The original guy he's talking about was just freelancing. I'm a freelancer and I made money from day one. A friend of mine quit his job 2 months back. Again, made money from day one. Difference between us and the guy in the story? We had contacts and relationships already built from working a few years.
What I'm saying is that most of this article is way off the mark for freelancing, you won't lose money the first year as long as:
1. You know how to network and get business
2. See 1
I'm not even very good at it and I still make money.
Also my old company's MD loved recounting how they were profitable within 8 months. The way they did this as a software vendor was to land a big juicy enterprise contract and get paid 30% up front. Just as a counterpoint to the 3 years thing.
There are plenty of businesses you can found which can make money very quickly. It all depends on whether that's the company you want to build, larger vision, longer lag.
> The original guy he's talking about was just freelancing. I'm a freelancer and I made money from day one. … We had contacts and relationships already built from working a few years.
Yeah, a thing about that is, it's hard to have those contacts and relationships in place when you're 20. A few people manage it, but most build up those networks over a period of years.
Another thing, which I didn't realize when I was 20, is that if you make contacts with a lot of 20-year-olds, when they're 30 or 40, some of them will be in a much better position to partner with you than when they were 20. The guy who was working as a manual software tester for a telecom firm at 20 may be the CTO of a startup at 30; the guy who's struggling through his CS degree at 20 may be managing a project at Oracle at 30. But he has a lot more time to get to know you when he's working at the telecom firm or struggling through CS. So even if you're a world-class connector like David Weekly or Adam Rifkin, with a Rolodex full of 1500 contacts at age 20, those contacts will be a lot more valuable for business when you're 30.
I quit my salaried day job with the intent of going into startups or consulting. I planned to take a week off, then seriously start looking for contracts, and if I didn't find anything I'd start looking for a more regular job after a month or two.
I was contacted the week I updated my LinkedIn profile to list myself as freelancing. An old friend had a husband who needed help with a big contract he had, and we ended up splitting the work fairly evenly, making good money, and creating a good site for a very large client.
I was surprised how easy it was to find contracts. In fact, I haven't had to go hunting for them yet.
I'll admit, I've been making less now than I did with my salary, but that's in a big part due to working on a startup on the side.
How are you making money freelancing from day 1? Chances are you went in the same field you already worked in, had contacts, knew how to get clients, etc. When starting freelancing in a new domain, or starting a business, it takes a lot longer to start making money.
Also, making money and being viable is two thing. I myself am trying to survive in the world of freelance. I've been going for a few months now and I make money. But it's very little money, no where near as much as I would need to keep going full time. Is it a failure because I'm 3 months into it? Hard to say, but I don't think so yet.
I don't think you can find a universal answer, everyone's experiences are different.
The take-away point here is that you should know it might take a while to make money & don't count on it being quick.
I started making money within 1 month of quitting my day job to work on my project (product, not freelancing), and just about now (~8 months in) it's starting to look like it's making enough money to live off of in the long term (I was living on savings before that point).
Another thing to take into account is how much money you need to support you working full time.
I'm 28 without dependents & living in Vienna, so for me that sum is a paltry (relative to someone living in SF or NYC) $25k/year.
The original guy he's talking about was just freelancing. I'm a freelancer and I made money from day one. A friend of mine quit his job 2 months back. Again, made money from day one. Difference between us and the guy in the story? We had contacts and relationships already built from working a few years.
What I'm saying is that most of this article is way off the mark for freelancing, you won't lose money the first year as long as:
1. You know how to network and get business
2. See 1
I'm not even very good at it and I still make money.
Also my old company's MD loved recounting how they were profitable within 8 months. The way they did this as a software vendor was to land a big juicy enterprise contract and get paid 30% up front. Just as a counterpoint to the 3 years thing.
There are plenty of businesses you can found which can make money very quickly. It all depends on whether that's the company you want to build, larger vision, longer lag.