when you thought decision making couldn’t get any harder (you didn’t sleep for 2 nights, trying to decide between Helvetica and Times font), real life appeared and forced you to make a resolution about your career.

In kindergarden there wasn’t really any competition. You were the one to paint the prettiest house with the white picket fence. But you can’t ride that success forever. So, for all of you ambitious designers out there who find yourselves pondering the future, we hand you this easy to use, yet enlightening Graphic Designer’s Journey: Freelance to Freedom infographic, to guide you in your time of need.

Feel free to share it with your fellow professionals to help them see the light at the end of the tunnel, start working and move out of their parent’s house.

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The offer is valid for all job listing types (full-time, freelance, or contract), and of course the 100% money-back guarantee still applies.

Read full post

Posted in Job openings.

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Use promo code 50CM to apply the discount.

We typically do only one 50% off promotion each year, so this is a pretty big deal for us. Discount applies to any of the job listing types—full-time, freelance, or our new contract job type. Valid today through Friday, May 7.

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Previously on Fubiz

• Samsung 3D Campaign
• AntiVJ Projects
• Samurai 3D

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Previously on Fubiz

• Nobody Beats The Drum
• Alyssa Monks
• Eric Zener

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The team here at You the Designer is looking for a freelance tutorial writer to help bolster the variety of content offered to our readers. If you have experience writing design tutorials, please email us right now.

How to Apply for Freelance Tutorial Writer Position

Email the following information to writers@youthedesigner.com

• Cover Letter
• Resume / Portfolio
• Per Post Rate

Go to Source

There’s a few pros and cons to becoming a blogger with the pros outweighing the cons. A design blog can be essential for every freelance designer because it can help a freelancer to generate a passive income on a monthly or weekly basis.

Broaden your name across to a wider audience

A design blog is perfect for freelancers to build up their name or their company brand on another platform. The advantage of a freelancer creating a blog means they can gain more exposure through blogging which means they can attract a wider range of clients to work alongside including even international clients.

A good blog can be something to add to your portfolio

When clients approach designers to work on a project 90 percent of clients will ask to see the designers previous work or past design projects, which they have worked on in order to find out if the designer will be suitable to work alongside and if they have the talent and skill to complete the design project to their satisfaction.

If your an upcoming freelance designer your portfolio may be very empty because you still have not yet had the opportunity to work alongside any clients. Creating a blog would be the perfect piece of work to showcase to clients and would be a great addition to your portfolio because it will show off you skills and talent to potential clients.

Generates traffics

A blog can be a great source for sending traffic to your portfolio website allowing you the opportunity for hundreds or maybe thousands of visitors to take a look through your content within your portfolio. Large amounts of traffic from any type of website can quickly and easily be turned into revenue weather it’s through selling advertisement spots or Google adsence.

The screen shot above is monthly page views which Creative Nerds receives notice each month the growth is getting higher and higher.

Can generate extra income

A freelance designer always looked to make a passive income and a blog is a fantastic way to do so. There are several freelancers within the design community who have decided to extend their portfolio by creating a blog section, which has lead to huge amounts of success and generated extra additional income through simply creating and regularly updating their blog section with new content.

Here a collection of freelancers who have design blog sections and how much money they are estimated to turnover a month from just their blog section alone.

· Blog.spoon graphics ($3150) http://www.blog.spoongraphics.co.uk/

· Vanderaley design ($3350) http://vandelaydesign.com/blog/

Cheap to setup

I’ve got my own hosting account via mediatemple.com so all I need worry about is buying the domain name for the website which is cheap as chips which from a website like heartinternet.co.uk it will cost about £7($11 dollars) with duration of the domain name lasting for a two year. Working out as 58p month just to simply buy a name for your blog which is fantastic and worth taking of advantage of.

Final Thoughts

I personally believe setting up a blog is great whether it’s a design blog or a personal blog because it can be a great way to interact within people in the design community, it can be finically rewarding also but don’t just blog because you think this will be a great opportunity for you to make some big bucks do it because it’s something your passionate about and enjoy doing.

Do you think it’s essential for every freelance designer to setup a blog ?

We would love to hear your thoughts about the article in a short comment below that would be great.

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D’autres images de son travail dans la galerie / Portfolio Akastudio

Previously on Fubiz

• Typography Videoclip
• Playful.
• Torture Basement

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This is a great article which features an interview with 12 web/design blogs which were started up in 2009 and are essential design blogs to look out for in 2010.

Each design blog was each asked five questions in total in order to gain an understanding in what motivated them to setup their blog, to find out what they have learnt about blogging, what’s the perks of blogging about web/design, and tips where you can take your blog within the next 12 months.

A perfect post for upcoming design bloggers because it gives you an insight into the challenges and experiences, which you may face and gain while blogging. The interview features only design blogs which where started in the last 12 months featuring Design blogs such as PVM garage, Line 25, Grace Smith, Inspired Mag, Media Militia, AI Monkey, Little Box Of Idea’s, Circle box, Design Informer, The Web design Blog, freelance review and Cheth Studios.

I hope you enjoy the article and thank you very much to everyone who participated in the interviews. leave a comment, which is your favourite interview ?

PVM Garage

Blog: http://www.pvmgarage.com/

Twitter:http://twitter.com/piervix

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

:Hi, this is Piervincenzo and I’m blogging about Web Design on PV.M Garage. I love to write tutorials and articles to tell my experiences and my growth as web designer and blogger. It’s hard work to maintain a site, but… I’m loving it.

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:Why? Hard to say because there are several reasons. But I think that the most important reason is the passion… without this essential element it’s impossible thinking to set up a blog.If a project starts from the need to share our passion, it will become a great project. I’ve probably launched my blog for this motive.

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

:Make a backup every day! Seriously, there are many great helpful people who can help us. Internet has a great power, it allow a quick and easy share of the knowledge. I trust in this power. And thanks to many other great blogger we can create a network of information to learn every day new things on a specific field.So, what have I learnt? Sharing free information and resources is a possibility of growth for all and a community, that works in this way, is a little goldmine for designers who want to learn.

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:Seriously, there are many great helpful people who can help us. Internet has a great power, it allow a quick and easy share of the knowledge. I trust in this power. And thanks to many other great blogger we can create a network of information to learn every day new things on a specific field. So, what have I’ve learnt? Sharing free information and resources is a possibility of growth for all and a community, that works in this way, is a little goldmine for people who want to learn.

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:Maybe a redesign and I’m trying to create a little team of author and guest posters for PV.M Garage. So, stay tuned.

Line 25

Blog: http://line25.com/

Twitter:http://twitter.com/line25blog

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

:I’m Chris Spooner, a designer and blogger from the UK. I’m the guy behind the relatively new Line25.com. Line25 is a weblog focusing on the topic of Web Design, and each week sees a new post covering web design inspiration, articles rounding up tools and resources, as well as the occasional tutorial. So far there’s posts about HTML, WordPress, CSS, a little jQuery and plenty of sites of the week showcases!

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:I had plenty of fun developing my first blog over at Blog.SpoonGraphics for over two years. In March 2009 I’d reached a point where I was wanting to cover more website design topics, but I didn’t want to suddenly switch focus from the Illustrator and Photoshop tutorials I usually wrote. The best solution I came up with was to start afresh with a new blog, this gave me the opportunity to develop a place to post all my website design articles, as well as provide the challenge of growing a blog from square one all over again! Although this time, I was armed with plenty of experience, and an already established audience from my main blog.

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

:Some of the experiences I brought through from main blog included knowledge of the posts types that tend to work, and how the post title can seem to have a serious effect on whether the post performs well on various social websites. I also based a lot of the structure and layout on my Blog.SpoonGraphics site design, as this seems to work pretty well! Little touches like a prominent RSS icon, large post titles and article header graphics all seems to play their part in capturing the viewers attention. Overall however, I’ve learnt pretty much everything I now know about blogging from developing my two blogs. I originally started out without any real clue, and slowly built up experience with a mix of research, picking up tips from various other websites, and learning from my own experiments.

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:The proudest moment on Line25 was to see how far it had grown in just six months of existence! The blog has grown to a higher point in six months than Blog.SpoonGraphics did in a year, so the future seems bright! It’s also fab to see traffic spikes every now again when a particular post takes off and gain additional exposure. The recent post about HTML5 became the blog’s highest traffic spike so far.

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:I’m looking forward to continuing Line25 with plenty more web design content. I’m also thinking about opening up the site to take on more guest writers, to give others a platform to get their name and content out there into the design community.

