Hi everyone, this is my first post here, but I need some guidance! I landed my first freelance dev job today almost by accident, and I have very little idea how to proceed.
What are some resources you can point me to or advice you might have on getting started with this. I honestly don’t even know what questions to ask! If you need more info on anything, please let me know. Thank you in advance!
Hi,
Depends on what job you got, what you need to practice on ect…
You might want to look here(not sure if its what you asking for):
One of the biggest things I would recommend doing after the wireframing/prototyping stage is that you have your client send you all the content that they are providing for the project before you start to code it. Customer content I’ve heard (and experienced a bit) is what delays a lot of projects.
Other than that, try to think about this as a list of smaller problems that you are trying to solve rather than a website that needs to be built. Come up with a list of questions to figure out how you can better serve them.
Ok, that’s helpful, thank you. The job is mostly front-end; building a website for a local hairstylist. Eventually, she said she wanted to do some retail of hair products through the site, but obviously, I would have to do considerable more research on that, since I’ve been mainly working with HTML, CSS and JavaScript so far.
What would be the best way of laying out for her what content she would need to give me?
There are many ways to do it and I’m not an expert on that. One way could be asking her what her main goal is for the site. Is it to get the user onto an email list, buy things from the site, or to increase the traffic in her salon. The website can do multiple things but having a main focus can help you figure out the required content. She might even have an idea what she already wants so you could ask her what her dream website has/does.
On a last note, make sure you have a contract that details what is expected from each of you and what is included. For example, will you offer maintenance later on? How much is your charge per hour, or maybe she wants everything taken care of for her regularly. Will you have a monthly cost? Do some research and do your best. Let her know if there is something you can’t do by offering an alternative (instead of saying no). If you for sure won’t be able to do something she needs, tell her the truth.
Perfect, those are all things that I needed to hear, I will get on that. I’m sure that I can find some examples of contracts online and what would need to be included. Luckily, this isn’t a rush job, so I can take a little bit of time to get things in order.
So, normally does building the site include getting the domain and hosting in order? Or is that something that I would have to decide with the client?
It is something you would have to discuss. Often times people that want a website do not understand much tech stuff so offering to set it up for them or walking them through the steps is a nice service to provide. Include it in your cost breakdown if you do.