S ometimes, like last month, everything seems to go wrong all at the same time. Thankfully this month karma seems to have evened itself out again and a lot of really good things have happened. I thought it’d be good to catch a few small updates and a couple of lessons!
What’s Going On
After a decidedly mediocre start to 2010 and a veritable drought of clients, I’m fully booked for the foreseeable future again. It’s funny how just 2 weeks of no work can really get you worried, even though I knew that things were in the pipeline I was slightly overcome by the panic of “I’m not doing anything”.
Since then, I’ve had a really enjoyable month’s work on several smaller projects and one big one. 12 months in, I’m finding that my skill-set is becoming more refined and the variety of work that I do is slowly reducing. A year ago I was doing hosting, email marketing, design, development, seo, social media marketing and consultation. Now I’m finding that the majority of my clients are coming to me for graphic design, WordPress development, and online marketing consultation – the three things which I absolutely enjoy most of all.
Spreading Yourself Thin
I think it’s probably a natural instinct for a web-based freelancer to want to offer as many services as possible. I’ve seen a lot of people start this way, presumably thinking that the more services you offer, the more things you can sell to clients. The occasional blog post pops up about being a Jack of all trades and master of none too, which is usually met with some lively debate.
I don’t think that specialising in a single niche (such as UX, or front end development) is the way forward; in this sort of situation you really are limiting your prospects. That being said I think offering a “bit of everything” is arguably worse as you really can’t claim to be good at all of them. I think there’s a happy middle ground somewhere between the two that I’ve discovered: mastering about three niches that all complement each other.
Design is my first love – it’s probably what I spend the most time on out of everything. WordPress is, in my opinion, the best platform ever created and is something that I would be happy to work with all day for the rest of my life. Online marketing is where I love to exercise the logical side of my brain and come up with unique ideas that make sense. These three things really complement each other quite well: I can design, build, and promote a very wide range of extremely high quality sites. This means I’m saying goodbye to ecommerce sites, little static sites, and custom web applications. I’ll refer those enquiries to one of the many other amazing people who I’ve come to know in this industry.
Some Updates About This Site
Regular posting this year is something that I really want to get into the habit of but so far I’ve been rather unsuccessful. On this basis I’m going to try doing slightly shorter posts a bit more often. It’s quite daunting coming up with one of my big blog posts which need research and planning. I also know from experience that the longer the post, the less likely you are to read every word of it.
I’m also working hard behind the scenes to improve my writing style and make my articles as engaging as possible. I realise that the technical details of this endeavor are of little interest to most people but I’d love to hear if/when you read a post of mine that you feel was particularly well written. (Don’t worry if the opposite is true, I have enough people telling me all about those.)
Finally
I feel like there are loads of things that I haven’t covered in the last year, things that I’ve taken for granted along the way. If you’re one of the group of people who’ve read this blog ‘cover-to-cover’ so far, please drop me a line in the comments and tell me what you’d like me to write more about. I aim to please!
Photo by DavidSpinks
Just keep the blog posts candid and authentic, and I’ll keep reading. As for your writing, it is great as it is. Of course all writing can be improved whoever the author, but I wouldn’t worry so much about that as your spelling is good as is the flow. I tend to write like I talk on my gaming blog, but think a little more about how I put things across on my personal blog. I’m rambling now. Keep it up O’NOLAN (did I get it right this time?).
You got it! +100xp for you! :) Thanks for the kind words too!
I personally like articles where someone is really sharing the business of running a business, sharing concerns and epiphanies, showing themselves as human. Running a small business can be a lonely affair and it’s easy to become insular and as in this post, having moments of doubt and having things go wrong! Keep keeping it real and I also like your style of writing too. Good work and thank you for sharing :-)
Great article John, it’s always good to get an insight into how others work and I think at some point everyone has been guilty of spreading themselves too thin. Focusing on the things you do best / enjoy the most is the way to go.
Another insightful article – thanks for your honesty and interesting thoughts on niche skills and general ‘jack of all trades’.
As a someone just starting to move into webdesign, with the long term goal of either agency or freelance web design, or possibly development, I’m wondering what you would suggest in finding your niche(s)? With so much information available, and so many paths to take, I’m not sure where to start (other than XHTML & CSS as a foundation). My current learning curve feels ‘jack-o-trades’ at the moment and hard to focus, or feel I’m making positive progress. Would be interested on any comments and/or suggestions.
