Computer Geek, SharePoint MadHatter, devOps Champion, Automation Fan, PowerShell Player and sometimes I write Blog Stuff. I know GeekFu and TechNinja. Passionate about software delivery, devOps, agile
Couple things off the top of my head from my freelance days...
Get a tool to track your work, something like Asana where you can schedule out tasks associated with each project, integrate with everHour or something similar for reporting, even if it's just you, the reports are helpful as a visual how you are spending your time. asana.com/apps/everhour
Obviously you're just starting out, but having a professional, clean looking site is going to be important (after all, you're hanging your shingle out as a web developer and clients are going to look you up and check out your site). If you've already done a couple things, put together a portfolio/projects page to show samples of your work (get permission for stuff like that from previous employers).
What are your strengths? Web Developer these days covers a wide range of technology, so you probably want to have a couple key words to emphasis your strengths, i.e. WordPress, PHP, CSS, UX, JavaScript, IA, etc. In addition to the technology you are familiar with, discuss accomplishments, value added to the businesses who are your customers, such as setting up a shopping cart that helped a business convert X amount of vistors giving them $Y in additional sales. As you start off on this journey, ask clients for testimonials that you can post for other clients to reference as well.
As for finances, when I did consulting I always kept separate accounts between the "business" and personal, just because it was easier to track income and expenses that way, so you may want to see about setting up a separate credit card to pay for any incidentals that you only use for business expenses, i.e. buying yourself a new monitor, computer, paying for internet access, development tools, client lunches and other incidentals.
Lastly, don't stretch yourself at first. You always want to under promise and over-deliver, since you're just starting out you may be tempted to under-estimate projects trying to win a contract. Be careful with your estimates. When I first started out I always tried to give the estimate "assuming nothing went wrong", but then you end up with unclear requirements, additional feature requests, or you code yourself into a corner and spend a lot of time crushing bugs and running over deadlines. Always give yourself plenty of time.
If you estimate two days but it takes you three, you end up being a horse. But if you estimate four days and it only takes you three, you're a unicorn.
For further actions, you may consider blocking this person and/or reporting abuse
We're a place where coders share, stay up-to-date and grow their careers.
Couple things off the top of my head from my freelance days...
Get a tool to track your work, something like Asana where you can schedule out tasks associated with each project, integrate with everHour or something similar for reporting, even if it's just you, the reports are helpful as a visual how you are spending your time. asana.com/apps/everhour
Obviously you're just starting out, but having a professional, clean looking site is going to be important (after all, you're hanging your shingle out as a web developer and clients are going to look you up and check out your site). If you've already done a couple things, put together a portfolio/projects page to show samples of your work (get permission for stuff like that from previous employers).
What are your strengths? Web Developer these days covers a wide range of technology, so you probably want to have a couple key words to emphasis your strengths, i.e. WordPress, PHP, CSS, UX, JavaScript, IA, etc. In addition to the technology you are familiar with, discuss accomplishments, value added to the businesses who are your customers, such as setting up a shopping cart that helped a business convert X amount of vistors giving them $Y in additional sales. As you start off on this journey, ask clients for testimonials that you can post for other clients to reference as well.
As for finances, when I did consulting I always kept separate accounts between the "business" and personal, just because it was easier to track income and expenses that way, so you may want to see about setting up a separate credit card to pay for any incidentals that you only use for business expenses, i.e. buying yourself a new monitor, computer, paying for internet access, development tools, client lunches and other incidentals.
Lastly, don't stretch yourself at first. You always want to under promise and over-deliver, since you're just starting out you may be tempted to under-estimate projects trying to win a contract. Be careful with your estimates. When I first started out I always tried to give the estimate "assuming nothing went wrong", but then you end up with unclear requirements, additional feature requests, or you code yourself into a corner and spend a lot of time crushing bugs and running over deadlines. Always give yourself plenty of time.
If you estimate two days but it takes you three, you end up being a horse. But if you estimate four days and it only takes you three, you're a unicorn.