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Hi all This is an article I wrote for Squidoo that I thought someone might find useful. It's some general advice for finding work as a freelance web designer. http://www.squidoo.com/uk_freelancer Hope someone finds it useful. Cheers!

I think doing a few sites for free to build your portfolio is a great idea. Hopefully this post I wrote a while ago might be useful inspiration for you: http://www.webdesignerforum.co.uk/topic/16610-finding-work-as-a-freelance-web-designer-uk Mailing lists of brand new UK businesses. Try us free at www.michrome.com .

Have a look at http://reignwaterdesigns.com/ad/tidbits/hacks/minimum_height_in_css.shtml Cheers James Mailing lists of brand new UK businesses. Try us free at www.michrome.com

Hi Remove "clear: both;" from the articleFooter class and add "float: right; width: 60%;" to the articleHeader class. I think that's what you're trying to achieve :-) James Mailing lists of brand new UK businesses. Try us free at www.michrome.com .

Thanks for all the comments

Many thanks for recommending us: glad you're finding our service useful.

Many thanks for the feedback - glad it was useful. --- Find start-ups and new businesses in the UK - www.michrome.com

Choose a target market (find a niche) When starting out, it's tempting to try to appeal to everyone. The general line of thinking being "having 1000 potential leads for work is better than having 100 potential leads". Unfortunately, the thinking is flawed. The thinking is flawed because not all leads are created equal: a local, small business might use a freelance web designer to create a web site for them whereas an international bank probably won't, for example. And there we have it - we've already started to define our target market. Rather than just offering "web design" perhaps "web design for small businesses in Hampshire" is more appealing to companies we are trying to reach? The trick is to narrow your offering until prospective clients feel you are more relevant to them than the competition. Always consider the following when thinking about what you can offer and who you want to reach. - Place Where you are is important. If you want to reach companies in Southampton, then tell Southampton! - Price Are you hoping to find a £800,000 project with an established multi-national or can you help startup companies with a more conservative budget? - Product Do you have one or two key products to offer? Perhaps you specialise in creating online brochures, online animations, online shops or sites optimised for search engines. Perhaps you offer sites based on templates that can be up and running the same day? - Promotion Could you offer a promotion to your target market? For example "10% discount to new startup businesses". - Past performance Boast about your past achievements, especially if they form a niche. For example "we specialise in online shops for clothing retailers" or "we have built web sites for more than 25 different yoga instructors". Write a fantastic sales letter First impressions count. If you'd rather not enlist the help of a copywriter, one of these books might prove helpful: How to Write Sales Letters That Sell by: Drayton Bird The Ultimate Sales Letter: Attract New Customers. Boost Your Sales by: Dan S. Kennedy I Want To Buy Your Product... Have You Sent Me A Letter Yet? by: Carol, AE Bentley The Complete Sales Letter Book: Model Letters for Every Selling Situation (Sharpe Professional) by: Rhonda Harris, Ann McIntyre Streetwise Sales Letters (Adams Streetwise Series) by: Sue Reynard, David Weiss Build a portfolio Most prospective clients will want to see a portfolio of your work. It's important your portfolio shows a wide range of your working styles: if all your example work has a very 'corporate' feel, for example, the owner of a toy shop may not be confident you can produce something 'fun'. When you are putting your portfolio together, think about practical considerations: - Print hardcopies Print screen grabs of your work onto good quality paper and leave them with your prospective client. They are far more likely to pick them up and show colleagues, friends and family. This also is advantageous if certain visual elements of your site are deprecated in some browsers. - Provide a link to your portfolio Your prospective client is busy with other things. Provide a direct link to your portfolio, so they do not have to navigate through your site. - Know the numbers behind the examples If you're asked how long an example site took to build or how much it cost, make sure you answer the question succinctly and set realistic expectations about what you can achieve within a budget or timeframe. - Know the people behind the examples If you are including a site in your portfolio, ask the owner if they would be willing to act as a reference or write a short paragraph endorsing your work. If you need to build the number of examples in your portfolio, consider designing a site for a charity. ------- Target Startups in the UK - www.michrome.com

Hi Stanni A shameless plug but if you're set on targeting local small businesses, Michrome should be right up your street.

If you don't want to install anything or you want to test across a broad range of browsers, screen sizes and operating systems, have a look at http://browsershots.org/ Target startup businesses in the UK - Michrome

Just so you know - the icons and text don't show in my version of Safari (3.1.2).

Manic Thanks for pointing that out. Noted and fixed. Target startup businesses in the UK - Michrome

Shubox, TruePresence, Shaun, Clearcutdesignz, Thanks for the positive comments; I do hope you find the service both worthwhile and easy to use. Target startup businesses in the UK - Michrome

Thanks for that, LeeSalter. Hopefully the New start-up businesses near Mansfield page is showing results a little closer to home now?

I expected to be able to click the wording on the paper and the email address on the phone ... but none of them seemed to be links (in Safari). Hope that's useful.