I’m on the side that thinks designers should be able to build their sites (from a coding point of view) hence the XHTML/CSS, and most likely JQuery, learning I’m thinking I should be pursuing, but there’s still lots of directions, lots to learn and no clear direction.
Any advice very much appreciated.
Am guilty of being a cover-to-cover reader of this blog. Pure and simple I find your manner of writing straight forward, insightful and honest. When things are wrong, you let us know….and also give us your thoughts on how to resolve. The monthly reviews, with your targets (hit & miss), are very enlightening and I’m attempting to work on something similar in my learning and designing…..with fairly reasonable success, which is a good feeling.
Hi Ben,
I think the niches you want to go for are the ones which you really enjoy most. An easier way to figure it out (for me anyway) is to take the things you like LEAST and stop doing them, you’ll find that the ones you get left over with are typically the ones which you really like and are really good at!
Thanks for the kind words too – they’re what keep me going! :)
Thanks John.
Can understand to focus on the niches you enjoy most – that way you’ll be more enthused to do the work, and feel good. I would imagine this is even more important if freelancing so you don’t get down trodden and procrastinate. However, from a learning point of view I’m struggling to know where to head, or is it that I need to dabble in everything first, give everything (I say that lightly – not going to try EVERYTHING obviously LOL), a try, build some test sites, see how things are done, and then I’ll get a gut feeling about what I do and don’t like?
Also, another quick question – if acting for a client as a freelancer, do clients expect you to be able to design and build a site, or will they be understanding in the definitions of each task? Or would you take the task in hand and then outsource (possibly to contacts you’ve met along the way, or worked with before)? For example, say I’m kick ass at Photoshop but can’t code…..is that limiting my potential client opportunities or is that something which is standard, and workable?
What most freelancers do in this situation (myself included) is to build up a good network of colleagues to subcontract for projects. No need to worry the client with your limitations as long as you can get the work done! It took me years, but I now have a partner-in-crime who’s just about the best developer I’ve ever met – so building up that relationship has been totally invaluable. Between the two of us, there’s pretty much nothing we can’t do!
Nice post, and congrats on having a great March. This game is always up and down, but I found as time goes on, things become more and more steady.
About this blog – I may be alone on this one, but I think I’d rather see LESS posts, but longer more impactful ones. IMO, that would engage readers more and build anticipation for each new article. I’m debating this same issue for my own blog…
Interesting thoughts Brian thank you – I’ll take that into consideration :)
I would say that as long as you’re passionate about your doing (and writing) you can’t go wrong.
Totally agree with you on finding your niche(s). Soon (can’t wait) I’ll be too going down the rabbit hole to see how deep it goes (aka move to full-time freelancing) and I’ve decided to dedicate every single second to the 2 things I love most: iPhone development and custom web solutions (Ruby on Rails).
Already got a lot of questions like ‘Why not Android?’ (and I’m sure I’ll get even more) but I believe staying focussed on what you love, enjoy and master most is the key to success. We’ll see! ;)
Please don’t stop writing about freelancing (and small business matters); e.g. the article on 30-day payment terms was brilliant and the comments were full of good advice.
Cheers!
Thanks Paul, always appreciate your kind words and comments :)
Great post once again John, your writing style is great as is but it would be interesting to see what you have in store.
Very insightfull, I am also trying to find my niche, you make a good point about selecting the few that complement each other.
Thanks for the post!
I’m completely with you on the whole, don’t specialise on one skill but on the same token don’t try and do absolutely everything. There is nothing wrong with learning a whole variety of skills and technologies, but don’t offer these to your clients unless you enjoy working on them and can really say you know enough should things get tricky. No one is going to judge you if you’re an expert in WordPress development but can’t design that well, this is why outsourcing was invented.
Play to your strengths and use the strengths of others to make up the rest. You’ll be respected more for saying no and focussing your skill-set than if you try and do everything.
A very good post John – it definitely makes me sit down and think about what my strengths are and what I should be focusing on, rather than being somebody that can “dabble in this, dabble in that”. In doing that I’ll never really find my true strength. Thanks for making me realise I need to re-evaluate a little :)