Grace Smith

Blog: http://www.gracesmith.co.uk/

Twitter:http://twitter.com/gracesmith

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

:Sure, I am a 26 year old web designer and owner of a small but perfectly formed studio called Postscript5 based in Northern Ireland. I work with individuals and companies based in mainly in the UK and USA on a diverse range of projects from branding and blog design to application UI’s. My blog focuses on web design, development and UX with a healthy dose of Apple and humor.

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:After a number of years watching how other designers created a brand around their blog and a funnel for their services, I decided in March of this year that I couldn’t hold myself back any longer and finally setup my blog.

I was held back because of my own fears and insecurities that no one would visit or comment, of ‘trolls’ and that it would be yet another ‘invisible’ blog. I realised that it was time to just let go of the fear and get out there, so here I am.

The blog is a way for me to talk about the things that I am truly interested in, namely, design, productivity, UX and freelancing. It also acts as a means of keeping in touch with other creatives and bloggers and as a way to improve my writing and teaching skills!

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

:That writing is only a small part of being a blogger! It didn’t take long for me to realise that one of the most important things a blogger can do is to become really involved in the community that surrounds them. I now spend a good deal of time networking, forging relationships and connecting with other bloggers as well as on creating content.

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:Tough question! There have been some wonderful moments since I started the blog back in March, from the very first comment, when one of my articles went popular on Delicious and Stumbleupon for the first time to featuring some of my web heroes such as Khoi Vinh and Veerle Duoh on the blog.

Although if I had to choose just one it would be when Jonathan Snook emailed me after commenting on one of my articles to say he was a regular visitor and knew me as “that ‘heavy-linkin’, web-lovin’, hard-workin” gal from Ireland.
It was a surreal moment to hear from someone I admired and respected being so fun, complimentary and down to earth. I think it made me smile for a week!

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:I’m beginning to concentrate on guest posting with other blogs to build my brand awareness and more importantly to reach out to different audiences. Due to this I am considering slowing down my post schedule to fewer but more in-depth articles. I also aim to start creating more design tutorials and focus on articles that take from my own experience within design, development, freelancing and business.

Up until now I’ve concentrated on resources, lists and features (and will continue to do so on a smaller scale) and now that I’ve build up my initial audience I want to focus a little more on my own experiences, as well as engaging with others in the community.

Inspired Mag

Blog: http://www.inspiredm.com/

Twitter:http://twitter.com/inspiredmag

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

:Because I felt like there is so much awesome content out there that I must create some on a ‘different’ kind of design blog. I like to say that one day Inspired mag will be a combination of weirdness and smashing magazine

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:Everything You know nothing until you start doing it! Come on people, grab a WP theme, get a domain name and start writing!!

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

: When I received three advertising offers in the same day

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:We’d like to extend our focus on other creative sides that relate to design but are often overlooked by the webdesign blogs. Stay tuned for some Huge surprises! and Thank you for considering Inspired Mag for your interview!

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:We’d like to extend our focus on other creative sides that relate to design but are often overlooked by the webdesign blogs. Stay tuned for some Huge surprises! and Thank you for considering Inspired Mag for your interview!

Media Militia

Blog: http://mediamilitia.com/

Twitter:http://twitter.com/mediamilitia

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

:My name is jeyaONE and I am from Reno, NV. I am a 29 year old designer that runs Media Militia. We love to create and promote free resources for the design community like vector packs, textures, Photoshop brushes, and PSD’s.  We also post creative tutorials, design articles, and interviews.

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:Media Militia was originally a site that sold premium design resources. We enjoyed the creation process and the income it generated; however, it lacked a community and our willingness to give. On our old site we had a freebies section that received a good amount of traffic.  Because of the high traffic, we always caught ourselves pushing the freebies more than the things we were actually selling.

In August of 2009, we decided that it only made since for us to relaunch Media Militia as a free design resource site and drive revenue by selling ad space. We took a huge hit in revenue because of the change but it was well worth it.  Giving back to the community by providing free resources is a lot more fun and exciting.

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

: We learned that it takes a lot more time and dedication than we originally planned on. We spend at least 40 hours a week designing, promoting and coming up with new and creative ideas.  When it is something you enjoy and love though time flies by.

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:It’s really hard to say what our proudest moment was. Every single day there is something that puts a huge smile on my face.  It makes me think how awesome it is that we have such a great website that people can rely on and use.  I love seeing our design elements being used in advertisements. The first time I saw our Paint Tossing images in an ad was overwhelming exciting! We just got our freebies published in 7 design magazines which is really neat to see as well.

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:Our top priority in the next 12 months will surely be redesigning our site. We rushed the relaunch as we were so excited to make the change and get our feet wet. We will be posting more design articles and pushing more innovative and useful freebies. We will be working with more artists to give away free exclusive design packs. I am really excited to see what happens!

Circle box (Callum Chapman)

Blog: http://circleboxblog.com

Twitter:http://twitter.com/callumchapman/

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

:I’m Callum Chapman, I live in a small town near Cambridge, UK, and I’m a freelance graphic designer trading under the name Circlebox Creative – but I’m more known as a blogger! Circlebox Blog is the other half of my company, and it’s where I post design articles, tutorials, free resources (such as textures and vector packs) and run the odd giveaway now and again. On top of writing for my own blog and completing the occasional freelance design project, I write for some popular design-related blogs such as Smashing Magazine, Six Revisions, Design Bump Originals, Tutorial9 and the Tuts+ Network; they all keep me very busy!

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:I originally started with a personal blog back in mid-2009, purely as an experiment to see what I thought of the whole blogosphere. I really started to get into it, and when leaving college after finishing my A-Levels, and the frequent updates on the news how 16-20 year olds are really struggling to find work, I decided to take it more seriously and open my company, Circlebox Creative – I opened my blog at the same time. Since then, it has brought me many opportunities such as writing for some of the popular blogs mentioned above, as well as an invitation to be featured in the popular French design magazine, “Advanced Creative” – you can see me in that in the special Illustrator edition being released on the 31st of December (please note it will be in French – so I can’t even read it myself!).

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

: Before starting my blog I pretty much didn’t know anything about it! It was my first time using the WordPress interface and my first time writing specifically for the public. I like to think I now have a good knowledge of blogging, after only 6-7 months. I also didn’t know that you could earn such a great living from blogging, or how many emails I would receive from readers telling me to keep up the great work – I’ve even had a few donations, so I guess I learnt there are still some great people scattered around the world!

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:I have a few, getting over 1,000 unique hits to my first ever web design tutorial within the first hour of it being poster, receiving an email asking if one of my tutorials can be translated to French and featured in a magazine and being contact by some of the greatest design bloggers out their asking if I would like to write for them!

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:Lots! Whilst writing this (22nd November ‘09) Circlebox Blog is going through a complete redesign. Although I love the current theme, it needs it’s own design! The new design is going to make it easier to find the content you’re looking for, a cleaner, more minimalistic design, and, in general, pretty sexy! A long with the new theme, you’ll be able to expect better quality posts much more frequently, by me and some great guest authors. Oh, and my portfolio/company site will have a redesign to match! Thanks Creative Nerds for giving me the opportunity to talk about myself! Keep up the great work!

Design Informer

Blog: http://designinformer.com/

Twitter:http://twitter.com/designinformer/

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

:My name is Jad Limcaco and I live in sunny Southern California. I have a full-time job as a web designer, I freelance part-time, and I run a blog called Design Informer.

Design Informer is a web design and graphic design blog. We feature freelance articles, tutorials, freebies, resources, and inspiration posts. While there are a lot of design blogs and communities out there, the purpose of this blog is still the same: to inform you about the latest in greatest in web design and graphic design, hence the name, Design Informer.

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:Well, there were several reasons. First of all, I wanted a way to share my knowledge with the community, so I decided that a blog was a perfect way to do that. Also, because I wanted to improve my writing skills. Blogging has definitely helped me to do that.

I wrote an article entitled, “Why I blog about design.” This explains the reasons behind Design Informer.

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

: I have learned many different things since I started blogging. In order for me to write about a certain topic, I need to be well-informed about that certain topic, so I do a ton of research before writing an article. This has helped me to gain as much knowledge as I can about that certain topic. I also learned that the design community is very close-knit. I have had plenty of other bloggers and designers help me in promoting my blog. They have also given me much needful advice in regards to any questions that I had about blogging.

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:Hmm… My proudest moment? That’s a good question. I would say that the proudest moment of my blog was when a few of my articles were tweeted by Smashing Magazine, Abduzeedo, and Web Designer Depot. They have also been featured in some round-ups in the community. This was a great moment because I never thought that as a new design blog, that any of our work would be mentioned by these top design blogs.

I would say that the second proudest moment of the blog is when I got featured in this article. Thank you!

