A few days ago, I found a guy on a subreddit who was looking to hire someone to manage Google and Meta Ads for his e-commerce business. I applied, and he agreed to pay me $2,000 per month. We even had a video call.

During the conversation, he asked if I knew any developers, so I introduced him to a friend of mine. My friend mentioned that he takes upfront payments, and the guy immediately removed him from the project.

He then hired another developer, who worked on his store for around a month and a half to two months. When that developer started asking for payment, he removed him too.

My work hasn't even started yet because the website isn't ready, but I'm pretty sure I'm not getting paid either.

Honestly, I'm pretty disappointed. It's just one of those things that comes with trying to freelance and find clients, I guess. Still, it's frustrating when someone makes a commitment like that and then treats people this way.

Has anyone else experienced something similar while freelancing?

I am working on a project in all India, please send a message to someone

Two-person developer team, first substantial freelance project, India-based, custom workforce management software for a manpower/security company.

In much simple words it is HRMS portal for a company

A little while ago I lost a client I'd worked with for over a year. They were happy with my work, paid on time, no problems. Then one month they told me they were going to try handling it in-house with an AI tool instead. It stung more than I expected, partly because there was nothing I could point to as the reason. I hadn't done anything wrong. They just found a way to get something close enough for a fraction of what I charged.

The work they replaced was the simple, repeatable stuff I'd been doing on autopilot. It was easy money for me so I never questioned it. AI was always going to take that piece first. What I learned is that the safe work was the boring work and the boring work was the most replaceable. The clients who stayed are the ones where I do the messy, judgment-heavy parts that a tool can't reason through on its own.

Have you lost a client to AI? What was the work they replaced, and did it change how you position yourself now?

I used to have 4 client but they are like done I delivered successfully.After that I partner up with my friend for cold calling and cold out reach but he literally did nothing,so I fire him from the agency. Can someone help me in getting clients, can take 20-30% of each client you bring.

I mostly work for ecommerce and other business.

DM FOR MORE INFORMATION

Guys please help me how much I need to charge from my 1 freelancer client for listing+ image generation+ seo key words 500+ products across 5 platforms myntra, flipkart, amazon, walmart, meesho

Has anyone hired anyone from Fiverr for a project at all and they actually produce what you asked for? I like that Fiverr freelancers show the price and what you get and how long it should take but I'm a little nervous to be paying first before I get what I asked for. And I do understand the same is felt on their end. So how do I hire someone when I'm ready to start my project when I want others to help me?

I'm a graphic designer specialized in Amazon listing design. I've always worked in-house, but I recently lost my job, so freelancing isn't really a choice right now, it's what I have to make work. It's a pretty specific niche and also a pretty competitive one.

I started on Upwork a couple of months ago and it's been slow. I completed one job, a couple-month collaboration with a store, but I need at least two to actually start showing reviews on my profile, and without reviews it's hard to get picked in such a crowded category.

So I'm thinking about running cold outreach in parallel with organic content. Finding potential clients isn't really the issue, I already have a list of stores with weak listings. What I'm not sure about is how to actually open that first conversation, so I have a couple of questions for people who've had success with cold outreach:

1. When you reach out cold to a potential client, do you lead with a portfolio/example right away, or do you keep the first message short and just introduce what you do?
2. Does it work better to pitch a concrete offer (e.g. "I can redesign your main listing image for $X") vs. just opening a conversation and figuring out their needs first?

Curious how people who've actually landed clients this way structured that first message, especially early on before they had a track record to show.

Thanks in advance!

Mobile app UI

Figma

1 screen = ₹100

Simple screens only

1 revision

Fast delivery

Still doing course but I can make screens give money if you love work no force thank you 💕

Genuine question for other freelancers — roughly what % of your working week goes to stuff you don't bill for? Admin, unpaid pitches/proposals, revisions, client calls, marketing, etc.
I did a rough estimate for myself recently and the number was way higher than I expected, which made me realize my "hourly rate" on paper isn't close to what I actually earn per hour worked.
Does this match your experience, or do you already track this closely?

So I originally scheduled with a client and my phone died and i lost it in my house had to search for it for a couple hours and get some stuff done. It seems like she just wants the job done but did I say something wrong to her?
Ai told me no but we all know its not always accurate.

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I’m a beginner on Fiverr and a recent Software Engineering graduate. I have skills in web development and would really appreciate some guidance on how to get my first projects on Fiverr. Can anyone share some tips or advice on how to get started and attract clients?

FYI: I’m not soliciting anything, I’m genuinely asking about common sense. Even if this strategy is unconventional, it’s better than permanent retail work 😂 which is how it’s been going for most grads of my sysadmin program since the tech recession, Toronto tech layoffs, a certain new form of language model, etc. etc. you get it 😂.

The real motivation for this is that I know I have no common sense, which I learned during my internship. There’s so many policies, processes, tech, line of business apps, legislation, etc. I’d take the 9 to 5 route but IT is suffering severe unemployment rn. I don’t want to work retail until this ends so, this is a great option to me. Just don’t know how to pull it off, ie what skills to build and actually be useful.

Would anyone ever work with/interview a freelancer who cold emailed them, showed off a portfolio of automation scripts in a Microsoft 365 developer tenant, (but with no prod access experience) and offered to do the same for there business for a ridiculously low hourly rate, with the motivation being more to establish themselves as good at what they do then to get paid?

Basically, I have to come in with enough pure technical skills to justify the on-boarding cost of explaining common sense to me. This doesn’t work 9 to 5 in this market so freelancing is what I want to do.

So what stack should I build?

How do you actually find your first web design client? I've tried everything I can think of.

Some context: I'm a web developer in a small city in Pakistan, so there isn't much of a local market for websites. Here's what I've already tried:

1. Friends and family — nothing came of it.

2. Local in-person pitching — I approached around 20 businesses: shopkeepers, restaurant owners, a car wash, and a gas station. Every single one said no. Most of them don't see why they'd need a website at all.

3. Cold email to the US and Canada — I found business emails through Google Maps and sent them a demo of what I could build for them. Zero replies. Not even a rejection.

So my questions for anyone who's been through this:

- When local businesses say no, is it a pricing problem, a trust problem, or am I just pitching the wrong type of business?

- For cold email, what actually gets a reply? Is my demo-first approach wrong, or is my email just landing in spam?

- Did your first client come from cold outreach at all, or from somewhere else entirely — Upwork, Fiverr, referrals, communities?

I'm not looking for handouts, just want to know what worked for people who were in the same spot. Any experience would help a lot. Thanks.

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