I'd like to expand more on this subject. Can anyone suggest the best strategies or resources on how to raise your contracting rate?
Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
31–40 of 162 posts
Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#32I've quit my day job in 2012, found a contract with a great client on Upwork (forget how it was called at the time). Initially a 6 months project, I've worked with them for 2 years.
Got a few other contracts off that site, until one day I've asked one of my main clients to move out of that platform and work with me directly. Worked with them 2 years, until I got an offer in January to become a full time technical director and shareholder.
What I've learn contracting:
1. Increase your rates. Make them non-negotiable. There's people that are ready to pay for quality. If a client asks you to lower your rate, they probably aren't a good client in the first place.
2. Increase your rates every year, as you get more experience and technical knowledge.
3. Upwork was bad, and now is even worse. Move out of those kind of sites ASAP, when you can trust your client.
4. If you do good work, you'll have old clients pinging you once in a while with new opportunities. So, do outstanding work, and you won't have to look for new contracts as much.
5. Don't be afraid to learn. Try not to specialise too much. Generalists/full stack devs are very sought after. You'll start a contract as a web developer and soon you'll be doing DB optimisation and securing their infrastructure.
6. Increase your rates.
Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#33We run a mobile game design agency - https://mobilefreetoplay.com helping people create apps. Some tips from me
1. Get yourself an account on Transferwise.com so you can accept all currencies. It then works well to bill people in their local currency as they pay quicker.
2. We use Xero for all accounting and invoicing. It works and saves time at end of year.
3. Slack. I am on 9 different teams. I binned off email a long time ago.
4. Write content on a blog and blog posts, this is the single best way we get new clients.
5. Keep your prices high. We work with Google, Amazon, Warner Brothers and we got that through recommendations. High prices = top quality.Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#34It's funny how with all the job sites and modern tools we still live in the world where employees and employers can't find each other. I'm the CEO of a US based startup, but we're hiring everywhere. We actually have a few digital nomads at the company. Somehow we still have troubles finding more talent. There are a few job boards dedicated to digital nomads, but the volume there is surprisingly low.
You should have a link or something in your profile.
Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#35I'm a digital nomad who as in the same position. I couldn't find contract work for high-skill engineers. So, I started building a marketplace for it. Today that's Moonlight - we are still small, bootstrapped, and growing, but we have companies ranging from startups to a publicly-traded company hiring through the site. Hourly rates average a little over $100US. https://www.moonlightwork.com
Neat site, I just signed up...hopefully I can find a neat company to do some additional work with (working for a college is great from a stability perspective, but it doesn't always force you into the most interesting of projects...so the ones I come up with I have to find time for outside of the normal day to day work stuff that comes up...hopefully if I can find a good company to do some extra work for it'll help provide an outlet for me to continue my personal growth :-).
Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#36I 55 and have worked remote many times during my career (including currently). The best way I've found is to work onsite initially and dazzle them. Then when the contract is up tell them you are willing to continue remote.
Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
I do this, too. Unfortunately, recruiters suffer from two really big problems for a contractor: 1. They take a cut, a very big cut, of your hourly or daily rate. Thus, to the client, you seem very expensive, and to you, you seem cheaper than you should be. It becomes a new effort to maneuver a proper rate. 2. Recruiters suffer from the fact that they are salespeople, and salespeople often intuitively omit information…
> Recruiters suffer from the fact that they are salespeople ... reminds me of the real estate agent trick of posting a listing for a home that's too good to be true. when a potential buyer calls that agent, the agent says the home is no longer available, but asks "are you currently working with an agent?"
God I've had people do that to me with dogs. No, I will not be conversing with you further about spending $1000 more on a dog I don't at all want.
Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#38I've quit my day job in 2012, found a contract with a great client on Upwork (forget how it was called at the time). Initially a 6 months project, I've worked with them for 2 years. Got a few other contracts off that site, until one day I've asked one of my main clients to move out of that platform and work with me directly. Worked with them 2 years, until I got an offer in January to become a full time technical dir…
Upwork previously was oDesk AFAIK.
Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#39I've quit my day job in 2012, found a contract with a great client on Upwork (forget how it was called at the time). Initially a 6 months project, I've worked with them for 2 years. Got a few other contracts off that site, until one day I've asked one of my main clients to move out of that platform and work with me directly. Worked with them 2 years, until I got an offer in January to become a full time technical dir…
> 1. Increase your rates. Make them non-negotiable. There's people that are ready to pay for quality. If a client asks you to lower your rate, they probably aren't a good client in the first place.
What if you're mediocre, though?
Re: Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor?
#40I am a remote executive recruiting contractor. Applied through a job listing. They liked me. They hired me. Now I look for senior and executive people online, remotely.
What’s the best way to contact you? I’m in the market for a remote tech exec role but found all these remote job boards cater towards engineering roles.