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:There are some really exciting things that’s in store for the Design Informer. More great and informative articles, lots of excellent tutorials, a ton of free giveaways, and a new redesign is in store for the Design Informer. Thanks again Timothy for featuring me. Keep up the great work with Creative Nerds.

Ai Monkey

Blog: http://www.aimonkey.com/

Twitter: http://twitter.com/aimonkey

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

:At this moment our team is composed from just two members: Ciorba Ilie and  Siminitchi Alexandru. We are good friends, both from Republic of Moldova, Chisinau and both self-taught freelance designers. Our blog is mostly about vector graphics, Adobe Illustrator tutorials and freebies but we’re planing to add web-design related tutorials soon.

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:Our main purpose is to give possibility to masses to improve their knowledge about vector graphics and design. I came up with idea to start this blog at the very beginning of October 2009, on 20th October it was already up and running.

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

:Blogging was a new sphere for both of us. The hardest thing about blogging was getting in contact with our readers, everyone needs to feel you real presence and they get that from your comments and letters. We both learned to pay attention to details understanding that the information we’re writing will be read by thousands of readers later. Another new principle of blogging that was new for us was “The more you give, the more you receive” what means that your blog success depends not just of the quality of your posts, but also their quantity. Every blog is like a hungry animal that needs to be fed and more food you give him, the bigger it gets! And that’s great! We a had a nice and valuable experience with this blog and we really appreciate it.

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:We are really proud of feedback that we receive from our readers, we receive feedback letters almost every day since we’ve started the blog and we haven’t received any negative feedback letter. People do like our tutorials, that is what makes us proud  and keeps our ship floating in the ocean of design.

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:Our ambitions are great! We are planning to become one of the greatest resources of high-quality Illustrator tutorials on the Internet, make our voice heard, raise our quality standards with every new post. Lots of new, exclusive tutorials, articles, interviews with designers and much more other stuff to come to aimonkey.comThanks again for your invitation!

Little Box Of Idears

Blog: http://www.littleboxofideas.com/blog/

Twitter: http://twitter.com/LBOI

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

: My name is Sneh Roy. I am a designer and content developer from Sydney, Australia and own a small design studio which I manage along with Nick, my husband and business partner. The LBOI Blog’s main focus is design and development related content for other designers, freelancers, students and design connoisseurs. The articles tend to lean heavily towards logo designing, vector illustrations, typography and the principles and basics of design. One very important and well received section of the blog is elaborate interviews with designers and developers from around the world, where they share their techniques and processes freely and generously. We also watch and track budding designers and feature them in our Artist Spotlights to give them that extra push into this big bold world of design freelancing.

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:I recently started working full time again after a sabbatical of almost 5 years and a lot had changed in that time. I was learning new things at an exponential rate, everyday and there was a lot of thought process going on. The blog started out to channel all that information and creativity surging through me at the time, a means of sharing what excited me creatively, with other designers. Later, it also became evident that the blog was also a log of my design experiments and a way to connect with other like minded creatives.

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

:It is not easy. When I started out, I knew it was a crowded space where all designers/bloggers have to fight hard to produce quality content to stay ahead. But I didn’t realize that it was a bit harder than I thought. With the explosion and oversaturation of every imaginable thing in this world, if you were one of the early ones, you caught the worm, or else you went hungry. Just producing quality content [which is hard in itself] is not enough, it doesn’t spike your traffic or bring in the bucks. It is a slow process [albeit a very sweet, satisfying one] and you should be prepared for endless days of no increase in your subscriber counts, no comments on your blog and virtually no income for all the hard work you put in.

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:One thing that sticks out is a few weeks ago Collis Ta’eed of the Envato Network fame tweeted my blog to his followers saying “Came across a nice little blog!”. That was pretty sweet .

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:Thank you Tim In the next 12 months we plan on bringing in the development aspect of our team onto the blog [right now it is mainly design], we plan to have articles and tutorials on css, jquery, AJAX, php. We also plan to have awesome guest posts and more exciting freebies and tutorials to make everyday design learning a breeze.

The Webdesign Blog

Blog: www.thewebdesignblog.co.uk

Twitter: www.twitter.com/philmatthews

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

: My name is Phil Matthews (www.twitter.com/philmatthews) and I’m a freelance web designer from the UK. I recently setup The Web Design Blog (www.thewebdesignblog.co.uk) in August 2009 as a way of sharing news, articles, tutorials and interviews about web design and development. It’s been an exciting few months!

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:I kept having lots of little ideas for articles that I wanted to write but I had nowhere to publish them. I’d had the domain name “thewebdesignblog.co.uk” for quite a while but never had the time to do anything meaningful with it. I started the initial designs for the blog in the summer and it has snowballed from there! I’ve been lucky enough to interview some great designers and developers for the website which has been very insightful as they’ve shared some fantastic tips and stories.

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

:I’ve found that once you start a blog you need to keep going and try and build on the momentum and keep your readers and subscribers interested. I didn’t realise how much time it would take to write, revise and publish an article to a standard I was happy with but I now set aside more time each week to develop my writing skills so I can provide content that I hope people will want to read. I feel I’ve learnt a lot in the last few months but I’m well aware that there is still a huge amount to learn!

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:Although the blog is only about four months old there have still been several moments that have made me proud. Seeing the comments of people thanking you for writing an article or designing a free download makes it really worthwhile. Another moment that was a lovely surprise was being featured on the home page of http://cssremix.com/ which helped bring lots of new visitors to the site.

Freelance Review

Blog: http://www.freelancereview.net/

Twitter: http://twitter.com/mcconnelldesign

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

: Freelance Review is a design blog ran by Chris and Candice McConnell of C McConnell Design. What makes us different from other freelance blogs out there is that we cover what matters most to freelance designers as opposed to freelancers in general. We have all the basic things you’d expect from a design blog like amazing inspirational galleries, mind-blowing interviews with designers and entrepreneurs, fun contests and giveaways, tutorials, advice and tips. We also have a health-conscious and eco-friendly focus.

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:We originally established Freelance Review as a channel to showcase our work and to educate clients. As the blog progressed we decided to expand and Freelance Review become a resource for the global design community (which is now read in over 130 countries). We’re also very interested in entrepreneurship and startup companies so we enjoy the thrill of making a success out of something new.

3. What have you learnt now about blogging which you didn’t know before you started your blog ?

:We’ve learned that it’s fun. It’s great getting positive feedback on the stories we write and seeing them spread across the internet through Twitter and other means. We’ve also learned that it takes a phenomenal amount of work – but the rewards are definitely worth it

4. Whats been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:I think the proudest moment so far is getting asked to do this interview since we’ve been doing a lot of interviewing but haven’t been interviewed as of yet. Other moments include getting accepted as a publisher on Buy Sell Ads and being able to get to know people from Google, Adobe, large ad agencies and other great companies.

5. Thanks for answering the questions and what can we expect to see from your blog in the next 12 months?

:The next year is going to be incredible. We’ll be adding some exciting new features (it’s a little too early to reveal specifics just yet), doing some exciting collaborations with other great design sites and increasing the overall “wow” factor of our articles.

Cheth Studios

Blog: http://www.chethstudios.net/

Twitter: http://twitter.com/cheth

1. Tell us who you are and what you’re blog is about ?

: I started it off as more of a personal blog in late 2008 dropped the idea and later revamped it to a complete design and web design blogexactly on January 7th 2009. And re-branded as ChethStudios.Net October 2009.

2. Why did you set up your blog ?

:Earlier before blogging, my web design skills were limited to freelancing. And after stepping into the world of blogging I’ve got chance to meet some top notch designers and get featured on their websites in their round-ups. The Quest for getting noticed became an obsession and made me realise that Web designers SHOULD have a professional blog too!

3. What’s been your proudest moment so far on your blog ?

:The Proudest Moment on my blog has to be the day when I woke up midnight to check out my page-views and then realise that 1.3K+ people were online bookmarking and reading my design roundup. Yeah that record is broken many a time, now but honestly it was the best ever moment of blogging for me. And of-course its a proud moment each day as the blog keeps growing; thankful to designers like Creative Nerds who had featured my designs before

Go to Source

A common misconception about successful independent workers is that one day, in dramatic fashion, they quit their dayjob, hung a shingle, and lived happily ever after. The truth is, most freelancers start off moonlighting, volunteering, interning, and doing client work at night and on weekends in addition to a nine-to-five gig. If you fantasize about living the freelancer life, you can do the same—even in a recession, starting now. Let’s turn some of your free time into a new career without giving up the steady paycheck.

