theAdmin.orgGrowing a simple software business

This morning as I boiled a pot of water, I took a step outside and saw the sun rising through the fall leaves of a tree. Something about it really hit me; the tree, the sun, or maybe the idea that I am able to take time off of my work to really see the world around me.

I realized that my business is making me happy. Not happy like “I am happy I decided to do this” happy, but really deep down happy. Like “My life is fulfilled” happy. My business is letting me work on fun projects with great people and is providing all that I need to survive (that includes a lot of books to read). The best part about my business is that it is mine and all of the successes and failures are because of my choices.

I think we all lose sight of the real reason we start a business, to improve our lives and the lives of people we care about. My business has improved mine and it makes me happy.

Eric

Has your business improved your life? Would you ever give it up?

Our society has grown dependent on computers. They are used in our shoes, clothing, and our children’s dolls. We are creating these computers at a breaking rate but are we really disposing of them correctly?

As harmless as they appear, these discarded computers and electronics contain substances that pose a threat to our environment and to our bodies. According to the Elizabeth Gorssman, author of “High Tech Trash:

Discarded electronics account for approximately 70 percent of heavy metals and 40 percent of the lead found in U.S. landfills according to a 2001 EPA report.

The world generates twenty to fifty million metric tons of e-waste each year, according to the United Nations Environment Programme.

There are several things each of us can do to help:

• Recycle old computers - organizations like Freegeek take old computers and will refurbish or break them down for recycling.
• Donate your old phone or computer to a charity or a needy individual.
• Slow down your electronic purchases - do you really need a new cell phone every 6 months?

This post was created as part of Blog Action Day, where bloggers around the world unite to write about the environment.

Eric

September is now gone but it left me with some vital lessons about business.

Marketing

If you are not marketing, you are not in business.

I think every freelancer should take the above quote and hang it over their desk. You cannot stop marketing and expect to survive for long. All of the marketing I worked on in August payed off this month with two new contracts.

Tracking goals

In order to improve something, you must track it. Last month I said that my goal for September was to bill 60 hours for the month. I ended up missing my goal by only billing 40 hours, but this was from measuring the wrong number.

What I really wanted was to make the amount of revenue those 60 hours would represent. If I used that as my goal I would have hit it, because I worked on some fixed price contracts that brought in the revenue I wanted and took less time than what I estimated. From now on, I will measure something that is the result and not the cause of the behavior that I want.

What to expect in October

Now that my marketing is working in overdrive, I am having to focus on closing many of the sales that I have pending and finishing up the current projects. So following the “Get Clients Now” program I have been using, I am going to focus on the proposals and contacts I have to see if I can serve them better and close out two projects. Some of the daily and weekly actions I have setup for myself are:

• Follow up with 1 proposal a day
• Get a “No” every day
• Have one new newsletter subscriber per week

As part of my program I have to set a goal for the month. Since last month I was measuring the wrong number I decided to set my goal to be $7,000 in revenue for October. This is a huge stretch but I really think I can make it if I try my hardest. The good thing is by tracking my revenue, I am following what is really important to the long term survival of my business.

Some lessons I learned from this month:

• Track your sales cycle: Start to track how long it takes you from discussing a project until you have a signed contract for the project. This is the length of your sales cycle, I found mine is longer than 30 days. If I want to work on a project in November, then I have to market and start talking to customers about it right now.
• Time for your business: It is really hard to take time to work on your marketing and business tasks when you are swamped but you still have to put in some time everyday. The last two weeks of September I had so many things going on I really slacked off on my marketing and I am starting to see a little dip from that. Try to put aside a set amount of time everyday to work on things other than your customer’s projects, and make sure they are the important things.

Eric

Depending on what your client needs, Ruby on Rails may or may not be a good technology choice. Whenever someone is looking for a new project I go through this mental checklist to see if Ruby on Rails would be the best fit for them:

1. Does the project call for a web based application?

Ruby on Rails can work outside of the web environment but it loses some of its productivity. Pseudo-web environments like web services will lose some of the productivity but the new REST features is making Ruby on Rails a good contender.

2. Is this a ”greenfield project” where no legacy code is in place?

If the client has legacy code in place that they are wanting to keep, the project will have problems when the time come to integrate the two codebases. Ruby on Rails can work in those places, it would just take some more effort and a very good deployment plan.

3. Are you skilled with Ruby on Rails or do you have access to a skilled development team?

A lot of people get into Ruby on Rails thinking it is a magic bullet. Unless you have programmed in Ruby before, you are going to have to be a fast learner. Learning a new programming language (Ruby) along with a large framework (Rails) is going to be painful. Luckily Ruby is a very beginner friendly programming language, and you can pick up the major points in a few weeks.

Because Ruby on Rails is very productive, it might be a good investment for a newcomer to take two weeks and write a simple throwaway application. I’m not new to Ruby or Ruby on Rails but I learned a ton of things in the 48 hours for the Rails Rumble 2007.

4. Does your client have high quality hosting?

Sad fact, Ruby on Rails needs a more powerful computer to run than something like PHP. But one thing to remember, do you really want to have a client spend $10,000 on a web project and then throw it onto a $10 month web host. A 256MB virtual private server is enough to get a good Ruby on Rails website running happily. I recommend Slicehost (referral link), they have hosted my websites since March 2007 and I have not had any problems at all.

5. Is the project going to use AJAX effects?

There exists many libraries to help add in AJAX effects to any programming language or framework but Ruby on Rails has a lot of built in helpers that can make adding AJAX one line changes. Ruby on Rails also makes it easy for your AJAX effects degrade gracefully for non-JavaScript users.

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I love Ruby on Rails but I find most of the headaches come from someone who uses Ruby on Rails because it is cool technology, and not because it is the best solution to their specific problem. Remember these are some of my guidelines that I use for my client projects.

What guidelines do you use to decide Ruby on Rails is your best choice?

Eric

Brett over at FreelanceSwitch wrote an article about working with freelancers with complimentary skills. It highlighted how freelancers shouldn’t be afraid to bring in extra help on a project, especially if it will help the client.

The first step is to connect to other freelancers or companies who offer skills that compliment your strengths. Graphical design is an area that will compliment my programming, so finding a great web designer to help me on some projects would let me offer more services to my clients.

Contact me if you are a great designer and would like to work with a web programmer on some projects.