Ask HN: Freelancer inquiry etiquette? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Freelancer inquiry etiquette?

8 pointskohanz14 comments

I'm curious what people consider to be proper etiquette for communications between freelancer/consultant types and their potential clients. I recently became an independent consultant after 10+ years as a salaried developer and while I'm happy with my existing clients and work, I have noticed some quirks in communication when advertising my services.

Specifically, when I have posted in the Freelancer? Seeking freelancer? thread, I have had the following happen twice:

1. High-ranking person from company X contacts me with a brief problem description and asks whether I'm interested. In one case they also asked for my rates.

2. I respond in a timely, enthusiastic and well-crafted (if I may say so) fashion with the info they requested.

3. I never hear from them again.

I've played the online dating game (happily married now), so I have a thick skin for rejection and not getting a response. However, this is quite a bit different. First, these organizations contact me, seemingly with a need and with questions. They are asking me to take the time to respond. I fully understand that they probably contacted multiple candidates, but I feel it would be proper etiquette for them then to notify those who they don't select.

This is not like a job posting where the applicant initiates the conversation. The clients are starting and then abandoning the conversation.

In the dating game, my thoughts would be "They're flaky, you dodged a bullet", but these two requests came from a startup with a decent seed round and a large, established professional organization. So I'm wondering if this is an acceptable norm?

Would love to hear opinions from more experienced freelancers.

This can happen and I wouldn't call it unusual. (Companies do this to interviewees all the time, let alone consultants. That is rude. You're supposed to tell a candidate if they're moving forward or not, because many candidates can't afford to just sit around; they aren't in the business of running a long-term sales cycle, like consultants are.)

Consulting leads who have found you on a message board are just shopping. You're offering a product, they kicked the tires a little, they decided not to buy today. These were cold leads, and busy people, so I wouldn't take it too personally. This is how sales works. You now share a bond with every other salesperson in the history of civilization.

One thing you can do is: follow up. This is what books like Get Clients Now! will tell you: The secret to making sales is to follow up, and to create systems for remembering to follow up. Give it a week or two, then write back to these folks: "We spoke the other week about X, and I wanted to make sure that you found what you were looking for. Are you still looking for help or all you all set?" It's okay to keep this very short. It's just a reminder, a sign that you still care.

One reason why you follow up is that a lot of these shopping expeditions just sort of get lost in limbo. Maybe the problem receded in importance for a month. Maybe they're short on runway and are hunting underneath the sofa cushions for loose change. Maybe someone just forgot.

You, patio11, and others nailed the advice that I needed to hear from this thread: Follow. Up.

As Patrick mentioned, as a newbie to this line of work, I have a slight fear of "annoying" people with follow-up contact that I need to get over.

Thanks to all for the helpful words of advice.

When I first started out, I experienced the exact same issue as you.

The problem is that whilst you're giving a timely and informative reply, it's just that; you're still just a name, albeit now with a tiny bit more information.

What really swung things around for me was always pushing for a Skype or in-person meeting, the latter being ideal, but Skype being a decent substitute.

This meeting lets you both size one another up, and figure out how you might work best together.

And, for that matter, whether the project, client and consultant are going to be a good match!

One other "so obvious in hindsight, it's painful" moment: never, ever, ever tell a potential client "I'm sorry, I'm fully booked for the next X months."

Instead, have the initial meeting, see how things go, and just simply tell them that you're available from day X.

If you're a good match, the client will wait.

Finally, my number one tip on how to really stand out of the crowd?

Reply to the initial inquiry fast, as in minutes after receiving.

You only need to say "Thanks for getting in touch, is it OK if I get back to you with a proper reply later on today?"

Given the incredibly poor communication habits of the average programmer on the street, small courtesies like this really pay off!

That's not ideal, but you'll have a lot more prospects go suddenly dead on you in your career than two.

That's definitely understood. I suppose I'm wondering at what rate people encounter behaviour like this. For me, this early on, it seems rather common, but my sample size is extremely small. How often (e.g. what % of leads) does this happen to the average, experienced consultant?

Lead qualification is a learned skill, but my quick sense is that a cold inbound from HN doesn't strike me as being supremely well qualified. I'd estimate that a cold inbound from HN would pass lead qualification and then successfully have an actual sales conversation maybe 25% of the time, if that. A portion of the 75% would fail to have the conversation due to... mutually insufficient interest in making the conversation happen. (Flakiness suggests the prospect is at fault. I would suggest that the prospect is, like you, a busy businessman, and that failure to follow up is most likely not intended to communicate "We are pursuing other options" but rather "Oh, crikey, I forgot about that among the 100 things I had to do this week." The successful consultant will learn to follow up with prospects and get them to say Yes or No explicitly rather than having that introverted fear of bothering somebody make one convince oneself that they've been rejected. And, oh boy, have I had that scuttle perfectly doable gigs before, let me tell you.)

(For the peanut gallery: "Lead qualification" means figuring out whether someone is worth your time to sell to. For example, most startups are not in a great position to require my services or, to be blunt, in a position to pay for them. If one hypothetically sent me a cold email out of the blue, and I had consulting availability, I'd research/ask to figure out whether they were at a certain level of success/sophistication, whether the person contacting had decisionmaking authority, and whether they had high five figures in the budget prior to having a sales talk. If they didn't, I'd probably still offer to have a chat, but it would be a "I like talking to startups and would love to give you a few pointers" flavor of chat rather than a "I am intrigued by your company and would like to discuss a few ways by which we could work together" flavor of chat.)

Completely off topic, but please please please, keep banging the drum on the whole "theirs no such thing as a sales vs tech. battle". The most recent podcast and your comments are so spot on.

Thanks. I'll try my best.

failure to follow up is most likely not intended to communicate "We are pursuing other options" but rather "Oh, crikey, I forgot about that among the 100 things I had to do this week."

This is absolutely worth repeating, or even printing and sticking on the wall.

Developing a nose for these sorts of good-but-busy clients takes time, but they can often turn out to be the best clients as they're the least likely to meddle and the most likely to schedule tight, productive calls with you.

You don't need this advice, but for anyone struggling to deal with busy leads, you need to ratchet down the complexity of your communications each time you get in touch. There are absolutely busy clients who won't/can't respond to complex e-mails that are wisely trying to assess a situation, ask questions, etc... but who will instantly approve a $10k order on the back of a very simple "Would you like us to do X? It'll cost Y" style of question. It's happened to me! :-)

I've been consulting for a few years now. In my experience it takes an average of nine months to go from stranger to the point where I get a green light on a significant project. Many times the client falls off the map. Just ignore it and follow up.

IMHO, your rates / experience were probably too high for what they were looking for. Note that "high" does not mean your specific rates are too high, but that startups generally pay poorly & they found someone cheaper.

Other than that, people are really busy (especially if they're high-ranking like you say). You can always send a follow-up email a few days later confirming if they had received your last email & play the "I'm trying to lock in my availability for the next few weeks" card.

Stop posting on Freelancer-- leave that for the bottom feeders. Instead, focus on gaining referrals from existing clients and target your networking efforts with prospective buyers.

Recommend reading How to Acquire Clients by Alan Weiss. Also, Strategy and The Fat Smoker by David Maister.

Are you referring to the HN Freelancer thread or something like Freelancer.com? I was talking about the former.

Answer: Either-- Consider the Buyers perception, I'll find someone "cheap" (exploitable) on Freelancer.

But, if I need someone "expert/dependable/fast" I'll ask my peer network. Considering your marketing strategy, areas to explore: Who are your best buyers? How do you reach them? How do they reach you?

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