Freelancing in a Recession: Inroads and Safety Nets

Armies of employees have gotten laid off in the past year, and when you’re one of the survivors still on payroll, the natural instinct is to feel grateful you were spared, hunker down, and not make a peep. The idea of looking for contract work when the unemployment rate is so high may seem ludicrous. However, there are contracts to be had. Freelancers cost companies less than full-time employees, and major waves of layoffs often create opportunities for contractors to fill in the gaps.

Doing freelance work in a time of job insecurity benefits you in two ways. First, it diversifies your income stream. When you freelance on the side, you don’t depend on a single check to pay your bills. If you do get let go or have to take a salary cut or furlough, the side income softens the blow to your bank account. Secondly, freelancing for clients is the best way to show off what you can do to potential employers. When you freelance you’re in constant “interview” mode, hoping to get re-hired or recommended to other clients. If you lose your job or decide to leave, you’ve essentially already interviewed for your next gig.

The point here is that even in a recession, freelancing is far from impossible—in fact, it’s downright smart.

Put Yourself on the Market

The tough part about becoming a freelancer—especially for introverts—is putting your name out there and having to hustle to sell your services. In addition to whatever work you do, being a freelancer means you also have to be a salesperson.

How you should put yourself on the market and showcase your offerings depends on your field. If you have no idea where to start, find some great freelancers that do what you do, and follow their example. It’s probably safe to say you’ll need some kind of web site, business card, and a portfolio or CV. Don’t skimp on this stuff: Instead of settling for a free hosting account somewhere, spend the $20 to register a domain name and put together at least a one-page web site describing who you are, what you offer, and contact information. (It’s more important than ever to have a say in what Google says about you.) If you’re a photographer, include a gallery of your best photos; a programmer, a list of projects you’ve contributed to; a project manager, a list of companies you’ve worked for. If showing off actual work you’ve completed isn’t possible, gather together some testimonials from folks you’ve worked for that get across your best skills.

Don’t do anything crazy like advertise your services in the newspaper or on Craigslist right away. The best way to find work is through people you know and referrals from happy clients.

How to Find Contracts—and When to Work Pro Bono

Once you’re officially on the market, it’s time to get some clients. Remember that old saying about who you know versus what you know? It’s so true. In my experience, referrals from people you know—the most vague acquaintances, even—yield the best business opportunities. Let your friends, business associates, former co-workers, fellow book club members, and the guy sitting next to you at the barber shop know you’re available to do freelance work. Don’t be annoying, but don’t be shy, either. People are much more likely to hire someone recommended by someone they trust, so it’s up to you to work your network. When you do, remember that other freelancers are not your competition—they’re your friends. Knowing other contractors who do the same or similar work just widens your pool of contacts and potential clients. Be generous and send referrals their way, and they’ll return the favor.

When you’ve exhausted referrals from folks you know in person, you can try advertising your services more broadly, but use the right outlets. The key is to find your audience. A freelance web designer, for example, will find a different potential clientele on Haystack than on Craigslist. Figure out where your ideal clients look for contractors and get yourself listed there.

If you’re just starting out and need to fill in your portfolio AND kickstart potential referrals, consider doing pro bono work for a non-profit or deeply-discounted work for a desirable client. I hate advising fellow freelancers to charge anything less than what they’re worth, but the reality is that sometimes you have to give something away to prove yourself and earn opportunities down the road. (In fact, I was in the right place at the right time to start Lifehacker precisely because of a barely-paying internship.) You don’t have to work for free on an ongoing basis to use this strategy: try speaking at a local event for free (and mention that you’re for hire), or offer a free trial of your services for potential clients. But remember: Only give these freebies to good prospects.

Pricing Yourself: When Time Really Is Money

Even after seven years of freelancing part and full-time, answering the question “What’s your rate?” is still a challenge for me. Your hourly rate will depend on the project, your industry, market, location, the economy, your experience, and how deep-pocketed your client is. Pricing conversations can be a scary game of chicken that takes pluck, confidence, and a strong sense of self-worth to navigate. As a general rule, when you’re quoting an hourly rate, overestimate both time and money.

When you’re just starting out, the tendency is to underprice yourself because you really want to score the contract and you’re optimistic about the number of hours it’ll take to complete. However, you’ll forget to take into account things like taxes and time for administrative tasks. As you get more experience, you’ll adjust your prices, learn how to read different types of clients and what their budget range will be, and have enough confidence to walk away from contracts that aren’t worth taking. I’m much more likely to do interesting work for lower prices, but I’ll only take on tedious stuff that’s well-paid. When it’s time to ask for the upper range, I use an unscientific method: I quote the highest rate I can while still keeping a straight face.

When it comes to scheduling, don’t forget that you’ll be doing this work at night and on weekends, and things almost always take longer than your initial gut estimate. So, overestimate the number of hours a job will take. It’s always better to set expectations and deliver early than have to pull an all-nighter and barely break even.

The Financial Life of a 1099er

Sending out invoices and chasing down unpaid ones, filing quarterly estimated taxes, itemizing tax deductions, managing your own retirement fund, collecting 1099 forms—these are all necessary parts of a freelancer’s financial life. Do yourself a favor and put a good system in place for making sure 1.) that you’re getting paid for the work you do by invoicing promptly and following up and 2.) that you’re putting aside money to pay estimated taxes on that money. Once you get that system down—and it should be easier with the cushion of a dayjob’s steady paycheck—you’ll be ready to face the “feast or famine” state that is a full-time freelancer’s financial reality later on. I use a simple “Waiting for payment.txt” file and schedule calendar reminders to check that list once a month and pay my estimated taxes each quarter. Start slow, see how your side gigs affect your financial picture, and work from there.

With your dayjob in hand, you can start your freelance career with less pressure to make loads of money right away; you’ll be able to get the word out, establish a client base, build a portfolio, and set your prices on your own time. Do you moonlight as a freelancer? What’s your best piece of advice for those just starting out? Let us know in the comments.

Gina Trapani, Lifehacker’s founding editor, welcomes you to the ranks of the self-employed. Find her at Smarterware and on Twitter.

Go to Source

Having a blog as a freelance web designer should be practically mandatory, as it can help to convey all kinds of messages to your clients but it also helps to give you an easy medium in which to network with other people in your industry. This basic form of networking can help to grow your business in amazing and unexpected ways.

List of freelance web designers with awesome talent and awesome blogs

Lee Munroe

Freelance web designer based out of Belfast, Ireland
http://leemunroe.com

Michael Dick

Freelance web designer based out of Tulsa, OK
http://m1k3.net

Mike Precious

Freelance web designer based out of Brantford, Ontario
http://mikeprecious.com

Aaron Russell

Freelance web designer based out of Swindon, Wiltshire
http://www.aaronrussell.co.uk/

Ted Lermontov

Freelance web designer based out of Sydney, Australia
http://www.tedler.com/

Lelia Thomas

Freelance web designer based out of Austin, TX
http://www.leliathomas.com/

Matt Brett

Freelance web designer based out of Ontario, Canada
http://mattbrett.com/

Comments

Go to Source

With the holidays upon us, and with winter in full mode (at least in the Northern Hemisphere) – we present to you a vector pack that reflects this joyous time of the year.

Winterize – an exclusive Six Revisions vector pack brought to you by Freelance Review, a design blog that covers the business of freelance design – is a vector pack containing 17 vectors, available in EPS and AI (Adobe Illustrator) format. You can use them royalty-free, even for commercial purposes. The only thing you may not do, however, is to redistribute the vectors without permission from Six Revisions.

Preview

Download

• winterize (ZIP, 1.3MB)

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• Free Social Media Icons: Old Bottle Crowns Icon Set
• Free Set of Social Media Icons – Large Icons Social

About the Author

Chris McConnell is the editor and co-founder of Freelance Review, a design blog that covers the business of freelance design. Chris also co-founded C McConnell Design, Web, print, brand design studio based in Nebraska. Follow him on Twitter: @mcconnelldesign.

Go to Source

You’ll get what you’ve paid for: probably a search engine death penalty.

If you took out an ad in a local paper for £75 you would get no 2 lines of text on a page that most people won’t read. You will not get into a national newspaper for that amount, full stop.

There are SEO companies out there who will say they can do SEO for a £100 per month, or £150 etc but I wouldn’t ever use them – you’d be better off getting a freelance seo guy just starting out in seo and hoping he was good, for that price.

Go to Source

Go to Source

Go to Source

By Robert Bowen

Compared to other professionals, freelancers seem to be a separate beast. They’re even a different breed than the rest of the online community. They pay whatever costs are required to be their own boss. Most became freelancers after having evolved to the point that the corporate shackles became more than uncomfortable, and they longed to break free and blaze their own trail. This evolved being now has mostly the same basic needs as the rest of the online community: feeds, /home, networks. But the freelancer seeks a different type of Web experience.

