With the US Presidential election coming up, I got to wondering about the political tendencies of my freelance brothers and sisters. Are we freelance web designers and developers a tight flock that predominantly lean one way when it comes to our politics? Or are we scattered and varied in our political beliefs. Let’s find out!

Photo by pgoyette.

Which way do the politics of freelance web nerds lean?

In the spirit of democracy and elections, tell us who you’ll be voting for in Elite Freelancing US Elections Poll which is over to the right on the sidebar. If you aren’t American, close your eyes for a sec, pretend you are, and cast your vote. And don’t worry, the voting is anonymous and no one will be able to tell that Joe Frankenwiener at 378 Pewpew Rd., Boulder, CO. voted for the Green Party or anything like that.

At the time of writing this, job giant SimlpyHired.com claims to have over 5.8 million jobs in their database. According to their web design and development job data, the salary range for a typical position in the US web industry is $55k to $74k. This spans general web design and development through to specialist niches such as user interface design.

Job data by Simply Hired

Average salaries in web design and development for September, 2008.

What surprised me the most was that flash design and development jobs have a lower average than general web design and development positions. I’d always assumed that the niche skill set of working with Flash paid better, not worse.

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I must admit, I’m picky when it comes to joining social networks.  It seems like new networks are popping up weekly and my inbox contains invitations to join them almost as frequently. Generally, I’m not interested in the overhead required in managing a profile on yet another site, so more often than not: I pass.  The one social network I couldn’t pass on though, is LinkedIn.

It was a couple of years ago that I first joined LinkedIn and it’s been good to me. For those of you unaware, LinkedIn is a social network focusing on work and career with a reported membership of 25 million people strong.  Think of it as a place where you can build social network which revolves around your professional life. Now, LinkedIn is great for worker bees of all kinds but of particular value for us freelancers. Here’s why:

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I believe a fit freelancer is a more profitable freelancer. From a fitness point of view, I dig the idea of having a job that allows me to work outdoors and do physical work.  That way I could enjoy being outside, keep fit and make a good living. As it turns out, I’m worth a lot more behind a computer and for the most part, love being there.

Photo by ericmcgregor.

Keep some dumbbells laying around the office and sneak a set in now and then.

The downside of being a nerd is having my body atrophy when I don’t push myself to stay active. I mean, we all know that keeping in shape is a great idea (for a so many reasons) but I think it’s especially true for us desk jockeys who are in long-term peril of turning somewhat chair shaped.

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Customer service.  It sounds like something that only employees of large companies have to worry themselves with.  The fact is though, us freelancers provide customer service every single time we interact with our clients.  Lets take a look at customer service,  how it effects our businesses and how you can shine like a freakin’ rock star in the eyes of your clients.

Photo by king edward.

Keep your clients coming back with killer customer service.

Differentiation

More than anything else, customer service will make or break your business and set you apart from your competition.  Yep, even more than your design work.  Many clients aren’t sure about what constitutes poor design work but you can be sure most of them know what poor customer services feels like. The good news is this: it’s way easier to consistently provide rock star customer service than it is to provide rock star design.

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I remember one of my jobs as a young teen was packing shelves at a local supermarket. Needless to say, there was nothing about this gig I liked aside from the fact that four of my friends worked the same shift. I dragged my heels at this job.

Photo by srbiosvert.

Mr. Happy Brick never works a day in his life.

The shelves I packed took longer than they should have and they were far from pretty. On the flip side there was Khalid, a fifty something year old fella who liked packing shelves. And because he enjoyed it, he’d rock up to work full of gusto and ready to pack the best damn shelf you ever saw.

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When it comes to freelancing, reliability is massively important commodity.  This is doubly true for remote freelancing since people never get a chance to meet each other in person.  Clients who know they can rely on you are happy clients that keep coming back. As a remote freelancer I’ve been both a service provider and a buyer of services. If you play this game long enough, you’ll work with some stand up designers and developers and you’ll work with some freakin’ awful ones.

Photo by joeshlabotnik.

Ideally, your clients should always look something like this.

Wingnuts

One guy,  lets call him Wingnut, vanished on me like a fart in the wind on the tail end of a project. He was working on the front-end design for a site and two weeks into it he disappears. Trying to call him or email him yielded no reply so I start making alternative arrangements to get the job done.  Meanwhile, he is updating his blog and obviously not dead.

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