Ok, so I know I said that Mr Oxton was my final interview, but I was chatting to Paul Farnell of SiteVista fame and just couldn’t resist but to ask if he would do the same (hey that rhymed). He was more than happy to oblige, and has some great advice for anyone looking to ‘go it alone’. I promise, this really is the last interview.

Why

Nathan: So what was it that made you decide to ‘go it alone’?

Paul: Well I’ve never worked at a web design agency or anything like that. Since around 1998 I’ve been doing client work, and it just gradually built up from being work for friends and family whilst I was still at school, to proper paying clients and so on.

Ch ch ch ch changes

Nathan: How did you prepare for the change in employment, did you ‘do it proper like’ and write a formal business plan before you started?

Paul: As there wasn’t actually a defined start to it, I never had a business plan – or any kind of plan really! I just aimed to get as much work as I could.

First day

Nathan: On your first day did you do a shed load of work or just play PlayStation?

Paul: I never have a problem getting work done on web stuff, because like a lot of people I genuinely really enjoy it, which is a great position to be in.

Rates

Nathan: If you charge by the hour, how did you decide on your hourly rate? Did you pluck a figure from the air or work out a rate based on the salary you required?

Paul: I started out picking an hourly rate that was just a bit higher than my previous part time job – I measured people for hire suits at Moss Bros.! I thought all this web was a bit more skilled than that, so I added a bit to my previous wage. Since then I’ve gradually increased it over the years and no-one has ever complained. Now I charge per day rather than per hour.

Selling yourself

Nathan: What about marketing then… do you advertise your services in local rags, wear a short skirt and tout yourself on street corners or just rely on word of mouth?

Paul: I placed one advert in my local paper and got two clients from that. Since then everything has come from word of mouth. Recently I’ve started attending conferences, like Reboot in Copenhagen, and the Geek Dinners. They’ve been really worthwhile for me, and every time I’ve attended one I’ve ended up working with some of the people I met there. Plus they’re a lot of fun! Reboot especially – lots of drinking!

Structure

Nathan: How does your average work day pan out? For example do you have specific times during which you respond to prospects and clients, read blogs and eat biscuits, or do you just go with the flow?

Paul: Since I’ve started reading blogs over the last year or so, I’ve found that I now need to plan my time more carefully. FeedDemon just sucks my life away! I don’t always stick to my plan entirely but then I don’t think many people do, do they? It certainly helps though, if I tried to “go with the flow�? I’d never get anything done.

Work and play

Nathan: Does working freelance ‘actually’ give you more free time for yourself and/or your family? Or in reality and do you actually spend every waking hour sat at the computer trying to make sure that you can pay the bills each month?

Paul: No, definitely the latter. Not just to pay the bills, but because I work from home my computer is always there so I think, “I’ll just check my feeds one more time, and see if there’s any email whilst I’m there�?. I’d love to get an office, but I don’t feel I can justify the expense.

When disaster strikes

Nathan: What’s the one single biggest disaster that you’ve had to face, and how did you deal with it?

Paul: Nothing major, money-wise. I’ve had my servers switched off by my host because their system thought something fraudulent was afoot (it wasn’t) – they were off for two days, and I was on holiday at the time. That was pretty stressful.

The future (is bright hopefully)

Nathan: Being self employed you must have some ambition… where do you want your business to be in ten years time?

Paul: Ten years – wow, that’s a long time! Within a few months I’d like half of my income to come from my SiteVista product, and within a year I’m hoping to have launched two more Vista products for web designers. After that, who knows?

Tip please

Nathan: And finally, what single tip would you give to someone who is considering going freelance to help make the leap into the unknown that little less daunting?

Paul: Allocate some of your time to “do a 37signals�? and build a product. It’s a ridiculously good feeling to know, “right, I have X subscribers, so this month I’m guaranteed £X�? – it gives you so much more security. And it’s ten times more fun to work on compared to client work – you can do anything you want! I dedicate about a third of my time to SiteVista – I see it as if it were a client. Other than that, I guess it goes without saying that you should have a blog, and I’d try and meet up with other people from the industry as much as you can.

Thanks for the interview, Nathan!

Nathan: No worries, thanks for your time Paul.