Readers Respond: How did you start freelancing?

Responses: 20

By Jennifer Kyrnin, About.com Guide

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From the article: Advice on Freelance Web Development

It can be scary to make the leap from regular employment to freelancing. But learning how others did it can help ease fears. Did you start out part time with your freelancing and then branch out when business got good? Or did you start out as a freelancer straight from high school or college? What made it easy or hard to start freelancing for you? Let us know

For friends

I started freelancing through my friends. A friend needed a really complicated imagemap built and I said I'd do it for like $50. Then a month later another friend needed a major change to his website. I didn't want to so I charged what I thought was the ridiculous sum of $50/hour. He said "great" and I had a new job.
—Guest Maos

Freelancing websites

I started many years ago using MS Front Page. Front Page was good because you did not need to know code, and I wanted to build a site for my business. Then I started using Dreamweaver 2004. It was all table based. I did several sites, but then got too busy. Now I am using Dreamweaver CS4 and have taken some online CSS classes. And again I re-did my site, one for a friend, and now I want to start doing sites again. There is so much more to learn with all the social networking. I really like your about.com It has a lot of useful information.
—Guest Steve

Just started

About nine months ago I built a website for my mom in MS Publisher (shouldn't have). The code was so messy that the website took forever to load, so that forced me learn HTML and I fell in love with Web design, so now I'm making templates to hone my skill and I'm starting up a business (with my mom as an assistant).
—Guest ChicWebDesign

From Freelance Writer to Webdesigner

I became interested in webdesign after applying for freelance writer on oDesk.com. There are lots of freelance web development jobs available, and the interest is obvious. I started webdesign as an occupational career, and enjoy the moments. My recent step toward this career is to create my own personal webdesigning website to the public full time.
—Guest Deloris

Freelance Writer

I started freelance writing through poetry sites, and writing song lyrics to record publishing companies, after finding ads in magazines, for poetry, and song lyrics contests.
—Guest Deloris

Eye Injury

Got an eye injury and had a lot of free time, I was good at web design before so I started a company, I'm still 19 so I came here for advice, I used to be a database manager so I know how to balance my budget etc.. but interms of breaking into this industry, I need more knowledge to go all the way so I came here for advice. www.integralwebdesign.co.uk
—Guest Jabari Holder

I jumped in

to web development about 4 years ago and was recently laid-off from an seo / marketing company a few months back and decided to give freelancing a shot. Luckily I had some friends to give me pointers and a bit of work to start me off but, its not as easy as one would think. Check out my website http://kylebrothis.com/
—Guest Kyle Brothis

What A Ride

Now this may seem weird but the way i got into developing websites was hacking a stupid video game. I would see a bunch of really neat sites with tutorials and things and i really wanted to learn. I was in sales at the time and it was boring as ever (even though i was a 3 year veteran and was always and yes i mean every month the number 1 sales rep) It just got too boring. My stepdad owns a website in a niche market and my mom was doing the updates. They would pay me $10 an hour to work on it. I was like cool :D. So i started in the backdoor(shopsite) and completely streamlined everything. What used to take her 8 hours now took me 15 minutes. I loved it so much i quit my job and went into freelance. I am still very new and havent had very many paying clients. Still doing free websites alot of times. But i know if i stick with it i will get more clients. I love what i do now I LOVE IT. To me there is nothing else i would rather do.
—ThePhoneGuy

My husband suggested it

Married for the first time at 48 and I guess my husband wanted to make sure he had enough free time for himself. He suggested I start a business building websites. I hooked up with my sister who owns a franchise consulting business. She sends her clients my way. I also market print design. Got involved in the community doing free work to better my skills. Now I charge and people definitely pay if you have what they need. I name my price and never look back...my business is worth it. And always get a contract. I have a nice setup and never worry about whether I'll be paid. I still work a full time job but can't wait for the future when I can go solo. Go for it!
—Guest DB

work at home

Stuck in a bad marriage, my spouse would keep me from going to work, so I decided to try working from home. I picked up a couple of projects from Craigslist, some of those clients are still with me for 6 years, despite my spouse's penchant for ripping the phone wire out of the wall (bye-bye DSL) and throwing my tower (bye-bye hard drive). She put me completely out of work for about year by pouring coffee on my laptop. I'm no longer with her, and I am working as much as I could possibly manage - I am considering hiring some help in the coming year. I have been going to the occasional interview for a "job" (sure, I could take $80-120K) but so far no luck, perhaps I am meant to be self-employed...
—decibel.places

Government Job to Freelance

I was working for NASA when the internet began to infiltrate everything....around 1992. Being the techy in our organization, I was assigned the task of setting up a server in our office and creating a web site to tout our mission statement, activities, NASA spinoffs, etc. With the help of our computer support contractor, we set up a server on an old Mac, and I jumped into HTML with both feet. Ours was the 2nd of only two web sites at Kennedy Space Center at the time. When I retired in 2001, that number had grown to over 100 sites at the Center. Having learned quickly and come to really love web site design, I started my small home-based business. I don't advertise and get only 2-3 jobs/year for design and hosting, but it is really just a hobby for me. I am still learning and always learn something useful in the About.com forums. My web site is at http://bw-graphics.com .
—B.Williams

Start Freelancing

I started we with my own website and grown from their. I currently have 3 websites of my own, and 2 other. Mine are, efcussins.com, cloudweekly.com, and moneylifeattitude.com
—Guest EFCussins

Because I needed to earn!

I hadn't really intended to be a freelance anything, but I got made redundant for the fourth time in three years and as there was no help package available from the governement, I had to do something. With a mortgage and a young family, I carried on using exactly the same skills I used when I was employed, but now I used them for a dozen different companies instead of just the one. Sure it's precarious, with more work than I can handle sometimes followed by droughts, but I'd rather be independent of worrying about whether the company is going to survive. Waiting months to get paid for work done is still a problem, though. and I decided I would never let that happen to me again.
—Guest MarathonMan801

Freelance Web Design

I got started much the same as your writer, almost by accident. I built a great website for myself then others started asking me to do small jobs, before I knew it I was freelancing full time.
—Guest Christopher Ross

Doing A Little For Free

I've seen that acquaintances/friends/etc have needed some work done on their websites. On my own time, I've done some simple mocks and wire frames which I've sent as my ideas - usually totally unsolicited. I write very little and let the work speak for itself. If they're interested, they get in touch and we talk scope and money later. From there, it's word of mouth. There are lulls in interest, but if I need to pick up some extra work, I just do the same thing over again. It's really worked for me as a side-gig, and I don't dwell on it when I don't get a response or a bite.
—Guest lleonardi