In September of 2014, I created a business profile on Yelp. In December, I was contacted by a Yelp sales rep, a very nice lady who showed me lots of statistics and graphs, along with links to press articles about Yelp. read more
You may have already heard about thumbtack.com, from all the press they have received over the last few months. This is how it works: you sign up, create your profile and receive leads from local businesses looking for web design services. read more
The competition is huge in the web design marketplace, but there are still hundreds of potential projects popping up daily. With the right focus on sources of leads which can easily bring you new clients, you will stay busy all year long. But things change fast and the way you find new web design clients changes every year. What worked last year may not bring you clients today, and popular social media places, even if seen as a potential source of new clients, are not always where you want to invest your time. read more
It may sound impossible to win a client while competing with offshore competitors who offer rates up to 90% less than you, yet it looks like crazy outsourcing practices are not so common anymore (Think globally, act locally). Of course, there are companies who are able to find cheap sources of labor out of the country, and some individuals cannot resist $5/hour. However, I meet many people (potential clients) who have had a bad experience with outsourcing and learnt their lessons the hard way – “you get what you pay for.” It turns out most start-ups and individual entrepreneurs understand the power of working with a local web designer. read more
There are various ways to go about finding a new web design client: you can receive new leads through referrals, advertise your services on AdWords, use search engines, and even attempt cold calling (though be warned, this tends to no longer work). But what option will reap the most success? The answer is simple, freelance job sites. Though there are various job sites to choose from (which can sometimes lead to frustration when deciding where and what to look at), these do tend to be the best online resources for finding new clients. It was actually the frustration of struggling to search through hundreds and hundreds of job postings to find decent referrals that I decided to create Area301. read more