You see, freelancers want to maximize their time online at every opportunity, to establish or build their business. They make contacts, hone their skills and solicit or share advice with others in their field to grow their businesses and create opportunities. For them, the online community is a kind of Freelance University, where they find mentors to lead class discussion and clients to assign projects.

Below is a collection of some useful websites that no freelancer should do without. Whether because of the awesome resources and information contained therein or the oodles of opportunities they promise, these 15 blogs should be at the fore of any freelancer’s mind as they find their way in cyberspace.

Freelance Folder

Freelance Folder is a multi-author blog dedicated to helping entrepreneurs and freelancers. Whether you’re a blogger, writer, publisher, designer, artist, small-business owner or entrepreneur, Freelance Folder is for you. You will find articles that provide you with the tools and information that you need to succeed!

Outstanding Posts from Freelance Folder

3 Things Your Customers Won’t Tell You … Unless You Ask
5 Easy Ways to Start a Productive Day
How To Get Your Clients to Take You Seriously
Ten Tips To Stay Motivated — Even When You Really Don’t Feel Like Working
Building Your Portfolio With Zero Clients & No Spec Work

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Freelance Switch

Freelance Switch is a community of expert freelancers from around the world. If you’re a freelancer, whether a young buck or seasoned veteran, this is the place to get all of the information and support you need!

Outstanding Posts from Freelance Switch

How Freelancers Can Use Active Listening to Improve Business
How to Tweak Your Home Office to Be Productive Full-time
10 Ways Freelancers Can Get Help and Support
How to Handle a Missed Deadline
Errors and Omissions Insurance: Do Freelancers Need It?

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All About Freelance

Well, the name pretty much says it all. All About Freelance is just that, a great resource for freelancers new and old and covers all things in the freelance arena.

Outstanding Posts from All About Freelance

Freelance Advice: The 4 Hour Work Day…
Freelance Inspiration Does Not Necessarily Mean Freelance Motivation…
Freelance Design Tips – Don’t Be Too Available…
Noise Canceling…
Freelance Design, 101: Touch Every Project, Every Day

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Guerrilla Freelancing

Guerrilla Freelancing is a website dedicated to helping every freelancer who is still in the trenches, working as hard as they can to build up a solid freelance business. The main objective is to be a voice for those who have not “made it” and provide straight-to-the-point advice and tips for the guerrilla freelancer. Are you a guerrilla freelancer?

Outstanding Posts from Guerrilla Freelancing

Get paid more (per client) and work less hours
15 benefits to working as a full time freelancer
15 draw backs to working as a full time freelancer
Building your freelance design business with only $25.00
50 money filled blog niches YOU should be dominating

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Wake Up Later

Wake Up Later addresses website-building, freelancing, blogging and online entrepreneurship. It covers a variety of topics, from freelance tips and programming to SEO and Internet marketing. It is a growing repository of Flash, audio and other stuff that are free for personal and commercial use. And it encourages the sharing of ideas and experiences through interviews and groupthink.

Outstanding Posts from Wake Up Later

10 Useful Tasks for Slow Times
Get Smart: 12 Free Educational Resources for Web Workers
Deciding When to Use Project Pricing
Setting Guidelines for Turning Down Freelance Work
Client Communication: The Most Important Part of Freelancing

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All Freelance Directory

All Freelance Directory is a directory and blog aimed at freelancers, consultants and the self-employed. It offers advice and many helpful tips and resources for home-business owners.

Outstanding Posts from All Freelance Directory

Getting Started Freelancing While Keeping Full Time Work Position
Subcontracting Out Your Freelance Work
20 Ways to Promote Your Freelance Services Using Forum Marketing Techniques
The Freelancers Guide to Setting Deadlines
Freelancers’ Guide to Time Management: Setting Limits On How Much You Work

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Freelance Venue

Freelance Venue is where freelancers can network. Join the Freelance Forum and connect with other freelancers on the Web. The website is dedicated to anything about freelancing: working at home, business opportunities, money-making opportunities and so much more.

Outstanding Posts from Freelance Venue

How to Get Traffic or Visitors To Your Website WITHOUT Google!
How to Get Started in Freelance Graphic Design
Have You Already Set Goals For Your Business? Here’s How to Setup Business Goals
How Entrepreneurs Succeed With Their Business
Freelancing: A Business That Still Thrives in a Down Economy

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Pro Freelancing

When people hear the words “freelance writer,” they often think of a starving individual tapping away at a keyboard for hours on end. While Pro Freelancing owner Chad does love typing away, he has accomplished a lot in his short time in the business and has built a successful foundation for his long career ahead.

Outstanding Posts from Pro Freelancing

Stop the Madness and Start Hand-Picking Your Clients
Always Make Your Purpose Greater Than Your Paycheck
Why Aren’t People Buying Yet?
5 Secret Habits for Success
How To Turn Your Dreams Projects Into Reality

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Podcast for Freelancers

The Podcast for Freelancers (which, ironically, also includes a blog) serves all those who currently or aspire to freelance. Whether you’re freelancing or want to, this website will help.

Outstanding Posts from Podcast for Freelancers

7 Reasons Why It Sucks To Be A Freelancer
6 things to do when your ill
5 ways to make your clients happy
Q & A: How to move away from the Job Boards
10 tips for freelance twitter-ers.

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Self Employed Blog

The Self Employed Blog was created to share ideas, products and opportunities that help others move closer to their dream of being their own boss. The content focuses primarily on home-based businesses run on the Internet.

Outstanding Posts from Self Employed Blog

Why You Should Create Your Own Info Product Ebooks
Should You Start Freelancing?
Pros and Cons of 3-Way Calling in Network Marketing
How to Keep Making Progress in Your Business and Life
No Risks, No Rewards

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Social Media Rockstar

Social Media Rockstar is another fantastic resource for freelancers who need a little guidance navigating the social media landscape, because social media is so key for freelancers.

Outstanding Posts from Social Media Rockstar

6 Tips for Creating “Sticky” Social Relationships
How to Build a Strong Reputation With Blog Comments
Is Social Media Marketing a Rat Race?
5 Signs You’re NOT a Social Media Expert, Yet
A Brief History Of Social Media

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Zen Habits

Zen Habits is about finding simplicity in the daily chaos of our lives. It’s about clearing the clutter so that we can focus on what’s important, create something amazing and find happiness. Zen Habits features three powerful articles a week on such topics as simplicity, health and fitness, motivation and inspiration, frugality, family life, happiness, goals, getting great things done and living in the moment.

Outstanding Posts from Zen Habits

The Only Way to Become Amazingly Great at Something
How to Stop Being a Workaholic
Coding Simplicity: How to Avoid Feature Creep in Your Life
How to Defeat Burnout and Stay Motivated
The Habit Change Cheatsheet: 29 Ways to Successfully Ingrain a Behavior

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Persuasive.net

Persuasive.net offers a wonderful way to learn persuasive communication, providing compelling articles without the fluff that usually accompanies content from trainers in the personal development industry.

Outstanding Posts from Persuasive.net

Use Conversational Hypnosis To Be More Persuasive
It is Written All Over Your Face: Understanding Facial Expressions
What Gets Buyers to Say “Yes, I’ll Buy?”
How To Handle Objections, After You’ve Made The Sale
The Difference Between Being Influenced and Brainwashed

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The Simple Dollar

The Simple Dollar is a blog for those of us who need both cents and sense: people fighting debt and bad spending habits while building a financially secure future and still affording a latte or two. Our busy lives are crazy enough without having to compare 500 mutual funds; we just want simple ways to manage our finances and save a little money.

Outstanding Posts from The Simple Dollar

The Best Money Advice, in Ten Words or Less
When Is Frugality Stealing?
Giving Experiences, Not Things, This Holiday Season
Teaching Money Management Through Self-Responsibility
24 Ways to Save Money Today

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Six Pixels of Separation

Six Pixels of Separation is a blog by Mitch Joel. Mitch brings you digital marketing, new media and personal branding insight, provocations and foreshadowing from his always on, always connected world.

Outstanding Posts from Six Pixels of Separation

How To Build Your Digital Footprint In 8 Easy Steps
Personal Branding Is Not An Option – It’s Crucial To Success
Hold Off On Twitter – Fix Your Website First
6 Ways To Build A Strong Community
Marketing Is More Important Than You Think

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Further Resources

This is a good start but by no means should be mistaken as the journey’s end. Below are other resources that every freelancer should check out. So many more helpful hints and tools are contained on the following websites that you would be remiss to have come all this way and not give them a glance or two. Go ahead: you know you want to!

