To add further to my earlier post:<br><br>If you are looking at long term steady income and have very good Drupal expertise, you should look at <br><br>a) Having a long term retainer relationship with clients. I.e They pay you every month for a block of hours whether they use it or not. This would work well with few clients as they don't have to hire full time employees but it depends on how efficient and available you are to them.<br>
<br>b) Build something very scalable that has mass appeal - something like <a href="http://www.galaminds.com">http://www.galaminds.com</a><br><br>c) Build your own web properties or become an equity based technical partner with a well established publishing industry business (newspaper or magazine) which is trying to put up a social network or rebuild their site.<br>
<br>In my opinion individual consultant generally gets tired after 2 to 3 years doing same thing over and over again for clients and at the same time having to keep up with Drupal will make his/her normal working day 16 to 18 hours. In the long run this will impact family and health. In services business you are also limited by your own capacity to work (unless you outsource your work or work with a partner who can take extra work). <br>
<br>But if you are building membership or ecommerce based web properties in specific niche or scalable solution in a particular vertical (SaaS), you will see higher returns for your invested time in the long run.<br><br>I do know at least a few of the big Drupal development shops trying to take this route and move up the value chain. This would also be an ideal situation for any individual too to get into.<br>
<br>I have gone through this entire cycle myself and hence I am sharing my own personal experience here. We started as Services business but today we have structured our business into Services, Verticals, Products, Training and Infrastructure Support Services. We have been recently nominated for "Best Innovative Technology Company in state of Gujarat, India" for GESIA Awards 2009. Of course - our other technology area of expertise is also Ruby on Rails where we have started doing a lot more work nowadays.<br>
<br>Roshan<br>-- <br>--<br>Gloscon Solutions Inc - <a href="http://www.gloscon.com/portfolio">http://www.gloscon.com/portfolio</a><br>* Drupal and Ruby on Rails Powerhouse<br>Skype : bpocanada<br>T : 604.630.4292 (Canada) <br>
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permanently destroy this email and all copies of it. <br>***************************************************************<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On Sun, Mar 15, 2009 at 12:21 AM, Sam Alexander <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:sam.polenta@gmail.com">sam.polenta@gmail.com</a>></span> wrote:<br>
<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; padding-left: 1ex;"><p>To respond to the thread about quitting the day job to freelance, I could also add that I have been freelancing for 10 years and aside from the issues mentioned, there are two which, for me at least, are prime. One is getting work and the other is getting paid.</p>
<p>Getting paid is usually not an issue, but I have had several clients over the years who failed to pay. Not only complete deadbeats who never paid anything but I twice had long-term gigs where I was basically telecommuting part time for someone (a small firm) and after a year, or 3 years in one case, of steady pay, the last month's paycheck never came. While this is not a major issue (in the long run), it *is* an issue.</p>
<p>The other is finding work. I am a good programmer and I know Drupal well, but I am a lousy salesman. People who can read my resume and appreciate my talents are happy to pay me a very good hourly rate. But for others who don't have an understanding of programming, I think they wonder why on earth should they give me such a rate when some other bozo is only asking for $30 an hour and he also claims to know how to program.</p>
<div>On the same note, I wanted to ask people if anyone has any advice on how to get new work. This is for sure my weakest point. This year has actually been, thus far, very good for me--a few small gigs here and there and two fairly large gigs which pay on time and are interesting work for me--and all at a good rate. But those two gigs are slowing down and ending soon and I am looking for more work, but, as usual, not entirely sure how to find it.</div>
<div> </div>
<div>Thanks,</div>
<div>Sammy</div>
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