Things I’ve discovered on the Web Consulting Learning Curve!
I have begun to successfully offer web consulting services, there are some tight turns that others might appreciate a caution sign for. When I began, I thought I would help others in the same way that I established my personal sites.
Quick Success on Personal Sites
I had never tried to become an expert, but I had relatively easy success throwing my personal site together using some off-the-shelf opensource software. I read one or two articles on Search Engine Optimization around January of 2000. I made a few changes to my site and submitted it to the major services. Within two weeks I was at the top of Google and Yahoo for my keywords.
Becareful when you think you’re standing!
All this led me to believe that I could enter the WebHosting/Design/Marketing arena with very little effort. WRONG! At this point, I have identified at least 7 key areas that have take quite a bit of research.
- Web Hosting Servers
- Domain Registration
- SSL
- Payment Methods
- WebDesign & Content Management Systems
- E-Commerce Systems
- Search Engine Optimization
Personal Sites Do NOT Require Experts!
The fact is, to setup a personal site only requires you learn enough to meet your specific needs. With my personal sites, I have been able use Mambo and then hack some opensource templates to get a site that expressed my needs (www.FreemanFeedback.org for example). I only needed to know the basic concepts of search engines. Then I just began throwing articles at it. I have continued to read and tweak here and there over the last 6 years, but I would ignore information that dealt with SSL or e-commerce. I didn’t need to really study CSS or PHP because I knew enough to make my site the way I wanted it.
Consulting Services REQUIRE EXPERTS!
As I began to court customers, I realized the areas above that required specific research. In order to quickly answer questions or estimate costs, you must have studied and become experienced in a larger base of knowledge. Since the industry is ever changing, don’t plan on doing this as a hobby. I do believe it can be a sideline job, but you better be ready to put some hours in. The information is out there and seeing your work meet companies needs is extremely rewarding, but …
…Slow Down, there is a curve ahead!