Freelancers’ Toolbox
30+ online freelance resources.

Fire your Boss!
The successful home freelancer’s guide.

A Guide to Starting Your Business
Help with the small-business paperwork, the basics of accounting, and an overview of some legal considerations.

85+ Tools and Resources for Freelancers and Web Workers
While a lot of these items are focused on Web design elements, such as photography, programming and writing, something is included for everyone.

Freelance Designer’s Toolbox
200+ resources for freelance Web designers.

The Roadmap To Becoming A Professional Freelance Web Designer

Freelance Contracts: Do’s And Don’ts

6 Simple Ways For Freelancers To Increase Productivity

(al)

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Zach Bush is a freelance illustrator from Washington D.C., USA. The first time I saw one of his designs was throught the depthCORE collective and I was really impressed. Now with the new depthCORE chapter, Zach created some fantastic pieces. So let’s take a closer look at his fantastic work.

As usually we highly recommend that you check out Zach’s webiste or his Behance profile.

Zach Bush, a freelance illustrator, is based outside of Washington D.C. As of 2006, he has diligently worked to perfect his skills by consistently taking on new projects by various corporate clients. Zach’s success is largely due to his perfectionist nature, as he will never release a project until he is 100% confident it can not be improved upon any further.

Zach is part of the depthCORE and Slashthree Collectives.

About the author

My name is Fabio Sasso, I’m a graphic/web designer from Porto Alegre, Brazil and I’m the founder of Abduzeedo. I hope we can share lots of information, tips, and ideas through Abduzeedo. Also you can follow me on Twitter or my personal site at http://fabiosasso.com.

Sponsored Links:

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In such a tough world, many of people may find themselves out of the game and lose their jobs any time, especially with the big recession when companies are losing clients and looking for reducing employees. This article tries to give a solution to find another better way to get more money and more clients, and gives tips to start your freelance career and give resources sites that can help you get more jobs and clients.

Introduction

When Peter lost his job earlier this year with the massive layoffs at the beginning of this year, he got no job, less money and much time to speed in front of his computer searching for jobs and applying for recruiting sites. For someone who spent more than 20 years of his life as a full time employee, it was not in his mind to think about being a freelance when he thought to give it a shoot.

Peter started to google for freelance jobs over the web, guess what? Peter was lucky to start his first freelance job and started to get more clients and more money from his freelance job. He can also spend more time in work as he is actually working from home and saves the time that he used to lose in driving to office and in big companies routine.

Actually, Peter story is not real, but the facts are. I invented this story based on true events and experience from people that experienced both working as a freelancers and full time employees.

Living as a Freelancer

Living as a freelancer is not an easy career. Freelancers are self employed and try to get more clients and projects to be able to continue their lives, which mean higher risk factor comparing with setting in office and get paid.

When you are employed in a company, you do not have to find projects, set deals or develop relations with clients, you only do your tasks and jobs. On the other hand, freelancers can be considered a small company as they get new clients, develop business relations, set deals and work in the project as well.

When you work as a freelancer, you do not have eight hours working limit. With the risk of unstable clients flow and market status, you need to get the most out of your projects and clients, so you try to invest more in your time and work for longer hours to be save in the bad days.

Since most of your deals are made through the web, you becomes under another risk to lose your money or meet a client who do not pay try to get extra work for free, so you have to be prepared for such really silly clients.

Along with the above risks, being self employed will make you be able to get more profits out of your job. Most company that is looking for freelancers are looking for less cost than a big company can provide, as big companies calculate over head costs on each project such as the offices, clearing , security and assists…etc.

You can give less prices than big company do and get more hourly rate than you can get out as an employed in a company.

Also, freelancers are more dependant and able to take their own decisions as they do to belong to a company structure or routine. You have the choice to work or not to work, choose the type of projects you find more challengeable or even spend more time to learn new stuff that can open more opportunities for you.

Can You Live as a Freelancer

People who lost their jobs like Peter will have no problem to try freelance life till they find another job. But if you are already employed, you have to think more before taking this important decision unless you can return to your job any time which is not available for every one.

You have to be able to live the freelancer’s life and got the talent to develop business as well as developing tasks and technical stuff. Also, you need to choose if you are one of those people that like to get higher positions and titles or focus on getting your own independent company and clients.

Before taking such an serious step, you have to have enough money support to relay on till you get enough clients and projects, although building relations and projects are not easy and losing it are. So, you have to be careful when building relations because bad impressions can destroy you before you start.

One of the advisable tips before getting into the freelance job is to try couple of projects in your free time after your full time job or in weekends. It is a big load but helps you to know if you can succeed in your new life and avoid part of the risk.

Tips Before Getting Into Your Freelance Career

Before you start the freelancer life, there are some tips that can help you avoid getting into troubles and help you build good business. These tips are:

Start as a company

Most people trust companies that individuals, because companies have more resources and more professional attitude. Build for yourself a website that includes your resume, brief about you and samples of your work. This will help clients to know about you and see samples of your work easily.

Develop relations

The relation developing process starts with your first job proposal, make your cover letter professional and focused to let the client know that you are the one and encourage the client to look at your work and resume.

Most of the freelance relations starts with a small task but you can drive more work with gaining more trust from the client and provide more services.

Develop business

Doing your task in a professional way is the most important part in this process, so the client can trust you and give you more tasks.  The right developing process lets the client think in you are real professional such as receiving the requirements and materials and know exactly what the client needs. Also, make sure to deliver the client the project in a professional arranged way, the client does not have the time to search for files or learn your job to be able to understand your matrix.

Timing

It is one of the important point to consider, meeting deadline and manage time is very important and give your client an impression how they can depend on you and relay on your time in their plans. You can use program such as MS Outlook to arrange your emails, deliveries and milestones.

Payments

One of the things that make people do not want to work as freelancers is managing their payments and the chance to meet bad people who do not want to pay. You need to work with this issue carefully as some clients starts to test your ability to be tricked from the first interview. It is always good idea to have an in-advance or down-payment amount of money that ensures the client is serious enough.

Freelance Resources Sites

The biggest resource for freelance projects is the web, and fortunately there are increasing number of the sites that provide freelance projects and connect between freelancers and project owners, some of these sites control the process between both freelancers and clients.

Elance

Scriptlance

Getafreelancer

Gofreelance

Odesk

Getacoder

Freshwebjobs

Freelanceq

Icanfreelance

Thefreelancenation

Freelancerjobs

Guru

Conclusion

With the increasing number of freelance sites, freelancers got more chance to get clients and people have more chance to get into the freelance career. The freelance career can help you getting more money and challenges than you can get from your full time job and it can help you getting money when you got affected with the recession and bad market times.

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Freelance Switch

Any freelance designers out there will find a direct connection with this oldie from Freelance Switch. Pick up some handy tips on how to work with a range of typical client personas.

Build Internet

Build Internet posts this second post in the series highlighting the fonts used in the logos of a range of popular websites.

Cats who Code

As font embedding becomes more popular with SiFR and Cufon, font choices due to licensing restrictions becomes more important. Cats who Code round up some of the best fonts you can use for free!

Digital Room

In need of some graphic design inspiration? Digital Room has put together this awesome collection of beautiful catalog and booklet designs. Great for generating inspiration for any type of design project.

Design Shard

Design Shard puts together this brilliant collection of inspirational clean and well structured website designs, showing the best layouts, typography and use of white space.

Similar Posts

• This Week’s Favourites – October 16th 2009
• This Week’s Favourites – October 30th 2009
• This Week’s Favourites – October 2nd 2009
• This Week’s Favourites – September 18th 2009
• This Week’s Favourites – September 4th 2009

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There seems to a lot more people considering the move to freelancing these days. The state of the economy is convincing more people to take the plunge, and this is hardly surprising. Here are nine tips to get people started in freelancing;

1.  Select an appropriate work rate that you will charge. In fact you should have more than one rate depending on the work. Being a freelancer does not mean that you have to charge less than everyone else. Take some time to select the most suitable rate that you will charge; you will need an hourly rate, and a project rate. When deciding on how much you are going to charge you should make sure that you take into account your particular niche of freelancing, the market demand, your own skills, your overheads, how much profit you expect, and how much your client will be willing to pay.

2.  Make sure that you get the most from the internet. Even though the majority of freelancers are web-workers nowadays they still fail to take full advantage of the web. It is possible to really bootstrap your freelance career by promoting it through a blog or website. The web also provided plenty of free software that can help with all areas of your business such as; idea generation, managing your budget, and invoicing customers.

