How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-week consulting

Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by sown on Monday November 19, 2012 @01:28PM (#4805657)

How do you make business acquaintances? I have a hard enough time leaving the house.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by onewland on Monday November 19, 2012 @01:35PM (#4805688)

If you write Ruby and go to a SFRuby Meetup, you will learn quickly that even if you are looking for work it is quite annoying to say you are looking for work, as the recruiters swarm in like vultures to fresh carrion.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by xiaoma on Monday November 19, 2012 @03:37PM (#4806254)

I write ruby (though I haven't done much rails yet), and went to literally dozens of SFRuby meetups. Yes, recruiters did swarm in a few times. However, it was a massive waste of time, hopes and energy since every single one of them was looking for a senior engineer. Interestingly, the last SFRuby meetup I went to at Carbon5, where we all had to introduce ourselves and what we did, about 5-7 of the twenty some people there were unemployed.

I've actually had better success finding work through HN and through friends of people I've worked for before (once again no help to someone just starting out).

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by pknerd on Monday November 19, 2012 @01:57PM (#4805793)

And what about those who not even in US and belong to a "3rd world country" where one wish to give work only because it's Cheap?

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by mootothemax on Monday November 19, 2012 @02:29PM (#4805939)

And what about those who not even in US and belong to a "3rd world country" where one wish to give work only because it's Cheap?

Be good at what you do; your location shouldn't affect your consulting rates.

By way of example, I routinely bill in excess of $100/hour despite being located in Poland. And trust me, I'm working on increasing the value I deliver, and charging appropriately.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by Ives on Monday November 19, 2012 @03:55PM (#4806324)

I sort of agree. You can definitely bill over $100/hour in Poland (or Belgium, where I'm located) if you're an experienced consultant, but patio11 was billing that much before he changed his pricing approach.

Do you know of anyone that bills 20k$ a week in Poland?

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by pknerd on Tuesday November 20, 2012 @12:53AM (#4807921)

There might be exceptions. Been working as a freelancer for parallel income for years, I see how the tone of clients get changed when they find out that I am not from 1st world. They eventually start expecting something cheap. Issue is that we Asians do spoil them by working cheap too. For instance Noah Kagan's APPSUMO was built in just $60 by a few Pakistani developers.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by yen223 on Monday November 19, 2012 @07:15PM (#4807082)

Are you talking about local clients, or do you have to take on international clients?

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by SwellJoe on Monday November 19, 2012 @02:05PM (#4805825)

Do the same things. Get a blog, become well-known for being awesome. I've hired several "third world country" developers at US market rates (not Silicon Valley rates; more like midwestern rates, like $30-$50/hour) because they were good. And, I've passed on $10/hour developers because they didn't convince me they could do the job. It's about value, not price.

That's not to say you aren't at a disadvantage, if you're wanting to charge very high rates while being in a third world country, but it's not impossible. Doing the same things suggested by this post, and by other comments, is how you raise your value. You may be raising it from a lower starting point, but it can be raised, and there isn't really a firm upper bound on how high it can go.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by debaserab2 on Monday November 19, 2012 @02:27PM (#4805926)

Midwestern rates for a decent programmer should not be lower than $80/hr. If you're finding good programmers in the midwest that are less than that, they don't understand their value in the local market.

Source: I work in an office co-share with a dozen or so web developers in Minneapolis.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by SwellJoe on Monday November 19, 2012 @02:47PM (#4806023)

Chicago and Minneapolis and other big cities don't count in my estimate. I'm speaking more about folks in places with very low cost of living, and no tech industry to speak of (but there are nerds everywhere). The fact that you work in a co-share with a dozen web developers means you work in a place where developers are a known quantity and have a reasonably high value. There are developers in Idaho, too. They don't usually make $80+/hour, even on contract, unless they're famously good.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by thisisdallas on Monday November 19, 2012 @03:05PM (#4806107)

Unfortunately, I can attest to this. I am one of those developers who live in a low cost no tech industry smaller city and I would cry tears of joy if I could land a job for $80/hr. I understand my value and I understand what I can bring to the table but that doesn't mean jack when potential clients could "make a website in Word if they just had the time."

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by ryusage on Monday November 19, 2012 @04:54PM (#4806510)

This is exactly correct. I work in a midwest city which I'd consider small/medium sized, and my entry level salary five years ago was only around $20/hr (which, as a single guy with a low cost of living, seemed like a lot). The most I've heard of a developer making here was somewhere on the order of $65/hr, and that was considered very high. If I went to Chicago, that wouldn't be high at all, but my costs of living would also probably triple.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by pknerd on Tuesday November 20, 2012 @12:56AM (#4807926)

I do second you and there are some good guys like you who value talent rather than saving a few $$$.

Patrick's post is more about consultation rather than freelance work, I wonder whether people prefer to hire remote consultants?

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by btilly on Monday November 19, 2012 @03:31PM (#4806227)

You are aware that patio11 established his reputation while living in Ogaki, Gifu, Japan? Which is a small, centrally located city in Japan, without a significant tech presence that I am aware of.

OK, it isn't a third world country. And Patrick is an American. But still, with the Internet you don't have to physically live in a well-connected place to make connections.

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by flyinRyan on Friday November 23, 2012 @12:08PM (#4822854)

Price is about perceived value, not what the product costs to produce. Your living costs are irrelevant to your rate (except setting the minimum you need to get to make it worthwhile, but even that doesn't affect market rate just viability).

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Re:How I went from $100-an-hour programming to $X0,000-a-wee... by bmelton on Monday November 19, 2012 @01:17PM (#4805604)

Perhaps not the most appropriate forum, but in paragraph three of the post, s/peak/peek/g.

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