When you go from being a generalist — that is, a provider of some commodity service, like web design — to being a specialist, who solves a specific type of problem for a specific kind of client, three things almost always happen: You’re able to charge more. Your clients give you more creative latitude and freedom, and…
Have you ever wanted to get away from strictly selling your time for money? Is your long term plan to either escape consulting altogether (through something like bootstrapping your own products) or to remove yourself as a part of your “product”? Sooner or later, almost all of us get to this point. We want more control…
Last weekend, I spent most of the weekend scrutizining what was shaping up to be the biggest update in two years to Planscope, my software-as-a-service (SaaS) startup. And as I was working on the pricing grid and trying to come up with how I could incorporate many of the new features and services I’m working…
If you’ve been getting my newsletter for a while or have taken my course DYFR, you know all about my love for productized consulting. It’s a fantastic way to package your time into what looks and acts like an off-the-shelf product, and — done right — it can be huge for both the long-term stability…
I hosted a training seminar to teach local businesses how to improve the number of leads & sales driven by their Web sites. I charged the 5 attendees $250 each, for an effective hourly rate of $312.50, and I delivered outstanding value to them. Best of all, this something I believe any freelancer or consultant…
I’ve recently been to quite a few “product” conferences (LessConf, MicroConf, and BaconBizConf), and what I keep finding is that a LOT of freelancers are in attendance. It’s no secret that most freelancers want to one day build and sell a product or two of their own, but how? How do you figure out what to build and…