3.  Build the best network that you can. In the beginning, as well as throughout your career, it is important to have a network of people who will send referrals your way. There are many opportunities for networking both online and offline and these can help send work your way as you build up your reputation. It is important that you use every possible avenue for networking including online resources like Linkedin and Facebook.

4.  Make sure that your work environment is optimal as possible. Being a freelancer doesn’t mean that you have to work alone at home. It also doesn’t mean that you need to go work in an office. Many cities are now seeing the arrival of co-working spaces. The advantages with these types of places is that they don’t need to be alone all the time, and it is also cheaper than getting an office.

5.  Make sure that you put by an emergency fund. Having an emergency fund will take some of the pressure off and allow you to just concentrate on being creative. Life is not fun when you have no food on the table, and having an emergency fund will allow you to be choosier about clients.

6.  Consider outsourcing your work. If you find that your freelance business is really taking off then you might that you need to turn down work. You don’t really need to do this though. What you could do is outsource the work to other reliable freelancers and manage these people remotely. Outsourcing can really be a great decision because it will allow your business to grow and it means not turning down work.

7.  Make sure that you keep an eye on your progress. If you want to be really successful as a freelancer you need to be able to track not only the financial parts of your business but also your own performance and attitudes. Once you have determined how your hourly work rate relates to your speed at completing projects you will be able to able to judge your own efficiency. You need to be regularly thinking of ways to improve efficiency so that you can then increase the amount of money you make.  You need to be careful though, because improving your work rate should not mean a reduction in the quality of your work.

8.  Expand your freelance services. When you reach a stage where you are happy with your work efficiency you should then consider broadening your freelance services. Almost everyone will be able to offer other content as well as what they are currently providing.  These could be things like podcasts, slideshows, screencasts, or diagrams. If you don’t feel up to this extra work now then you should at least make plans to offer them within a year or so.

9.  Break down large projects into smaller units. Many freelancers can become a bit daunted by the idea of taking on a big project; many freelancers try to avoid these as much as possible. If you are taking on a big project then it will come with a bit more responsibility and might feel like a lot to take on. The trick is to break it all down into small jobs and tackle each job as you go along; this will make it all seem less overwhelming. If you need to you can also outsources some of the work to other appropriate freelancers.

Finally, remember that bad times come and go. The ebb and flow nature is freelancing is part of the package. To be successful you are going to need to accept this. The best way is to do the best you can, plan well, and don’t worry too much about those things that are out of your control.

Related posts:

1. Ways For Designers To Work for a More Productive Workday
2. The Rules of Pricing your Design Services
3. The Top Biggest Mistakes in Freelancing

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There seems to a lot more people considering the move to freelancing these days. The state of the economy is convincing more people to take the plunge, and this is hardly surprising. Here are nine tips to get people started in freelancing;

1.  Select an appropriate work rate that you will charge. In fact you should have more than one rate depending on the work. Being a freelancer does not mean that you have to charge less than everyone else. Take some time to select the most suitable rate that you will charge; you will need an hourly rate, and a project rate. When deciding on how much you are going to charge you should make sure that you take into account your particular niche of freelancing, the market demand, your own skills, your overheads, how much profit you expect, and how much your client will be willing to pay.

2.  Make sure that you get the most from the internet. Even though the majority of freelancers are web-workers nowadays they still fail to take full advantage of the web. It is possible to really bootstrap your freelance career by promoting it through a blog or website. The web also provided plenty of free software that can help with all areas of your business such as; idea generation, managing your budget, and invoicing customers.

3.  Build the best network that you can. In the beginning, as well as throughout your career, it is important to have a network of people who will send referrals your way. There are many opportunities for networking both online and offline and these can help send work your way as you build up your reputation. It is important that you use every possible avenue for networking including online resources like Linkedin and Facebook.

4.  Make sure that your work environment is optimal as possible. Being a freelancer doesn’t mean that you have to work alone at home. It also doesn’t mean that you need to go work in an office. Many cities are now seeing the arrival of co-working spaces. The advantages with these types of places is that they don’t need to be alone all the time, and it is also cheaper than getting an office.

5.  Make sure that you put by an emergency fund. Having an emergency fund will take some of the pressure off and allow you to just concentrate on being creative. Life is not fun when you have no food on the table, and having an emergency fund will allow you to be choosier about clients.

6.  Consider outsourcing your work. If you find that your freelance business is really taking off then you might that you need to turn down work. You don’t really need to do this though. What you could do is outsource the work to other reliable freelancers and manage these people remotely. Outsourcing can really be a great decision because it will allow your business to grow and it means not turning down work.

7.  Make sure that you keep an eye on your progress. If you want to be really successful as a freelancer you need to be able to track not only the financial parts of your business but also your own performance and attitudes. Once you have determined how your hourly work rate relates to your speed at completing projects you will be able to able to judge your own efficiency. You need to be regularly thinking of ways to improve efficiency so that you can then increase the amount of money you make.  You need to be careful though, because improving your work rate should not mean a reduction in the quality of your work.

8.  Expand your freelance services. When you reach a stage where you are happy with your work efficiency you should then consider broadening your freelance services. Almost everyone will be able to offer other content as well as what they are currently providing.  These could be things like podcasts, slideshows, screencasts, or diagrams. If you don’t feel up to this extra work now then you should at least make plans to offer them within a year or so.

9.  Break down large projects into smaller units. Many freelancers can become a bit daunted by the idea of taking on a big project; many freelancers try to avoid these as much as possible. If you are taking on a big project then it will come with a bit more responsibility and might feel like a lot to take on. The trick is to break it all down into small jobs and tackle each job as you go along; this will make it all seem less overwhelming. If you need to you can also outsources some of the work to other appropriate freelancers.

Finally, remember that bad times come and go. The ebb and flow nature is freelancing is part of the package. To be successful you are going to need to accept this. The best way is to do the best you can, plan well, and don’t worry too much about those things that are out of your control.

Related posts:

1. The Rules of Pricing your Design Services
2. The Top Biggest Mistakes in Freelancing
3. Tips To Help Get Your Creative Juices Flowing!

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There are 1000s of online job searching resources available on the internet. All of them to help job seekers find work.  Among these top sites, job seekers can determine what approach to job searching works best for them. Here a list of the top 10 most popular now a day’s job search websites to help 2expertsDesign readers land that new dream job as quickly as possible.

Do you want to be the first one to know the latest happenings at 2ExpertsDesign.com just subscribe to our rss feed and you can follow us on twitter as well.

FreelanceRadar

The FreelanceRadar provide to freelancers one stop freelance jobs searching solution.

Pizini

Pizini.com allows job seekers to search all job openings on the web in just one spot.

NetJobies

NetJobies is a new site that is aimed at programmers, web designers and content creation members! The site allows people to find freelance and full time jobs from around 6 different websites, update every minute of every day! The Simple easy Ajax Driven interface makes it a breeze to get the latest jobs from around the web!

Plasis Jobs

Aggregates jobs from lots of popular job sites and filters them so that only freelance development projects are shown.

Careerjet

Jobs search engine for the US. Search jobs from more than ten thousands of web sites. In one simple search, Careerjet gives the job seeker access to a massive selection of jobs that are compiled from various internet sources, saving the trouble of having to visit each site individually.

MashedJobs

A design and development job board aggregator. You can view jobs posted recently to most of your favorite job boards, like Authentic Jobs, 37Signals, Smashing Magazine, Krop, Fresh Web Jobs, and many more.

Joblighted

Joblighted is a single page jobs aggregator. Highlighted new jobs since your last visit. Filter jobs by freshness, source, location and keywords. Subscribe to filtered RSS feeds.

MostHired

Most Hired collects jobs from the following job sites: Jobs and Giggs, 37 Signals Jobs, RealWebJobs, 37 Signals Gigs, Krop, Venture Beat, Authentic Jobs, GigaOM Jobs, Joel On Software, Crunch Board, MeFi Jobs, FreshWebJobs, Slashdot, CSS Beauty, MinistryCamp, Boxes and Arrows, Design Meltdown, nPost, Web Pro Jobs, Coroflot, Most Hired, CrispSpot, Jobs on the Wall, Searchwebjobs.

JobFloat

Why search all those job boards when we can deliver it all on one page, daily?

JobPile

The Job Pile aggregates the best job boards on the web and collect jobs from the following job sites: Authentic Jobs, 37signals Jobs, Krop, MetaFilter Jobs, Fresh Web Jobs, Slashdot Jobs, CssBeauty Jobs, Coroflot Jobs, MinistryCamp Job Board.

More Great Resources with Useful Information

Top 10 Most Effective Job Search Websites

The 20 Best Job Search Web Sites

If you enjoyed this post, please consider to subscribe to the feed and you can follow us on twitter to get future articles delivered to your feed reader.

