Tips and tricks for becoming a successful contractor
January 20, 2012 
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If you have decided to start working for yourself as a freelancer or contractor, it can seem stressful to get started and begin making money. The first thing to remember is that no one starts making an amazing wage straight away, so it is often worthwhile becoming a freelancer or contractor on the side of a regular job to begin with.
Decide what it is exactly you want to do and advertise yourself everywhere you can think of. You might also want to look at specialist job sites (as well as more mainstream ones) to identify the type of work you are looking at and the jobs that are out there. Once you have gained your first contract the first thing is to never let the client know that they are your first job! If you have an air of professionalism and seem to know what you are doing the client will be confident in hiring you – it will also allow you to charge a little more than someone who is upfront about just starting out.
Work out with the client a contract you are both happy with, which states in the simplest terms possible what it is you are being hired to do, how long you intend to do the work in (freelancing is all about deadlines!) and how much the client will pay you on receipt of the work. Be strict in the contract on what it is you are hired to do. There is no point going into a company to help with tech support and then being levered into a design role, make sure you are paid for exactly what you have signed up for and stick to it.
Let the client know exactly how you intend to deliver the finished project, what they will have a say over and how long you will give them to make any changes. As a freelancer you need to be flexible when it comes to making changes and be prepared for negative input. You may complete a project only to find it has major changes that need making, but you should always be paid for your time and shouldn’t get frustrated – this is the part of the job that you make up for by being able to choose your own hours and which jobs you take in the first place!
Always make sure you network once you have gained a new client. They are the ones who will be able to tell other potential clients what a fantastic job you have done and recommend you for future work!
You don’t get to choose the terms of a contract. Agencies give you the contract. So you have to work the hours. And who would not want to work less hours if they are desperate for money to just about pay their bills.
The same goes for other things. And if they feel like it, the employers can drop you at a hat.
And its not choosing when you want to work. That would maybe be feasable with proper contractor rates. But with the rubbish rates being paid, you need to work all the time. But you can’t. With so little contracts about, you end up taking what you can get – even a poorly paid month’s contract – with the hope that something will come up in the meantime. That never comes up – at the beginning there are plenty of other offers where you have to be available immediately. Then as the contract goes by, these urgent offers dry up. The last week rolls by as one has been looking for the next contract and then its another two months without any contract = sitting on yor backside and looking constancly instead of earning money and gaining experience. The only experience you gain is sending out your CV. And two weeks into this sitting, suddenly you get agencies calling you about some contract where there are two inverviews and a technical test – sometime in the next couple of weeks.