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Bad news people – you need to read all these 10 articles in order to become a better freelancer! That’s it, don’t make plans for the weekend!

A Comprehensive Guide to Starting Your Freelance Career

Working as a contractor – or freelancing as it is often termed – is both a great stepping stone to running your own business and a viable career in itself

The Roadmap To Becoming A Professional Freelance Web Designer

Becoming a freelance web designer is a common dream among many designers, although it takes quite a bit of talent, business savvy, committment, and time. With all there is to consider when becoming self-employed, one can become overwhelmed — enough to deter themselves from trying at all

13 Tips for Effective Communication with Clients

Being able to communicate effectively with clients is easily one of the most important aspects of being a web designer. The communication process starts immediately as you’ll need to learn what the client wants and expects from you, and as you get to know more about their business

Freelance Contracts: Do’s And Don’ts

In the world of freelancing, the entrepreneur has to take on a number of tasks for themselves that would normally be handled by a separate department at a bigger company

15 Tips for Breaking in as a Part-Time Freelancer

The best way to get started as a freelancer, in my opinion, is part time. There are many benefits to starting off in a limited role (which we will discuss in this article), as opposed to jumping in full-time. Here we will take a detailed look at the subject and provide tips based on experience

50 Essential Web Apps for Freelancers

When you make the decision to go out on your own, you are faced with many choices. Should you work from home or rent a space? Bill hourly or by the job? What kind of hours should you assign as ‘work time’?

How to Stop Interruptions

We interrupt this productive work day to bring you this special message on how to avoid distractions

20 Top Design Blogs Looking for Freelance Writers

Inspired by an article from Blogsessive – How a Great Backlink Can Make You An Instant Success – I started to scan my favorite design blogs in order to see who’s accepting guest writers

The World’s Top Freelancers Share Their Secrets

Instead of bestowing my vast knowledge and experience upon you, I’m going to open up this blog post for everyone to contribute to. Post your best freelance advice or stories in the comments

Creating Your Own Deadlines and Setting Aggressive Goals for Your Business

In this post I thought I’d discuss some of the benefits for entrepreneurs and startups to setting aggressive goals and creating deadlines

How To Maximize Your Freelance Income

In this post we’ll teach you how to maximize your income by both finding and winning opportunities that are already out there, and then by creating your own new income opportunities

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Today we have Grant Friedman, a freelance designer and founder of Colorburned. Colorburned is a popular design blog that provides design news, resources, and tutorials from around the web.

Tell me more about your background. How did you get started in graphic design?

I got my start in graphic design about 10 years ago. Back then, the Internet was still relatively new to everyone. I volunteered to figure out how to distribute a newsletter to the membership of a student organization I was involved with over email.
It didn’t take much time before I began taking classes in HTML, Dreamweaver, and Macromedia Fireworks.

Eventually, I migrated over to Photoshop and Illustrator. Today, I’m a design junkie and couldn’t be happier!

How long have you been doing freelance work?
I’ve been doing freelance work since the beginning. I used to have a full-time job working for the government a while back but I’ve been freelancing and blogging full-time for a about 2 years now.

What type of projects do you typically work on (branding, website design, print design, etc)?
I will work on all sorts of projects. I’m happy to do branding, web design, or print but typically I like to work on projects that don’t involve a lot of code.

What tools/apps do you use to help manage your work?
I’m fairly old-school in terms of project management. I handle most of my projects through careful organization of email. There are a lot of project management apps out there but for the most part I’m just too small-time to make the most of them at this point.

What advice would you give to other freelance designers who are just getting started?
I always give the same advice to aspiring graphic designers. When you’re just starting out most people will try to take advantage of you. They will say things like -”since you’re just starting out we can’t pay you much money or we can’t pay you much but this job will be a great opportunity to build your portfolio”. Don’t let this happen! Whatever you do make sure that you are fairly compensated for your time. It’s very hard to get over the stigma of being some one who will do work for free. It’s better to be thought of as some one who charges a fair price.

I see that you have a book coming out entitled Retro Style Graphics (1000s of Style Palettes). What is it about the retro style that enticed you to write a book about it? When will the book be available?
If you were to tell me 5 years ago that I would be publishing a book in the near future, I would have called you crazy! But after my blog started to take off about a year or so ago, the thought of writing a book seemed a bit more plausible, although far-fetched. That was until Angela Patchell of Patchell Books contacted me about writing Retro Style Graphics. I’ve always been fascinated with retro-inspired design so I enthusiastically agreed.

Click the Book to Pre-Order from Amazon

The book is essentially a resource style guide of retro-style graphics. The book will include an attached CD which will contain Illustrator brushes, Photoshop brushes, vector graphics, textures, color palettes, lists of retro fonts, links to tutorials, and much more! The book should be available some time in October or November of 2009.

Tell me more about Colorburned. When did you start the blog?

Colorburned originally started as a means of promoting my portfolio. At the time, I had just left my position with the government and was preparing to find a design job in the private sector. The more I got into blogging, the more I found myself drawn to the freelance lifestyle. When my blog began to take off several months later I just kept at it. Now I rarely update my portfolio and plan to eventually migrate it away from the site.

How many people do you have writing for Colorburned?
There are 11 authors on the site but I am the only one who contributes full-time.

How often do you post new content?
I try to publish new content about 3-5 times per week.

Since launching Colorburned, how have you seen it grow. Walk us through the stats for the site 6 months after launch, a year after launch…
When I first started Colorburned in May of 2008 the site was receiving about 1,200 visits per month. By November of that year Colorburned was receiving over 60,000 visits per month. By July of 2009 Colorburned had doubled that figure and is now receiving about 120,000 visits per month.

In terms of RSS subscriptions, the site now has over 5,000 and growing. I have to say that one of the most flattering statistics however is the number of followers my site has on Twitter. By the end of September I’m hoping to have reached the 10,000 follower mark which would be an amazing accomplishment.

There are a number of plug-ins, scripts, and customizations within the design for Colorburned. Can you give us a list of these?

1. Yet Another Related Posts Plugin for displaying related posts
2. Glider.js to power the slider for featured content
3. Darren Hoyt’s TimThumb Script for auto-creation and auto-resizing of images to create the dynamic thumbnails below the featured content slider

There was also custom work done to integrate Twitter below each Commenter’s avatar as seen here:

For a nice run-down on the inner workings of the site check out this case study from E.Webscapes.

Give us the run down on the Hardware and Software you use.
Sadly, I’m currently running a couple of 5 year old Dell computers. I’ve been meaning to upgrade to a Mac but I’m holding out until one of them dies. In terms of software, I’m still running CS3 right now but will upgrade as soon as I buy a new computer.

Thanks for taking the time Grant. We look forward to following your continued success with Colorburned, your freelance work, and your new book.

Be sure to check out Colorburned.com and follow Grant on Twitter.

No related posts.

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The Details

For more details, writing topics, payment information and article guidelines see the “Write for Us” page.

Looking forward to your articles.

Find freelance jobs or post freelance projects on GetAFreelancer

Want to advertise here ? Contact us

Related posts

You might also like these similar articles:

1. We are looking for contributors
2. 30 cool wallpapers for designers
3. CrazyLeaf Design Blog Community
4. 41 websites to promote your design articles and resources
5. Milk Photography

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For this icon set we’ve focused on icons based around freelance and office work, this set contains everything from invoices & contracts, to noticeboards and project folders. For a full understanding of the variety of icons on offer make sure to check the full preview image.

Function Freelance & Work Icons Details

As always we want this set to be able to be used along side our other two icon sets [ 1. Function Premium Icons ] [ 2. Premium App Icons ] – So we’ve made them in a similar style, same dimensions and a similarly low price. The set is available for only $15 which includes all the icons featured below, just click the image or buy them direct.

Congratulations to our Previous Winners

In our last pack of Icons we gave away 10 sets free. We had some great comments & feedback and are happy to announce the winners, who have all been informed and have received their winning Icons.

Josh

Thomas from BrushKing

Matthew from UXBooth

Jaswinder from Jaswindervirdee

Angie Bowen from Arbent

Chad Mueller from Inspiredology

Michael Angrave from CreareDesign

Steve Robillard from Digger Design Labs

Tom

Grazz from Blogging CSS

Other Icon Sets Available

As mentioned we’ve made all of our icon sets in a similar style, meaning you can put them all together to build one large collection of various themed icons. So if you like what you see here make sure to check out the other sets that have been available for some time now.

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Previously on Fubiz

• Egor Bashakov
• Follow the Ball
• DHL Address

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Previously on Fubiz

• Egor Bashakov
• Follow the Ball
• Plasticbionic

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